Addendum to Ante Proportions

In my inaugural column in the April 12, 2002, issue, I attempted to provide an expansive treatment of the most common ante structures a stud player would likely encounter. I did the best that I could with the information I had available. It has come to my attention that a couple of new structures exist, and I may not have adequately covered some that already do.

If you're exclusively a $10-$20 through $75-$150 player, your structures were addressed in my initial document. Although many players would argue where the artificial lines exist that separate low, medium, high, and superhigh limits, my definitions are simple. To me, $10-$20 and lower is low limit, and $15-$30 through $80-$160 are medium limits. Basically, once the small bet reaches three digits, that's starting to get into high-limit games. Anything above $500-$1,000 constitutes superhigh, at least from my perspective. Frankly, I don't know what to call it when the rare game pops up that contains a big bet in the five figures, as this game reaches a monetary stratosphere that defies having a conventional definition.

That being said, I'm going to address a very low limit ($5-$10) and the first of the high limits ($100-$200).

Recently, the Mirage elected to change the structure of its $5-$10 game by doubling the bring-in from $1 to $2 while keeping the ante the same at 50 cents. If you're a low-limit player, take note: This seemingly small change has mammoth ramifications. This structure in $5-$10 games is already used elsewhere in places like Foxwoods and the Taj Mahal. As I mentioned in my original column, the $1 bring-in of the $5-$10 game constituted the lowest of any conventional structure that I knew of, at 20 percent. However, by raising it to $2, we now have a bring-in that is actually the highest of any conventional structure, at a whopping 40 percent. The only other structure that comes to mind that has a 40 percent bring-in is $500-$1,000 with a $200 forced bet. So, what does this mean to the player who is accustomed to the $1 bring-in? Well, to borrow a cliche, you're not in Kansas anymore.

Ante stealing is a vastly different proposition now. Let's examine the arithmetic, assuming an eighthanded game. In the old $1 structure, the "thief" was putting in $5 to steal a $5 pot. He was getting only 1-to-1 on his money. Compared with other structures, this was never an altogether profitable situation on the surface. The only saving grace in this scenario was the mathematical chasm the low-card player had to reconcile to augment his proportionally paltry $1 investment up to $5. He had to put in four times what he had in the pot to obtain immediate pot odds of only 2.5-to-1 ($10 pot vs. an additional $4 investment). This was a highly unprofitable situation when compared to other structures. This made for a tight game, wherein plenty of hands were folded on third street, assuming people were playing with some semblance of correct play in mind. With the new structure in place, the ante-steal proportion is increased only slightly from 1-to-1 to 1.2-to-1. This is still not a tremendous incentive to go out on that limb. The positive expectation from this play is further reduced by the radically different pot odds the bring-in player now garners with this structure. First of all, he already has the aforementioned 40 percent in there. He now has to chuck in only $3 to get a shot at a pot with $11 in it. This yields a 3.67-to-1 proposition. As I stated, this is radically different from the 2.5-to-1 odds he was getting before. In fact, by calling in this structure, he's getting 46.67 percent greater pot odds! Also, bear in mind that the call is psychologically easier to make, as the bring-in player is throwing in only 1.5 times his forced bet, as opposed to the proportionally huge four times his bet in the old structure.

So, what does this do to the game? If most of the players are behaving prudently, the number of unsubstantiated raises on third street should decrease while the number of bring-ins calling said raises should increase. In the long run, this should stimulate action insofar as fewer hands will be folded on third street and many more marginal hands will consequently develop because they might receive a free extra card or two. I'll try to summarize this limit by submitting that correct play in this game would be choosing your ante steals extremely carefully, and being more prepared to call from the bring-in position when faced with a raise. Of course, if you are the low card and have garbage, fold the hand if faced with a raise. I'd say that's good advice in any structure. As you read this, you may be asking yourself if the majority of your opponents will in fact play correctly. Some will and some won't. With this structure, I think knowing your opponent will prove to be even more valuable to you. Ratios and percentages: A (Ante) = 10 percent, B.I. (Bring-in) = 40 percent, A.S. (Ante Steal) = 1.2-to-1, C (Calling a raise with the low card, assuming your forced bet is already in the pot and there is one other player) = 3.67-to-1

A similar but alternate choice exists. Bellagio (and some other places) hosts a $4-$8 stud game with a 50-cent ante and $1 bring-in. This is proportionally identical to the $40-$80 structure with a $5 ante. Simply divide everything by 10. If you're interested in a fairly in-depth discussion of that limit, or simply wish to compare the structures, please refer to my original column (Card Player Vol. 15, No. 8, April 12, 2002) on this topic. I'll merely reiterate my summary of that limit in this column. Summary: Play the $5-ante game almost identically to the typical $10-$20 structure. Calling a third-street raise, from the position of already having the $10 call of the forced bet in, gives you identically proportional odds, and attempting an ante steal yields only 13.6 percent greater proportional profit. Ratios and percentages: A = 12.5 percent, B.I. = 25 percent, A.S. = 1.25-to-1, C= 3-to-1

Let's move on to a completely different animal, the geographically specific $100-$200 game at Commerce Casino. This game is played with $20 chips and evolved from the $80-$160 limit. Although I have not been to L.A. in quite a while, I was recently informed of this game's existence. Just how different is it from $80-$160? Taking a look at the math, we see that the fundamental bets have increased by 25 percent while the ante and bring-in have remained the same at $20 each. An ante-steal scenario would play out quite differently now. The "thief" in $80-$160 was pitting an $80 risk against a $180 reward, a 2.25-to-1 ratio, while the bring-in player (if electing to call) would place $60 in a pot that contained $260 to get 4.33-to-1 on his money. That's a huge reason to steal and a huge reason to call. Contrast that with the new structure described forthwith. The raiser now would have to risk $100 to steal the same $180 pot. He's getting only 1.8-to-1 on his money. This is a world of difference, as the "old game" thieves received a full 25 percent greater incentive to steal. Conversely, the low card would now have to place an additional $80 in the $280 pot to stop the steal, and would receive 3.5-to-1 on his money. Like the old $5-$10 game, the bring-in player must now put four times his bet in to receive only those 3.5-to-1 pot odds. Commerce Casino's $80-$160 stud game has a well-earned reputation for being a wild and dangerous game with monstrous fluctuations. I would venture that the 25 percent increase in game size, which yields a 20 percent decrease in ante and bring-in proportions, allows a player to be substantially more patient in his hand selection. In fact, you have to be somewhat more patient in your hand selection. You're getting a shot at a much bigger pot for the identical ante, so it is correct to wait a little. Of course, you can't be a nit and wait exclusively for premium hands. While a 20 percent ante doesn't put the proverbial fire under you the way a 25 percent ante does, it will rip into your bankroll if you play too tightly. All of this mathematical hyperbole leads me to think that while this is a game whose size is larger, its proportional fluctuations are actually smaller. In fact, due to these structure alterations, I'd speculatively venture that the actual fluctuations might even be smaller as well. Don't kid yourself, though, this is still the hair-trigger, raise-on-anything, dangerous crew that has made the $80-$160 Wild West limit the game that it is. Also bear in mind the sheer number of chips that a 5-chip/10-chip game is likely to have in a pot by seventh street. This will produce a virtually unprecedented psychological "action/need-to-stay-in" sort of game. I don't really know of another 5-chip/10-chip structure. The $50-$100 structure does not qualify as it is a 2-chip/4-chip game played with quarters ($25 chips). The traditional $100-$200 structure is a 4-chip/8-chip game played with quarters, and while $500-$1,000 is played with some $100 chips, it is thought to be a 1-chip/2-chip game because the majority of the chips on the table are the big nickels ($500). While $100 chips will probably be on Commerce Casino's $100-$200 table, I suspect that there will be massive amounts of $20 chips making mountains in the center of the table and sets of skyscrapers in front of the players. This should make for an interesting poker "experiment." I'm sure the game will still have common daily $10,000 swings, but I think the long run may prove this to be a more "beatable" game than it was. Ratios and percentages: A = 20 percent, B.I. = 20 percent, A.S. = 1.8-to-1, C = 3.5-to-1

Editor's note: Grant Strauss is a Las Vegas-based medium- and high-limit professional seven-card stud player who has played in cardrooms throughout the country, and has earned the reputation of being a successful player.