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The main prize money in tournament poker is concentrated on the final tables. And they grow rapidly from place to place, reaching a spade in the first three places. In this regard, the game on the final tables is very different from other stages of MTT. A separate video course from Poker University of Exan13 tournament poker will be devoted to this topic in the near future. And from this article you will learn the basic techniques and features of the game at the final table.
Before reading, we recommend that you study the following useful materials: What is the ICM Factor, bubble factor, FGS factor in tournament poker, How is ICM taken into account in tournament poker in preflop all-in and what are the allowances, ICM Part 3: features of the game with a chiplider stack, in the later stages of tournaments and at tables with hobby players
1. Different value of players' chips (bubble factor) at the final poker table
If you describe the value of the bubble factor as simply as possible, it is the difference in the value of your chips in relation to the chips of other players. This is the most important element of understanding ICM in tournament poker.
- For example, imagine you have a 1,000 chip and another player also has a 1,000 chip. But here it is just silver, and he has silver with gilding. And the third player has gilding and with the insertion of a precious stone. At the same time, when to equalize the bet, only the nominal value is considered.
Having simple chips makes it much more pleasant for you to play with players whose chips cost more money. And opponents, on the contrary, are less profitable to win your chips. This is a metaphorical example of the bubble factor.
Bubble factor is a coefficient
If we take your chips as a reference point of value, it will be a coefficient of 1.0. For other poker players, the chips may be cheaper or more expensive. Coefficient — 1.2, 1.5, 0.85, 0.7. Thus, the value of chips affects the mathematics of poker on both pre-flop and post-flop, since it becomes not obvious where the positive action is, but where the negative one is from the point of view of converting the stack into live money.
2. What influences the changes in the bubble factor
There are several factors that influence the change in the bubble factor. Tournament poker coach Alexey Exan13 discusses each of them in detail.
Availability of knockouts
After the appearance of knockouts in tournament poker, the mathematics of calculating the profitability of the action began to change. Having the opportunity to get money to the cashier directly affects the value of players' chips. When you overlap an opponent and have the opportunity to get his entire stack in the hand, this increases the value of the opponent's chips even before the hand begins (bubble factor 1.1-1.3). And if the villain has already gone to the all-in and you know for sure that in cases of winning you will take his knock-out, his chips become much more valuable (bubble factor 1.3-3.0 and more). The value of knockouts also varies depending on the number of participants in the tournament - its AFS. In low AFS, the value of knockouts will be much higher than in kilopoles, where the jumps in prize payouts will often be significantly higher than most bounty rewards.
Tournament life and the growth of prize money
The peculiarity of multi-table tournaments is that you get real money only when you occupy a certain place in the ITM zone. There is no direct correlation with the won chips. Sometimes you can get a giant stack in the first half of the tournament, and not even get to the prefinal table. And sometimes it is possible to reach the final table by sitting the entire tournament at the bottom of the list of participants by stack size.
The most valuable thing in MTT is tournament life.
You can take a higher prize place only when you have stayed in the tournament and can continue to play. Whenever you risk relegation from the tournament (bet all-in), you have a negative bubble factor. That is, our chips become more valuable than the ones we are trying to win. For this reason, there are equity premiums that act as a balancing act for the difference in the value of the chips.
- For example, you bet all-in 19 BB SB vs Co. You need to make an increase of 5-7% to the result for Chip-EV in order to consider the situation profitable. If you have 3% net profit in chips, the situation will be negative in terms of profit in money.
Tournament life has different values in different tournament segments and situations, that is, the bubble multiplier will be different. The most expensive tournament life is on the segment before the start of the prize zone, which is called bubble in poker, and starting with the prefinal table. This is due to the jumps in the profit you get for the prize place. On a bubble, you can be left with nothing or get a minimum payout — and this is a very high jump in earnings. And starting from the pre-final stage, the growth of prize money between places increases, and therefore the value of “sitting out” other players becomes higher. This begins to directly affect the bubble factor, greatly raising the value of our chips.
- For example, at the final table, passive actions that bring a little gross profit at the the long run begin to become negative. These are also koldkols from free positions and especially the protection of BB. The profitable defense range of the big blind is greatly narrowed, since your tournament life at this stage is worth a lot, and the game on the BB is always dispersive.
Your chips have a high bubble factor multiplier. If according to chip-ev you play a situation in -75 ev\bb where the fold is -110ev\bb and the variance is high, then this small +EV becomes unprofitable in terms of monetary expectation, and you better fold your hand. This applies to situations when the raiser covers us and at the expense is able to exert additional pressure on the preflop and postflop. In the opposite situation, we should already use the ICM factor in our favor and exert similar pressure on the racer - after all, he risks leaving the tournament, and we do not.
Impact of tournament AFS
As we said, in tournaments with low AFS, the value of knockouts will be much higher than in kilopoles. The higher the ratio of prizes relative to the buy-in, the higher the bubble factor. This means that we should choose only the most positive decisions on waiting. It will be a mistake to play the same strategy on the final tables of tournaments for 300 people, for 1500 people and for 3000+ people.
3. 3 game scenarios on the final table
The distribution of chips between players at the final table can be different. At the same time, your tournament situation has different forecasts for the future, which affects the strategy.
Here are some examples:
1-2 players - pronounced chip leaders, the rest have short stacks.
The best strategy is to wait, put in all-in only in good plus situations. If this is explained mathematically, then the bubble factor multiplier will be big. You have very valuable chips. This is due to the fact that in future scenarios there is a high probability of quick relegation of the “shorties”, which affects the raise of prize money. The probability that you will reach the TOP 3 stage even without winning the big pots is much higher than in situations where the chips are evenly distributed among the players.
All players have approximately equal stacks.
The bubble multiplier is not so serious, and you can play more relaxed if the оpponents allow it. In such a situation, they will play more aggressively and uninhibitedly. It is important to analyze your opponents and choose the optimal strategy of the game.
The average stack is 20BB or less.
This happens at the final tables of turbo tournaments. Here, the standard range of the game on the stack is greatly narrowed, since the variance affects the result of the game more. A good strategy would be to try to strengthen your position with actions that don't result in a full stack stack. Even 5-6 BB in the stack leaves you with a high chance of success in the conditions of a small average stack among opponents. It is advantageous for you to have a bluff 3bet range instead of a 3-bet push in 14-20bb stacks. This will allow you to make an open raise instead of an open push in the stack from 7bb. Exposure to all chips should be with high chip-ev expectation, because one double will make your stack TOP 3 in the tournament and allow you to wait for the departure of many shorties.
Chiplider stack
When we get a big stack, the bubble factor begins to exert minimal pressure on us, and the maximum pressure on the players who are forced to play hands against us. Therefore, it is important to realize this advantage and increase pressure on opponents (at least those who "respect" ICM) with their active actions. To do this, the range of open raises must be greatly expanded (sometimes up to 100%). Pay attention to the number of stacks less than 5BB. In this situation, the rest of the table participants will fold as much as possible for any aggression on your part. Especially in kilopoles, where the padjumps are already significant relative to the buy-in of the tournament.
4. How to learn to play MTT final tables in poker
The main tool for working out the game in ICM is HRC (Holdem Resources Calculator). The more spots you analyze, the more confident you will feel in different situations. You can also learn from other people's hands: open any ongoing tournament, scan a few spots, record which range you would use in different situations and stimulate the hands in the solver. At the beginning of your poker career, try to play as many hands as possible under the pressure of the ICM - that is, choose tournaments with a small average API - from 100 to 1000 people.
Conclusion: the game of tournament poker is multifaceted and interesting. There is a lot of non-standard mathematics that is important to consider in order to achieve positive results over a long the long run.
