The Poker Tournament Formula by Arnold Snyder...

[jdog1999]

I wanted to take a moment and thank Arnold and Mason for comenting in public.

Arnold I look at you book in B&N for the first time today and passed it over thinking "Here's some Lamo writting another Poker book" Now I can tell you I will pick up your book. I like the what you have written here and I like how you presented you ideas. You could have let this become personal instead the discussion was about ideas. I like that.

[Arnold_Snyder]

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Also, I wasn't sure about this....

The cards in cards vs. chips are much better cards than the cards in position vs. cards....correct?

Yet, I don't see a reason why they would be different. I would think everything would be pretty much constant as far as a concept goes.

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If I understand your question correctly, jackaaron, the answer is yes, my contention is you need better cards to go up against a big stack, even in position, than you need to go up against a normal stack in position, even when that normal stack is in front of a player who is indicating he probably has good cards.

A big chip stack can afford more risks, meaning a big stack can afford to play back at you or call you with lesser cards. If he has any legitimate hand, even a good draw, he is less likely to go away. If you have great cards, that makes him a great opponent because he's often more likely to double you up.

When you are playing position versus good cards against an opponent who has a relatively normal chip stack, however, your cards don't matter. My contention is that his good cards out of position will more often not be strong enough to continue in the hand against aggressive betting from a player who has position on him. To quote from Chapter 25 of my book, "...instead of waiting for the luck of good cards to bet, bet against your opponents' luck." You are on sound mathematical ground with these types of position plays against modest chip stacks that will feel threatened by your raises, because really strong hands are few and far between after the flop, and most players will fold more marginal hands when they're out of position. The nuts are rare.

In the book, I also clarify that the speed of the tournament dictates the frequency with which you will make plays like these, and there is also specific advice on the types of players that you should be confronting (and avoiding) with these types of plays. I don't want any players in here to just start using these plays without that foundation of understanding. The book is 350 pages, and I can only explain so much in a post.

[jackaaron]

This is good. I was thinking of trying to put together an example using the same cards, same stacks, etc, just switching them around to show how each part of the r/p/s wins, but I'm in the middle of a VERY fast 10k entrant tourney w/8300 chips, and 50/100 blinds, and I'm not even in the top 350 stacks.

[Mason Malmuth]

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In fast tournaments you may not see a premium hand before you're blinded out or forced into an all-in with a less than premium hand due to having a low M.

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And therefore you adjust your strategy because your M is low. You don't adjust it because of tournament speed.

Best wishes,
Mason

[Mason Malmuth]

Hi Arnold:

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A player in a fast tournament whose M is in Harrington’s green zone at the start, and who plays according to slow tournament green zone strategies, will similarly find himself suddenly out of time, just as if he were in a football game that he suddenly discovered had only one quarter of play.


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No, and the football analogy is flat wrong. Furthermore, it happens all the time when the score is tied in the fourth quarter. Good coaches won't deviate from their game plan. In fact, many of them will concentrate on being conservative since they believe that not making mistakes is often the key to winning.

What happens in a fast tournament, is players frequently and quickly move out of the green zone (towards red). Thus they should no longer use green zone strategies because they are no longer in the green zone.

A major point of Harrington II is that many players wait too long (and let their M drop too low before they begin to accelerate their strategy). But it has nothing to do with how quickly the blinds/antes are being raised.

If your M is above 20, according to Harrington and Robertie, you play one way. If your M drops under 20, you play another way. If your M drops under 10, you make more adjustments. And if your M drops under 5, you play even faster. Furthermore, they give an example starting on page 142 of playing when your M is well within the red zone, and notice that in this example there is no mention of how quickly the blinds are being raised.

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in fast tournaments the single best time to take risks is during this stage of the tournament when all of your opponents are primarily concerned with survival

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But this happens in virtually all tournaments. I wrote many years ago in my Gambling Theory book to "take advantage of tight play" and that "You don't win tournaments you steal them." The best tournament players do this all the time. But again it has nothing to do with how fast the blinds/antes are going up. If you notice your opponents are afraid to play, you take advantage of that.

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Regarding Mason’s concern about my “suicidal” basic strategy advice to call a standard raise from the button with any two cards, note that my book specifies (p 158) that this strategy is not advised if you only have 30 big blinds or less in your stack.

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Believe it or not, I'm on page 157. But it's clear to me that "The Chip Strategy" completely replaces what came earlier.

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Regarding Mason’s concern about my “suicidal” basic strategy advice to call a standard raise from the button with any two cards, note that my book specifies (p 158) that this strategy is not advised if you only have 30 big blinds or less in your stack. With more than 30 big blinds, I’ve found this play to be very profitable. There are so many players in fast tournaments who give up the lead in betting if the flop does not hit them, or looks scary to them, or who can be driven out with a raise during their green zone period when they are not desperate for chips, that I have found this to be one of the most profitable steals to make.

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But this is a function of your opponents. It's not a function of how fast the blinds are going up. As David Sklansky and Ed Miller show in No Limit Hold 'em: Theory and Practice weak tight opponents in no limit are easy to win a lot of money from.

Now it just may be that many of the players around town who play these smaller buy-in tournaments have these weak-tight tendencies. If that's the case, then you might be able to rob them fairly often. But I guarantee if this same player was in a slow tournament, he would have the same tendencies.

Now I do agree that this tendency might be related to his current M. But that's all I agree with.

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To sum it up, to play according to M without an adjustment for tournament speed will put you in the position of a coach playing according to a normal football game structure when in fact he only has one quarter to win.

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So if the game is tied in the fourth quarter and there are just a few minutes left, you're saying that a good running team should throw the ball long on every play. It seems to me that this is equivalent to still having a fairly good M.

If they were losing -- equivalent to a low M -- then I would agree with you. And if they were winning, -- equivalent to a high M -- I notice the passing teams playing very conservatively and running a lot.

Now this is for everyone. For those of you reading my criticisms don't think that I'm saying The Poker Tournament Formula by Arnold Snyder is no good. I do believe that it will help the majority of people who read it to preform better in these tournaments because it does frequently recommend the right play in low M situations which many players don't adjust to properly, and these low M situations will frequently occur. But again, tournament speed is a falacious concept. It was first proposed in How to Win at Poker Tournaments by Tom McEvoy which came out in 1985 and was not right then.

Best wishes,
Mason

[Leavenfish]

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No, and the football analogy is flat wrong. Furthermore, it happens all the time when the score is tied in the fourth quarter. Good coaches won't deviate from their game plan.

[/ QUOTE ] - Mason

I think the problem is you both are playing different games and you are both correct...within your own game:

It seems to me that Mason is looking at 60 sec = 1 min; 15 min = 1 quarter; 4 quarters = 60 min (1 game).

In Arnold's football game, time moves like this: 60 sec may = 1 min; but 14 min = the first quarter, 11 min = the second; 7 min = the 3rd and 4 min = the 4th quarter.

Mason is saying that being down 30 - 21 going into the 4th quarter means you have to step it up but not altogether abandon your strong run or option game...though your are down 9 and will need to score twice.

Arnold is saying that you want to go to rather great pains make sure to not allow yourself to get down 30 -21 going into the 4th quarter in the first place. This is because in his football game, you will have a far bigger hole to dig yourself out of as you will have less time to make up the difference. [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

----Leavenfish

[jackaaron]

Actually, I would say that Arnold is saying that people are gathering advice and reading books for a full 4 quarter game, and realizing (in the last few minutes) that the game they're in is only 1 quarter.

[Cactus Jack]

Guys, thanks for a great thread. I hope the discussion between Messrs. Malmuth and Snyder continues until we have consensus, because I really want to understand both positions.

Barry Greenstein says, "Tournament poker is a lottery with better odds and an element of skill." I hope to do what I can to increase the gap between skill and luck. I like the concept of "betting against their luck" which Mr. Snyder says. Anything that reduces the amount of luck needed and increases the edge in skill is +EV to me.

Funny, after years and playing in hundreds of tournaments, I never thought of a coin flip situation as coming down to luck. duh You think you know a lot... The fewer times you put yourself in this situation, the better, therefore, playing the player not the cards becomes even more important.

From reading this thread, I think Mr. Snyder is making an important contribution to my continuing education, as is Mason is getting him here and clarifying.

nh, sirs

[Shroomy]

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For those who don't know, Snyder is one of the foremost authorities in blackjack

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He certainly is, and I owe much of my black jack success to him, thanks Arnold for your books and other work.

[Arnold_Snyder]

Thank you to Mason and all for the opportunity to make some clarifications.

Success in fast tournaments is not primarily about exploiting weak/tight players. And my book shows mathematically and in great detail why it is not primarily about playing according to the current size of your chip stack relative to the current blinds/antes. It is about making enough money during the portions of the tournament where you have the greatest control over your results to go into the crapshoot portions of a tournament with an advantage. Every fast tournament (and very many slow tournaments with large field sizes) turns into a crapshoot at a very predictable point in the tournament, which my book shows players how to predict.

If you play Harrington’s conservative green zone strategy during the first hour of the Orleans Friday night tournament, when your current stack is in the green zone, you have only 30 hands to make money with conservative play. When you have time to read The Poker Tournament Formula, you will see that I show mathematically that you cannot expect to make enough money on premium cards and position during those 30 hands to have an advantage once the crapshoot starts in that second hour. You cannot count on having weak/tight players at your table, and even if you could, you could not make enough money from them during three rounds of conservative strategy to position yourself to have an advantage in the crapshoot portion of the tournament.

One chapter in my book that is particularly relevant to this discussion is the rebuy chapter, which I don’t think you’ve read yet. The rebuy chapter shows the underlying math behind the value of a big stack in a luck-based tournament, or luck-based portion of a tournament. Essentially, what the chapter proves is that a player going into a crapshoot with a small stack is doomed to lose in the long run to a player who goes into a crapshoot with a big stack.

Optimal tournament strategy requires analysis of the overall structure of a tournament to figure out if and when the tournament will become a crapshoot. The point where the tournament will become a crapshoot is determined by the blind structure and the field size (which determine the speed). Optimal strategy requires anticipation of this time and recognition of the fact that you have to use strategies that will earn you enough chips to give you an advantage when you enter the crapshoot period.

Regarding Mason's concern that the book’s chip strategy “completely replaces” the position strategy, Mason, I’m not sure I understand your point. I say in my chapter on the basic strategy of position play that the basic strategy will often be altered as a result of your cards and/or chip position. In the chapter on cards, I show how cards alter the position strategy, and in the chapter on chips, I show how chip stack alters both your position and card strategies. This is more or less analogous to a blackjack card counter who alters his basic strategy based on the cards that have been dealt and the level of penetration into the shoe. Chip strategy doesn’t completely replace position strategy, but may override it at particular times that are clearly defined in the book.