Ok

[TheyNeverLearn]

Ok it says there are no dumb questions on this one so here I go probably to prove it wrong haha

Erica said one of her buddies here said they would explain to me what an "M" and an "EV" means? because when you talk about that I have no clue, and she said the only way I will find out is to get on here and ask you! haha she is determined to get me to talk on here more I guess. I just get lost when I try to read this stuff that's all.

Well I have to go to work soon but I guess when ever she gets on here tonight before she goes to work I will see the answer. Maybe it will storm again today and I will get to come home early because nobody in there right mind goes swimming in a lightning storm haha


Ok well thanks for your answers,
Carrie


Oh and by the way a big thank you to "corey?" I hope I got that right, but thanks for your help with the computer, I have not seen Erica this happy in a long time so thanks

[Vito_Nuccio]

I would not take these to be bad questions in the least.

M value: Used in tournament play. Take your chip stack and divide by starting pot (ante, SB and BB). This is M. The old fashoned way was chip stack divided by BB only. The M value is a measuring device to determine your chip strength and playing options. It will tell you things like when it is time to shove so as to not get in a poor chip position. Everyone has their own little adjustments to the M scale, look some up. Use this little calculation on the fly to further help you in your poker making decisions.


EV Expected Value: Used in all poker games and betting levels. The expected long run earning potential for your hand for the given situation. I will not get into specifics, there are good full length articles out there with EV examples.

Thanks,

[irishpkr]

OK I'll talk some stuff about M and EV, hopefully wont overlap with mr. vito's post K here goes:

M - So as said, M = (your stack) / (SB + BB + Antes) ; this is only relevent in tournament play. So basically the idea is that the M value tells you when and what hands you should be going with. For example, playing fullring tourny, with M=8, if its folded to you in the cutoff, you pretty much have to shove a much wider range of hands that have an edge over the blinds random hands. So you'd be shoving stuff like A4o, KQ, pairs, etc. When your M is below 10, you cant really afford to raise to 3x/4x the BB, so its shove all in or fold at this point. When you have tiny M values, say, 3, you pretty much have to be shoving when you get anything halfdecent, you can't afford to wait for premiums. I'm not a tourney expert so I'll go no further with that incase I go offtrack

EV - Ok so this is perhaps a more useful concept, and applies to both cash and tourney play. Tied in with EV are the ideas of pot odds and equity. So incase of any confusion:

Pots odds = $$ to call / $$ in the pot So if pot = $20, and have to call a further $10 bet, you have 10/30= 1/3 or 2:1 to call

Equity = The % of the pot that 'belongs' to you, or put another way, how often you will win the pot if you go to showdown. For example if you hold 44 against villains QQ, you have roughly 20% equity here, or against AKs, about 50%.

So the EV, expected value of a play, is the comparison between the pot odds being offered, and the equity you hold in the pot. Maybe simpler if put into an example:

You are on the turn, and are drawing to 9 outs to the nuts, which for simplicity, we will call 20% equity (9X2+1=19and a bit). So we are 4:1 to win this hand (we win one time, lose 4).
So for a play to be EV neutral the pots odds are equal to our equity. So say the pot is $80, and villian bets $20. Here we are calling $20 to win $100, which is 5:1 pot odds! If the price we're being laid is better than the chance of hitting, ie. we are paying a cheap price, then the call here is +EV, and ofcourse if the pot odds are worse than our equity, calling is a -EV play, in other words, every time we make this play we expect to lose money.

Ofcourse into this you must also factor implied odds, which complicate the matter of EV, as you can pay 3:1 on the turn with 20% equity if you expect to get a good payoff from villain if you do hit your hand on the river.

[frob23]

I always found poker itself as a very hard medium to comprehend EV -- if you don't already understand the concept. I think it's easier to simplify it a lot to get the basics and then it can be generalized for poker.


So, for example, your friend comes up to you with a fair coin (a 'fair' coin is one that has no bias). They say, "Let's each put a dollar down and flip the coin. Heads you win the money and tails I win."

Now, half the time you will win a $1 and half the time you will lose a $1. So we can calculate our expected value by computing:

$1 * (1/2) - $1 * (1/2) = $0.50 - $0.50 = $0

So our expectation for this game is zero. We can flip the coin till the cows come home but we have no EV. Not negative or positive... just none.

After a night of heavy drinking, your friend decides to change the odds because you got bored with 1-1 odds. They say, "You put down $2 and I'll put down $3... and we will flip the coin." This changes our expectation:

$3 * (1/2) - $2 * (1/2) = $1.50 - $1.00 = $0.50

Each time we flip the coin, we're making 50 cents. This remains true regardless of what actually happens. Maybe we flop the coin 10 times and lose eight of them. In the "real" world we have lost $10 ($3*2 - $2*8) but in the world of statistics and numbers we have made $5.00 because if we keep taking this bet... our expected value (EV) will approach 50 cents a hand over time. Our EV=+$0.50. At the same time, our friend has an EV=-$0.50.

Note: we have a fairly huge edge in this game so it wouldn't take long to beat it.

Knowing your exact EV in poker is often harder but you can know that some situations are almost certainly +EV and others are almost certainly -EV.

Calling a shove on the flop with 10-high: -EV
Calling a $5 bet for a $55 pot with a flush draw: +EV
Drinking until you puke on the table: -EV
Having someone shove all-in pre-flop when you hold AA (and calling): +EV

Note: in that last example, calling was +EV even if the person gets lucky and cracks your aces. What happens in one hand does not matter. Over time what happens will begin to approach the true EV.

Also, if you do a lot of things which are -EV (like limping in early position with 10-8 offsuit). . . you are losing money even when you get lucky and flop a monster. You rarely will have the implied odds to make such a negative EV move correctly.

EV also has NOTHING to do with being the favorite to win. If I knew I was up against a full house and needed to hit a gut-shot straight draw to win (1 card in the entire deck to help me)... I would insta-call if I was being offered $100-$1 pot odds (which often happens in weak NL games). I am going to lose 43 times, and win only once. But the $43 I lose trying to hit it... will be made up by the $100 I get when I do. $100 (1/44) - $1 (43/44) = +$1.29. So my EV there is huge... I couldn't turn it down. I'm going to get a 129% return on my investment.

[Boilermaker]

Oh and by the way a big thank you to "corey?" I hope I got that right, but thanks for your help with the computer, I have not seen Erica this happy in a long time so thanks

You are both very welcome!

[Wyte22]

M is the strong force in determining your play style in tournaments, but another stat that is worth keeping up with that is rarely mentioned, is your Q, the weaker force in determining play style.

your Q is your chip stack .v. the average chip stack of the tournament.

Ideally, you want your Q to be 1 or higher. The further you get from 1, the more aggressive you need to be.

Some examples:

You are an online tourney, you have $60,000 left with the average stack being 120K. This means your Q is .5

The blinds are 2.5K/5K with 750 antes. Considering this is a 9 player table, your M is 4.2. This means your in the red zone and both your M and Q dictate that you need to be shoving or folding, there is no more room for just calling (There are expections but since this is beginner discussion, we won't get into that).

Now let's back it up some, let take the same stack, avg and Q but this time, the blinds are 800/1600 with 200 ante (still 9 player tables). Your M in this case is, 14.3. Soo your still in a comfortable position even though you Q is telling you, you need to get to shoving because your well below the tournament average. When M and Q conflict, ALWAYS.....I mean ALWAYS go with the M.

One of the best places to use Q is in qualifying tournaments. They give a better layout of prospects of winning something or nothing.

IN MY OPINION, Q is kinda like looking at the big picture and seeing how you need to improve to get where you need to be, but M is more based AT the table, where the action is. M is your reality.

[Jonathank]

yes but since you have such high implied odds in nl poker, you are supposed to play every hand amd call most raises.

any way i do not care about all your fancy mumbo jumbo terms. i just want to win.

[liladypokerpro]

Carrie says tell everyone thanks She's going to work now She's gotta work 6-3 today bless her heart...so I stayed up and made her breakfast and lunch so she wouldn't have to rush this morning < Insert AWWW here > LOL

Anyway, I'm just curious, is anyone else having issues with the site this morning? Or is it just my PC acting up again? The quick reply button isn't working, and neither is the font color tool, as well as other tools like Bold, etc...and I hate "Plain Jane" fonts LOL

Ok like I said I've been up all night so I guess I'm going to bed now.

Nighty Night and have a good day all. I'll be on this afternoon before I go to work and then back after work.

[Vito_Nuccio]

Carrie says tell everyone thanks She's going to work now She's gotta work 6-3 today bless her heart...so I stayed up and made her breakfast and lunch so she wouldn't have to rush this morning < Insert AWWW here > LOL

Anyway, I'm just curious, is anyone else having issues with the site this morning? Or is it just my PC acting up again? The quick reply button isn't working, and neither is the font color tool, as well as other tools like Bold, etc...and I hate "Plain Jane" fonts LOL

Ok like I said I've been up all night so I guess I'm going to bed now.

Nighty Night and have a good day all. I'll be on this afternoon before I go to work and then back after work.

I have to type the codes in today for the special faces and suits. I can not select them from the box at right.

Thanks,

[liladypokerpro]

I dunno why I didn't think of doing that myself Possibly because I haven't had very much sleep this week LOL Good think I know the codes