'The System' improvements?

Rudbaeck · #1 01-22-2005, 01:07 PM

I have a head cold and can't focus enough to play, and was bored out of my skull, so I played 20 5+1 SnG's using 'The System' from TPFAP.

I won one, didn't reach the money in the other 19. Seems to me that The System is a bit too loose, did anyone ever get around to doing extensive sims trying to figure out the 'correct' pushes? (If it's folded to you on the button on level 1 it's a push with 54s according to the System.)

Yes, it's obvious I do better playing my regular game. But I have a little boy's fascination with breaking things, and figuring out exactly how broken NL tournies are if lots of dead money play like this is fun. Especially when sick.

jstirrell · #2 01-22-2005, 01:35 PM

1) The system was not designed for SnGs
2) The system was designed for the WSOP, or other high buyin events, not 5+1 Sngs
3) I believe the system reccomends you wait through the early rounds and does not reccomend pushing with 54s on level one.
4) The system was not designed for SnGs

I don't play in tournaments but these things seem obvious.

Rudbaeck · #3 01-22-2005, 01:48 PM

1) Duh.

2) Well, in WSOP today you'd be called plenty of times by crappy hands. The 2,000 or so dead money players would love to call you... I guess one could argue that it would have been good before the poker boom, but we'll never know, will we?

3) Yes, obviously one can wait through the early rounds. But if you do the math for the pushes 54s on the button when it's folded is correct according to the system.

4) Duh.

There still should be a way to figure out the math for an optimal all-in strategy. Yes, it would be worse than optimal real play, but by how much?

Stew · #4 01-22-2005, 04:45 PM

[ QUOTE ]
1) Duh.

2) Well, in WSOP today you'd be called plenty of times by crappy hands. The 2,000 or so dead money players would love to call you... I guess one could argue that it would have been good before the poker boom, but we'll never know, will we?

3) Yes, obviously one can wait through the early rounds. But if you do the math for the pushes 54s on the button when it's folded is correct according to the system.

4) Duh.

There still should be a way to figure out the math for an optimal all-in strategy. Yes, it would be worse than optimal real play, but by how much?

[/ QUOTE ]

I think like the poster above said you applied a system to something it wasn't designed for, thus you can't say it's broken. Further, there is an optimal mathematical strategy for all-in situations, but that doesn't mean it's 100% full-proof. In other words, if you have a mathematically correct situation to push all-in with 45s on the button and get called by aces, that doesn't mean the math wasn't wrong, that means you ran into a better hand and over the course of 20 tournaments (which is a statistically insigifagant sample) that will happen.

Oh, and one other thing, the original system was not the same as the one you are using. The one you are using is David's modified system which is mathematically optimal.

Rudbaeck · #5 01-22-2005, 05:06 PM

No, it's not optimal unless it was by blind chance. Sklansky says so himself in the text, see page 132 of TPFAP. "Let me reiterate that the above guidelines are very far from perfect. A deep analysis, perhaps with the aid of a computer, would result in more precise and accurate criteria."

It's still a rough draft.

So, which changes would need to be made for it to work in a sng? And more interesting perhaps, which changes need to be made now that basically all major tournaments have vastly multiplied the percentage of dead money more than willing to gamble it up? (You're going to get called rather often during the first three or four days of the WSOP main event.)

In neither case do I believe that a system like this is better than optimal play, but it's very interesting to see how broken no limit as a betting system is.

binions · #6 01-22-2005, 06:36 PM

Sklansky published the System which was pretty basic, then came out with a modified System that had you dividing the SB + BB + antes into your stack, (or if you had the biggest stack of who had acted or those who were left to act, the next biggest stack among that group).

Is this the system you are talking about?