the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

is having them to your right while having a full stack to your left. does anyone think that a coherent argument could be made to the poker sites that allowing shortstackers makes the games less fair -- not because it creates an unfair advantage for the shortstackers, but because it arbitrarily creates unfair advantages between the remaining players?

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

That's just silly. Firstly, the advantage goes to whoever adapts best to the presence of the shortstacker, which is inherently unfair because it is based on whoever is skilled at poker. Secondly, you can't call it unfair, it's just like the retarded argument on facebook that wearing sunglasses at the poker table is unfair because it gives them an advantage. It's not unfair because you can do it as well - so if you're in a situation where you're sandwiched between a full-stack and a shortstack, you're always allowed to get up from your seat and wait for a better one. If game conditions mean you're not in a profitable spot, you get up, and it's bad play from you if you continue to sit in that bad spot.

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

How much do you want the minimum buy-in to be? At casinos around here it's 50 big blinds

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

[ QUOTE ]
How much do you want the minimum buy-in to be? At casinos around here it's 50 big blinds

[/ QUOTE ]

They should let you buyin between 50-infinity. 100bb would be better but that will kill games over 1/2.

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

Do you consider 50 BB to still be a "short stack"?

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

[ QUOTE ]
That's just silly. Firstly, the advantage goes to whoever adapts best to the presence of the shortstacker, which is inherently unfair because it is based on whoever is skilled at poker. Secondly, you can't call it unfair, it's just like the retarded argument on facebook that wearing sunglasses at the poker table is unfair because it gives them an advantage. It's not unfair because you can do it as well - so if you're in a situation where you're sandwiched between a full-stack and a shortstack, you're always allowed to get up from your seat and wait for a better one. If game conditions mean you're not in a profitable spot, you get up, and it's bad play from you if you continue to sit in that bad spot.

[/ QUOTE ]

i actually do get up if i'm sandwiched between a couple of tight shortstack and a decent full stack, but most people don't. i think you're being a tiny bit too dismissive of the idea that there is at least some unfairness here. let's say i get 4 shortstacking friends together and we intentionally take over a 6-max table with one deep stack, placing me immediately to his left, intending to take advantage of our superior position and sharing the profits after. even if we don't share cards or softplay each other or anything, i still think this would be kind of sketchy, bordering on collusion. and, although relevant, i don't think the fact that he can stand up relieves that sketchiness entirely.

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

[ QUOTE ]
Do you consider 50 BB to still be a "short stack"?

[/ QUOTE ]

not really. let me put it this way: having two 50 bb stacks to your right and two full stacks to your left would not be a very significant disadvantage. two 20bb stacks, on the other hand, most definitely would be.

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

I think that there shouldn't be a buy in below 35BB

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

I dont mind shortstackers, they are not much of a threat and never seem to win much.

I am a winning player every month and they are not a problem for me, cant see why anyone is afraid of them.

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

[ QUOTE ]
I dont mind shortstackers, they are not much of a threat and never seem to win much.

I am a winning player every month and they are not a problem for me, cant see why anyone is afraid of them.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't really mind shortstackers either, at least these days, because they tend to be really bad. But that doesn't change my point that having 80% or more of your stack always out of position is a huge disadvantage.

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Do you consider 50 BB to still be a "short stack"?

[/ QUOTE ]

not really. let me put it this way: having two 50 bb stacks to your right and two full stacks to your left would not be a very significant disadvantage. two 20bb stacks, on the other hand, most definitely would be.

[/ QUOTE ]

Slotboom devised his short-stacking strategy playing in a 50 BB minimum buy-in game.

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Do you consider 50 BB to still be a "short stack"?

[/ QUOTE ]

not really. let me put it this way: having two 50 bb stacks to your right and two full stacks to your left would not be a very significant disadvantage. two 20bb stacks, on the other hand, most definitely would be.

[/ QUOTE ]

Slotboom devised his short-stacking strategy playing in a 50 BB minimum buy-in game.

[/ QUOTE ]

so? i didn't say that playing 50bb in a deeper game wouldn't still give an advantage to the shortstacker, i just said that it wouldn't be nearly as big of a disadvantage for the player to his immediate left.

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

[ QUOTE ]
is having them to your right while having a full stack to your left. does anyone think that a coherent argument could be made to the poker sites that allowing shortstackers makes the games less fair -- not because it creates an unfair advantage for the shortstackers, but because it arbitrarily creates unfair advantages between the remaining players?

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't play fullstack often. It's easier to play shortstack (and I am not an elite player) especially when you multitabling and you create a form of cap-game, which for many reason is a decent professional move.

One thing I am quite convinced of, but can't prove because I do not collect any statistics from my own or other games, is that the problem at PLO is the medium stack. With a medium stack I mean 50-200BB against big stacks who often have much more. There you can talk of disadvantages - anyway is that my feeling when I play.

A big stack have to pay attention to shortstacks, but he just roll over the medium stacks (Of course every player can take advantage of shortstackers by the table if the player itself are good). So in my mind, you have to go for a very big stack or you should keep to short stack play. If your playing style is very laggy, then you go of course for the big stack advantage.

So my conclusion have nothing to do with position. If you want to forbid shortstackers (bit problematic I guess when they are all over the games in all form of poker - so it may hit the pokersites profit just to benefit the very minority of superior laggy big stack players), you should probably do it because you want to see another dynamic at the poker tables.

As medium stack you will always suffer under the massive pressure of a superior big stack player regardless where your position are. If the medium stack limp after I limp and the big stack raise after, and I re-raise, then you are in disadvantage. If I limp, the big stack raise and you call, and it's back to me and I re-raise, you are in disadvantage again. If you limp, I limp, the big stack raise, you call and I re-raise, you are in disadvantage. In all cases, not because of your position, just because of your stack size.

The bottom end is of course this. A good player will make profit regardless of the stacksize, but the medium stacks I am sure have not an easy task.

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
is having them to your right while having a full stack to your left. does anyone think that a coherent argument could be made to the poker sites that allowing shortstackers makes the games less fair -- not because it creates an unfair advantage for the shortstackers, but because it arbitrarily creates unfair advantages between the remaining players?

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't play fullstack often. It's easier to play shortstack (and I am not an elite player) especially when you multitabling and you create a form of cap-game, which for many reason is a decent professional move.

One thing I am quite convinced of, but can't prove because I do not collect any statistics from my own or other games, is that the problem at PLO is the medium stack. With a medium stack I mean 50-200BB against big stacks who often have much more. There you can talk of disadvantages - anyway is that my feeling when I play.

A big stack have to pay attention to shortstacks, but he just roll over the medium stacks (Of course every player can take advantage of shortstackers by the table if the player itself are good). So in my mind, you have to go for a very big stack or you should keep to short stack play. If your playing style is very laggy, then you go of course for the big stack advantage.

So my conclusion have nothing to do with position. If you want to forbid shortstackers (bit problematic I guess when they are all over the games in all form of poker - so it may hit the pokersites profit just to benefit the very minority of superior laggy big stack players), you should probably do it because you want to see another dynamic at the poker tables.

As medium stack you will always suffer under the massive pressure of a superior big stack player regardless where your position are. If the medium stack limp after I limp and the big stack raise after, and I re-raise, then you are in disadvantage. If I limp, the big stack raise and you call, and it's back to me and I re-raise, you are in disadvantage again. If you limp, I limp, the big stack raise, you call and I re-raise, you are in disadvantage. In all cases, not because of your position, just because of your stack size.

The bottom end is of course this. A good player will make profit regardless of the stacksize, but the medium stacks I am sure have not an easy task.

[/ QUOTE ]

Personally, I find playing a 50bb stack very interesting, and I think you can do a lot more with it than people think. There are some game conditions for which I think it would be ideal.

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

[ QUOTE ]
One thing I am quite convinced of, but can't prove because I do not collect any statistics from my own or other games, is that the problem at PLO is the medium stack. With a medium stack I mean 50-200BB against big stacks who often have much more. There you can talk of disadvantages - anyway is that my feeling when I play.

[/ QUOTE ]

Rolf Slotboom advises when you play a medium stack that you min-raise any pot you're going to enter. It essentially doubles the blinds making a 40-120 BB stack play more like a 20-60 BB stack.

He also talks about exactly the problem you mention. In his section about his experiences moving to the 10-20 online game, he says if he bought in for the minimum ($400) once he got over $1,000 he found no benefit to playing that size stack. So he'd advise that you quit, or top up to the max buy-in.

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Do you consider 50 BB to still be a "short stack"?

[/ QUOTE ]

not really. let me put it this way: having two 50 bb stacks to your right and two full stacks to your left would not be a very significant disadvantage. two 20bb stacks, on the other hand, most definitely would be.

[/ QUOTE ]

Slotboom devised his short-stacking strategy playing in a 50 BB minimum buy-in game.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah, but he was playing in a live game that probably saw much larger BB pots preflop than the online game most of us play. Did the game have a straddle in it to?

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Do you consider 50 BB to still be a "short stack"?

[/ QUOTE ]

not really. let me put it this way: having two 50 bb stacks to your right and two full stacks to your left would not be a very significant disadvantage. two 20bb stacks, on the other hand, most definitely would be.

[/ QUOTE ]

If you mean when you have 100 BB, then sure it doesn't make much of a difference, but I think it's important to have position on the big stacks no matter where the stacks are relative to the blinds. For instance (not that this comes up much on Stars), if I have a 500 BB stack and the person to my left also has a 500 BB stack, I think that's a huge disadvantage if everyone else at the table is at 100 BB. I won't stay at the table in that situation unless the 500 BB stack is really bad.

Also, the whole thing about a medium stack being at a disadvantage against a big stack is just silly unless the medium stack is playing like a bitch. If they're trying to maximize their equity and don't care about dropping a couple buy-ins here and there, there's no difference at all. The only way you could make an argument like that is if you're saying that the advantage you as a skilled player have over the other big-stacks as a big stack is enough to counter the edge the short-stackers have over you, whereas you're smaller edge as a medium stack isn't enough to cover that edge + the rake.

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Do you consider 50 BB to still be a "short stack"?

[/ QUOTE ]

not really. let me put it this way: having two 50 bb stacks to your right and two full stacks to your left would not be a very significant disadvantage. two 20bb stacks, on the other hand, most definitely would be.

[/ QUOTE ]

Slotboom devised his short-stacking strategy playing in a 50 BB minimum buy-in game.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah, but he was playing in a live game that probably saw much larger BB pots preflop than the online game most of us play. Did the game have a straddle in it to?

[/ QUOTE ]

Actually his regular game had a single $2 blind (in the $100 min game) and a single $5 blind (in the $200 min game). From how he describes there was a lot more pre-flop raising that I've found in most online PLO100 games. Not to say his games were overly aggressive. But I've seen few maniacs (or even semi-maniacs) in the Stars games.

Slotboom goes mention some 5-5-10 games. But apparently his main one was the single blind game.

Re: the main problem with shortstackers that no one seems to mention
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Do you consider 50 BB to still be a "short stack"?

[/ QUOTE ]

not really. let me put it this way: having two 50 bb stacks to your right and two full stacks to your left would not be a very significant disadvantage. two 20bb stacks, on the other hand, most definitely would be.

[/ QUOTE ]

If you mean when you have 100 BB, then sure it doesn't make much of a difference, but I think it's important to have position on the big stacks no matter where the stacks are relative to the blinds. For instance (not that this comes up much on Stars), if I have a 500 BB stack and the person to my left also has a 500 BB stack, I think that's a huge disadvantage if everyone else at the table is at 100 BB. I won't stay at the table in that situation unless the 500 BB stack is really bad.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes, I usually don't play deep with the only other deep stack to my left either. But I would guess more people pick up in that kind of situation than when they're on a normal full stack and have (good) short-stacks to their right.