wamplerr
12-26-2002, 07:32 PM
I'm new to the forum, so I'm sorry if this has been debated before:
I can't say I feel very confident about anything that disagrees with books in the 2+2 series, but something is bothering me about calculating deals in tournaments.
My main problem is with the assumption that your chance of winning is your percentage of chips. In "Tournament Poker", Sklansky says players with equal skills and similar strategies will win in proportion to their chips. I cannot dispute this.
In his "Fundamental Secrets" book, Mike Caro says something about in a heads up situation, the short stack has a slightly better chance of winning than his chips because of an "all-in" advantage. If he's saying what I think he is, then I disagree. Sure there is an advantage to being all-in (As a few of the 2+2 books say, if you could somehow buy in for the ante each hand in a 7 card stud game and be all-in, you would make more than any pro is capable of making), but in a heads up situation, both players have this advantage. When the short stack is all-in, he gets to see all the cards and he will make a lot of backdoor straights, flushes, sets, etc. on hands that he would have been forced out after say the flop had there been betting. But I don't see any advantage to the short stack. The big stack will make just as many backdoor hands. In a heads up situation, with equally skilled players, using the exact chip proportion must work (as shown by a few math examples in "Tournament Poker").
When applying the same method to a tournament with 3 players left, I don't feel it works. Again, we're assuming the players are equally skilled and employing similar strategies.
Let's say the three players left A, B, and C have 50 dollars, 40 dollars, and 10 dollars respectively. Let's say the game is for everyone to ante a dollar, and roll a die. If the number is 1 or 2, player A wins the $3 pot, if the number is 3 or 4, player B wins, and 5 or 6 goes to player C. They are each equally skilled, and playing with the same strategy, so they should win 50%, 40%, and 10% of the time, and the methods used in "Gambling Theory" should work to find their chances of coming in 2nd or 3rd. This would be pretty easy to check using computer simulation.
Now here's a situation from a Limit Hold'em Tourney from the Hall of Fame classic this year: Huck Seed is a short stack, he raises all-in before the flop. Everyone folds to Scotty Nguyen on the small blind, who asks Huck "Do you want me to call?" All of the sudden, an inexperienced player on the Big Blind says "I'll call." Scotty folds, the Big Blind's AK beats Huck's 10J, and Huck is out.
Though never this obvious, big stacks are always in collusion against small stacks. In this case it was wrong, as the player on the Big Blind didn't know better, but in most cases it's just the way the game is played. So here's my point: In a poker tournament, if all players are equally skilled, and the chips are not evenly distributed, then players will not play with similar strategies. If all 3 players have read "Tournament Poker", then player B with 40 dollars is not going to get into many hands with player A that has 50 dollars. Priority number one for both of them is to get out player C and his 10 dollars.
So my intuition tells me, that if the math works for the die rolling situation, then it shouldn't work for the more complex situation of a 3 handed poker tournament. Now back to what Caro said earlier, now it seems to me that the short stack does have a bit of an all-in advantage, if the pot is 3-way. When he's all-in, he has the luxury of seeing all the cards, while the two bigger stacks may be bet out of the pot by the other. In practice however, the big stacks often check it down, so the "all-in advantage" shouldn't make up for the fact there is a form of "collusion" against the small stack. Sklansky says that the short stack tends to get less money than he should when making deals, but it seems to me the short stack in a poker tournament shouldn't deserve as much as the short stack in the dice rolling tournament if they were to make a 3 way deal.
Is anyone capable of running simulations like that?
I can't say I feel very confident about anything that disagrees with books in the 2+2 series, but something is bothering me about calculating deals in tournaments.
My main problem is with the assumption that your chance of winning is your percentage of chips. In "Tournament Poker", Sklansky says players with equal skills and similar strategies will win in proportion to their chips. I cannot dispute this.
In his "Fundamental Secrets" book, Mike Caro says something about in a heads up situation, the short stack has a slightly better chance of winning than his chips because of an "all-in" advantage. If he's saying what I think he is, then I disagree. Sure there is an advantage to being all-in (As a few of the 2+2 books say, if you could somehow buy in for the ante each hand in a 7 card stud game and be all-in, you would make more than any pro is capable of making), but in a heads up situation, both players have this advantage. When the short stack is all-in, he gets to see all the cards and he will make a lot of backdoor straights, flushes, sets, etc. on hands that he would have been forced out after say the flop had there been betting. But I don't see any advantage to the short stack. The big stack will make just as many backdoor hands. In a heads up situation, with equally skilled players, using the exact chip proportion must work (as shown by a few math examples in "Tournament Poker").
When applying the same method to a tournament with 3 players left, I don't feel it works. Again, we're assuming the players are equally skilled and employing similar strategies.
Let's say the three players left A, B, and C have 50 dollars, 40 dollars, and 10 dollars respectively. Let's say the game is for everyone to ante a dollar, and roll a die. If the number is 1 or 2, player A wins the $3 pot, if the number is 3 or 4, player B wins, and 5 or 6 goes to player C. They are each equally skilled, and playing with the same strategy, so they should win 50%, 40%, and 10% of the time, and the methods used in "Gambling Theory" should work to find their chances of coming in 2nd or 3rd. This would be pretty easy to check using computer simulation.
Now here's a situation from a Limit Hold'em Tourney from the Hall of Fame classic this year: Huck Seed is a short stack, he raises all-in before the flop. Everyone folds to Scotty Nguyen on the small blind, who asks Huck "Do you want me to call?" All of the sudden, an inexperienced player on the Big Blind says "I'll call." Scotty folds, the Big Blind's AK beats Huck's 10J, and Huck is out.
Though never this obvious, big stacks are always in collusion against small stacks. In this case it was wrong, as the player on the Big Blind didn't know better, but in most cases it's just the way the game is played. So here's my point: In a poker tournament, if all players are equally skilled, and the chips are not evenly distributed, then players will not play with similar strategies. If all 3 players have read "Tournament Poker", then player B with 40 dollars is not going to get into many hands with player A that has 50 dollars. Priority number one for both of them is to get out player C and his 10 dollars.
So my intuition tells me, that if the math works for the die rolling situation, then it shouldn't work for the more complex situation of a 3 handed poker tournament. Now back to what Caro said earlier, now it seems to me that the short stack does have a bit of an all-in advantage, if the pot is 3-way. When he's all-in, he has the luxury of seeing all the cards, while the two bigger stacks may be bet out of the pot by the other. In practice however, the big stacks often check it down, so the "all-in advantage" shouldn't make up for the fact there is a form of "collusion" against the small stack. Sklansky says that the short stack tends to get less money than he should when making deals, but it seems to me the short stack in a poker tournament shouldn't deserve as much as the short stack in the dice rolling tournament if they were to make a 3 way deal.
Is anyone capable of running simulations like that?