The Grandma dilemma:<SPAN> </SPAN>Debunking the myths

One of the arguments of the cheaters (the word is used just for description, no offense intended) and the apologists is that the likelihood of a player with two accounts playing the same tourney and ending in the same table is pretty small, insignificant they say, <SPAN> </SPAN>“don’t worry about it”

Well, let’s take a look to see if you should worry:


Tournament: Daily PS $100 Rebuys

Number of players:<SPAN> </SPAN>108

Starting tables:<SPAN> </SPAN>12

Lets say Grandma has two accounts; lets call the accounts (just for description purposes); “supercheater” and “megagreedy”

<SPAN> </SPAN>What are the odds of cheater and greedy ending up in the same table at the beginning of the tournament?

Well, the answer is pretty simple; 1 in 12. Every 12 tournaments cheater and greedy will start the tournament in the same table, and 7 people in that table will be screwed. If grandma decided to play this tournament 4 times a week then she’s going to be cheating 7 people every 3 weeks. If she plays 6 of these tournaments a week; then every 2 weeks she’s cheating 7 people; and of course this is just at the beginning of the tournament.

Just looking at some information from the tournament results of some of the good players, we know that they usually bust after 60% of the field do it. So a good player is usually around with 50% of the people left; for our tournament this is 6 tables. Do you want to calculate the number of people cheated now per week by Grandma? You may want to calculate also how this number increases if Grandma has 3 accounts instead of 2.



Tournament:<SPAN> </SPAN>$20<SPAN> </SPAN>180 players S & G

Number of players:<SPAN> </SPAN>180

Starting tables: 20

Now, just for fun, let's say Grandma has 3 accounts, “supercheater”, “megagreedy” and “IownFThaters”

Given 20 tables to accommodate 3 people, this can be done of 20*20*20 ways = 8000

Since we don’t want the 3 of them to be together then we have 20*19*18 = 6840 ways to do this. This means<SPAN> </SPAN>8000-6840 = 1160 times at least two of the accounts will start together; this is about 1 in 7. So every 7 tournaments Grandma should be cheating 7 people in the table. If Grandma is healthy I think she can be doing this …… mmmmm ….. daily?



Tournament: $150+12 party Super

Number of players: 1000

Starting tables: 100

Granny playing 3 accounts gives us numbers of 29800 out of 1000000 starting at least 2 in the same table. This is 1 every 33 times. If Grandma can play 4 of this weekly (could be easily more than that with the Friday and Saturday); then even in this “big” tournament; Granny is cheating once every two months just at the beginning of the tournament. I guess that’s ok for some people standards.



Tournament: $100+9 Party Midnight

Number of players: 450

Starting tables: 45

Here the numbers with 3 accounts are 5985 out of 91125. This is once every 15.23 tournaments. Playing 5 of this a week, she’s cheating every 3 weeks.

Summary:

Let’s suppose Grandma Schedule for the next 2 months is the following tourneys per week and she will be playing 3 accounts:

4 times the stars $100 Rebuys (cheating rate: 1 in 4.24)

4 Party Supers (cheating rate: 1 in 33.56)

5 $100 Party Midnight (cheating rate: 1 in 15.23)

So she will cheat, 8 times in the $100R, 1 time in the Party Supers and about 9 times in the Party $100; and remember this is just at the beginning of the tournament. So with this schedule she’ll cheat about 18 times in the 2 months, about 9 per month, about twice a week.

Twice a week Grandma will be seated with 2 of her accounts at the same table at the beginning of the tournament; and for the poor 14 or 16 players in the table, well, it’s just bad luck.

I let others elaborate with corrections to my numbers (I’m not spending any time to check all the numbers), results changing some of the variables, like number of entrants, Grandma’s schedule, number of accounts; Grandma’s accounts in the middle of the tournament, Grandma’s accounts in the final table and of course dealing with multiple Grandma’s in the same tourney.

To the apologists: I’d really appreciated if instead of wasting your valuable time with insults to people like me and others in the “we care about this issue” camp or trying to generate sophisticated arguments why we shouldn’t care and why nothing can be done ever to solve this problem or even with disingenuous calls to moderation; you spend more of your time thinking about solutions; if you don’t want to do it, that’s ok; just don’t make our efforts harder.

To the multi-accounting people: I hope some of you look at these numbers and realize that this is not ok. And you don’t need to do it. You are a good player, there are tons of tournaments these days, and you can win tons of money without the need of multiaccounting.

I’m not calling you a cheater; maybe you just make a mistake like most of us have done at some time or another in the past with wrong assumptions. It’s time to realize this was a mistake and move on.

David

yea but partypoker uses ten seats so your numbers are off.

Excellent insights sirio! Glad to see some well thought out examples concerning this issue. Your numbers illustrate just how often the multi-accounter will actually get seated at the same table, at the beginning of the tourney. It's alot more often than most of us realized, I am sure.

Very nice post sirio. I just wanted to comment on JJ's "explanation" It's hilarious, and he made an "explanation" to save his ass. He plays 2 accounts bottom line, and the "grandma story is just down right funny similar to the commercial where the squirrels come in and take the guys wallet while "robbing" him. Good try JJ, stick to 1 acct please.

The really disturbing aspect of this whole sorry story for me is the top internet players lining up to defend the use of multi-accounts and even stating 'lots of players do it' as if that is justification.

Seems to me it's all about the top players wanting even more of an edge than they already have due to their superior skill level.

It's greed pure and simple.

what i dont get about the whole story is if he was really lying and going to make up a story, why not make it believable?? something like, my friend was over here and had to leave because of a family emergency and i took over which was ok since we were in different rooms on different computers the entire tournament...if he had said that, holy shit what a difference and no issue and we're talking about how god damn good the kid is and how he just banked 140k. but instead we get RANK GRANDMA posts for 2 full days (my fave was the one who looked like TJ Cloutier , where did that go anyways?)

anyways, this g'ma fiasco which has officially set the record for the topic that has spawned the most jokes ever

Your numbers are correct, but it gets worse from there -

People are bounced around tables often in the big tourneys, so the accounts are more likely to be at the same table.

Once the accounts are at the same table they will bsut people more quickly than usual, meaning more than 7 people (on average) will be getting screwed.

There would be an inherent advantage to certian styles of play. If both accounts get reasonable stacks built up they can wait around hoping to get to the same table and bring the hammer down on the unsuspecting players at that table.

Those are just a few examples, there are many others, why this situation is worse than it looks for grandmas opponents.

Thanks for the insight, Sirio. The ramifications are worse than I thought they were.

siro, will you marry me!

great post sirio11..........

unrank all of these multiple account playing p.o.s.............

It is getting silly. Although I am glad Siro took the time to actually show the data on why playing multiple accounts is wrong.

Very good post, this should help people see how serious this is.

I disagree with the idea that this post is so insightful.

3 example tournaments with <500 people, even going so far as to use 3 accounts in these hypotheticals. Also using 3 accounts in your party Special example with a lower than average number (I think).

Your entire argument seems so unfair to the situation and will serve to reinforce this idea that top online people are using even 3 or more acounts. Regardless of that being the case, 3+ isnt the situation at hand. You go on to just blow off the grandma story fiction, without any basis other than you think it sounds stupid.

Summary: I think you're hurting the situation more than helping by presenting the community with these ideas of 3+ accounts in <500 person tournaments, referring to the account holders has "Megagreedy" and "Supercheater", and giving this example of 4 Specials per week or 5 100rebuys per week when then grandma account has played 13 total. By using JJs situation as a framework for your argument then adding in this other stuff like the frequency of play and more accounts, you're changing the situation for the worse and being moreso unfair to those involved.

If you guys can give any reason to not believe the grandma story, by all means, let me know. But I am going to give JJ the benefit of the doubt. He has given do indication that he is a liar. You people trying to play judge, jury, and executioner ought to do the same rather than jumping to conclusions because you think the story sounds made up.

I dumped my balance to a friend at a HU cash game table because I was having the account closed, dipshit.

I am not going to explain the situation to you, because its none of your concern and is completely unrelated to this thread.

i realized that too. Why would he choose grandma, a friend/cousin/brother/uncle is so much more believable because its more ordinary. And JJ responded quite quickly with his explanation, you think the whole time inbetween he was making up a story about his grandma?