The abbreviation ICM stands for Independent Chip Model, but what does it mean and how it should influence our strategy? ICM exists in tournaments where the prize pool is shared among multiple players — even if you win all the chips, you don’t win all the money. What is ICM in Poker? ICM stands for independent chip model. It’s a way of assigning a monetary value to our chip stack in a poker tournament. The fundamental idea is here is that doubling our tournament stack doesn’t necessarily double our average tournament payout. The Independent chip model (ICM) converts tournament chip stacks, to real money equities. It assigns a $ (or £, €, etc.) value to the current chips stacks. For any given player, these real money equities are worked out by taking the probability of that player finishing in each of the paid spots in a tournament, and multiplying this.

Independent Chip Model (ICM)

Poker Tracker 4 has several tools for work with ICM, such as “ICM Quiz” and “ICM Calculator”. Let’s consider them separately.

“ICM Quiz” is designed to train playing skills to Independent Chip Model. You can find “ICM Quiz” in “Tools” in main menu, and choose “ICM” and “Quiz”, like on the picture below.

In the opened window you can set up the varied parameters of the game situations, which you want to train.

In “Tournament Structure” you can choose structure of tournament. There are several templates with tournament prizes structure, such as “10 player SNG 50%/30%/20%”, “10 players DON”, “2 Player 100%” and others.

Also you can create your own prizes structure by pressing relevant button.

In the opened window you can edit and remove the existing tournaments types, and you can create your own tournament type. To do so you have to specify “Tourney Info” и “Prize Pool” in “Info” tabs.

On “Desc” tab you can indicate additional structure parameters, such as “Seats per Table”. Here you can choose “Full”, “6max” and “HU” tables. In “Total Tables” you can choose “MTT”, “SNG” or… In “Blind Speed” you can set up tournament table speed. Also, you can mark flags for tournaments, such as “SNG”, “DON”, “REBUY”, “STATELLITE”, “DEEP” and etc.

After all settings press “OK”.

Let’s return to “Quez Parameters”. Here you can set up “Number of Hands” for you training “Position” which you want to train, “Preferred Seating” (не очень понятен смысл). In “Hero’s Range” you can set up range, which you want to train. For example, “AA” or “72”, it’s pretty easy decision in any position. You can remove it from range.

Also, you can indicate Minimum and Maximum Players at the table and “Blind Structure”.

You can also choose the type of opponent, which depend on the opponent range. With it opponent will close your “Open Push”. You can choose “Average”, “Loose”, “Tight” and etc. Click “advanced” to combine several kinds of opponent in one type.

After all settings press “OK” and in each Replayer window choose “Push” or “Fold” answer, or press “Quit” for premature quit.

After answer on all questions you will see the following window with the results.

In this window you can see what was necessary to do in every situation and consideration of your variant with Independent Chip Model. Here you can make double-click to review hand.

ICM Calculator

This section will be helpful to calculate the value of the stack according to Independent Chip Model. You can find “ICM Calculator” in “Tools” in main menu, and choose “ICM” and “Calculator”, like on the picture below.

Here you can calculate Prizes in Pool% and in the Money.

For calculation in $ you need to enter “Buy-In”, “Fee” and “Bounty”. Also, you can save or import “Player/Chips/Results” in .xml foramt. After entering parameters in “Info” and “Desc” tabs, press “Calculate” and you will see the following result (like on the picture).

Understanding the Independent Chip Model (ICM) for SNGs

In poker, the Independent Chip Model (ICM) uses the stack sizes of remaining players and the payout structure to calculate each player’s equity in the tournament.

Knowing your equity allows you to assess whether a particular play is +$EV and is a hugely powerful tool when making decisions on the bubble in Sit n Go tournaments. This knowledge can allow you to make some +$EV moves that are not immediately obvious to everyone. This gives you an edge on the competition and will give a healthy boost to your ROI.

Equity calculations using the Independent Chip Model

The definition might sound a little complicated if you haven’t heard it before but it’s quite simple to understand with the aid of a couple of examples.

Let’s first take a look at an example of a bubble situation.

You are in a regular 10 man SnG with a $10 buy-in, 50/30/20 payouts and 1500 starting chips each. You are down to 4 players and by a happy coincidence all players have the same number of chips 3750. We will ignore the effect of the blinds to keep things simple.

It is not hard to work out that the equities for all players here is $25.

The next hand player A and player B get all-in and Player A wins. Now the chip stacks look like this:

Player A - 7500

Player C - 3750

Player D - 3750

This is where ICM gets interesting. The chips that Player B lost were worth more to him than they are to Player A. It sounds counter intuitive, after all player B lost 3750 chips and player A gained 3750 chips, but Player A’s equity has gone up by less than Player B’s equity went down.

Player B’s equity has gone from $25 to $0. This $25 must be split by the remaining players. If Player A’s equity went up by $25 to $50 then that would imply he is guaranteed to finish in first place. He certainly has the best chance of finishing in first but the other two players are still in the race and their equities have now increased accordingly.

Using an Independent Chip Model calculator we can see the player equities are as follows:

Player A - $38.33 (+$13.33)

Player C - $30.83 (+$5.83)

Player D - $30.83 (+$5.83)

[An ICM calculator is a piece of software that does ICM equity calculations for us. Getting one will help your game immensely and will pay for itself in no time. SnG Wizard is one of the best around and can be purchased at www.sngwiz.com]

Why is this important?

Let’s assume that you are Player A. In the all-in hand between you and Player B, Players C and D fold, Player B shoves and it is up to you to decide whether you should call or not.

You have to risk $25 in equity to win $13.33 in equity. This means your hand needs at least 65.3% equity against the range of hands that Player B shoves.

(25 divided by 25 + 13.33 = 65.3)

By looking at a couple of examples of hand ranges using PokerStove we can see that ICM will allow you to make a superior play here that is not obvious to most players, which will increase your ROI.

[PokerStove is a free poker tool that allows you to calculate the equities of different hand ranges]

Example 1:

You look down at AJs. It’s a decent hand and you know from your previous games with Player B that he will be shoving the top 35% of hands.

AJs has a big edge against this range. Its equity is 61.5% (calculated using PokerStove). 61.5% falls somewhat short of the 65.3% needed for a call to be +$EV though, so even though AJs has an edge over Player B’s hand range, the correct play is to fold.

Example 2:

Here we will take an extreme example where you know for a fact that you have the best hand. You again have AJs in spades. Player B shoves and shows you that he has KQs, also in spades. You have the best hand and if this were a cash game you would snap call. However, if you run the equities in PokerStove you can see that your hand has roughly 61.1%, again not enough to make this a profitable call.

The Independent Chip Model and your ROI

So we have shown you how you can use the Independent Chip Model to sometimes profitably fold the best hand. What effect will this play have on your ROI?

Take the numbers from example 1. Our hand has 61.5% equity. How much of a difference will folding make to our ROI versus calling?

If you fold:

You will still have $25 in equity

If you call:

61.5% of the time you will have $38.33 equity = $23.57 on average

38.5% of the time you will have $0 equity

So calling costs you $1.43 in equity on average. This is 14.3% of the $10 buy in! Obviously this exact hand will not come up in every Sit and Go, but every time it does, your knowledge of the Independent Chip Model will make you 14.3% of a buy in. It’s not hard to see how this knowledge applied to many situations can add up to a significant edge over your competition.

Time for some fun – Relentless aggression!!!

So far we have shown you that ICM can assist you in making good folds in SNGs, but where’s the fun in folding your way to a min-cash all day long? It’s time to use the Independent Chip Model to ramp up the aggression.

If you need a very strong hand to call a players shove, then it’s also true that if you shove, your opponent needs a very strong hand to call. This opens up a lot of opportunities for you to really pile on the pressure in bubble spots.

Keep in mind our example above. Let’s now assume that you are in Player B’s spot. It’s time to shove all the chips in the middle. Awesome! Let’s say that you know player A has AT. We can shove any two cards and Player A does not have the correct odds to call. That’s right! A hand as strong as AT has to fold here. AT vs. a random hand has 62.7% equity, so if Player A knows perfect ICM we could even tell him we are shoving any two cards and there’s nothing he can do but fold.

Now before you go off and start shoving every hand like some sort of unstoppable monkey, we have made some pretty big assumptions here and there are some very important considerations and adjustments that need to be made.

Additional considerations for the Independent Chip Model

ICM and player type

Each poker player is different and most will not know perfect ICM strategy. Again let’s assume your opponent has AT and you are considering whether to shove any two cards. If you know this player is too loose and unaware of ICM then shoving any two cards is likely a big mistake because he will very likely call.

Notice here that your opponent is making a mistake by calling but you need to adjust your strategy to account for his mistake. He is calling with too wide a range, so you need to tighten up your range to account for this or the other opponents in the tournament will be the ones that benefit from his mistake.

[Don’t be discouraged if someone makes a play that you know is incorrect and it ends up costing you money. This is a good thing; it means there’s money to be made in the future. Just take a note and adjust your range next time.]

ICM and the blinds

ICM does not properly account for the blind positions. For example if the next player in the BB is so short that he will be forced all in next hand then it is quite likely that he will be knocked out in the next hand. You will gain a significant amount of equity by just folding and letting him bust out so you need to tighten up your range in this spot considerably.

ICM and player skill advantage

ICM assumes that all poker players are of equal skill. This is obviously far from the truth. This fact can change some of your marginal decisions. For example if you know you have a big skill advantage over your opponent it may be best to avoid pushing a very small edge now to take advantage of a larger edge later when your opponent makes a larger mistake.

The Independent Chip Model – Avoiding ICM suicide

Poker is a game of mistakes. Put simply, if you make fewer mistakes than your opponent, you make money. Opponents who do not utilise ICM while playing SNGs will often commit ICM suicide. That is to say they will get into spots where they put their tournament life at risk with only a marginal advantage or even a disadvantage. Your study of ICM spots will mean you avoid committing ICM suicide while your opponents go at it again and again, handing you equity in the process.

Poker Independent Chip Model Calculator

The Independent Chip Model – You know the basics, what now?

We have only discussed some of the situations where ICM is useful in this article. To use the Independent Chip Model to its full potential it will require a little work on your part. This work is best done using an ICM calculator such as SnG Wizard which also includes a quiz feature. This feature is extremely helpful in putting your ICM knowledge to the test before hitting the tables.

Poker Independent Chip Models

This work will make you a much better poker player and greatly increase your ROI in Sit n Gos. Once you master ICM, most situations will become second nature to you and you will crush your opponents with ease.