Low/Medium pair pre flop

[Romain672]

Hi,
I'm writing the tips for the game, and I put my own idea to put 22 > AK pre flop.

If you disagree with that, how you rank initially with no context low pairs, medium pairs, and JJ?

Why are you doing it? Which kind of advantage do you have above just putting pairs at the highest position?

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And which hand is stronger pre flop: 82 or 76? Does the color of them matter?

Thanks

[Romain672]

Ignore that post and answer me if you prefer

And let's talk about KQ.
KQ is supposed to be in chip 4 out of 5.
But let's said one second that you push a lot to put it in chip 5, and you end up getting it and that A4 which was normally 5 is pushed back to 4.

Now when the flop come then the turn and the river, if there is exactly one A/K/Q/4 or at least one 4, that problem disappear, and someone is stronger than the other.
If there is none of those, then you would need to correct the 'lie' during the river.
If there is AK or AQ on the flop, then the ace should be way stronger, the person holding A4 could think both of them have an Ace, but the person with KQ should know 'for sure' they are below.
And so in theory that should work.

But now if you imagine that someone got KQ, and another player got KJ, then by putting KQ far above KJ (chip 5 instead of 4), if you end up with K on the flop, or AK, it's much clearer who has the better hand since KJ would start chip 4.

All of that can be resumated by KQ lie about their hand because there is an high chance that the lie got resolved naturally, and by doing so, it makes the chips 5's hand be more varied.

[Meereseule]

In the first round, I only go after what is my highest card. But not everyone does that. I find it easier to estimate the cards better later, if you know how high the card is approximately. That means also with a pair of J I go for example to 3 in the first round. When a jack comes, you can better assess it. Couple on hand has almost no one on the screen anyway.

I tried differently, but that only led to insults. For example, if I have a 9 pair, but someone has an ace. He won't give me the highest chip. If I click on 3 and then take 5, out it back fast and take again 3 - to signal that I have a couple, I have already been insulted. For me it is therefore best to just go after the highest card. This also makes it easier if, for example, someone has a pair of 2 and a pair of 8. You can see better what is higher.

That's why 82 would be higher than 76 for me in the first round.

[Romain672]

I wanted to add arguments, but nothing please me, I don't have experience with it, so I could be totally wrong. Pairs is only 6% pre-flop which is pretty low, and have the upside of often being able to rank naturally post flop (like 44 vs 66 on a flop 25K and another player having pair of 5 can make both of them fight for differents tokens).

Like I said in my previous post about KQ, you want to have various hands in the chips, and putting pairs accross all of them has a big upside there.


All of that make me think that my way of playing which looked natural to me is not optimal.

And about connectors though 82/76 I have an hard time agreeing. I'm okay with 'lieing' with KQ and QJ, but since that seem to have a hugh cost, 'lieing' with JT seem already extremely tricky. [what I mean by that is playing KQ/A9 the same pre flop, and QJ/K8 the same pre flop, but only those one, not any other one]
But maybe I'm just too afraid to lie. Lieing preflop, being a nice guy post flop, turn and river, and right at the end correcting the lie seem great. Being able to rank strong connector one chip higher has a lot of value.

[Meereseule]

I now changed my opinion and try to take 5 with a pair.

[PseudoPserious]

22 > AK because a pair is higher than high card. If the AK never improves, you want the initial ranking of 22 over AK to carry over in the red chips. If the AK improves, they communicate it and the 22 can correctly lower their relative ranking.

[MasN]

22 > AK and 82 > 76. Suits are no consideration.

[ionalien]

If the AK never improves, you want the initial ranking of 22 over AK to carry over in the red chips.

This explains simply what I have found is the better strategy through experience. I came across a user who explained his method for what I would consider "lying" about his hand strength. (the rules state that if you take the highest star chip you believe you *currently* have the strongest hand. Without context, a pocket pair is top 10% hand) If he had for example 44 he would take a low/medium chip preflop, and then take a single chip higher on the flop in order to indicate "minimal improvement". I think this is pretty clever, but can get into an awkward situation. Example:

I have 62 preflop, 1 star chip.

Pocket 44 takes 2 star chip.

Flop comes A96.

In this situation as 62 I will always wait a beat, then take the highest chip available, assuming no one else improved to a pair. If the player with 44 used the "lying" strategy and took a higher chip than before the flop, I with 62 will not allow them to be below me after the flop as I believe they minimally have an A,9, or 6, and an underpair would thus not be in the range I assign them. The worst hand they could have is the same hand as me since I have the weakest improvement with the weakest kicker. Of course in game I might give up eventually deciding they have the same hand, made a mistake in an earlier round, or are playing with a different strategy to me, which is also OK.

[Romain672]

While I'm still unsure about what is best about pairs, your example is a great argument imo for putting pairs low preflop.

You are saying that you will never let them be under you, and they will never let you be above them, so you run into a problem. After a while, there is only one option left: there is one or two pocket pair going on.
And here, once you assume that, the pair 44 should easily be under the bottom pair.

I was going to said that the real downside is in two cases but that's no even right:
- with 44 vs 55, even ranking pairs 'normally' would be extremely hard, so nothing is better
- with a flop A63, then that 44 on a fight against you will put themselves as 93. And so again it work again


And even if you compare 22 vs 63, 22 has only 55% chance to win, so assuming that's worst is imo fine because it fully lose against others pocket pairs.
In the french rules: "if you take the highest chip, you signal to others that you think you have the strongest combinaison".

[ionalien]

And even if you compare 22 vs 63, 22 has only 55% chance to win, so assuming that's worst is imo fine because it fully lose against others pocket pairs.
In the french rules: "if you take the highest chip, you signal to others that you think you have the strongest combinaison".

It’s totally okay if you take a different conclusion from my example. I will caution against using “equity” as a reason to change the ranking of hands though. Ignoring pocket pairs for a moment, A2o is only 50.19% against 76s preflop for example, but if you start taking chips with 7 high the same as you do with an A preflop, you will lose definitely cause confusion and losses. (With the general population. I am sure there are groups who agree to such a style, and they can win games, but I would be interested to put two groups head to head with the same shuffles, I have a strong feeling the “equity/potential” group would not do as well.)