This is the 10th installment of my weekly poker column in the Economic Times, Range Rover.
If you read a lot of fantasy fiction, you would be familiar with parallel universes. In this real world, unfortunately, life is mundane and singularly singular, even if we do have the escape of fiction to console us. That said, there is one kind of person who does, indeed should, inhabit parallel universes: the poker pro. Poker players reside in three worlds, with three separate currencies: namely real money, Sklansky dollars and G-Bucks.
On Planet Earth, we play in real money: the dollars or rupees we actually win at the poker table. On Planet Sklansky, we play in Sklansky dollars. Named after David Sklansky, these measure the amount of money you would have won from a pot based on your equity in it. For example, you are in the big blind, and the small blind goes all in with 30bb. You have AKs, so you snap. He has AQo. He hits a queen and wins the pot. Now, you lost 30bb in the first universe you inhabit. But you had 75% equity, which translates to 45bb in a 60bb pot. Given that you put it in 30bb, that means that you made a profit of 15 Sklansky dollars in the second universe. The hand was played profitably.
The concept of G-Bucks, named after Phil Galfond, is a little more evolved. As Galfond defines it, ‘instead of taking your hand and seeing how it does against your opponent’s hand, you take the entire range of your hand and see how it does against his hand.’ (Your range against your opponent’s hand, and not your hand against his range, as some people misinterpret it.) Here’s an example from a recent hand I played:
I was at a cash game with a 500bb stack in the cutoff. An early-position loose-passive player with a similar stack raised to 5bb. I flatted with 75hh. The button, with a stack of 125bb, flatted, as did the small blind. The pot now had 21bb. The flop came Kh6h7c, giving me a pair and flush draw. It checked to me, I bet 15bb, the button made a small raise to 35bb, the other two guys folded, and, with effective stacks at 120bb, I shoved.
The button was a player who plays draws passively and has two seemingly contradictory leaks of always raising top pair for information and never folding top pair on a wet board. Given that I have little fold equity (FE), I would only repop him with a value hand. My range here, thus, comprises made hands like AA, AK, 76, sets, and all combo draws such as straight-and-flush draws and pair-and-flush draws. I would never raise with a bare flush draw here, because I don’t have enough FE. The button tanked, said ‘I think you have a flush draw,’ and called. He had KTo, which held, and he doubled up. Now, let’s look at an earnings chart here.
In terms of real dollars, starting at the flop, I lost 120bb. In Sklansky dollars, as my hand had 52% equity against his hand, I gained 15.7bb. (The pot was 261, 52% of which is 135.7 minus my 120 that went in on the flop.) In the G-Bucks universe, though, I did really well: my range was 75.2% against his hand, which means I benefited by 76bb. He had made a huge mistake against my range, and though he got congratulated for his call by everyone at the table, I was quite pleased with myself.
In the long run, your score in these three universes will converge. But in the meantime, you will play much better if you focus on winning G-Bucks. Thinking of actual dollars won or lost makes you too results-oriented; and strange as it may sound, Sklansky dollars also focuses on outcome, in terms of which hand from your range you actually happen to have. You want to think in ranges, induce errors from your opponent and make as many G-Bucks as you can. Real money will follow, and you will have the best of all worlds.
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Previously on Range Rover:
Finding Your Edge
Raking Bad
Om Namah Volume
Make No Mistake…
Kitne Big Blind The
Sweet Dopamine
The Balancing Act
The Numbers Game
The Bookshop Romeo