Join the journey of a tourney!

Published on Jul 24th 2008 10:41PM by fritzson - Views: 59

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fritzson

Nibs: 1,987
Member Since: Apr 20th 2008

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Join the journey of a tourney!

(and do no not fall behind)

Different kinds of stage

We who plays tournies often knows how important it is to be aware of the different kinds of staget, we don't want to fall behind. Here comes a short introduction for those who does not play tournies very often and just wonder why it is so hard to get to money. I thought it too in the beginning. It took me some month to figure it out... and I have also been reading a litte about it.

Early stage

In the beginning of the tourney, you have a lot of chip and the blinds are small, if you are looking to the blinds. Because of that, there is time to wait for good starting hands before you need to go in to pots. It is good to be careful and not play away your chips to monsters. It is good to be stable and have patience as strategy, when you are trying to catch the less good players by putting out traps. In this stage, you don’t want to take big risk and risk to go out form the tourney. A good goal is to double or triple up your stack, before the middle stage.

Middle stage

The blinds are getting bigger and the bets and becaue of that you can’t wait to long for monsters and top hands. If you wait to long you can be force to act. There is a risk you fall behind, while the blinds gets bigger. The blinds starting to mean something and it is important to pick up pots. It is good to be the one who takes the initiative in the pots. It is better to the one who bets rather than call when you are taking risks. It is good to take some notes of the players to know how they play, easier to isolate the weaker players, who are easier to kick out. The goal is to collect enough chips to be in a good position to the late stage.

Late stage

Good thing in the late stage is to have a good stack and position on the “leaderboard”, because if you are in a pot it can lead to all in. That is why it is good to have a big stack. It is better to have a bigger stack than your opponent if you need to go all in, incase you lose a big pot. Big stack can sit back and wait for good hands without blinds eating the stack. With a big stack it is easier to control the table throught aggressive play. As a player with a small stack, you should stay away from big stacks as much as possible. It is important to pick up pots, you don’t what to fall behind. As a short stack you need to play very aggressive, never call except with AA possibly. To steal blinds it is good to make a raise in late position on the table. Only play top hands in early position.

Final table

The goal on final table is to reach the top 3. With a big stack is it good to take control over the table and at same time avoid to big risks, which can help the small stack to double up. The small stack if force to act because the blinds are big and now they need to survive for every round. With a little stack you have to play very very aggressiv to avoid to big risks against big stacks. When it is 4-6 players left you can play more and steal more pots. It is good to be extra aggressive when it is few players left. A good strategy is to play same strategy as for short handed game.