I see what you are saying but this is poker, colorful words are almost part of the game.
My 7 yr old daughter would like to see scary movies but we don't let her...

PAs
 

Why Call? no reason to call. You can wait out anything except an all in. It does not show that you are weak. It shows that your odds have increased due to the fact that 3 people will be out of the tournament. The point of day one is to survive and pick up enough pots from weaker players. Why risk your entire tournament on one good hand with good odds? There will be plenty of hands in your favor that you do not need to risk it all. But as mike would say "**** it Im all in"

Wuss...
 

You DO realize that by getting your money in with the best hand with that many callers it is in your favor to at least triple up. You are at worst, a coin flip. If you lose, it is unlucky. That happens in poker. If you win, you could go take a nap for 3 hours and proabally come back in the money and having a descent chance to win still. If you are not willing to call with pocket As before the flop, you shouldn't be playing poker at all. PERIOD!

How could u fold aces its the best starting hand . if its the world series and u pay 10,000 to enter this u should ber ready to gamble. every bodys in with overs or pairs your way ahead before the flop no ones calling with suited connectors.If your scared get a dog playing tight in tournaments gets u nowhere.blinds will eat u up.this strategy isnt playing tight its playing scared and scared money doesnt make money.man up and triple up and then u can play tight.

if you not gonna call with aces, then you have no stones and dont even play.

...
 

*the most important thing you do in hold em is fold. knowing when to fold is priceless...why would you call 2 all ins on the first hand? i kno of guys that play at local tournaments that they do that every tourny on their first hand regardless of what their holding...why? because they know that no one wants to be in that position the first hand of a tourny. ive laid down plenty of huge pocket cards when two or more people have gone all in and its never been the wrong decision :)

Did you not read the question? We are talking about pocketAs. I might fold them after the flop on a rare occasion or 2, but never before. If you ever fold pocketAs before the flop, you are obviously inexperienced. IF you go in with the best hand (As), you should WANT more people to call. You will be a coin flip at the worst and if you win, you can likely coast into a paying position without even playing a hand.

Bottom Line: Folding IS important, but folding the best hand is idiotic.

only time to fold is late in a tournament when you are shortstacked and people are in too move up in prizes

Folding AA is not necessarily idiotic
 

This is not entirely true. When there are (too) many callers your pocket aces become weaker. You will have the best starting hand but the more people see the flop the more likely it is that one out of the pack gets ahead of you.

It's hard to fold them, but if there are three or four people calling, the odds to win the hand with AA can be a lot worse than a coin flip...

There are implied odds. Yes AA is the best STARTING HAND. Not the best hand. If you have pocket pairs you want to put in a large size bet before the flop to limit your competition, hopefully everyone will fold and you will win the blinds right there. If not, you are in a great position to make alot of money or lose alot of money. You do not want to lose money in a tournament and become short stacked early. People who slow play or overplay top 5 starting hands early get busted early. If there are 2 and you callers all in, you are most likely at 50% to win. 3 and you, you are at best are 40% to win. Now I ask you would you bet $10,000 when you are an underdog? Dont look at the hand strength look at the implied odds of the overall gamble. Even at 50%, that early in tournament, I would fold. There are too many times in a tournament, after the flop, that you will be able to make up that lay down. Never over value a pre flop hand. Its takes skill to properly play after the flop. Anyone can call all in pre flop and win the most money possible, Even with 7-2 os. Lay and wait, undervalue your starting hands before flop(bet them, but dont overplay them), and when you hit a hand play it properly after the flop. Thats how winners win. How many times have you seen the top 5 chip leaders after day one finish in the money? Doesnt happen very often.

You're not the underdog in the hand if it's the first hand of the tournament. If everyone has equal stacks, AA has pot odds on any number of all-ins. Since it's an all-in situation for everyone, just compare how much money you're getting back for what you're putting in and compare with the odds of you winning. For you and 2 callers if you're 50% to win and getting 3-1 pot odds, easy choice. Even for 40% with you and 3 callers getting 4-1 it works out. Whether you're willing to risk the tournament right there is up to how you want to play the tournament, but since everyone in the hand is going to need to rely on their pre-flop odds, your best bet is to call.

don't forget there are 5 more cards coming
 

unless something has changed and a pair now beats a set, a straight, or a flush, this is the one time you can sleep good at nite knowing u did the right thing by folding. remember, if you call this is a 5-way hand to the end. in a 5-way pot, a pair, even a pair of aces, is vulnerable. think about this...you could even lose to another pair of aces if one of those four players is sitting on AK and another ace hits the board. there are entirely too many ways to lose this hand for it to be worth it.

i see a lot of posts that talk about guts and luck, but the key to playing good poker is to make decisions that take emotion and luck out of the equation. a well executed bluff doesn't take balls, it takes the intelligence to analyze the situation and determine if the bluff is playable. poker also requires patience, impatient play will get you a seat at the bar more times than it will a seat at the final table. think twice, act once, fold the aces and watch 3 people go home.

Here is a new twist. Now say you are in a satellite where the Top 10 make it to the WSOP. There are 11 left. You are very high in chip count and someone with a bigger stack goes all-in. You know you are a big favorite in the hand but if you get knocked out then you don't make it. Giving up Aces here would still be a blow to the ego . . . but please tell me no one would call this.

This i my earlier post


The above talks about pot odds. You cannot value pot odds as much because you cannot pull money out of your pocket, and keep playing when you lose the hand. You can never make up the odds if you are not playing anymore. If this was a ring game, its a no brainer. Even with 10 callers i would call because even if i lose, in the long run i will make money with that play. There is a huge stratagy difference on hold-em and tournament hold-em. That why alot of pros still do not play tournament holdem.

3rd post these are all my posts
 

I think my post reads strange so im adding this to clarify. I would fold the aces in the tournament but with 10 callers in a ring game would call every time.

this is a more interesting situation than the original question, becuase now you're inferring a potential one-on-one hand, in which case the aces give you much more leverage. it would be safe to assume that big stack has a high pair, or is suited, possibly with connectors (with at least one over card). the other twist is the fact that he's all in, which typically means he DOESN'T want a call, especially one seat away from the WSOP. i'm not sure...but there are some days i'd call this just because i'm feeling lucky or have a read on big stack...

folding aa preflop
 

If it such a bad play here is the case where it worked out increbibly well. Im in 2nd place in the tourney with 8 people left. I have 95k in chips the chip leader has 115k and moves all in preflop I look down and see AA then look around the table and realize there are 3 people with less than 10k and noone else has more than 30k, and the only person that can knock me out just moved in on me so I folded AA. He makes a flush and I live on(he also knocked out 2 people). Iget down to the final 4 and we make a deal for $1400 each. If I call there and get knocked out I lose $1200 because Icouldn't let go of AA. The point is yeah you have aa but if the situation calls for it where you could make alot more $ by folding you have to do it. Please tell me how this was a bad play. If I would have won the hand(after folding) I still would have been happy with the play because for that situation it was the correct play.

yes that was a terrible play
 

if your going to play your hands scared youll lose more often than not. folding aces in that situation is a terrible fold even though he may have caught the flush. ive lost with aces all in preflop many times. you cant be scared and fault yourself for going in with the best hand. if you would have won that hand you would have had a substantial chip lead and more than likely won the tournament. more often than not you will win with aces all in preflop. if your aiming to just place in the tourney rather than win it all, be my guest. you should come play cards with me and my friends. ill shake your hand for folding aces. as far as the idiot who says they folded aces cause 2 guys were all in first hand, thats just retarted. no matter how many people are all in you are the favorite versus everyone else. you have to calculate your pot odds and if you wanna win or just cruise. but folding aces preflop is just retarted, period.

here we go again...what do pot odds and probability have to do with playing scared? poker, despite the fact that it is an overwhelmingly men's game, is not about beating your chest, it's about beating your opponent.

and since when has conservative play been indicative of mental retardation? the whole purpose of this forum is to hear other players' thoughts and possibly learn from them, not brag about how great a player you are and how everyone else is a timid fool...did i see u on WPT last nite?

If you want to talk about odds the odds of me winning that hand(aces vs. chip leader aqhearts). I am a maybe 6-1 favorite but it could cost me about 9-1 money wise if i get unlucky. Folding aa preflop is not a bad play for another reason lets say you are the 5th guy to call now your only like 2-1 against 5 people. how do the #'s work out now for a supposed retard when other people are getting knocked out and you make more real cash. Afterall what good is a big stack through out the tourney if there is no cash in your pocket on the way home.

funny story
 

Ok, I've got a little story about this situation. I was playing in a 60 person tournament at a local bar (10 people per each of 6 tables). I got delt the pocket aces on the very first hand of the tournament. I'm sitting one position to the right of the button, one person goes all in before me so I go all in thinking I'm invincible. He beats me with 3 jacks. Here's the kicker - the bar has a siren to signal when the first person is out. So I had to wade my way through a laughing and pointing crowd to the bar to soak my sorrow. Would I go all in again? I honestly don't know:)

That is a brutal story. Funny though. I think that the arrogance is the worst thing about poker. When someone out draws you and then brags about it and acts like a fool. I hate that. I act calm but im already steaming from the loss and heres this A hole laughing and telling me how great he is. also when the person is not a very good player and starts telling me how to play as the game goes on because i got beat in a couple of hands early. That sometimes works out because he will start to over value his hands and i can get some good cash of of him but it still makes me want to bitch slap him.

to my unlucky friend who did what any good poker player would do with pocket bullets..............

remember, "what goes around, comes around."

get right back on that felt, go right back to that tournament, and listen for that siren....only this time you won't be the one walking away from the table with your head between your legs...he will.

Bradley (North Carolina)

Here's another...
 

Here's something that happened to a buddy of mine at a tournament here in Columbus, OH. It was a NL tourney with 1 rebuy. He sat down and his first hand was AA, in late position. Before him there was a bet and a raise of all in. He called. I can't remember what the guy had (I know my buddy does!) but it wasn't that good and he pulled a straight to bust the aces. He bought in again and his first hand was AA again! Same story, an all-in in front of him that he called only to get busted again. It's awful but I laughed so hard when that happened.

Alright, I'll put my two cents in on this issue. Seeing as how I only read the first 2 pages of this I'm probably just repeating what someone else said. You don't go all in with the pocket aces. Here's why.

People go all-in with good hands for the most part. AA, KK, AK, QQ. Now more than likely the second caller is going to have a hand that is REALLY good that he/she would risk their tournament life on. Most likely this hand contains an Ace. I'd bet on AK suited or maybe even the other two aces. Therefore your hand is VERY unlikely to improve. If you read these posts you notice that many times the pocket aces were cracked by someone making trips. If there aren't any aces out there for you to get your trips with, you're effectivly sitting there with your fingers crossed that you don't get beaten. Not something you want to do.

Toss the hand aside and wait till you can out play people on the flop. Remember the winner of that hand will have a lot of chips that you can take over the coming hands.

Good point. If there are a number of callers the two remaining aces may very well be hole cards for other callers, and you can hardly improve your hand. Therefore it is an excellent reason to fold. But... only if there are a lot of callers.

If there's only one caller or perhaps two players, I will go all-in with my AA. Despite the horror stories. Let's not kid ourselves. The AA horror stories are so well known because they are the exception to the rule. Would you tell your buddy if you beat someone with AA? I think not.

give me a break
 

That was the most idiotic theory I have ever heard. OK so I have AA, you have AK. Your going to have to have KK hit the board to beat me with no A falling. I have AA you have KK, QQ, JJ. I have you beat, I dont need help. An A is just as likely to fall as a K, Q, or J. If someone is all in, and they do have AQ, AJ, A10 or A anything else, then they should not be playing poker. Those are not all in hands the first hand of a tourney...SO, if you have AA, play that somone will go all in, I do, and I win most of the time. If you are afraid of getting busted out first, find a new game.

Yes, you should.
 

You obviously played the hand right, getting all of your chips in while being a 4 to 1 favorite. You simply got unlucky. Sh-t happens.

No!
 

Keep in mind that THEY are the ones that have to catch cards to survive. Catching the 3rd A would only be an added bonus. Never count on the 3rd A.

play poker much??? when I have AA in my hand I want as many others to go all in as possible. i mean unless they have a pocket pair also they need to hit 2 cards to beat you. with a pocket pair they have as much chance or getting trips as you do. I've seen it get beat plenty of times but I still want to get AA all the time.

bs
 

uh, that theory makes perfect sense. sure you're a big leader going into the flop with pocket rockets, but so what? I rarely play any pocket pair all in due to the fact that I really only have :::::TWO::::: outs to improve my hand. Now, when 20 cards are delt preflop, you're telling me that my two outs haven't been compromised? I have 5 cards to make my 2 outs.. the odds of that are not in my favor.

someone with AJ/AQ/KQ even a suited connector has so many damn outs to bust me it's not worth the risk.

2 outs vs 20, which would you rather be?

i've seen aces go down to two pair, straights, and flushes all the time.. pocket rockets are ONLY effective in smaller games. a 10 player tourney will get you some callers, especially if people get married to hands... because we all know that those are the ones that get lucky the most.

Well...
 

Yes, but that 20 card thing also applies to the other person's outs as If someone has let's say QJ, you don't think at least one of their hole cards/drawing cards has been compromised? All the more unlikely that they will be able to pull a two pair/straight/etc....

Gosh, if you're scared to go all in (preflop, of course) with the best hand in the game then you shoulod probably stick to Go Fish or something.

Without knowing anyone's hole cards:

AcAd QsJs
% chance of outright win 80.121053 19.522410
% chance of win or split 80.477590 19.878947
pots won: 1374968.50 337335.50

There, I even gave you that the AA didn't even have his suit.

EVEN WHEN BOTH OF YOUR ACES ARE DEAD:

Dead/exposed cards: Ah As

AcAd QsJs
% chance of outright win 78.642411 21.000997
% chance of win or split 78.999003 21.357589
pots won: 1080438.00 290316.00


The results are similar for KQ, KJ, Q10 etc.... suited and much worse for any Ax suited.

Here, I'll even show you with one of the hands you mentioned


AcAh AdQd
% chance of outright win 86.838494 11.916692
% chance of win or split 88.083308 13.161506
pots won: 1497596.50 214707.50

And here's with the last ace dead


Dead/exposed cards: As

AcAh AdQd
% chance of outright win 85.825056 12.846143
% chance of win or split 87.153857 14.174944
pots won: 1326695.50 207243.50


So, in conclusion, the guy got fucking lucky. That's all there is to it. You made the right play and you lost. It's just the nature of the game that's all.

funny
 

Kind of funny that these people are saying "you shound find another game" if their belief is to fold. You must under value your aces before the flop with a lot of callers. period. If you want to call, call. Unfortunatly the 1st day of the wsop the amount of chips that can be won is smallest in the ntire tournament, and can be made up easy later. Think about it, all in on day one is a big blind on day 2.

I dont think everyone is realizing the situation warrants the fold not the odds. As I have written before I folded them in a tourney where i was in 2nd place and the leader moved in the reason was i knew if i call and lose i lose alot of cash if i fold and watch the sub 10k stacks get knocked out (I had 95k) then i make real $, and it worked the chip leader knocked out 3 people and it made me $400 immediatley and eventually made me $1300. If you can move up in real money by folding then it is the right play everytime. Take this situation your the chip leader at the wsop and its 3 way the 2nd place and shortstack have about the same amount. your in the bb, the button moves in and the sb calls you have aa in the bb but if you fold you know one will get knocked out or crippled. Why wouldn't you fold here you'll move up in real cash and also go into heads up with at least the same amount of chips.

Do you have any calculations that are less obvious than a headsup all-in pre-flop, let's say AA vs 2 or 3 players all-in already. Now, that would be good information.

Your right, but the original question was the following:

It is the first hand of the WSOP, a player goes all-in with and 3 players call. You figure at least a couple of them have high pairs and ther other player a decent hand. Against 3 other players, AA is a slightly better than 50% favorite (54%). Do you call looking to double up and take the chip lead - knowing you could also bust out on the first hand? or fold knowing that you can double up your stack anyway with less risk - knowing that having the chip lead on the first day means nothing?

The problem with the above, is that the question is making assumpions on the other players hands. You could be under 50% to win with 3 other people in the pot with you.


Three and its probably a fold. because

You can lose and be out of the tournament, if it was for anything under 50% of my chips, i would call. You can make up the loss the next time you are dealt a very strong hand if you have chips left. You cant make up those losses if you are out of the tournament.

So everyone quoting odds: your odds are only good if you have the time to make the odds real.

As an example: Even though the odds are in their favor, a casino can lose alot of money in a 15 min time frame(say they had to pay a couple of big jackpots). If the casino was forced to close down right then, just like you would have to leave the tournament by calling and losing, they would go out of business even though they had better odds.

Lets say that the casino has a 10% theoretical advantage on you. They will win 10% more often than you. But thats not the only odds that you should look at. Out of 10 trys with a 10$ bet, your total loss theoretically is -$10. But short term fluctuations can easily make someone win 4 times in a row. If you stop playing after winning 4 times, you will make +$30 out 10 bets. Hence, beating the odds and going home a winner. Now, if there was someone making you play 1000 games in row, the short term fluctuations will go both ways, and the casino will win everytime because the odds have time to catch up.

This is why casinos can work on a small percentage on some games. Its Time that makes odds work, not short term fluctuations. You have one advantage the the casinos do not want you to know.......You can leave anytime when you are up. They will stay open, they have to because they are playing long term odds and thats what makes them winners. not a short term fluctuations , win/loss. That is why casinos dont care when someone wins, they know that they will make it up long term. They cannot do that if the player stops playing or if the casino shuts down.

Poker is one of the few games that a player can have an advantage long term if played properly. Not short term. No one has a short term advantage. The turn of the cards can make anyone a winner. Even a bad starting hand. but if played long enough, the the good hand/player will make up the loss if the betting is the same in the same situation.

Why the same? because if you lose a $1000 bet on PAs you cant try and win it back by betting $100 in the same situation, or only getting 2 callers instead of 3. If you do, you are getting even worse odds for your PAs, because you paid more to win less

Now...If your PAs, at a short term percentage at 50%, get busted in the first hand in the WSOP, do you think, long term, you will ever be in the WSOP, in the 1st hand, with PAs, and 3 callers?

Those odds are so large they cannot be calculated.(unless you consistantly play in $10,000 tournaments with 2500 entrants)

Therefore, a fold is obvious.

Not because you cant win, but because the short term odds actually trick your brain into thinking that it is a good call. You are therorically getting 3 to 1 on your bet, and you have the best hand. But if you lose, and you are only a 50% favorite, you will never be able to make up the loss.

If you are in a low limit tourney that you play every week. Its a good call to make. Your odds of making up that loss will eventually catch up to you, and you will make back your short term 3 to 1 bet.

pussies
 

playing poker is gambling. if your not willing to gamble with aces preflop you should bet on something else. yes, if your in a tournament and your delt aces and three people are all in your odds arent too great. you can fold and rub your vagina or you can gamble and try to quadruple up knowing your going in with the best hand. its just common sense.

I agree, Pocket Aces is the best hand you can get pre flop....what more do you want...My philosophy is if My Pocket Aces are cracked it just wasnt meant to be...

Casino post
 

Thanks for the 'long casino post'. A new perspective on why you should at least consider folding AA going against 3 or more on the first hand. Refreshing view compared to the two posts following who continue to confuse playing smart with a sex change.

PokerWannaBe
 

The way I see Aces is simple. All-in with aces with 3 or 4 shooters already in is treacherous, a set or two pair makes you a guy looking to kick the dog!
I would like to be the first all-in in that situation. I suppose most of the posts up there are sound in that, why play poker if you are to fold the best possible pocket hand there is?