ICM - What Is It ?

[AKingdom]

Hi, I've heard a lot about ICM and ICM calculations esp. in the context of SNGs. Could someone tell me what this term means and where it originated?

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[Small Fry]

Has something to do with the value of your chips / move in odds, etc. You might get better answers posting (or even checking out the) the SNG forum

[AngusThermopyle]

Independent Chip Model

Google or search the SNG forum would be your best bet for a full explanation.

[pzhon]

The Independent Chip Model (ICM) is a model for predicting the probability of finishing in each place given the stack sizes of all players in a tournament. This is helpful for analyzing decisions in tournaments where there are prizes for second and lower places, particularly single table tournaments and decisions at the final table of multitable tournaments.

The model has been invented independently by a few people, but I believe bozeman coined the term in a post in the Poker Theory forum about 3 or 4 years ago.

One way to describe it is that you choose the winner in proportion to their fraction of the chips, remove their chips, then choose the second place finisher in proportion to the fraction of chips remaining, etc. Another is to remove random chips repeatedly, letting players be eliminated when their last chips are eliminated. It may not be obvious that these are the same. To see that they are equivalent, you can shuffle the chips, and rank the players by their highest chips. If you focus on the high end, you get the first method. If you focus on the low end, you get the second.

The ICM is not perfect. It does not take into account the blinds or skill differences or how you might bully someone who just wants to reach the money. However, it is a good start, and it is used by professional SNG players.

Here is an ICM calculator designed for SNGs.

[AKingdom]

thx pzhon.