The Poker Tournament Formula by Arnold Snyder...

[BigAlK]

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This is what I don’t like, its nice to build your stack early, but the important thing is to consistently make +EV decisions. All else is waffle.

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I don't think this is the case (advocating taking -EV gambles). If I could summarize the premise of the book in one sentence it might be that it is better (more +EV) to build your stack before blind pressure forces you to take on more risk than waiting until the blind pressure starts impacting everyone and the tournament becomes an all-in fest. He suggests situations where this can be done with relatively little risk (therefore +EV) that might go against conventional wisdom, such wisdom having been formed without taking into account how little time you have before the blinds become a major factor.

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You appear to be agreeing with my statement you quoted while claiming to disagree with it. When I said none of the four factors took precedence, I did not mean on each hand they were all equally important. On each hand one or two of the factors will often be irrelevant and sometimes one factor will supersede all others. However over a course of a fast structure tournament all four factors will be equally important in your decision-making.

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I misunderstood you here. We agree that all these factors are important and that different factors will have more weight in different situations. Our only apparent disagreement here is whether each hand should be considered in isolation. I suspect we're probably really in agreement there as well. I don't think you believe meta-game considerations such as table image don't matter at all.

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The impression I have got, which may be wrong because I have not read the book only this thread, is that the author is a bit confused but a large part of what he advises ends up being ok.

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I think if you read the book you might find that you agree with most of it - the confusion might be those of us who aren't the author trying to describe it for him. Also it's hard to summarize a concept in just a few paragraphs that takes a chapter of the book.