[AKQJ10]

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My question is - what if you don't play enough MTTs to SEE the 'long-run.' Do/should you play the same?


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A related question -- in my mind, they're equivalent or at least strongly related -- is, "How does it change tournament strategy if your utility function isn't directly related to your cash payoff?"

In other words -- suppose winning the WSOP ME is the only thing I care about in life. Nothing else matters. Therefore, if finishing first is worth a trillion "utils", finishing second isn't worth 333 billion utils (or whatever the ratio of payoffs is).

The reason this is related to the short-term is, if you can't generate enough trials then all the theory about winning a bet X times and losing Y times goes out the window. Risking the rent money on a good gamble is a bad idea, because if I lose the rent money I can't hang around long enough to wait for good fortune to catch up with me -- I'm broke!

Of course we all understand not to bet the rent check, but even adequately-bankrolled bets with the best of it can be -EV in utility terms. If I play Foxwoods $4/8 for 12 hours, there's a decent chance I may end down $200. If I'm down that much, I will be miserable for the next couple of weeks. Therefore, even though there's not a doubt in my mind that I can beat the $4/8 over the long run, I don't play it unless I've already won some at $2/4. That's -EV in cash, but +EV in utility. (Hopefully as I win more at $2/4 I'll give myself more emotional leeway to play higher.)