Richard~;289186 wroteyes, but I didn't feel like the direct odds made up for the lack of implied odds. Is there any way to calculate the decrease in neccesary implied odds as a function of direct odds?
Well say we need 20:1 to setmine profitably in a heads up pot generally. This 20:1 usually means "20:1 stack odds"** or "we need to be have 20x the size of the raise in our stack". It wouldn't really matter if this was direct odds or implied odds or whatever because they're in theory all the same. We just need to be able to win 20x what we invest in order to make it profitable (as a loose rule, this isn't always the case).
Now in this hand we have an opener who we perceive to be strong because of a read. We're in the BB closing the action. Say that vs. an unknown we need 20:1 to setmine here, but with our read it make setmining a bit more profitable because he will stack more often, so we only need... 16:1 vs. this guy since he's going to stack more often given his range, and given the buyin he's probably not going to be hero folding much. Now with 1 other person flatting we already get 3BB more added to the pot, and is probably going to put in a couple BB more on average on the flop, now we might only need 14:1 to setmine. Then we throw in the other guy who puts 3BB more in and is going to put in a BB or 2 more on average when we hit a set. Now we might only need 12:1. The odds we need to setmine go down because the amount we win on average goes up, and our potential winnings go up (when 3 people that cover us our in the pot we can theoretically quadruple up).
On top of this direct odds are slightly better than implied odds because they're guaranteed. If our odds of flopping a set are 7.5:1 (but say we don't win all of the time we flop a set so we need more like 8.5:1 to breakeven), and we have 5.5:1 direct odds already, we need them to put in ~6BB more on average post flop to breakeven. Given the pot is already 13.5BB, that's less than <1/2 pot bet on average to make our money back. I'd say we easily get that every time. There might be a suuuper small % of the time that we win the pot with a set without getting any more money put in, but that will be made up by the times that 1 guy bets and gets a call, or a raise, and we make even more back.
**many people say 20:1 implied odds but it's a slight misuse of the term usually I think because just because we have 20:1 stack odds doesn't mean we're stacking them 100% of the time we hit a set, so our implied odds are naturally lower
