Does respecting ICM mean you win less often?

ICM savvy players cash more and win more; it just means you know when to switch gears.

There is a belief that playing an ICM aware strategy makes more money, but leads to fewer wins in poker.

The ICM aware players get further in the tournament more often than the 'play for the win' guys, and they win more.

When I started online, I specialised in 6 man STTs that paid two spots. At the time, the most debated question among regs was “If we are three handed with roughly even stacks, should we be aggressive and play for the win and get it more often, or should we be tight and try to lock up the min cash (2 buy-ins)?”

It depends...

The answer, as is so often the case in poker, is “it depends”.

If the other two players are going hard at it, your best bet is to hang tight and let them at it. You’ll nearly always get heads-up but at a 2:1 chip deficit, but this is worth over 3 buy-ins on average, much better than the theoretical 2 buy-ins you have in equity as one of three equal stacks playing for 6 buy-ins.

If the other two players are playing very tight, trying to ensure they cash, you should attack.

You’ll bubble more than one-third of the time, but you’ll also win more often enough to more than compensate.

The conundrum is what happens if one guy is playing tight and the other loose. Now, if you play tight, you’re one of the two tight players being exploited by the loose guy, and if you play loose, you’re one of the two loose guys being exploited by the tight guy.

Being ICM aware does not mean you don't accumulate chips, quite the opposite in fact.

What it really means is that you have the ability to change gears, to determine the best possible strategy at any time.

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