Why Do Poker Solvers Love Ace Five Suited So Much?

Have you ever wondered why people seem to talk about Ace 5 suited as if it's a magic hand that we should always play aggressively, or perhaps you've heard players or commentators refer to it as the solver hand? If you have, this video is for you.

Let's start with the basics and talk about the properties of the hand itself. The best way to look at Ace-5 suited is that it's one of very few hands in the deck which possess the properties of multiple different hand classes at the same time. In fact, it may be the only one.

Connectedness

Yes, this hand can't give open-enders, unlike 76s. But this is compensated by the fact that you can't flop a lower straight with it. If you have 76s and the flop comes , then you have no outs against QJs – and at the same time you do not block the first nuts. The same can be said about on the flop — we're losing and we don't block. Plus, if you have a flash backdoor, you can buy a flash – and lose to a flash stronger.

Well, what if you hit the flop? , you only lose 65s – and you block one of these combinations. So it's much safer to play a big pot. And if you flop a backdoor flush, it will always be the nuts.

Here it is worth noting that A4s and A3s will also rarely lose to a stronger straight. But A2s is less promising, because you can lose to 67s on the flop . This is one of the reasons why the solver doesn't like A2s so much. Another reason is that the machine doesn't like the 2 in hand, which blocks part of the opponents' passing range. And anyway, the kicker 5 is better than 2!

Also, don't forget that with a small suited ace you can flop a straight flush or a straight with a nut flush draw. And the boards will be such that opponents will often give action.

Suit

We've already mentioned the value of the nut backdoor flush draw. But it's worth talking about the regular flush draw itself! With A5s, you not only get to buy the nut flush, but you also don't block weaker flushes in your opponents' ranges. This puts you on the right side of the cooler – and you can stack off lower flushes, including second nuts.

We can also hit a flush right away and get a top pair + flush draw with a king from our hand. That is, you will often be paid with hands with virtually no equity. You can also buy a pair and a flush draw or a pair and a backdoor on the flop: in both cases, you will have the opportunity to play aggressively. And finally, you can hit a top pair + flush draw, and your opponent can just hit a flush draw. In this case, he can choose an aggressive line, having no outs at all.

And you also have an ace!

This is what sets A5s apart from other suited hands. You'll often win the pot with top pair. Heck, you might not even need a pair! For example, when you bet a flush draw in position, didn't buy anything by the river, gave up – and still won the pot because your opponent had a lower flush draw.

Another plus of the ace is that it blocks the top of your opponent's range. When you raise, you are less likely to get 3-bet. When you 3-bet, you are less likely to get 4-bet. This is very valuable preflop! And postflop, on any board without an ace, you will always have 3 outs to top pair. And at the same time, you block possible top pairs with top kicker in your opponent's range. This again gives you the opportunity to play aggressively postflop.

A small kicker also works in your favor. It doesn't overlap with your opponent's range and doesn't block potential bluffs. This is especially important when you get a three-bet preflop.

In general, A5s is such a powerful hand because it combines the properties of several categories of hands at once. If I had to describe in one word what is good about it, I would choose the word "versatility". In Hold'em, as we know, an ace can be both a high card and a low card – which allows A5s to achieve a variety of goals depending on the situation.

This is a suited connector that can hit a strong top pair. It is a hand with perfect blockers and unblockers – and it also makes straights and flushes. So it is no wonder that the solver respects it so much! Now let's look at a couple of examples.

Example 1: Very deep stacks

Let's start with an example in deep stacks in a rakeless environment (Chip EV).

Stacks are 300 BB each, table is 8-max. We open with A5s with a UTG raise of 3 BB.

The hand is well within the raising range, but that's not the interesting part. Let's quickly take a little quiz. Which of these hands do you think has the same EV expectation from a raise from UTG as A5s?

Answer options: AQo, KTs, and 65s.

Think a little and check yourself:

Now let's move from A5s to the button. The player on UTG opened with a raise to 3BB, how does the solver react?

He never folds A5s, mixing 3bets (60% of the time) and calls (40%). But again, this is not even interesting, but the EV that the hand generates.

A5s earns 0.16 BB, or 16 BB per 100. That's more than any pocket pair from and lower and any suited ace weaker than ATs.

Now let's go back to UTG – how does the solver play against a 3-bet from the button? This is where we see the true magic of A5s.

Solver will 4-bet A5s 70% of the time! More often than not, only one hand in the range 4-bets – aces. It's all about that perfect ratio of blockers to unblockers. Everything will become clear when we look at how the button reacts to a 4-bet. Here's his folding range:

Please note two things:

• Solver folds a lot of hands that are stronger than Ax, including Ako
• The rest of the hands in the folding range don't overlap with A5s – and we'll unblock them all

Here is the 5-bet range:

Literally all hands that 5-bet at least occasionally contain an ace, so the effectiveness of a bluff 4-bet with A5s is at its maximum:

• We unblock most hands that play 3bet/fold
• We block all hands that can respond with a 5-bet

And an interesting bonus for last.

Look at the hands that call a 4-bet. Specifically, these two:

The solver adds 65s and 54s to the button calling range to cover different board types. So not only do we lock down the 5-bet range and unblock folds, we also get value when dominant hands call! On flops like or we can win a huge pot in this case. And because of this, the overall equity of A5s will be slightly higher than that of the button's range.

Example 2: tournament

Depth 40 BB, button vs SB.

We're on the button with A5s (solver will always raise), SB 3-bet (13% of the time, pretty wide):

In response, the machine will play A5s 4bet push 100% of the time:

Why? Because of the same flawless combination of blockers and unblockers. Let's look at the small blind's 3-bet/call range. It's largely made up of ace-high hands that we block:

And at the same time, we don't block a lot of hands that the machine will 3-bet/fold:

Pushing with A5s generates +1 BB in EV — and that's good in itself. It also balances our 4-bet/push range and forces the opponent to call, including with medium pocket pairs from 66 to 99 and good (but not nut) Ah like AT. It's clear that we don't want such calls with a specific hand (A5s), but we do want them with our range in general, because we'll be printing money when we have 99-QQ, AQ, AK. For the same reason, 4-bet/pushing with 88 generates as much as +3 BB, with 99 — 4 BB, with TT — almost 7 BB, JJ — more than 9 BB. And AQ/AJ also make great money over the long run precisely because of this.

If you only push nuts, you won't get called enough. If you push too wide, your opponents will call too often. And for balancing your pushing range, A5s is just perfect. And it's not scary to push it: you'll get a lot of folds, and A5s has great equity against most of the calling range. That's the whole secret!