is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

am starting to really wonder how much of a role luck plays in a large tournament.

last night, i had just got my internet connection back so playing a $1 NL tournament with 150 people. hit a few AA fairly early (after going 900 hands without) but couldn't get people to commit too much $$$$ early on, but i was doing quite well.

then went cold and an aggressive guy just ran over the table. so i'm waiting to take this guy down and i had a comfortable #'s of chips (1800, 1000 start, and leader = 19000)... so i doubled up thru him and had a couple of other nice plays. got myself to 6,000.

anyhow, eventually it's 3 am and i need to get to bed. so i go all-in on Q7s and, lo and behold, get three callers. i can't remember the hand but i won.... so now i'm an overwhelming chip leader (and went on to win the tournament). but the whole basis for my win was stupid "going to bed" all-in.

somewhat similarly, my friend finished 4th out of 70 people in a pretty tough home tournament ($50 per person). but he was down to one card and needing to hit the flush. either he was super-low (running on fumes) or chip leader of whole tournament (fairly early) based on one card draw.

i guess it seems alright as we won, and i don't generally spew chips or anything....

one thing i noticed online is that no one ever raises until they have something really good. classic, classic, predictable betting patterns. very little raising in general. i was the only one i saw who utilized strongly.

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

poker is a game of chance so yes, luck plays a very important role here. The skill of the game comes from being able to read players and knowing the math of the game (%, equity, etc.)

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

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am starting to really wonder how much of a role luck plays in a large tournament. .....one thing i noticed online is that no one ever raises until they have something really good.

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[img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

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am starting to really wonder how much of a role luck plays in a large tournament.

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I posted this in another forum a while ago:

Isn't this sort of question quite meaningless? Poker is in part a game of chance and in part a game of skill. Luck determines the cards that fall. In respect of who gets what cards and when they get them, the game is 100% luck. But luck will even out for everyone in the long run. No one is inherently "lucky" at poker. A winning player and a losing player will each benefit from and suffer from luck equally over a lifetime.

Skill, which in poker comes down primarily to making correct decisions with a positive expectation, is the only element of poker that creates profit over and above the long term levelling effect of luck (of course, with the rake, luck will end up considerably worse than even). Since in the long run a poker player will lose as much by being unlucky as he will win by being lucky, he is dependent entirely on skill to make a profit. In this respect, poker is 100% skill.

To use a simplified example, let's look at flipping a coin. A friend offers to flip a coin a billion times. If it comes up heads, he'll pay me $1.05. If it comes up tails, I'll pay him $1.00. The number of times it falls either heads or tails is dependent entirely on luck. No decision of mine can make heads or tails more likely. On the other hand, the profitability of my decision is in no way dependent on how the coin falls. I have used my skill (such as it is) to make an obviously correct decision and take a bet when I have the best of it. My profit depends entirely on my skill, and not on the flip of the coin. An event that is random, and therefore 100% luck, has by virtue of my decision transformed into a wager that is 100% skill.

Having said all that, I think it's much easier for limit grinders like me to view poker in this way than for people who play the occasional multi-player tournament. No one wins any particular tournament without getting "lucky". Long term profitability over a (long) career of tournaments depends entirely on skill.

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

This is a common mistake that newer players make all the time. It isn't that luck plays such a big role, its VARIANCE. The luck evens out in the end, but in tournaments, it takes way longer to even out. The nature of poker-- especially tournament poker is such that you can always win or lose in the short term, regardless of how good/bad you are-- no matter what. There are donkeys who luckbox there way to final tables all the time, but they still are losing players over the long term, they just got a great rush of cards in that specific tournament.

The amount of "luck" involved in tournament poker, and poker in general, is minimal in the long term. In cash games, if you are a winning player, you probably will rarely have a losing month (but you still will sometimes), but in tournament poker you very often will have losing months, because of the insane variance. That said, you also could have insane rushes where you are playing well, and running well (case in point: Rizen, Sirio11) and the results will just keep coming.

With regards to larger tournaments, there is an insane amount of short term luck involved. If you play a 2000 person tournament, the chances of winning without a few key suckouts are almost non-existant. Think of it this way. Say ever person in a 2000 person tournament had the same chance of winning- 1/2000. Now say theres one player who has 5x the chance of winning (this person would have to be insanely good, and this is probably not a sustainable ROI), he still only has a 1/400 chance of winning.

Obviously tournament success is not arbitrary. Why would we have a forum for it if it was. So we could discuss how to use our pattern mappers, and find the most rigged online sites (I'm looking in your direction POKERSTARS [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img])?

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

thanks for the responses!!

i'm not a beginner, i just am really shocked at all the luck in the short-term. as someone said (very valuable comment), you probably do need a couple of huge suckouts to win a 150-200 person tournament. OTOH, i don't think winning those suckouts is sufficient to win or place very highly. i've seen guys get to dominant cheap leader thru risky aggressive plays and luck, but then they don't practice money management and eventually get taken huge.

regarding my comment about no one ever raising without something really good, i meant a strong made hand. no one seems to raise AK, AQ. not even sure they'll raise QQ. they want to see the flop, but if it's low cards, you won't get action. if it's ace, then you're in big trouble potentially.

two other things about raising online. alot of people seem to use 2x raise which is already in the box (my site). they won't seem to raise 3-5X ala harrington.

and people never seem to adjust too much to the higher level of blinds. they still think we're at 20-40 blinds, when we're at 500 big blind. never ever see 1500 raise at that level of blinds unless someone has nuts or close to it.

people barely raise until the turn/river anyhow and at that ppoint you should have folded or have good idea you beaten (or occasionally be able to go "over the top"!!!)

bear in mind, this is online at my site. B&M (or home) no limit tournaments have been alot more difficult.

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

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one thing i noticed online is that no one ever raises until they have something really good. classic, classic, predictable betting patterns. very little raising in general. i was the only one i saw who utilized strongly.

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you've played in one $1 entry fee tourney, and you're ready to state this as fact?

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

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you've played in one $1 entry fee tourney, and you're ready to state this as fact?

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i just got my internet connection BACK UP today after a couple of weeks down.... i've probably played 60-70 no-limit tournaments online, and yes a bias towards the lower entry fees.

good news though, i have nominated you for "troll of the year"

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

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eventually it's 3 am and i need to get to bed. so i go all-in on Q7s

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Starting a tournament when you don't have time to finish it is a big leak.

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

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you've played in one $1 entry fee tourney, and you're ready to state this as fact?

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i just got my internet connection BACK UP today after a couple of weeks down.... i've probably played 60-70 no-limit tournaments online, and yes a bias towards the lower entry fees.

good news though, i have nominated you for "troll of the year"

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Why? He's absolutely right. Even 60-70 tournaments isn't a large enough sample size.

(I've been having a good run lately, but I busted out of a tournament yesterday with TT after a TT5 flop, so I think all my variance caught up to me at once.) [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

Regarding no one raising: If you want to see raising, play at PP. Their tournaments, especially low buy-in, R + A, and free rolls are full of action. That's why one of their tournaments that started with 2,500 people can be down to 500 in a couple of hours.

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

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i've probably played 60-70 no-limit tournaments online, and yes a bias towards the lower entry fees.

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It's a very good idea to keep detailed track of your tournament-buy-ins - and your results.

60 - 70 tournaments - and especially when it's micro-buy-in tournaments - is a very sparse foundation to conclude anyting on. Most of the regular posters here (including yours truly) play this many tournaments every month - at least.

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i have nominated you for "troll of the year"

[/ QUOTE ]Guess I now have earned an nomination as well, right?

Keep plugging.

Best,

McMelchior (Johan)

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

Lemme tellya somethin' 'bout luck ....

Don't let it get into your head, whether good or bad. I just had the most lucky turns of cards I've ever seen in a single MTT and it still wasn't good enough to get to the money. This was out of this world.

- Bad beat early in MTT on the short stack; all in 77 v AJo, flop ace, turn blank, river 7, still alive

- Short time later, still short stack, all in JJ v AQ, flop ace, turn J, still alive

- Mid-tourney about 90 minute point, JJ again, not pressured to go all in but think I have the best of it, so I push and get TT v AJo, flop comes QAA, turn is a blank and T on the river, still alive

- Late tourney medium short stack, still need more than a double for the money, again think I have the best of it and push JJ v AKo, again Ace flop and J turn, still alive

But alas it's feast or famine as with two or three exceptions, those are the only starting hands I see. The big stacks are aggressive and getting in the pot first and I am powerless to do anything with my medium hands. I end up limping to the exit seeing 74o and 72o for 3/4 of the final orbit.

Moral of the story, keep it in your head that luck means nothing. You can make a cash with bad luck. You can not make a cash with good luck. Sure good luck can't hurt in the right spots, but you'll get enough of both that it will even out.

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

Not possible, what hand could have beat quad tens?

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

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Not possible, what hand could have beat quad tens?

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Running JJ, QQ, KK, AA with matching pocket pair??

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

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Not possible, what hand could have beat quad tens?

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Running JJ, QQ, KK, AA with matching pocket pair??

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Don't forget runner runner royal.

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

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bear in mind, this is online at my site. B&M (or home) no limit tournaments have been alot more difficult.

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What site is this?

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

vis-a-vis sample sizes, it was basically an observation more than stating anything definitive or trying to prove anything.

i have seldom seen alot of aggression pre-flop (or the correct raise amount as per harrington) in low buy-in no limit. although i have no doubt there'd be more aggressive people at higher levels. although probably still enough people who don't what they're doing.

i have played probably 1500 hours of low limit, and there i seldom see people with the big pre-flop raises (more often than no-limit though, that's for sure).

i did very well today (2 SNG's and 1 tournament). i think i'm playing more like harrington suggests (i.e. very tight) and the cards are running very hot (trust me, i've been on the other side of it where i wanted to cry after being busted 8 times in row)

it seems like the worst players are the weak-tight. they just seem to fade away into oblivion and you can often get them off o.k. hands with a very small bet. aggressive players on the hand always make me nervous even if they aren't that good.

Re: is tournament success this arbitrary??
 

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Not possible, what hand could have beat quad tens?

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AA with runner-runner AA.
I'll post the hand as soon as I can get a converter to work, not just for a bad beat post, but because I'm curious what people think of my line.