ICM, what hands do we call with?

PokerFunKid · Jan 24, 2018

Hey everyone, it keeps me busy: How wide do we call in certain spots. It is very interesting to see in what kind of situations you get in double or nothing SNG's, and trying to learn the correct shove range, call range in many different situations.

Here is another one from today:

Blinds
200/100/20
Stacks
Player 1 (reg) 2000.
Player 2 (rec) 2000.
Player 3 (reg) 1200.
Me 2000.
Situation
4 players left, 3 pay the same (double or nothing SNG).
I am sitting in the small blind, and the short stack is in the big blind posting 200, with 1000 behind. It folds to the small blind who goes all in. What hands do we call with in the small blind? We have to call tight, very tight, but how tight? With the game being this short do we go wider then AA? Perhaps KK? What do we do with QQ? What about AKs?
Bonus question
How wide should we jam as player 2, on the btn in this situation?

1dkp0k3r · Jan 25, 2018

PokerFunKid said:
Hey everyone, it keeps me busy: How wide do we call in certain spots. It is very interesting to see in what kind of situations you get in double or nothing SNG's, and trying to learn the correct shove range, call range in many different situations.

Here is another one from today:

Blinds
200/100/20
Stacks
Player 1 (reg) 2000.
Player 2 (rec) 2000.
Player 3 (reg) 1200.
Me 2000.
Situation
4 players left, 3 pay the same (double or nothing SNG).
I am sitting in the small blind, and the short stack is in the big blind posting 200, with 1000 behind. It folds to the small blind who goes all in. What hands do we call with in the small blind? We have to call tight, very tight, but how tight? With the game being this short do we go wider then AA? Perhaps KK? What do we do with QQ? What about AKs?
Bonus question
How wide should we jam as player 2, on the btn in this situation?

If you are in the SB and act before the short stack, you should be shoving pretty wide, 77+, 67 suited +, 89 off +.

If short stack is acting before you, or another stack shoves before you, calling ranges are extremely tight. QQ+ for other stacks and probably something like JJ+ and AK suited versus short stack

PokerFunKid · Jan 25, 2018

1dkp0k3r said:
If you are in the SB and act before the short stack, you should be shoving pretty wide, 77+, 67 suited +, 89 off +.

If short stack is acting before you, or another stack shoves before you, calling ranges are extremely tight. QQ+ for other stacks and probably something like JJ+ and AK suited versus short stack

Yeah i tought it would be around here, just very surprised how bad of a call AKs is in this spot. I've been doing some ICM questions in the ICMizer App and Calling off with AKs, even in a much better situation where we are in here, say we have 2,6k and vs 1,8k, 1,8k and 900, its a very unprofitable spot to call off with AKs vs a 1,8k jam. I tought i had to in this spot, but i'm very wrong.
I've ran this current situation in the nash eq. calculator and it says we should only call AA in this spot. Though, it gave btn a prety tight range. I will add some weaker hands tommorow and see if it makes our calling range wider.

DaveE · Jan 25, 2018

The calling range is very tight when stack ratios are less than 2:1.

I haven't looked at ICM in a long time but pretty sure once you get to a 3.5 : 1 ratio and higher your calling range is much wider.

PokerFunKid · Jan 25, 2018

kcanuck said:
The calling range is very tight when stack ratios are less than 2:1.

I haven't looked at ICM in a long time but pretty sure once you get to a 3.5 : 1 ratio and higher your calling range is much wider.

Ah i see, that makes sense yeah. Especialy when you're able to bust out someone and finish the SNG, i gues the range gets a bit wider too.

DaveE · Jan 25, 2018

PokerFunKid said:
Ah i see, that makes sense yeah. Especialy when you're able to bust out someone and finish the SNG, i gues the range gets a bit wider too.

^^^That, plus they are shoving wider as the stack to BBs ratio decreases.

PokerFunKid · Jan 25, 2018

kcanuck said:
^^^That, plus they are shoving wider as the stack to BBs ratio decreases.

But even once they shove wider, i don't think our $-ev with hands like QQ, JJ, TT, AK etc will improve a lot when we are at risk, or risk to get in a very bad situation? There for i don't think our calling range will change a lot in those spots either. I could be wrong though, i'm just getting into some very tricky spots. Considering buying ICMizer for a month to study ICM spots.

DaveE · Jan 25, 2018

PokerFunKid said:
But even once they shove wider, i don't think our $-ev with hands like QQ, JJ, TT, AK etc will improve a lot when we are at risk, or risk to get in a very bad situation? There for i don't think our calling range will change a lot in those spots either. I could be wrong though, i'm just getting into some very tricky spots. Considering buying ICMizer for a month to study ICM spots.

That's a great idea Mat, I should do the same.

My instincts say the ICM calling range only increases slightly when villain is getting short, it's another "it depends" situation. Stack ratios, villain's aggresiveness etc....Having a big chipstack advantage makes life much easier

Andrew Popov · Jan 25, 2018

PokerFunKid said:
Bonus question
How wide should we jam as player 2, on the btn in this situation?

I would like to see some statistics on these players to determine if not the exact range, then at least the style of playing these villains. In the rest - we must play +77, + A7o, + K10s, KQo. I think that this is a fairly narrow range, but we should try not to play these cards, and steal the blinds from a suitable position. And respect other people's raises!

PokerFunKid · Jan 25, 2018

Andrew Popov said:
I would like to see some statistics on these players to determine if not the exact range, then at least the style of playing these villains. In the rest - we must play +77, + A7o, + K10s, KQo. I think that this is a fairly narrow range, but we should try not to play these cards, and steal the blinds from a suitable position. And respect other people's raises!

I think this would even be a to wide calling range in a normal SNG, i'm not sure if you noticed this is a double or nothing SNG, but this calling range you stated is WAY to wide for a double or nothing SNG even vs a 100% shoving range. I think we would even have to fold many of the hands in the range you gave if villian showed he have 27o and then shoves. Ill have to remind myself to run those stats for this 72o situation out of curiousity once i have an ICMizer membership.

Andrew Popov · Jan 26, 2018

I agree that there is a fairly wide range, but it is only in view of the high blinds (100/200/a20) for a short (4 participants) table. You can not just sit and wait for AA / KK. After 10-12 hands, your stack will just end. The probability of getting AA is about 1/210 hands, you have to expand your range. But we do not forget that we should play from the position against not active villains. This means no calls from the KJ against pre-flop all-in.

Alex330 · Jan 26, 2018

tournament poker

If you have a big stack on the hands, play only strong hands. only attack with combinations of monsters.

If the hands are of medium or small stack, then the range of hands increases. Here you have to play as you can actively

ucdengboss · Jan 26, 2018

I probably only call with AA and KK but not surprised that the calculator tells you only AA. You must call really tight here.

If I were on the button I am shoving quite a few hands, any PP, any Ace, K7s+, K9o, Q8s+, Q9o+, 67s+,89+. This is assuming the SB and BB are calling pretty tight as well. If you believe they will call with AT, KJ, 66+ types of hands then this shoving range will be different than someone who is only calling QQ+.

PokerFunKid · Jan 26, 2018

Andrew Popov said:
I agree that there is a fairly wide range, but it is only in view of the high blinds (100/200/a20) for a short (4 participants) table. You can not just sit and wait for AA / KK. After 10-12 hands, your stack will just end. The probability of getting AA is about 1/210 hands, you have to expand your range. But we do not forget that we should play from the position against not active villains. This means no calls from the KJ against pre-flop all-in.

I see what you mean, but calling off with some hands here is a lot worse then open shoving 27o the next hand after in a extreme example. Calling off with say, KJo here will show a much worse losing play then openshoving a weaker hand afterwards because of their tight calling range. Surviving is the key, we have to try and survive and hope others bust eachother out, or us doing so with a stronger hand or a correct shove and not by calling light. Our chip-ev needs to be a lot higher in those situations and we can shove lighter because of their tight calling range.

Andrew Popov · Jan 26, 2018

Survival is very important in these tournaments, you are absolutely right! But it is the idea of "survival" that creates a very high fold equity for your attacks from the right position.

PokerFunKid · Jan 26, 2018

Andrew Popov said:
Survival is very important in these tournaments, you are absolutely right! But it is the idea of "survival" that creates a very high fold equity for your attacks from the right position.

Exactly, but this is why we jam lighter and call very tight. The range you gave was meant for a calling range as i understood. Or did you mean jam?

PokerFunKid · Jan 26, 2018

I've ran the situation versus a 100% hand range from the btn, which i think is to wide for an average player, even the best playing those games wouldn't jam 100% here with the soft fields i think.Results show that we should only call with AA or KK versus a 100% jamming range.

Now lets run this situation where btn face up shoves 27o. How wide do we call then? Still very tight as you can see. But ofcourse, the hands make sense.

Andrew Popov · Jan 27, 2018

PokerFunKid said:
Exactly, but this is why we jam lighter and call very tight. The range you gave was meant for a calling range as i understood. Or did you mean jam?

No! No calls! We respect other people's raises. And we call only with the best hands QQ+ and AKs. The range I specified above is the range for opening, and when the stack is <6 BB - for all-in. Stack >6BB: raise and continue bet regardless of the cards on the flop (of course, if the villain has something to discard and his stack is more or equal to ours). Our fold equity is large enough. Of course there is a risk - it is always there. But just a passive game in the high blinds will not let us survive.

PokerFunKid · Jan 27, 2018

Andrew Popov said:
No! No calls! We respect other people's raises. And we call only with the best hands QQ+ and AKs. The range I specified above is the range for opening, and when the stack is <6 BB - for all-in. Stack >6BB: raise and continue bet regardless of the cards on the flop (of course, if the villain has something to discard and his stack is more or equal to ours). Our fold equity is large enough. Of course there is a risk - it is always there. But just a passive game in the high blinds will not let us survive.

Ah yes that makes sense then! Still so hard to create a range and judge by how not perfect our opponents are playing. Very tough to decide what hands we should jam. Origally i tought around what you said too, adding all aces having the ace blocker and taking their super tight range in consideration which includes some aces. And when we do get called we have some equity versus high pairs. Apparently in a perfect game we shove any 2 here, but because of their much wider calling range, i am not sure about this one. I would agree with your + a bit wider.

Andrew Popov · Jan 27, 2018

In addition, we also need to consider whether there is a short player at the table (very short stack), and whether we are the shortest player ourselves. It's really closer to the ICM model, but when the blinds are already high and the stacks of all players are no more than 10BB - we should be ready for push / fold without thin draws.

Masi2197 · Jan 28, 2018

depending on the position, the amount of chips, hands like ak aq, aj same stick, hands as AA kk no matter the position, increase strong or equal a previous all in, are hands with which you can call

ICM, what hands do we call with?

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