What does 'Hero's M = 33.33' mean?

[Danh Bai]

Momma?

[kevster]

M is a number that is calculated by summing the blinds and any antes and dividing our stack by the sum. The higher the number the better. You will notice it dropping rapidly during the course of an SNG and, as such, our play should be dictated based on our M. Whilst devised for MTTs, it is directly applicable to SNGs too.

You should read more on this in Harrington On Holdem, though there maybe more to be found by searching FTR.

[GatorJH]

As an example to Kev's definition, if the blinds are 10/20 then your M is as follows based on the below stack sizes:

Stack Size M Calculated as
1500 50 1500/30
900 30 900/30
300 10 300/30
150 5 150/30

The intent of calculating your M is to determine how many times you can make it through the blinds without being "blinded out". You don't want to let your M get too low because then when you get your chips in the middle your fold equity (FE) will not be that good so you run the risk of getting called by weaker hands.

One final note; don't forget to add ante's in when calculating your M. For example, if the blinds are 100/200 with 20 chip antes and 5 players you now will be putting in 400 chips every orbit (the two blinds plus 20 chips 5 times), so if you have 6000 chips your M there would be 15 (6000/400).