All in or Fold

I was so tilted last night by all the weak calls that sucked me out that I entered a 20 cent SnG at UB and decided to play "all in or fold" for any hand that I played. The only exception was that if I was SB or BB I could call and or check. Otherwise all actions pre flop had to be all in or fold. After the flop was either check or all in. No calling.

Actually came in 2nd place and did this even at HU play, which was silly but I wanted to do the full experiment.

I am sure this has been done before and I am sure this would never work at levels higher than 20 cents however I have seen some beginer strategies that suggest very similar ideas. The first Chapter of Daniel N's Low Ball book comes to mind.

Is there any way to build on this strategy to make it a winner most of the time and to expand on it in MTTs?

Thoughts appeeciated.

Seems like you got really lucky...and most likely, unless you get really lucky again, you will have a hard time duplicating your results at the 20 cent level, let alone at higher stakes,

Kasanova in some of the cases I got a little lucky but most of the time i had the best of it when i got all in. I guess the luck part may have come from people folding small pairs when I had A10 suited. I was playing premium hands almost every time depending on position.

When playing with people who have no regard or respect for a raise form UTG and will call with J10o from MP when UTG has raised 4x from UTG I think this strategy is actually pretty good.

What part of what i wrote led you to believe this was just all luck?

I think you answered your own questions to a point.

Pushing all in pre-flop with A-10 suited and not getting called by better is REALLY lucky...keep doing that and you would be sure to bust. A-10s is a very, very easily dominated hand - not only by a pp but by: AA, KK, QQ, JJ, TT, AKs, AKo, AQs,AQo,AJs,AJo - so that's ELEVEN hands that would have you completely dominated and there's another dozen or so that you would be an underdog to, or at best a coin flip.

Basically, if you went all in 10 times with similar hands, there better than a 90% chance that you would bust one of the 10 times, so yeah, seems like you got lucky.

The 2nd part is that when you get into a little higher stakes, say $5+ entry fees, you will find much tighter play, so people do have respect for normal raises from UTG, so there would be absolutely NO reason to push in those situations b/c I can just about assure you that you will only get called by better at the higher stakes.

You got lucky because you never shoved your range into a premium holding or you were lucky enough to be seated with players who couldn't figure out how to exploit what you were doing.

I like the replies guys. I am not saying I want to move my entire game to this play. Heck people appear to be doing that successfully with rush though.

For the one response I will say that if I have A10s and I pre flop raise 4x BB and get 3 callers. Flop comes J72 rainbow. I do a continuation bet after being check to by the two callers. They call again. Turn comes 3 and again two checks to me. I am just playing with fire if I bet again since it is likely someone has a J. Let's say I bet and get reraised and I fold the other person stays in and the winning starting hand comes to be J2o. How is it better that I lost those chips on Flop and rivr to J2o as supposed to getting it all in and either forcing him to make a bad call or most likely fold?

Ummm...

The "goal" is to increase the size of pots we are likely to win and limit the pots we are likely to lose.

Open shoving does the opposite.

If someone has AA-KK behind, we're maximizing a pot that we are likely to lose.

If they have a hand worse than ours but good enough to call a standard raise then our shove limits the size of a pot we are likely to win to the minimum. Just the blinds...

If he's bad enough to call a shove with a2c, we'll make money when he doesn't have a hand and lose money when he does. Problem is, we won't know until he turns his hand over. We're essentially betting our whole stack that nobody has a hand better than ours. Might as well flip coins.

Personally, if I was at a crazy loose table - and there are plenty of them like that, I would:

A. Probably not 4 bet A-Ts pre-flop anyway, b/c I know I'm getting callers all over the place, AND I'm surely won't be the favorite against 4 callers - it would be impossible. Depending on position, on a crazy loose table, best to limp in with them UTG, see if you catch, if not E-Z fold b/c you have nothing invested in the pot.

B. Once I missed the flop it is almost useless to c bet against those type of players b/c YOU KNOW YOU WILL GET CALLED, so what's the point?, other than the fact that you have zero fold equity against players like that and you will end up losing a large portion of your stack and going on tilt. Just let it go and move on to the next hand.

C. I know from experience that you can't bluff maniacs off hands and draws, the only way to beat them is straight ABC poker and trapping. Let them dig their own graves. This is the one area of poker where being passive pays off - IN A BIG WAY.

BEST ADVICE SO FAR follows:

"The "goal" is to increase the size of pots we are likely to win and limit the pots we are likely to lose."

I liked that Double-A and that pretty much is the answer! Good post and good comments.

TC, Wally

^^^ exactly openshoving is ok for very bad players but if u can play poker this is the least optimal way to play.

Thanks for all of the replies. Like I said I wsnt looking to change to this as a fulltime strategy but in fact the replies I am getting are showing me why I should not always do this.

I will save it for when I am tilting

Thanks again for the replies. More welcome anytime.

There are a number of studies and strategies out there that explore 'all-in or fold'. I participated in one that tested SnG's and large field MTT's. Only reason I did was because it was funded by the study developer ...

It covered a broad spectrum of do's and don'ts ... specific situations in order to go all-in. It was heavily stack, hand and position oriented and produced very mixed results. In some of the MTT games I made it ITM, but not very deep. Over 100 games I managed to come out slightly ahead... by a matter of pennies. Hardly worth the effort.

In a later SnG test set, I had a run of 10 consecutive losses. Not even a sniff of getting close to ITM. Just glad it was his cash ...

During one MTT test that produced (iirc) about 50k+ hands between all of us that participated, only 1 player made a significant cash.

IMO, it's only a good strategy if you do it for fun ... without ANY expectation of profit and are willing to lose the farm. Tell the wife to leave the boxes packed ... you'll be moving regularly.

Not the worst strategy in the world but obviously far from the best as any edge we have in postflop ability is lost.

However, I employ this strategy on occasion for two specific reasons:

1) If my game has got a bit stale and samey a game of 'all or nothing' can change my habits and help to get me out of a rut.

2) As a training exercise it sharpens my game by making more decisions life threatening and improving discipline. For example, you really have to think hard about whether to play that KJs into a raised pot.

This 'training' becomes most valuable for late stages of tourneys and short stack play where you tend to be committed to a pot if you enter it.

Not sure why you'd even want to consider to expand on this style of play for playing MTTs??

WHy not just 'employ' this strategy when the time calls for it? (i mean.. are you insinuating to 'train' yourself in other situations where shove/fold game isn't the best way to play your hand?). To elaborate further... sure when we're on a stack size of 14-22 bb's in late levels we're looking to shove over a LP aggressive raiser as a resteal & we're often looking to open shove w <14bb's (< sometimes more, depending upon scenario).

I don't see how 'training' ourselves by playing a strategy that isn't the optimal way to play at the time, in order to be 'trained' to play it when it is called for has any purpose? Wouldn't we just do this while reviewing our games, playing our games, watching other games, etc. etc.

I wasn;t sure either that is why I wanted to hear what others had to say.

There are 2 sides to a successful poker strategy.

1. Make the most money with your good hands

2. Lose the least possible with your bad hands.

All-in or fold certainly increases 1) however it does not keep 2) at a minimum.

Therefore the strategy is an unbalanced one and would not work.

Pretty much playing bingo if you ask me.

I both hate it and like it. Allin or fold is pretty much what you have to do at the start of the superturbo 300-chip silly things. If you don't like to go allin, you have no chance; if you don't have a sense of what spots to choose in a superturbo format, you won't go far. (I don't play them much, and only at really cheap levels, but do enoy them especially for satellites.)

Playing a cheap tourney allin or fold is freeing. Personally, I loathe going allin in tourneys and have to force myself to do it when I need to. Playing allin-or-fold on occasion gets me more comfortable with this, plus it clarifies why I do not want to do it much. Roll the dice! Trust to luck! I prefer to stay alive in tourney, but sometimes you just have to go for it. Practicing shoving is useful. Develops a thicker skin. And, hopefully, it develops a clarity that is not results-oriented. What will be, will be.

As a regular strategy, it would be dumb. Even in the super turbos, once one has a stack, one must slow down seriously.

It is fun, though. Woooohooo!

The way I started to see it (and the way I took out three players) was that they saw me as a manaic. Which I guess is the case but only with very good hands. With this in mind people start calling with any two. This is great because most of the time I went in ahead. But even at that you can get unlucky and have a 72 hit a 772 flop when you least expect it. To me that isn;t Bingo poker. It would be Bingo poker if I was going all in every hand no matter what I had and not regarding postion at all.

I won't be using this technique in the future. I just wanted to experiment with it. If others are tilting go over to UB and enter a 20 cent or 50 cent tourney and give it a try. Let us know your results.

Yes, fair point, P.O. I think doops sums up what I meant pretty well - I find the odd allin or fold game gives me the confidence to play correctly when a game I care about gets to that stage. A big bit of what I have called training is about sharpening up my reading ability and concentration as the decisions are more often make or break. It is a bit like spending an evening playing a load of heads up to get the practice in for when the real thing comes along. Likewise I find those otherwise nasty 'double-or-nothing' games help me with aspects of a MTT or STT that are a bit like them at times.

I don't know if you are a cricket lover, Poker Orifice, but it is like having a session in the nets where you practice your forward defensive for 50 balls. If you are not this will make no sense whatsoever

unless you were being delt monsters you were getting alot of luck, although getting dealt monsters is luck also... i might give this a try haha

Is this really that bad?

Yes, it's going to look strange early on but once you're up to 200/400 And whenever you're near the bubble shove or fold is a fairly standard, unexploitable strategy.

I ask this of myself every time I look in the mirror...

kmixer, I originally read this thread when it was initially posted; I had no comments @ that time since this was a strategy I wasn't familiar with or had even thought about trying.

Recently I read that David Sklansky had developed an all-in or fold strategy for peeps to play in the WSOP w/o any poker knowledge? Not really sure if this would transition well to an online environment though.

The primary factor = 'good' players are not too likely to risk his/her entire tournament life w/o a big edge.

Skanlsky All-in or Fold System Basic Overview
Key # >>> (Stack/[Total Blinds + Antes]) x (# of players still to act) x (# of limpers + 1)

ie: 4th position, 4000 chips, blinds = 100/200, 1 limper, 6 left to act
1. 4000/300 = ~13
2. 13 x 6 (left to act) = 78
3. 78 x 2 (1 limper + 1) = 156

Key #
Fold everything unless otherwise indicated:

• 400+ >>> A.A
• 200-400 >>> above or K.K
• 150-200 >>> above or Q.Q or A.K
• 100-150 >>> above or J.J or 10.10 or A.Q or K.Q
• 80-100 >>> 2.2-A.A or A.K or A.Q or K.Q or A.Xs or suited connectors 5.4+
• 60-80 >>> 2.2-A.A or A.X or K.Q or K.Xs or 1-gap & no-gap suited connectors
• 40-60 >>> above or K.X
• 20-40 >>> above or 2 suited cards
• < 20 >>> ATC

So in the above example, I guess the peep would shove with A.A or K.K or Q.Q or A.K.

I haven't read Skanskly's book Tournament Poker for Advanced Players yet so I don't know if I might have missed some steps and/or other pertinent info but it was developed MTT (which was your ??? in the OP). Something to consider...

I think allin or fold can work well in some situation, like when you are moved to a new table. If i run into someone playing like this I wait for an ultra prieuim hand to take there chips. like having AA, KK, QQ or Ak so i will call in a spot like this and eventually we can eat away that persons stack and knock them out. but if you get lucky you will amasse alot of chips, then I would suggest to play like normal.

At some stage of a sng it always comes to a shove or fold game, just hold off untill the blinds are worth winning, its pointless shoveing to win say 45 chips save your chips unless you get a good hand.