Poker Hands Chart Question

When a poker chart lists the percentage of each starting hands winning probabilities versus the number of opponents, does number of opponents mean players that go on to see the flop or does it mean players sitting at the table regardless of how many players see the flop?

The percentage is generally for if you were all to go all-in against 'x' number of players.
The percentages are ascertained by trying 2 card combinations against 1, 2, 3 or more random hands over say 1000 test deals.
So say AA is 50% against 3 other hands, you have a 50% chance of the hand holding up 4 handed ON THE RIVER.
What these charts fail to take into consideration is that the best hand doesn't always make it to the river. You can be bluffed off any hand at any street given the right circumstances. I used to have one that I got with a magazine and it got binned!
That said, these charts are a good indication of what kind of hands to play pre-flop, especially for new players.

the other thing to consider about these charts is that its a certain hand vs a random hand. if you put in a raise you often will be up against a better than random hand.

Good point. AK, for example, is significantly weaker against ANY pocket pair rather than any random 2 cards.

Exactly that makes a lot of difference. So its the percentage that a certain hand will win on the river versus the number of opponents in play with RANDOM hands. Would it be mathematically correct to divide the winning percentage by 2 if you assume that half of the random hands are not playable?

Even better is there a chart out there that lists the percentage of a hand holding up versus the standard playable preflop hands? I am not sure what the standard is myself but for 8 opponents I would say about 10s and above, A10 and better etc and for 3 opponents 6s and above, A6 and better etc.

In the "Full Tilt Poker Tournament Guide" Andy Bloch has a section on starting hands. He also has 3 different sections on how different hands hold up (win %) vs certain ranges. ie: T9s vs top 10%, 25%, 50% hands. It's quite useful if you feel you can put your opponent on a range.

Take a look at Pokerstove, if you haven't already done that, it's free - www.pokerstove.com - also look at the several threads in this forum related to using a HUD if you haven't done that (start in Golden Archives - and seriously consider using a HUD if you're not already using one, especially if you play ring games).

If you think about the ranges of hands that an opponent is likely playing, based on his style, his position, his history, was he first in the pot/limped behind, etc., pokerstove will help you evaluate the strength of specific hands against those ranges of hands. This can be much more useful than how a hand fares in a multi-way pot (though the charts referring to how starting hands play multi-way are certainly useful).

Even if you don't use a HUD, the discussions related to using a HUD (and the several discussions of ranges) explain these ideas and how to use them.

Great suggestion .....

Thanks for the info .........

Thanks for the referral to pokerstove