99 other people each paid 10,000 for 10,000 in chips. The prize structure is 60-30-10. All players are exactly equal in skill to you. You are allowed to buy in for any of the following five amounts and will be given that many chips. 1000, 5000, 10,000 20,000 50,000. From the pure standpoint of maximum profit what is your best buy in? What about if you were slightly better than the others? How about a lot better?
Answer 1:
Same skill I would buy in for $1,000. If I’m slightly better $1,000 or $50,000 would be O.K. If I’m a lot better $50,000 seems reasonable, since you can net $574,000.
Answer 2:
I guess it’s 1,000 in all cases. The fewer chips you have the more valuable each chip is, so paying $1,000 for 1000 chips is a bargain.
Answer 3:
From a pure mathematical standpoint, the fewer chips you have the more valuable each chip is in a percentage payout tournament. Does this imply you should buy only 1 chip? No, because the second chip, and each succeeding chip until you have an average stack (assuming tournament just starting) will also be positive expectation. You should buy $10,000 worth. This brings up an interesting point. How significant is this effect (different chip values for different stack sizes) this early in the tournament? I believe that nearly all tournament theorists grossly overestimate the importance of this effect. For the tournament as described, this effect will be completely insignificant (i.e. less than 1% difference for the value of a chip in a short stack versus an average stack) until the final table is set. For a 300 player tournament paying 3 tables, different chip values for different stacks does not begin to be a factor (for small and average stacks) until there are perhaps 6 tables left. Much more significant is the skill factor. If you have even an infinitesimal skill edge, you have a higher positive expectation the more chips you buy. If you are slightly worse than average, do not enter the tournament at all, or buy $1000. Another point: if you are in a tournament and are worse than average with an average stack, you should be thrilled to get your money in with a small pair against AK or the other way around. You can also exert a lot of pressure on superior players with similar stacks sizes who do not want to commit there stacks on a 50-50 proposition. (Do not gamble excessively with a large stack in a no-limit tournament, as your skill deficit will be more of impairment the more chips you have.)
Question: 48
Why is it that there are no-limit and pot-limit hold-em and Omaha games, but there aren’t any no-limit or pot-limit stud games?
