17 way chop - was it a good decision

[ATrebek]

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So the short stacks will be dropping like flies, why pay them off?

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Mathematically I don't think it was too bad - your chance of finishing less than 4th was very high. That of course assumes you wouldn't have another opportunity to chop at a later time for more money, which is almost certainly not the case.

A 17 way chop is pretty lame. I would rather take my chances and talk about a chop when we get to 6-8 players. What was the approx total prize pool?

[budblown]

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So the short stacks will be dropping like flies, why pay them off?

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Mathematically I don't think it was too bad - your chance of finishing less than 4th was very high. That of course assumes you wouldn't have another opportunity to chop at a later time for more money, which is almost certainly not the case.

A 17 way chop is pretty lame. I would rather take my chances and talk about a chop when we get to 6-8 players. What was the approx total prize pool?

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Total prize pool was around 4200. Everybody wanted to chop at 20 players when the blinds were 3/6k but I was the only one who objected and then when the blinds raised to 5/10k with 17 players and the chip leader only had 7bb I decided to agree with the chop.

[ATrebek]

Meh. I'd want to keep playing, but it sucks being the only holdout to a chop. If you're comfortable with being singled out and having people gun for you, then keep playing - otherwise just chop and get to the cash game.

[rivermetimbers]

i agree, everyone else would be extremely pissed with you (probably) if you didnt chop the second time around.... also it probably wasnt worth wasting ur time sticking around/ gambooling if you could take 4th place money right then and there

[MicroBob]

Would be somewhat amusing to try to bargain for a little bit more in the chop since your stack was larger and everyone was so interested in doing it.

Being the only holdout definitely sucks.
But if it was just a situation of whether you took bad value by accepting a chop the answer is almost certainly yes...although this depends on the payout structure, where the button is, how long until the blinds move up again and how much they move up...etc etc.
In other words, there actually isn't enough information given to 100% accurately determine if the chop was a good idea.

If you were going to be in the BB in a couple hands and the blinds were going to move up to 25k-50k before it got to you then chopping was obviously a good idea.

But in most situations and making assumptions on the payout structure and how quickly the blinds are moving up I think you made a bad decision value-wise to accept the chop.

Just because the largest stack has 7 BB's and it's a shove-fest doesn't mean you have to knock yourself out first if you keep playing. All those short-stacks are going to be dropping out REALLY damn fast.

[daveT]

They will be dropping out really damn fast, but it only takes one bad hand for you to be in jeopardy. The only thing I could say is never play in this tourney again. That is a terrible structure. With 5 BBs, it is unlikely that you would make it to 4th place. With one more ante raise and you are still back to square one.

I call it a good chop and a bad deal.

[Gonso]

That's an awful lot of people who let themselves get pretty short by not taking the fast structure into account...

I mean if you're going to play a small buy-in tourney in the 1st place, you might as well play it down a little further, at least to the final table. You paid the juice and spent a couple hours of your time, so it's not as if this is really a strictly EV-based decision anyway. You could distribute the prize money by stack size, which would be a little more fair but more a pain in the ass. It's not like your ever going to explain ChipEV to that kind of crowd so forget that idea.

But, if everyone else wants to chop, then hey chop it up and don't waste your time on that nonsense tournament anymore.

[MicroBob]

"don't waste your time on that nonsense tournament anymore."


For some reason I am in disagreement with the majority opinion about this issue.
Depending on the juice, etc etc I think these turbo-type tourneys can be extremely profitable against a bunch of players who have no idea how to adjust.

Live, low buy-in type tourneys are going to have fast-ish structures no matter what. Everyone wants super deep-stack, long-structure tourneys even if it's only a $50 buy-in but that just isn't very realistic.
The players in these can be so spectacularly bad and fail to adjust for the structure that I have to imagine they can be extremely profitable if the juice isn't awful.

[IgorSmiles]

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it's not as if this is really a strictly EV-based decision anyway.

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Exactly. EV it's an ok chop. But seriously, youre playing a low level donker. Play for fun, and to tune up your game. You'd have to play these every day for weeks or months just to get ahead of the variance caused by all the donkeys, the juice and the escalating blinds to really have an edge.

Not to mention, any chop involving 17 players is a freakin joke just on principal alone!

[redfisher]

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Meh. I'd want to keep playing, but it sucks being the only holdout to a chop. If you're comfortable with being singled out and having people gun for you, then keep playing - otherwise just chop and get to the cash game.

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I think the cash game point is key. How likely are the remaining tourney players to leave? Will they join cash games with their $240 windfall? What's your cash game edge here?

Getting out of the tournament and into the cash games my very well be your best move here. The chop may not be the best move for the tournament, but the tournament doesn't exist in a vacuum. I occasionally just show up at one particular casino on tournament night because it's the only time they get a 2/5 going. This game is great. I don't even enter the tourney because it's -EV versus being in the cash game as the early bustouts roll through. By the time the tournament is over, most of the easy money has already been scooped up.