The Tournament Quiz

[c9h13no3]

ICM is not the only answer in tourneys.
You wont be the 1st cash game player or tourney player either,that I will disagree with on tourneys,im use to it.

Just a side note, Michael Binger & bluff magazine disagree with you as well.

http://www.bluffmagazine.com/magazine/Making-Big-Laydowns-Michael-Binger-1408.htm

In the article he presents a similar situation as question #2, and uses ICM to justify a fold. Its pretty standard.

You can win plenty of tournaments without using any sort of method to value your tournament chips. But if you want to take your game to the next level, you should at least figure out what it means.

 

[ethon]

The A9s vs JJ is a tricky spot -- personally, I'd tend to side with Snow on this one. I want him to call here 95% of the time, if only because of effective M ratio. Essentially, if you win that pot you earn 2 orbits before you are blinded in.

Also, the idea of folding JJ in this spot (Effective M of 1.06) is laughable -- are you going to see better cards before you get blinded out and not even have a CHANCE of making it ITM?

The more and more I think about it, A is the right answer 100% of the time.

 

[c9h13no3]

Also, the idea of folding JJ in this spot (Effective M of 1.06) is laughable

I'm not advocating folding JJ. I'm saying you want your opponent to fold, and give you 300 chips with no risk. Folding JJ in this spot would be the worst possible move. But the fact is that your opponent folding shows a slightly higher expectation than when he calls.

You guys just aren't taking into account how little the extra chips help you. The extra chips you win when you win the all in shove don't do much. You're still the shortest stack at the table. But you have a 32% chance of getting nothing when you lose.

I figured this would be a pretty controversial question when I posted it. But I guess that's why even though SnG's are a solved game, there's still plenty of money to be had playing them.

And telling me "I'm a bad tourney player" is fine. I know I am. However, this isn't really debatable. Even if I was bad at cash games, I still know how to calculate pot odds, and determine if something is the correct decision or not. What you're telling me by saying A is the correct answer to question #2 is that numbers are wrong. 1+1 = 3, or something like that. And that just doesn't make any sense.

 

[c9h13no3]

Ive killed low stakes tourneys over a large sample size.

Btw, I took the liberty of checking your OPR data.

On pokerstars, as $nowmobiler, you have a -85% ROI over 11 tournaments.
On Full Tilt, as urajackazz, you have a 19% ROI over 24 tournaments.

I'm not sure I'd call that a large sample size...

You do have a large number of SnG's played on P-stars, and I wouldn't be surprised that you have a decent ROI in them. But really, this isn't a contest of lets compare ROI. You should be able to debunk my argument with some reason, and you haven't really provided any of that.

 

[ethon]

You guys just aren't taking into account how little the extra chips help you. The extra chips you win when you win the all in shove don't do much. You're still the shortest stack at the table. But you have a 32% chance of getting nothing when you lose.

Well, you're going to have to double up in order to make a run at this. If you take the free 300, you're now at 1100. But if you have him call and win, you're at 1700, right? That's a HUGE difference in the sense of your next play.

Say you get AA the next hand. You'd be in CO spot, not having put any more blinds in, and lets say BB calls your all-in and you win the hand.

Would you rather be sitting at 2300 chips or 3500?

 

[ethon]

And by no means am I attacking your thought process c9 -- just explaining the line I would personally take. Yeah, I'm going to go busto 31.5% of the time, but I'm fine with that if it puts me, even marginally closer to taking it down.

 

[Snowmobiler]

C9,calculate how often you are going to bust out of the money, after you make this JJ fold

Honestly,if you make this fold you stand no chance in tournaments!

Im fist pumping to have this spot here and this situation.





Snow

 

[c9h13no3]

C9,calculate how often you are going to bust out of the money, after you make this JJ fold

Pre Flop: (300 chips) Hero is BB with J♣ J♥
UTG folds, Hero goes all in for 800

How can I fold when I'm already all in? How can you argue against a post you didn't read? Why do I bother replying to your quips?

 

[ethon]

How can I fold when I'm already all in? How can you argue against a post you didn't read? Why do I bother replying to your quips?

Fair enough, I kind of neglected the fact that we are already in this pot. I still stand by my maths/double up though.

 

[Snowmobiler]

[/color][/color][/color]How can I fold when I'm already all in? How can you argue against a post you didn't read? Why do I bother replying to your quips?

In your example,You get to decide what you want the other guy to do,
To me if you want him to fold, then you should be willing to fold your hand in this spot.Whats the differance?

Either way it is a mistake my point has been consistant although I understand the confusion,sorry

If your next post is the same caliber as your last one,I wont be replying.

You ask for help,Ive tried to give it.You reject it.Thats cool with me,I tried




Snow

 

[c9h13no3]

To me if you want him to fold, then you should be willing to fold your hand in this spot.Whats the differance?

Pre Flop: (300 chips)

You see, there's these things called blinds. And when the blinds are 38% of your stack, winning them is kinda cool.

 

[Snowmobiler]

C9,I know I didn't explain myself well in that last couple of post,however
your opponant isnt ever turning there cards up and letting you decide what to do.I tried to convert it into real world situation and I made it confusing and a bad example.Its 3 am so my bad.

Im really glad you want the guy to fold his a9 to your JJ.

No hard feelings :icon_sant


Snow :icon_bigs

 

[ethon]

I <3 this thread.

 

[dufferdevon]

Let's do the reverse of this problem. If we have A-9, then we are correct in calling J-J's all in, according to ICM ? If I know he has J-J - then I only have 3 outs and I am folding to conserve my chips.

 

[Stick66]

In #2, I understand what you're saying about chip value C9. But when you are that low on chips and you are a 68% fave, it seems like you shouldn't be waiting for a better situation than to go up against Ace-rag. Settling for the 300 chips is almost like a defeat. The danger of getting blinded out should be considered, also.

And you justify it by showing a 0.4 % equity difference? Close enough for me, man. I'd rather use the power of my JJ to try to double up while I still have a stack big enough to help me more now. You never know when you'll be card dead.

(And if you look up my OPR, keep in mind that I play mostly turbo STT's with 3 minute blinds on FTP that take a bit more luck. I like turbos because my attention span is quite small.)

 

[c9h13no3]

And you justify it by showing a 0.4 % equity difference?

Yeah, the difference is really small. I intentionally picked an example that was really close between call & fold so that you guys would go "WHAT? No way him folding shows a higher expectation".

The trick is, its not "picking a better spot" to double up. Its just the decision between having 300 chips risk free or 900 with 32% risk of going busto. And keep in mind, you don't have to double up to come in 3rd. You just have to last longer than some other player. The outcome would also drastically change if we had the BB covered, since we wouldn't lose instantly if he wins the all in.

Let's do the reverse of this problem. If we have A-9, then we are correct in calling J-J's all in, according to ICM ?

1 quick thing before I run this example: ICM isn't some magical decision making engine. Its just a way to put a dollar value on tournament chips.

ICM Calculator Link

If villain 2 folds A6s (not A9, the example was with A6s) he will have 4900 chips. If we plug the resulting stacks into the ICM calculator, he has 32.3% tournament equity.

If he calls, his average tournament equity will be (0.318)(0.368) + (0.682)(0.296) = 31.9%.

So if other considerations are negligible (skill difference between players, ect.) then the BB should fold to your shove.

Which is why so much emphasis on tournament strategy is about open shoving. In almost all cases in the end game strategy of a SnG, unless your hand is extremely strong, it is more profitable to pick up the blinds than to put yourself at risk. So the standard advice is to always go all in preflop if your M is 10 or less, so that you maximize your fold equity and the chance you win the blinds without a chance of being eliminated.

If the point of the hand was to get the money all in as a favorite, then we'd limp in, or min-raise, or do something so that causes villain to put money into the pot with as wide a range as possible.

The point is, in a tournament, chips have diminishing value. Having 99% of the chips in the tournament does not mean you will win 99% of the prize pool. And therefore, you need a bigger edge than pot odds require to correctly put $ into the pot.

And don't worry, I'm not going to look up your OPR stats stick . You haven't turned the discussion into a "who has more tournament wins" contest. Poker is a game of making logical decisions, and I like people who logically discuss things, rather than just saying "People on cards chat fear my game, I have tons of tourney wins, so that means I'm obviously right." And when people make claims like that, its often just too easy to go on OPR and burst their ego bubble ^_^.

 

[Snowmobiler]

You say you are no good at tourneys,but now you act like you are an expert.

How often is the guy going to turn his cards up and let you decide if he folds or not.Have him fold A9 to your little stack so you can increase your stack without a showdown. Gl with that!

You seem to have a good grasp of how tourneys play!I think most will do this for you and you will win big monies!
nice work champ

You also seem to completely ignore the other Tourney players are agreeing with me.




Snow

 

[WVHillbilly]

You say you are no good at tourneys,but now you act like you are an expert.

How often is the guy going to turn his cards up and let you decide if he folds or not.Have him fold A9 to your little stack so you can increase your stack without a showdown. Gl with that!

You seem to have a good grasp of how tourneys play!I think most will do this for you and you will win big monies!
nice work champ

You also seem to completely ignore the other Tourney players are agreeing with me.




Snow

Pretty sure C9 knows this is never going to happen in an actual tourney. It's a hypothetical situation used to get people to realize that you want your opponent to fold his equity rather than call because the value of the chips you get 100% of the time your opponent folds > the value of the chips you get 68% of the time when he calls. Yes, it's not much greater but that doesn't change the FACT that you should want your opponent to fold.

Instead of learning something though it seems that you guys are just trying to argue points that irrelevant to the original question. How good/bad your results are in tournaments doesn't change the fact that you're wrong on this one.

 

[Snowmobiler]

Pretty sure C9 knows this is never going to happen in an actual tourney. It's a hypothetical situation used to get people to realize that you want your opponent to fold his equity rather than call because the value of the chips you get 100% of the time your opponent folds > the value of the chips you get 68% of the time when he calls. Yes, it's not much greater but that doesn't change the FACT that you should want your opponent to fold.

Instead of learning something though it seems that you guys are just trying to argue points that irrelevant to the original question. How good/bad your results are in tournaments doesn't change the fact that you're wrong on this one.

It doesnt matter what you want your opponant to do.He isnt going to listen to you.If you want to hope that he folds a9 to your pocket jacks in this scenario then go ahead, that is up to you.

In a real tourney A9 is raising enough to put your little stack in and JJ is calling....period.You will have to win a showdown with JJ here without question.

Even after you win this showdown you are still in critical shape and need another quick pot to keep from busting.

I stand by my thinking and you guys can pray A9 folds here,I just dont see how your info helps to win a tourney which is what is important to me.

Back to my winning ways,gl with your silly arguments :icon_sant


Snow

 

[WVHillbilly]

Fair enough but don't you think that coming into a thread like this should be to learn something not just to cling to what you think is correct?

Also you go back to a real tourney situation were you just know your opponent isn't folding A6s (not to mention you confuse the facts further by saying the A6s villain is raising us, hard since we're all-in) but that's NOT the situation presented in the problem.

The question is IF you go all-in with JJ and 800 chips do you want your opponent to call or fold the 300 chips in the blinds to you IF you know he holds precisely A6s. The answer to that question has zero to do with what your opponent will do or the fact that he'll never show you his cards or the fact that you're still in trouble if he folds or anything else. The answer is you want him to fold.

 

[Snowmobiler]

My point is the problem is flawed to what really happens in a tourney to the point of being useless info to me.

Please tell me in a real tourney situation,how to use this info that, I hope my opponant folds a hand that I shouldnt know what it is (but I do). A9 is a great hand in this situation

Oh by the way,I have no chips and 27 off should make me win a showdown here.

Oh btw I have JJ (lol) and Im thinking about folding just kidding about the folding (but for sure the small blind has to put pressure on you with any 2 if you were to fold.

Please explain again the big lesson I was suppose to learn?
In this situation A9 is always making me win a showdown here....period

Happy Holidays all

Snow :icon_sant

 

[Debi]

This was a great idea for a thread and I for one appreciate C9 doing something that can generate some good strategy discussion among tournament and sng players. His sole intention in doing this was to do that. He admits he is not a tournament player - but whether or not I agree with his strategies I have enough respect for his overall poker game skills and knowledge of poker that I would only debate strategy with him respectfully. (and reluctantly lol - but that is just me)

It should not be a debate about who is good at tournaments, who is beating sng's and how good anyone thinks they are.

If he minded that you have a different opinion than him he would not have purposely chosen what he thought to be a borderline decision - or one that he knew would generate debate.

So guys have a poker discussion and leave egos out of it. All of you have valuable contributions to make in this thread.

(I have cleaned the thread up a bit to keep it on track)

 

[spunka]

Question #2:


The following scenario occurs on the bubble of a SnG.

$100 SnG, Blinds 100/200, No antes, Payouts: 1st, $450; 2nd, $270; 3rd, $180

Folder is UTG with 3600 chips
Hero is BTN with 800 chips
Folder 2 is SB with 4000 chips
Villain 2 is BB with 5100 chips

Pre Flop: (300 chips) Hero is BB with J♣ J♥
UTG folds, Hero goes all in for 800, SB folds, BB flips over A♦ 6♦ and asks you if you want a call. He assures you he will do whatever you say, and the floor man says that whatever you tell him to do is binding. You reply with:

A. I have you dominated, call!
B. I am a scared little girl, please fold.

@snowmobiler and c9h13no3

I do think there is a flaw in the question maybe that cause the misunderstandings..

It's says Hero is on the BTN on top next it says hero is the BB

Folder is UTG with 3600 chips
Hero is BTN with 800 chips
Folder 2 is SB with 4000 chips
Villain 2 is BB with 5100 chips

Hero is BB with J♣ J♥

As to the other question especially the bubble questions it very much depends on:
1. Stacks other players have.
2. Bubble payout.
3. Your edge vs the other players.
4. Is the bubble pay out "worth" anything to you ? (bankroll management)
(let's say pay out is 500 and buyin is 450+50) now if you have sattelited to the tournament for 20+2 the 500 is a good payout, but if you paid 450+50 well you have justed wasted 3 - 5 hours, maybe gainde some experince had a good time but it makes a huge difference..

 

[Debi]

Hero is Btn - the BB is obviously a typo.

 

[spunka]

Let's do the reverse of this problem. If we have A-9, then we are correct in calling J-J's all in, according to ICM ? If I know he has J-J - then I only have 3 outs and I am folding to conserve my chips.

I do think what c9h13no3 is saying is shoving is good, calling is something completly different.

To call an open shove you need a very strong hand or have an amount of chips where you tournament life will not be in danger, to be able to call.

aka Sklansky's gap concept