Bomb Pots - what’s the best strategy
For those not familiar with them, a bomb pot at the casino I play at consists of everyone putting in 5x bb, and the dealer deals in whoever puts in the 5xbb and if you’re in the bb or sb and you don’t participate, you are dealt in and then cards are mucked.
After dealing the cards the dealer then burns one and deals a flop, then burns another and deals a second flop. There’s a round of betting, then burn and turn top, burn and turn bottom. Then bet round then same thing river.
If you win one board you split half the pot if you win both boards you scoop the whole pot.
In this style of game what are the best hands to try to play and why?
If anyone have any tips with reasoning, feel free to leave them.
My speculation is suited connectors are probably the most valuable preflop along with aces kk and ak
I might be wrong, but approaching from the other side of the table (dealing speed), I think this is very much recency or confirmation bias.
A little over a year ago I found out that the casino I work at will (very) occasionally track number of hands per hour the dealers deal. Since then, I have been constantly querying about it. For better or worse, I have paid far too much attention to this measurement.
As would be expected, it is mostly a bell curve. Most dealers clustered around a middle with
obviously i don't have access to this kind of data, but i take you at your word for it.
all i have is empirical information, from playing countless hours in often very long sessions at aria or wynn in the 5-5 rock game (plo).
and i've been in sessions where i was literally the small blind in a bomb pot like back to back 6-7 times in a row, or heard other people complain (in another session) like "man, this guy over there is the button again, etc."
i've even seen people tank a very long time on a simple fold preflop in the SB (and at first didnt understand what was going on), bc dealer change was about to happen, but he wasnt there quite yet, so that the guy made sure that he's the button in the next hand.
and, to deny that its an advantage to be in position in the BP is not even worth discussing imo, bc it's so obvious.
all i was trying to do was give some help (for anyone interested) in how to speed up or slow down (depending on the game) the process, so that the BP button moves around, up and until places like aria or wynn (and apparently other places in the US too) have caught up to what we've been doing in Europe for a while now (separate button for BP), bc it's much fairer.
over and out.
Up until I moved recently, I dealt a game out of my home where bomb pots were in high demand. To randomize the button position, I picked a target frequency for bomb pots and then identified an event that happened at about that rate. For us, it was 1 in 20 hands, which is about the frequency of monotone (single-suit) flops for games that see a flop almost every hand (e.g. my game).
My players loved this. They would all hope for and celebrate a monotone flop. Players would make bad preflop calls just to give the table a shot at a bomb pot.
It even provided some good branding: the occurrence of a monotone flop at other home games would inevitably have someone say "that's a bomb pot at [albedoa's] game" 😃 A free mention every 20 flops or so!
Up until I moved recently, I dealt a game out of my home where bomb pots were in high demand. To randomize the button position, I picked a target frequency for bomb pots and then identified an event that happened at about that rate. For us, it was 1 in 20 hands, which is about the frequency of monotone (single-suit) flops for games that see a flop almost every hand (e.g. my game).
My players loved this. They would all hope for and celebrate a monotone flop. Players would make bad preflop calls ju
Very funny and inventive, I like it
When I play at Kings (depending on line-up, not everyone likes BP), we do one BP on dealer change, and then the BP button moves counterclockwise to the next player, and then we do another BP when the BP button crosses with the normal button
I find the opposite. People check bomb pots all the time w/ the nuts or bet w/ worse than the nuts. Having position is better than not, but nowhere near as important as in a regular hand. It just plain isn't -- single board and especially double board.
Having position just doesn't give you a big advantage compared to having position in a regular hand -- and not to be rude, but if you don't understand that, then you haven't played enough bomb pots 😉
Agree and disagree. It depends on the player type, but generally, a big bet on a bomb pot is generally 2-pair+.
However, for the less experienced players, I've found that strength and weakness tells weigh much more heavily than usual.
guys, i really don't wanna be rude or anything, but i'm convinced you're dead wrong on the position thing ... there's so many situations (especially in BP), where the fact that you are last to act is so big ... be it to be able to easier extract value, or, when you have a lock on one side and are not sure about the other ... when you are OOP, in the same situation, that sucks. In position you clearly know (bc the guy OOP would have bet with a lock on one side, he'd never check) ... and so on and
No one suggested that position isn’t an advantage in a BP. Just position value is less in BP.
You allude to one situation, lock on a board, but guess what that is rare when you will be both btn and flop a lock. And if you don’t think EP will flop trap in BP, esp with a board lock, you have not played enough.
A major aspect of position is taking advantage of those who limp call to wide pre flop. That happens exactly 0% of the time inBP
Basically every post flop position advantage is available in both normal and BP, although there are differences, but BP have none of the preflop positional advantages. You just cant stop those preflop auto fold hands frim realizing full equity when they happen to flop a monster.
So sure, I always prefer to be in position but you need to proceed with lots of caution for the vast majority of time you don’t flop a lock because with so many players seeing the flop, someone flopped a monster if not the stone lock. In some way position in BP is like pocket aces. It can help you win lots of smaller pots but with out caution you can lose the huge ones.
I can you give you a million examples for the opposite, and even the one you mentioned (punishing limpers in normal hands) can be interpreted very differently.
One last attempt:
Let’s say, you have the exact same hand, and your opponent too, with all the extra difficulties that come in a bombpot … and you play it twice, with positions reversed … where do you think you make more money and where do you lose less? ��
But anyways, I will force myself to be open to the idea that I could be wrong … so I can bring Peace to the (2+2) universe ��
I can you give you a million examples for the opposite, and even the one you mentioned (punishing limpers in normal hands) can be interpreted very differently.
One last attempt:
Let’s say, you have the exact same hand, and your opponent too, with all the extra difficulties that come in a bombpot … and you play it twice, with positions reversed … where do you think you make more money and where do you lose less? ��
But anyways, I will force myself to be open to the idea that I could be
You keep coming back to the ‘in position is better in BP, so position more important than in non BP’ claim. But that is a non sequitur argument. I and others have repeatedly said that yes position is important in BP. No one has said otherwise. But let’s look at your current example, ofc with the same hands, position in BP will have advantage. But so what. Same thing is true in a non BP. With the same hand in non BP, player in position.
If you mean to play it in BP and non BP, yes the BP is likely going to win more. But that is not due to position. That is due to BP are inherently bloated preflop, esp single board BP. That is it isn’t position that wins you more, it is that the pot is bloated and most folks don’t play bloated pots as often so they play them less well regardless of their position
Either was if you know how to adjust to the game position is little less valuable in BP. Let me try one other explanation. Normal pot you get 4 chances to use you position advantage. In a BP this is 3 chances. BP would need to have 33% more advantage on each of those chances to be equally valuable across the entire hand.
You keep coming back to the ‘in position is better in BP, so position more important than in non BP’ claim. But that is a non sequitur argument. I and others have repeatedly said that yes position is important in BP. No one has said otherwise. But let’s look at your current example, ofc with the same hands, position in BP will have advantage. But so what. Same thing is true in a non BP. With the same hand in non BP, player in position.
If you mean to play it in BP and non BP, yes the BP is likel
I think this is right.
Obviously position is better. Regular poker or bomb pot. No doubt. The question is position more important in regular poker or bomb pots. I have never thought about it in those terms before. So initially I am leaning to agreeing with you, but I am open to arguments both ways.
But even still, I think all of that is besides the point. It is my limited experience that the skill level in bomb pots among the general poker public is so bad that IN GENERAL, bomb pots are worth it, even out of position simply because the skill level is so bad (and the pots so big). Obviously there are games that are exceptions, but in general I think bomb pots induce a lot of mistakes for a lot of money.
Position matters, but skill also matters. I have seen far too many players call lots of money with good, but non-nut draws on one board (maybe a 3 card straight wrap on a board that also has a flush draw) and absolutely nothing on the other board.
That said, I also think that at a table full of decent regs, I think aggressively semi bluffing with ok, but weak 2nd board hands might be a viable strategy. Many regs will play strong fit or fold and end up folding too much. They are (maybe rightly) looking only to play big pots with great hands against bad players that they overfold everything else. I don't play enough in these games to confirm this, but as a dealer that is the feeling I get.
