call this shove?

[BelgoSuisse]

Only suited QJ+ or unsuited KQ+ are better against our opponents range (I used top 60% in Pokerstove) than A5os. That said A5os is still only 52% to win against his range.

I think AA, KK and QQ are out of his range. He would call or minraise those instead of shoving.

Against top 60% minus those 3 pairs I'm 55%.

 

[dj11]

Why? What range do you put him on that makes ANY connectors better than A5?

I think his range is essentially any two cards, minus absolute trash like 32 and minus high pairs which he would try to trap with. So I mostly expect to face 2 unpaired cards between my A and 5, against which I'm 55% to win. How do your connectors beat that unless they are AK, KQ or maybe QJ (don't have pokerstove here, so i'm guesstimating)?

A5 might as well be a single card. Most players will not consider 52 in their decision to play atc, so one must figure that those atc really will both be above that 5. Given the choice between shoving UTG with 96 and waiting for a possible face card in the bb, I'll wait. But even 96 looks better to me than A5. A flaw in my logic no doubt.

An A-rag hand will only win if nothing pairs (often), or an A comes up (about 30% to the river).

But my point is I would rather leave the short stack short, than risk a radical table change, either way, with what I would not play against a normal stack. I don't like coinflips, unless I provide the coin!

 

[dj11]

If you understand ICM really well, perhaps you could produce a document which will enlighten many of us. I have been through the ICM descriptions that I could find and think about it in specific situations, but the core concept still eludes me. Ramifications of an aging mind no doubt, but it isn't yet a dead mind.

Should you do such a thing, strive for simplicity. I know most of the ICM concepts are convoluted, but that doesn't mean they are not valid. I for one, just need a different view.

The (2) core concepts that I think I understand are;

-The value of your chip is not equal to the value of your opponents chip. This is stack dependent. So 1 does NOT equal one unless your stacks are identical. The larger the original field, the more pronounced this may be. It is less pronounced in this situation as this is a single table SnG. (Which suggests that perhaps a more extreme version of this hand in a MTT might be easier to grasp).

-There may be positional advantages that affect the value of your chips, either increasing or decreasing that value, even when your stacks are identical. Here there is some mingling with the Fold equity concepts.

 

[zachvac]

I'm no tourney expert, but from what I've seen we want to be flipping coins if we have the chip advantage.

And I'm not entirely familiar with ICM, but it is definitely not a "guide". From what I understand, ICM is basically the money ev in a decision instead of tourney chips ev. So if 2nd place were $1 and 1st was $20k it reflects that you should shoot for 1st and that even if you make a -ev chip play, if 10% of the time you win the 20k and 90% of the time you bust, it's better than 100% of the time winning 2nd place. See the point?

The OP is getting decent odds to call, is actually a FAVORITE over villain's range. On top of that a win makes you chip leader while a loss doesn't even have him last place in chips. Easy call imo.

 

[Dorkus Malorkus]

ICM comes much more into play in the money and under bubble conditions. 7 handed you're not going to come across many situations where cEV is grossly different from $EV.

(which adds support to this being a call, incidentally)

 

[zachvac]

ICM comes much more into play in the money and under bubble conditions. 7 handed you're not going to come across many situations where cEV is grossly different from $EV.

(which adds support to this being a call, incidentally)

While the first part may be right, the part in parenthesies is not if I understand the theory correctly.


The point of ICM is that the chips you stand to win are worth more than the chips you stand to lose. The more chips you have, the more of a shot you have at taking 1st, which is a huge prize jump from 2nd, which is a big jump from 3rd, etc. So if right now you'll probably be in 2nd, and you have the chance to coin flip, where you could end up in 1st or 3rd, or just fold and take 2nd, taking the flip is worth it. So with ICM it utilizes this tourney structure information and would make this more likely to warrant a call, whereas the chip ev may be close to neutral and the people who complain about not wanting to take risks in a tournament lean towards the fold.

 

[Dorkus Malorkus]

My point (which I didn't explain because I had to run and stop food from burning ) is essentially if this were manufactured somehow into a 4-handed bubble situation, it would probably be correct to fold, because while calling may be +cEV it would most likely be -$EV (because if you lose you become the (well, 'a') shortstack and the chance you will finish 4th would shoot up).

You're obviously right in that ICM accounts for differences between 1st and 3rd and the fact that by getting into the top three you have a shot at second and when you're heads up you have a shot at first, but the largest consideration is the jump between 4th and 3rd (-100% ROI to +~90% ROI or something in a standard SNG structure).

You seem to have things the wrong way around though. I can't think of many examples of SNG situations where a play is -cEV but +$EV (a possible example is some cases when ITM when you have a massive stack against two very short opponents and one of your opponents makes a smallish shove which you just about don't have odds to call but will eliminate villain if you do, but that's not the case here). ICM generally deals with why we shouldn't always make +cEV plays in late stage SNG play.

 

[Flappyf1sh]

Position plays NO part in this after the decision to call is made.

I should of explained myself more. I mean next hand he will be in small blind when he can use his stack to bully the small stack. This is much better advantage then calling on a coinflip.

 

[BelgoSuisse]

I should of explained myself more. I mean next hand he will be in small blind when he can use his stack to bully the small stack. This is much better advantage then calling on a coinflip.

1. it's more or less a coin flip, but I have great pot odds to flip that coin
2. I may not have the chance to bully villain next hand. Who says I will get the hand folded to me so I can bully BB from SB ?
3. If that was indeed my plan and I did get the hand folded to me, I may get worse odds by shoving ATC next hand than by calling here.

 

[THe Slob]

2. I may not have the chance to bully villain next hand. Who says I will get the hand folded to me so I can bully BB from SB ?

True, you might not get the chance to bully this particular opponent before someone else has taken his money, but there are two other short stacks sitting there as well.

You made the right analysis and you made a good call. It sucks you doubled up a short stack, but hey, you still got chips, you ain't dead yet.

 

[BelgoSuisse]

If you understand ICM really well, perhaps you could produce a document which will enlighten many of us. I have been through the ICM descriptions that I could find and think about it in specific situations, but the core concept still eludes me. Ramifications of an aging mind no doubt, but it isn't yet a dead mind.

ICM is really just a model to estimate your chances to get to each of the money places in a tournament from the relative sizes of the chips stacks. The assumptions are pretty straightforward:

1. your chance of ending 1st is the ratio of your chip stack to all the chips on the table.

2. If a given other player ends 1st, your chances of ending second is the ratio of your chip stack to all the chips on the table minus the chips of that given player.

3. Your overall chance of ending 2nd is the above, averaged by the chances of each other player at the table finishing first.

4. You iterate for 3rd, 4th, ... places.

Once you have these probabilities of finishing at each money place, you compute the $ expected value by multiplying probabilities by payout for each place and adding the results.

Since no one can do that in his head, you use a calculator. Personally I use ICM Poker - Online ICM Calculator .

 

[BelgoSuisse]

If you understand ICM really well, perhaps you could produce a document which will enlighten many of us. I have been through the ICM descriptions that I could find and think about it in specific situations, but the core concept still eludes me. Ramifications of an aging mind no doubt, but it isn't yet a dead mind.

Once you know $EV, you just use that instead of chip EV when computing pot odds. Nothing complex here.

The effect of replacing chips by $ is negligible when you are playing for a small portion of your chip stack. It becomes crucial when you consider going/calling all in. Essentially, what happens is that when two equal stacks go all in against each other, part of the $EV is spread to the other players at the table instead of split between the two players all in. That means you don't take coin flips in tournaments unless you have really good odds.

 

[BelgoSuisse]

If you understand ICM really well, perhaps you could produce a document which will enlighten many of us. I have been through the ICM descriptions that I could find and think about it in specific situations, but the core concept still eludes me. Ramifications of an aging mind no doubt, but it isn't yet a dead mind.

Caveats:

ICM is only a model, not reality. The assumption that the relative size of your stack is a good predictor of your chances to finish first is often a dubious one. IMO, the two main flaws are

1. At the start of a tournament, ICM says that everyone involved has equal equity. Obviously this does not take into account the relative skills of the players. if you have a proven track record of having 20% ROI at the stake you are playing, then you should adjust your model to take that into account. This means calling even tighter than ICM suggests. This is exactly what you see happen on the first days of the wsop main event. Most of the pros are playing excessively prudently as they value themselves much higher than their amateur opponents and that affects their $EV guesstimations

Incidentally, this correction may also justify that a fish takes ridiculous chances early on. If you adjust ICM estimates to a very negative ROI, the resulting $EV should actually push you to decrease your calling requirements. Actually, if I had to play a table full of pros such as you do in the Poker after dark show, for instance, I'd be delighted to take 50-50 coin flips against them. That's a much better chance then playing skill vs. skill.

2. ICM does not take into account the dynamics of the table but only the current hand. For instance, if you are the smaller stack and you are being bullied by your opponents, it may be strategically better to take a chance earlier with improper ICM odds rather than wait until your stack becomes so small ICM tells you to call. If you are a big stack and the table lets you bully it on the bubble, then it may be better to not break that bubble too early.

 

[BelgoSuisse]

Another flaw of ICM is that it underestimates the strategic value of a big stack, which you can use to bully the table and gain even more chips. So IF you know how to handle it, it may be correct to gamble below ICM $EV to get a big stack which give you more than the ICM estimated chances to finish 1st.

 

[DeCodeD]

Fold 100% of the time. You have a lot of time to pick a better spot

 

[marble]

holy schmocks! what's up with all that number crunching BelgoSuisse? i'm fairly new to the site but i get the impression that you're prolly one of the math guru of the group. I like it and good to see.

now back to the question.....I CALL. if it's marginal in your analysis then you take the big hammer in psycology poker to nail the call. assuming you're playing with somewhat competent players, some or a lot of players don't want to get too short stack after the blinds. if the villain doesn't make a move now then he'll prolly end up w/ about 600 chips after the blinds, NOW knowing he's push is prolly going to get called w/ any too cards from the BB next orbit. with the limited information given, that's my basic observation

-m