Max Holdem

Texas Holdem Max Players Per Table
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Max Holden

by Mel Leggett (MellowYellow on the Low Limit Poker Forum)

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This is a discussion on spin n go or max holdem? Within the online poker forums, in the Tournament Poker section; 3 or more player? More prize or more chance? What do you think?

So you've read up on holdem and have begun perfecting your game. You've built up your bank roll and have begun slowly climbing up the limits and you’ve noticed a new style of table that seems to grow with popularity as you move up. It's 6 Max, same old holdem rules, but with… well, 6 seats per table. 6 Max is popular on many online poker sites, and on some, such as Bovada Poker, you may even find more 6 Max than full tables. So why are people choosing to play them, and what adjustments to your normal strategy need be made.

It's time for some Action

One problem many players encounter in holdem is the boredom factor; folding hand after hand preflop, waiting around for the other players to finish up, finally getting a playable hand, only to fold it on the flop after totally missing, and starting all over again. This can lead to leaks in your game such as playing too many starting hands, or refusing to fold once you finally do get cards worth calling the blinds. You could take a break and play action oriented non-poker online casino UK or online casino EU games (craps, roulette, or blackjack), or you could try 6 Max poker. Players in 6 Max will get to see more flops, win pots more frequently and generally have more hands per hour simply due to the lower number of players competing in them. This keeps the game more interesting and may actually help you avoid playing too loose.

If only I could read…

Perhaps the most sought after and admired skill of many professionals is their ability to get reads on their opponents and classify their play. Some pros like T.J. Cloutier even claim to be able to observe the way each of his opponents have played in every situation and remember it for later use even at a packed table with side conversations going on throughout the game. However, for those of us less versed in this field it may be asking too much to remember enough to have a general classification of each player at our table while in the midst of a full game. Trying to keep tabs on the style of 8 different players simultaneously can be overwhelming causing you to get inaccurate reads or to simply give up and play based solely on your cards potentially costing you numerous big bets/session.

In 6 Max however you only need to observe 5 opponents making it much easier to keep track of their particular style. Also you generally see them play more hands more often making it quicker and easier to get an accurate read on who you are up against. This is a great way to practice categorizing your opposition and adjusting your play according to what you have observed. Just remember that while at a 6 Max table your opponents will likely have a better read on YOU as well! Getting to know your opponents style is very important in 6 Max because you will be raising more often with a wider variety of hands and it is important to know what type of hand your opponent will 3 bet or cap the betting with pre flop so you can adjust your play accordingly.

Making the necessary adjustments

A common mistake players make in 6 Max is playing almost every hand.

The first thing to adjust when playing at a 6 Max table is your starting hand requirements. The average game you will run into will have about 3 callers per flop. This means that your average drawing hands are not going to be worth while, 6 Max is a high-card game. Hands such as 67s are not going to be profitable long term. They just don’t hit often enough, and when they do there aren’t enough people in the hand paying you off to compensate for all the times you’ve missed. Unlike a loose full table where the winning hand is often a flush or straight, 6 Max hands will be won time and time again by middle pair or top pair with a mediocre kicker. Given this, here are the suggested starting hand groups:

Group 1: AA, KK, QQ, JJ, TT, AK, AQ
Group 2: AJ, KQ, 99, 88, AT, KJ, A9
Group 3: A8, A7, KT, QJ, QT, JT, K9, 77, 66, 55, 44, 33, 22
Group 4: Axs, K8, Q9, J9, T9s, 98s

Group 1 hands should be played with a raise or re raise from all positions. Most times it is correct to cap the betting preflop except for the instances where you have been 3-bet by a player you know would not do so without Aces or Kings.

Group 2 hands should be played from all positions and should come in for a raise in an unraised pot. These hands can be played even in early position in a raised pot, and in late position hands like AJ are even strong enough for a re raise.

Group 3 hands are playable from all positions but are not strong enough to raise in most circumstances. They are strong enough to come into a raised pot from late position but with a lot of action preflop you should strongly consider getting away from these hands in early position.

Group 4 hands are borderline at best. These are only playable in late position and under perfect circumstances. For these hands you want about 4 limpers in the pot before you. Also you don’t want to play these hands when the person to act after you is the type that is very likely to raise preflop. The weaker Kings and Queens are playable in this circumstance because if your hand is dominated there would have likely been a raise, also with 4 limpers in the pot you are getting better odds to play the better drawing hands like T9s. There are more people in the hand to pay you off if you hit and if not T9 may be capable of taking down a pot simply by pairing up, however like any time you play marginal hands such as these you have to be ready to get away from them without a perfect flop when there is lots of action.

A common mistake players make in 6 Max is playing almost every hand. They realize there are fewer players and therefore their 2 cards have a better chance of taking down pots. However this isn’t just a slot machine, taking any two cards and pulling the lever hoping for a winner. The adjustments to be successful are to play higher cards stronger and get away from most drawing hands, you will be surprised what hands your opponents will play at this table but by playing the cards listed above and letting everyone else play any two cards you will OFTEN find your top pair getting called down by someone’s pair of 3s, and that is a great place to be in.

The Game Play

The main difference in 6 Max post flop play is the degree at which you must hit the flop to continue. In a full table with 7 people seeing the flop you probably wouldn’t dream of raising with bottom pair let alone with Ace high. However with only approximately 3 people seeing each flop often times that is all it will take to win the hand. That is why aggression is so important. When you have a premium hand and have raised PF unless a very scary flop emerges it is almost always correct to proceed betting to the river until you have reason to believe you are beat.

There are three reasons for this:

You don’t want to give anyone a free card to allow their Q9 to hit a 9 on the turn and beat your AK.
When the flop is rags your opponents will not put you on a pair and you will be surprised how often they will call you down with King high and you don’t want to miss out on bets when they make this mistake.
If you are consistent it will be hard for them to get a read on you and the next time when you are raising down to the river with QQ they will give you lots of action assuming you have nothing but ace high.

You should also realize that your opponents are likely playing a similar style. So it is important to play your middle pair hands aggressively. If player 1 has raised PF and follows up with a bet on the flop, you should be raising with your middle pair and even if he 3-bets, you should usually call down to the river until you are shown that this particular player will only raise with a made hand. In short handed games middle and lower pairs gain strength and need to be played accordingly.

Another issue that can be somewhat dismissed is the idea of being out kicked. This isn’t to say that it doesn’t happen, especially when aces are involved, but due to the smaller table it doesn’t happen nearly as often. Therefore, if you flop top pair you should be raising or even re raising, And unless you are up against an absolute rock you would NEVER want to fold top pair, even a hand like Q3 that pairs its queen for top pair should be calling down to the river unless you are getting multiple re raises. If you find that you are being out kicked on a regular basis by a certain player you need to tighten up your starting hands when faced by a raise from him.

One final issue to be wary of, when choosing a table, be sure it is truly a 6 Max table. If you find that nearly everyone is seeing the flop then you are basically at a full table. The starting hand chart and strategy on this site was written for tables where 5-6 people are seeing every flop, and if this is happening at a 6 Max table then your strategy should be more like playing against very loose players at a full table.

When you find yourself at this style of table it’s not a bad idea to find another, the suckouts are going to drive you insane, and this style of table isn’t really why you started playing 6 Max to being with. However if you decide to stay, keep in mind that on tables like this, aggressiveness is not going to get you as far. The players are not going to fold to your bets even when they have nothing, and are going to call to the river waiting for their 6 to pair up. You are going to be truly up against 5 random hands every time making it impossible to put them on any hand. In these situations you need to be extremely aggressive pre flop, raising as much as possible with your premium, and even mediocre hands, making them pay as much as possible to see the flops with their Q5o etc. This does NOT mean that you should loosen up on what hands you play!! When you do flop your top pair, again, you have to make them pay as much as possible to see the next card to try and suck out on you, but if you flop nothing you have to be prepared to drop it, as bluffing will get you nowhere against these players. It’s not necessarily a bad idea to play at tables such as this. They are definitely beatable and for people who prefer full tables over 6 Max, at the very least playing at loose tables like this will help you perfect your ability to read your opponents quicker and more accurately. Then once you feel comfortable with your ability to classify your opponents you can make the transition to a full table with ease.

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What’s Six Plus Hold'em all about?

Everyone has been hyped up about this new game that arrived to the Macau tables where Ivey and Dwan play, called Six Plus Hold’em. At the first glance, it looks like a very exciting and attractive game for new players! This just might be the new Chris Moneymaker in terms of attracting the fun players to play online, and the good thing is, if you know how to play Texas Hold’em well, you’ll have an easy transition to this new game mode.

It’s becoming a really popular game, and I predict that it will be added and instated as a permanent game on PokerStars in a few weeks, or even less, and the traffic will be huge. Let's get into it and learn the Six Plus Hold'em rules!

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The Rules of Six Plus Hold'em

So, what are the rules to this weird sounding variation of the Hold’em game? It’s still Hold’em, right? RIGHT. The only difference between 6 Plus and classic is that all the cards from deuce to five are taken out from the deck, leaving 36 cards instead of 52.

The Ace is still low, A6789 making the lowest straight or the wheel as you may know it, and it’s still high making TJQKA.
There are also some differences in hand strength, like 3-of-a-kind now beats a straight and a flush beats a full house (since it’s harder to make one because you only have 9 suited cards out of 36 with which you can make a 5-card flush from).
Although Six Plus Hold'em is for the most part played as the traditional Hold'em in terms of streets, the main difference comes on the river, at least in some variations of the game, when, instead of dealing a community card, every player is dealt one extra card. In the final round of betting, every player still in will have three hole cards and will need to combine two and two only of those with the four community cards to create the best possible five card hand. In other variations, it is played with a traditional river.

Hand Rankings

Royal (straight) flush
Four of a kind (quads)
Flush
Full House
Three of a kind
Straight
Two pair
A pair
High card

Why is it good?

It’s good because having less cards in the deck makes it so that you get better hands more often, and for a recreational player that’s awesome because he’ll be getting a lot more action this way, and even though A6 represents the absolute minimum Ax type of hand, it can still be kind of hard to find a fold for a beginner.

It’s also simpler to play than Omaha, so that’s another reason why it could turn out to be very attractive for recreational players.

For us regs out there, it’s also a very good thing, because it’s more fun and more action-packed than Classic Hold’em; it’s like a breath of fresh air that you take from playing the classic format. Also, playing multiple formats of poker has been proven to yield high skill increases in all your other poker games, so learning how to play Six Plus Hold’em will most definitely make you a better player overall.

It’s also important to play it as much as you can at the onset. I remember playing Razz online and people would HU SnG me for 10$ and after a few hands they’d rage in chat saying something like “Why did I lose, I had 3 kings?”.

At the beginning, a lot of players will be attracted to the novelty factor, and some of them will even play not knowing the full set of poker rules

Texas Holdem Max Players Per Table

, so that’s where you make the biggest profit. Like Hold’em was so loose in its online beginnings, where people would stack off with top pair no kicker on any flop back in '03, and people who were decent by that time’s standards made thousands, if not millions of dollars. It was the same with Omaha when people first started playing it, so the time to act is right now as you don't want to lose this opportunity.

You have the skills needed, now it’s time to make money!

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Adjustments and Six Plus Hold'em Strategy

The first thing that you have to understand is that there are 36 cards instead of 52, so the chance that you'll make better hands on average is higher. This means that you’ll value TPGK less, but some other players might overvalue them and call you down even though it’s much easier in this game to make two pair+. I remember playing 5-card draw 9-plus when I was a kid and a straight or a full house were very frequent.

Also, there’s a bigger difference between the odds of hitting. Now, one out becomes one card out of 31 which is roughly 3% chance to hit it. So to hit a flush draw on the turn or on the river you have 5 cards (2 in your hand and 2 down, 5 left out of 9), so 5x3x2=30% chance to hit a flush. But remember that this beats a full house, so it’s the virtual nuts.

The good thing is, although the percentage of hitting a flush is a bit smaller than in regular Hold’em, you’re almost never beat when you do make your hand, because you’re not afraid of sets or paired boards anymore.

Probability of flopping a set is increased to about 18%, which makes calling 3bet with pocket pairs a much more profitable proposition

Next up we have the straight draw, and this is going to be interesting. To hit an open-ender by the river you have 8(outs)x3(percent)x2(turn and river)= 48% which is insane. Basically, if you know that your opponent doesn’t have trips or better, you can just keep on raising, because if you have any kind of fold equity, you’re going to profit in the long run; and when you do get called, it’s as close to a flip as it will ever be, provided you’re not drawing dead.

The modification in draw hitting percentage and flush strength make the game more action-packed and people will get it in a lot more often on flops, making it a very exciting variation to play.

Two pair is also easier to hit because we have 5 outs from 31 cards so it’s going to be 5x2x3%=30% to hit two pair until the river, which renders overpairs a bit less powerful.

Another thing that we need to talk about and everyone absolutely loves is the probability of flopping a set. Here, it’s about 2x3x3%=18% so calling 3bets with pocket pairs becomes more profitable proposition.

AT and AJ lose a lot of their power, but AK becomes much stronger. I’d never 3bet AQ though, because we’re never, ever getting called by a worse ace if we are up against a decent player.

More strategy and math considerations

Max Holdem Strategy

Now that we know the basic rules of Six Plus Hold’em and that money will fly around way more often, I expect that all poker sites will integrate it pretty fast after it appears on the main one, and that it will be fairly easy to exploit opponents, especially at the beginning, if you integrate the knowledge from this article into your game.

Let’s start off by talking about all of the aspects of pre-flop game.

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Stacking off

Obviously, stacking off now becomes a little bit tighter because we have less cards in the deck, ergo we will get AA or KK a lot more often.

If the chance to get AA pre-flop in regular Hold'em is 0.45 percent, let’s try to calculate that in Six Plus Hold’em:

Max Holden Obituary

The chance to get dealt one ace in one card is: 4 / 36 = 1 / 9 (one out of nine possible cards).
Now, the chance to get dealt the second ace is: 3 / 35 = 8.5%
To get the probability of catching aces, you have to multiply the two probabilities and get the percentage, so the probability that we get Aces is: (1/9)*(3/35)=3/9*35=3/315=1/105

Once every 105 hands you’ll get AA in Six Plus Hold’em, which is 0.95%, which, to tell you the truth, is insane! It’s more than the double of regular Hold’em, and that goes for KK QQ JJ TT and any pair!

Also, let’s see what the probability of getting AK is now:

Probability to hit an Ace: 4/36
Probability to hit a King after you’ve hit the Ace: 4/35
If we multiply these probabilities we will get the odds to get AK pre-flop, so the result is:
4/36 * 4/35 * 2(because the order doesn’t matter) = 4*4/35*36 = 16/1260 *2 = 2.53%

So this means that the range of QQ+/AK now is 0.95+0.95+0.95+2.53= 5.38%. In Hold’em it’s 2.6%. This is going to invite more action into the game and make it a lot more 3bet oriented, because in Six Plus, 2.6% is very close to AA/KK/AKs.

2/36*1/35=0.158%

To verify our calculations, we re-calculate pair and AK probabilities like this:

AK – 16 combos – 0.158%*16 = 2.53%
AA – 6 combos – 0.158%*6 = 0.95%
AKs - 4 combos – 0.158%*4 = 0.63%

So we now have the solution to the combinations problem.

3-betting and stack-off ranges

Max Holden Big Brother

The pressing matter here is that now, QQ+/AK is 5.38%, which is a huge 3-bet value range and is advisable in 6-max but in FR it’s a lot looser than it may seem. Also, a lot of players in the beginning will still stack off QQ/AK from virtually any position in 6-max games, so you’ll benefit from that by playing QQ a lot more like JJ/TT/99 and only 3bet AA/KK/AK.

Why do we still 3-bet AK? Isn’t this a good hand to flat now ? Yes and no.

Let’s say you have AK
This means that from all of his combos of AA, 3 are taken out of the 6 because you hold the Ac.
Also, from his combinations of KK, 3 are taken out of the 6 because you hold the Kd.
Also, from his 16 combinations of AK, he is left with 9 out of 16 because you hold Ac and Kd.
This means that he’s 50% less likely to have AA, 50% less likely to have KK, and 43% less likely to be holding AK, so he’ll fold a lot more often pre-flop

Fold Equity

Let’s say the UTG opens for 3x and you 3-bet from the button 9x.
If UTG opens 10% of his range and continues only with KK+/AK, even if you fold every time to a 4-bet, you’re making a profit in the long run.
How? Well, 4.5% of that opening range is AA/KK/AK, but you’re holding blockers so it’s reduced to about 2.5%. That means 3 out of 4 times you win 4.5 blinds(bb/sb/open) and 1 time you lose 9 blinds. That’s good profit in the long run and cannot be overlooked.
If his opening range is bigger than 10%, you’re winning a lot more in the long run.

Keeping his weaker hands in.

If your opponent opens UTG and you only flat AK, he will not have the option of folding AQ, possibly AJ/KQ to a 3-bet and you can get value from him post-flop, when an ace or a king hits.

The element of surprise

Most players will discount AK out of your range when you’re not 3-betting it, and thus make mistakes post-flop. A lot of them might bet AQ for two streets on an ace-high board and check/call the river, and the same goes for KQ on a king-high board. That’s when you get 3 streets of value with your AK against hands that would have folded pre-flop to a 3-bet.

Not having a standard play, varying your game

Sometimes if you combine 3-betting AK for 50% and flatting it 50% you become much harder to read, thus your opponent will never know this frequency and it will be hard for him to adapt to your play style.

Max Holden One Life To Live

Most players will discount AK out of your range when you’re not 3-betting it, and thus make mistakes post-flop.

I’d actually be more inclined to 3-bet AKo and flat AKs (leaving my AK flatting range 25%), just because AKs has better playability post-flop from flopping a flush draw. The equity of getting it in pre-flop with AKs is not much higher than that of AKo so I consider flatting a lot more often with this type of hand.

Also, when using your HUD, watch out for the people who have a 2% 3-bet range, because they’re only 3-betting AA/KK, so it becomes super-profitable to call for set-mining purposes (because now you flop a set 18% of the time), and stacking off with only AA versus these players becomes the ultimate exploitive strategy. I’m even folding AK pre-flop because if we call the 3-bet and we hit a king, he’s most likely holding aces, and if we hit an ace, he’s most likely not paying us off with KK.

Max Holden Wikipedia

Conclusion

All in all this will be a very interesting, action-filled game and I can’t wait for it to become an official format adopted by the major sites, because I really believe this is the new Hold’em and it will be a worthy breath of fresh air for all of us that have been playing the same game for years and years. I hope you found these Six Plus Hold'em rules easy to follow and useful as an introduction to the game.

To wrap it up, I leave you with the words of wisdom from a great man:

We keep moving forward, opening new doors, and doing new things, because we're curious and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths. Walt Disney

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Max Holden

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