Dene Tribe's Poker Tournament Evaluation System is a Rip-Off

[Sherman]

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I've also published numerous articles on the importance of tournament structure on optimal strategy and skill requirements. The latest of these was "True M" versus Harrington's M: Critical Flaws in Harrington's M Theory, And Why Tournament Structure Matters.

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Arnold, the article states "Thus, we are forced to believe that what Mason Malmuth claims is true: that Harrington considers his strategies correct for tournaments of all speeds. So it is doubtful that he made any True M adjustments, even for slower tournament structures. Simply put, Harrington is oblivious to the true mathematics of M."

My opinion is that this is not correct. I believe Dan does, in fact, know intuitively that his M is not quite correct. Or at least, that there is more to it.

Consider his comment on page 156. "Before you start a hand with a short chip stack, you want to review your M... With the blinds totalling $75, your M is about 15... In a few hands, however, the blinds will double and your M will shrink to between 7 and 8... so on all counts you're looking to make some sort of move."

So Dan understands how speed affects things, at least on some level. He just didn't flesh it all out.

In other words, I believe Dan basically agrees with you about "True M", if you pressed him, but his book was what it was at the time. Now his strategy may well be conservative, possibly too conservative to be optimal. But that is another matter.

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This has already been extensively discussed: Link Just in case you wanted to know. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[BigAlK]

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In other words, I believe Dan basically agrees with you about "True M", if you pressed him, but his book was what it was at the time.

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Jeff,

This is also what I've always believed. The discussion of effective M as well as several asides in other sections have led me to this conclusion. However Mason says he talked to Harrington and he said no. Not sure if it is the same thread Shermn linked, but a current thread in the Books and Pubs forum has the link to what Mason said on this. If he truly feels this way I'd be interested in his explanation of the parts of the book that seem to contradict this and what he really meant.

Your example is just one of many examples. Taking that comment to the logical conclusion (what if blinds go up and your M goes down every 8-10 hands) then he and Arnold don't seem to be that far apart on this issue whether Harrington spelled it out or not.

Al

[Sherman]

Holy Crap. That discussion in Books and Pubs (linked here) is too long for anyone to read IMO. In the post above, I linked a much shorter discussion of Snyder's most recent article in the MTT strategy forum. Good luck to anyone who wants to start reading the books and pubs thread now. [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

[BigAlK]

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Holy Crap. That discussion in Books and Pubs (linked here) is too long for anyone to read IMO. In the post above, I linked a much shorter discussion of Snyder's most recent article in the MTT strategy forum. Good luck to anyone who wants to start reading the books and pubs thread now. [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

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OMG, not that one. No one deserves that. I meant this one. If someone reads the thread you linked and wants more there are a bazillion others over the last year in the books and pubs thread although that one is the mother of all threads.

[Brann]

Tribe's article is the "Edsel" of strategies to adjust for tournament speeds.

Brann

[malo]

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LOL at this whole imbroglio. Mason, you couldn't possibly have any less credibility than you do right now. You whined and moaned when Hilger published his book and used a hand example where someone had AK and a K flopped. You bitched and bitched about how you had published a similar example years earlier, and he should have credited your work. You're such a buffoon.

And now, this. Hilarious. No integrity, no objectivity, no clue.

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Thanks for the reminder, Jeffnc. Had forgotten that one.

So far can't find that old discussion thread (and have run out of time to look before work), but found a collection of MM's reviews which contains this comment about Hilger's book:

"Another complaint I have about the book is that many of the ideas and concepts come from other books, yet the author gives virtually no credit to these sources. Many passages in the book are clearly just rewrites of material in either The Theory of Poker or Hold ’em Poker for Advanced Players, and to increase his credibility as a legitimate authority worth listening to, Hilger should have included many appropriate references."

Guess giving credit is only important when it is a 2+2 book he feels has been slighted. Hmmm...

A link to where this was found:
http://archiveserver.twoplustwo.com/...te_id/1#import

[jeffnc]

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However Mason says he talked to Harrington and he said no.

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Yes, I recall the thread where Mason claimed this. Unfortunately, he was in the middle of desparately trying to protect 2+2 turf, and in light of that and all things since, that comment has no credibility with me. Which is not to say it's false, just to say that just because Mason said it doesn't make it true.

By the way, I'm more than a little curious as to why Harrington has never bothered commenting on any of this stuff. Probably because he'll make just as much money if he doesn't :-)

[MrX5000]

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The revelation of my book is that fast poker tournaments are not crap shoots, but highly valuable for players who adjust their tournament strategy according to the structure of the tournament. The reason fast tournaments were considered crap shoots is because the published strategies were incorrect--losing strategies--for these events. My book provides a fast tournament strategy in which I have compiled a win rate of over 230% past 5 standard deviations.

In addition, my book is the first to provide a systematic method of assessing the skill value of fast tournaments.

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Personally, I think you AND Harrington's M have good points. I use your criteria as a way of choosing the tournament but as far as adjusting your play based on where you're at in the tournament, it's nearly identical because harrington does make these adjustments as far as loosening up starting hand requirements and short stack play just like your book. Your book claims that he doesn't take certain things like position into account which is nonsense. I've read them both and I agree that you make some inaccurate statements about harrington's formula. It's almost as if you really didn't read his entire 3 books set like the most of us.

Anyway, I do believe along with yourself that you deserve some type of credit about you're blinding off theory (I'll just call it that because simply put it's how long it takes to blind out). The other formula seems like an abbreviation of this formula. But to be honest, your formula seems almost identical to Harringtons. Did you realize that Harrington adjusts his M according to the number of players at the table and a correction factor can be added based on how many hands per hour? Now take into account the zone theory he comes up with and you pretty much have the same theory as yourself except it 2 times 2 instead of 2 plus 2. The answer is still 4.

[Piers]

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The revelation of my book is that fast poker tournaments are not crap shoots

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You are correct

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but highly valuable for players who adjust their tournament strategy according to the structure of the tournament.

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but for the wrong reason.

Fast structure tournament give a large advantage to players who understand low M poker. M is very useful as a tool for quickly estimating pot odds in various situations.

The use you and Dene Tribe put M to seems to me to be fairly obvious anyway and rather missing the point.

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<=5 No Stack Lottery No Skill: This type of tournament will proceed very rapidly and those who receive the best cards will prevail with little regard for tactics.

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This quote from Dene Tribe’s article is just wrong. “No Skill” is just an exaggeration that is going to confuse people. Further his article seems to overlook the fact that faster tournaments are quicker than slow ones. You should not compare one fast tournament with one slow one, but rather several fast ones with one slow one. Once you make this adjustment I think you find fast tournaments have a lower variance as measured against time and are almost as profitable although not necessarily for the same people.

[MrX5000]

I have an idea on how to solve this whole debate. Let's take some specific examples in tournament play and how each theory would differ. Anyone have the book, they could just list an example...Of course each example would need to have the right information available to make the correct assessement. For instance, in harrington volume 3, it's all examples and they are mostly well known tournaments. I'm sure we could pull some of those examples and even the tournament structure and compare notes. It would be interesting if Arnold Snyder's strategy is different based on the known factors in the examples in Harrington's books.

- X