In case people are unaware Spin and Go MAX games play out a pre-determined number of hands or until there is a winner. If the number of hands runs out all players are forced allin until there is a winner. This makes for a very complex strategy in the ones that involve ICM going into the flip stage. I'll outline the hand below.

Buy In: $15
Prize Pool: 1st Place EV: $70, 2nd Place $35

Last hand before All in Stage.

Blinds are 50/100, no ante.

BU: 870 chips
SB: 925 chips (875 after posting SB)
BB: 705 chips (605 after posting BB)

This hand has alot of things going on. First thing to point out is BB wants to surpass 2nd in chips if possible so they are very much incentivized to gamble given the opportunity in this spot rather than going into a flip in last place against two people when two spots pay out. If BU folds SB can fold tighter and still maintain 1st place in chips going into the flip. The only way BB can surpass going into the flip in > than 3rd place is if either BU or SB commit more chips in this hand and BB wins the pot.

Button can still take the chip lead going into the flip by stealing the blinds and SB is not incentivized to collide with Button in this spot wide at all.

So what ranges do some think are optimal for each player at equilibrium? I think this hand is very interesting because BB wants to commit chips even with very low equity hands and even against semi tight ranges rather than take their chances in a 3 way flip with 33% equity on average.

I'm shipping this on the button super wide. Basically top 50% of hands. SB is likely folding almost everything (really just big pairs and AK or maybe AQ could get a call). Button needs to call pretty wide.

In a normal ICM spot where play would continue after this hand Button wants to push ~25%. SB only calls ~5% and BB calls about ~10%. In that same situation if Button folds SB is suppose to push ~80% and is called by ~30% from BB. So the higher collision factor between SB and BB forces a tighter shoving range from the Button.

In a Spin and Go MAX the BB is enticed to call wider though than ICM because if they fold they go into the flip next hand 3rd in chips against two other ranges.

So this hand will get called much wider by the BB player. How much wider? That is the question in this hand. In the actual hand I was sitting in the SB with K10ss and felt if the Button folded I'm better off even folding a hand as strong as K10ss and going into the flip 1st in chips rather than running it against a reasonable high calling range. I think the Button has a bit more to gain by shoving as SB still has to call tight and Button can overtake 1st in chips if BB folds or bust BB in the hand but they still should expect to get called a much higher percentage of the time by BB in this spot than a normal ICM hand in a vacuum would dictate calling.

I really like that thinking, and agree with it. But how strong a hand should we fold here? What range do we shove?

Also if button shove and we fold, we are going to lose our chiplead. Is that an argument for calling just a bit wider than normal? Would it be disastous to call AT+/66+ here?

I'll try to answer your 1st question later when I can come up with a more accurate calling range from the BB player in the hand. I believe they should make minus chip EV calls. They need 41% equity to breakeven in straight chip EV.

I do think that calling a Button shove here wide as SB is a disaster and just benefits the BB player in the hand. In these tourneys with two people being paid, going into the flip in either first or second in chips is the main thing you should be concerned about as you will be 66% to cash in that scenario on average at the very least. More so if you go into that spot as the chip leader but folding and being able to basically collude against the 3rd place stack in a flip is more beneficial than any small gains made to become the 1st place stack in most cases. You can still shove your 2nd place stack into the 1st place stack wide in alot of spots but this really isn't one of them because you are also shoving into the BB player who wants to call alot more.

Also, I could be wrong about SB's play as they are guaranteed to go into the flip with equity either way, even if calling loose and losing they'd still have much more equity than usual with their leftover chip stack in forced all in spots.

Consider the situation where you do call that wider range and lose to the Button's shove you are only left with 55 chips but all you need to have happen to get atleast 2nd is win the flip and have the big stack win against the guy 2nd in chips. So your 55 chips are still worth alot more than busting.

I don't see how the flip phase should have any effect. It will just make everyone realize their equity. This equity might not be exactly ICM, however, rather some "Flip Equity" to be determined.

Ah, now I get it. It is a bubble spot where 3rd gets zero.
That would IMHO bias the BU and SB to play tighter than usual, because they are already "ahead". Case solved!?

There might be more interesting cases, e.g. where the BB moves ahead if folded to, which the other shortstack obv wants to avoid.

On reading other comments:
I agree that BB has to call wider, and I am quite sure that this makes the SB shove tighter, but only a simulation could answer by how much. Pretty much unsolvable "by hand", I guess.

Thank you very much cneuy3. Great posts.

Yep. It should be easily solvable in a simulation because we know exactly how future game plays out as players are forced all in every single hand after this hand. It is difficult, for me atleast, to figure out the exact thresholds by hand as you mentioned above. It makes sense that having slightly more than your opponent/opponents or slightly more than zero rather than bust going into the flip is always going to have added gain than in a situation where the tournament would continue to play out but it's difficult in quantify.

Take the situation above. It's even difficult to quantify. 3rd place stack is in sort of a bad spot because they are only slightly less in chips with the other two players but will lose in a flip situation ~66% of the time they still have a fair bit of equity in the tournament the other third of the time they do win the flip as they will triple up and have a very reasonable shot at taking down the tournament.

One thing I'm sure of in these Spin and Go MAX SnGs is there is a rather large EV gain in some very small chip stack differentials going into the flip. Just take a few extreme examples:

Give the 3rd place stack 1 chip and the other two stacks "x" and "x" and you will see that the 3rd place stack has way more equity in this situation going into a flip than they would had the tournament played out normally.

Same if you make all three stacks 1 chip difference from each other. In that situation though the 3rd place chip stack would be at a huge disadvantage compared to if the tourney had played out normally.


No problem. I'm not even sure how good the content is as I'm not sure the exact answers to these problems but this format is alot of fun and actually quite interesting close to the flip stage. It's raked extremely high for how long these games last and obviously has a ton of variance but they are a very popular format on PokerStars.

Hi guys,

After thinking about this some more I think I'm able to better articulate what happens in the forced all in spot.

Let's assume:

A = chip leader
B = 2nd in chips
C = 3rd in chips

There are six possible scenarios that will happen on the 1st hand of all in.

A,B,C where A wins the tournament and B gets 2nd prize, B and C eliminated
A,C,B where A wins the tournament and B gets 2nd prize, B and C eliminated
B,A,C where tournament continues, C is eliminated
B,C,A where tournament continues, C is eliminated
C,A,B where tournament continues, B is eliminated
C,B,A where tournament continues, no players eliminated

We do have split pots and ties in poker and those are not accounted for in this model but you can see that it illustrates that "C" is eliminated 2/3rds of the time on the very first hand. Only 1 out of 6 times does C cash on this hand where as B will cash 2/3rds the time on this hand. A cashes 5 out of 6 times on this hand.

So there is actually a huge difference between going into the flip 1 chip ahead of C as player B. At the same time having just 1 chip still = ~1/6 time ITM for player C.

All players have ~their chip equity for the 1st place prize but their equity for the total prize pool with the addition of the 2nd place prize is greatly altered in many spots by their position going into the flip.

Hope this makes more clear what I was trying to get at in the original post. It's still certainly not as simple as saying we always punt it in as player C on the last hand before the flip as their stack still has significant equity at 1st place. In the hand above they win the tournament probably somewhere close to 30% of the time in the flip but they are still in a much worse position to cash if they go into the flip in last place.

Btw, I appreciate your kind words above McKrogh. Thanks.

Lets assume Stacks are "equal" but mechanics A>B>c apply.

(1) A,B,C where A wins the tournament and B gets 2nd prize, B and C eliminated
(2) A,C,B where A wins the tournament and B gets 2nd prize, B and C eliminated
(3) B,A,C where tournament continues, C is eliminated
(4) B,C,A where tournament continues, C is eliminated
(5) C,A,B where tournament continues, B is eliminated
(6) C,B,A where tournament continues, no players eliminated

(1,2)
A: 70
B: 35

(3)
B: 70
A: 35

(4)
B: 70
A: 35

(5)
C: 70
A: 35

(6)
C: 70
A: 35

A: 70 + 70 + 35 + 35 + 35 + 35 -> 2
B: 70 + 70 + 35 + 35 -> 1.5
C: 70 + 70 -> 1

Im not sure what this is good for. But you could model some BaseEQ/Factor and adjust it based on stacks.

Just an extreme example for my curiousity:

A: 1999 B: 1000 C: 1

(3,4)
A: 999 B: 2001

(5):
A: 2997 C: 3

(6):
A: 998 B: 1999 C: 3

So in this case, (1,2) and (3,4) remain the same. (5) has shifted from C 1st A 2nd to A 1st C 2nd. (6) Is essential almost the situation again.

Good points. 1,2 and 3,4 will always remain the same. You got 5 mixed up though. C wins but A is still a heavy chip leader and likely to win the tournament. C does cash though. In 6 with these stacks it is essentially the same situation again. However with closer stacks it dramatically changes. Imagine stacks of 1001,1000, and 999. Next hand C would have 2997, B would have 2, and A would have 1. C will win the tournament in this situation most of the time.

I think that is one of the main takeaways. Chips going into the flip still do equate to the % you'll win the tournament. In a 1001,1000, and 999 example all players will share similar expected value on the 1st place prize. It's the remaining amount, $35, where equity sort of gets stolen in some of these spots. In a 1001,1000, 999 example the 999 stack is facing a disadvantage and losing EV in the flip but there are also examples such as the one you posted above where the shortstack actually steals EV from the other players in the flip.

This hand really got into me. I think theres so much strategi involved here. But none the less. With ICMIZER I cant find any kind of range where this would not be a shove. cneuy3, you said it could be a possibility to pass up a shove with a hand as strong as KTs. And for all the above reasons I see the logic in that to.

So my question is now, can we pass up this seemingly huge plus EV spot for strategic reasons?

The issue is the forced allin. Unlike previously stated it doesnt realise your EV. Because of this nifty midstack wins when bigstack wins mechanic.

Look at the situation with 1001-1000-999.
Everyone has very close to 33.3% eq acording to ICM.

1001:
(1,2) 1st
(3,4) 2nd
(5) 2nd
(6) likely 2nd

1000:
(1,2) 2nd
(3,4) 1st
(5) 3rd
(6) likely 3rd

999:
(1,2) 3rd
(3,4) 3rd
(5,6) 1st

1001: ((2/3)*(1/3)) + ((1/3)*(2/3)) = 0,444
1000: ((2/3)*(1/3)) * ((1/3)*(1/3)) = 0,333
999: (2/3)*(1/3) = 0,222

These are closer to the true Equity. As you can see, that differs quite a bit from ICM.

Hey guys,

Ronni, that is good stuff but one thing to correct is your (6) for big stack and mid stack. big stack is likely 3rd in that scenario and mid stack is likely 2nd. The EV results should still be similar for player C it's just that it's more of a big stack and mid stack stealing equity in this spot against player C rather than A taking it all for themselves.

So since the OP hand is similar to this example how wide do you guys think Button and SB should push and how much wider does BB call in this spot?

No offense but this looks pretty absurd, in these spots BB obviously severely spites hero to knock him off from those ATC spots.

Well its just ICMIZER so dont be sorry.

More like the misuse of it These spots often converge around the 43/34s before ranges begin to expanding again.

Dont misuse icmizer!

Just to make everything clear guys, ICMIZER doesn't offer an accurate model for the end stage of Spin & Go MAX tournaments.
"Everyone going all-in" isn't really modeled by ICM or FGS.
So you have to apply manual adjustments according to your own understanding of a better way of modeling the spin & go max rules to any results that you are getting in ICMIZER.

Hey Q,

shouldnt it be somewhat easy to calculate the equities in this mode? Even creating a table with endgame equity should be somewhat easy!?