The early stage of a tournament is very similar to a cash game. The stacks are still very big in relation to the blinds. The main difference to a cash game is that we normally can't re-buy in a tournament. In a cash game we can re-buy as long as our bankrolls allow. For this reason, in tournaments it's much more important not to lose all our chips (in a single hand), because this would mean elimination from the tournament.
To sum it up: As a new tournament online poker player, your default strategy should be to start out with a tight poker game during the early stage and the middle stage. As the tournament progresses, you can start playing a wider range of hands, possibly even doubling your range during each progressive phase. Here's the poker tournament strategy I use to fight back against the maniacs. Poker Tournament Strategy 1: Pick On The Bully. Generally, in the early stages of a MTT, most decent players will be playing a tight aggressive strategy similar to how they would play in a cash game. In this article we'll cover the tight strategy for the early stages of tournament play from a pro-con perspective. It's up to you to determine what approach fits best into your game, but hopefully the below will give you a starting point for analyzing whether or not tight really is right for you. It's a similarly big mistake to play the early levels of a tournament the same way you'd play the middle or later stages, and vice-versa. Priorities change as you proceed from the start of a.
In order to play this stage of the tournament successfully it is helpful to read the article on the no-limit hold'em full ring strategy (or big stack strategy/BSS), because very similar principles apply.
Tight is Right
Many inexperienced players think that they can play even marginal hands in the early phase of a tournament as the blinds are still very low and they can see the flop cheaply. This way of thinking is wrong! In fact, the opposite is correct. There is little or no reason to play marginal hands, precisely because the blinds are still small in relation to the stacks. We play this phase extremely tightly, i.e. we only play our good hands, thus exploiting the loose style of our opponents.
Advanced poker strategy reddit. In particular when we are in early positions we should play only premium hands such as JJ, QQ, KK, AA and AK. If we concentrate on these hands we will often be able to knock one or two bad players out of the tournament, simply by virtue of having the better hand. In later positions we can also play smaller pairs and suited connectors such as 7♥6♥.
A common mistake is playing cards that are easily dominated against raises from an early position. This occurs most often with hands such as AQ, KQ and AJ. These hands are weak when we are playing them against hands that are typically raised in early position (EP).
The tight game usually has two objectives:
- Firstly, we want to get into the pot as favourites and win our opponents' chips. Good starting hand selection makes our decisions in later rounds of betting considerably easier.
- Secondly, we want to create a suitable image for the later phases of the tournament when the blinds are higher, the image of a 'rock' who plays only the really good hands. If we are subsequently only dealt bad hands, this image will enable us to play a steal or a bluff.
There is one problem with this way of playing, though: when we are dealt good hands, we often get less action from our opponents. If a player continually folds and raises only once every twenty hands, even the most unobservant of opponents will become suspicious and fold the weak hands they would normally have resisted folding against other players.
Although this type of game is generally to be recommended, it does have a further disadvantage for good and very good players. They could make something out of weaker hands such as smaller pairs, e.g. 4♦4♣, or high Broadway cards, e.g. A♠Q♠.
The optimum type of game thus includes playing a few hands that are not quite as strong but which nevertheless have potential. This applies above all to hands played in the later positions.
- Small Pairs
Small pairs, i.e. all starting hands from 22 to 99 can rake in a respectable number of chips as soon as they become a set. If we don't hit a set, though, these hands are worth nothing. With cards like these we try to see the flop cheaply and hope for a set. 'Cheaply' means that we either limp if we are in middle or late position or are one of the blinds, or that we even call a raise up to a maximum of a tenth of our stack if we are in late position. In early position we always fold because, out of position and pre-flop, small pairs are too weak to hold out against a possible raise.
- High Pairs
it's from TT to AA should always be raised pre-flop, not only because they can make us a lot of money, but also because they need to be protected by a raise so that our opponents aren't able to improve their hands cheaply. If players before or after us raise more than once then we can fold hands such as TT and JJ, and even if there is only a single raise after ours we should consider folding this hand and waiting for a better opportunity. However, this decision depends largely on the opponent.
- Big Broadway cards
A♣K♦, A♠Q♦ & co. are also strong hands, similar to high pairs, and should correspondingly be played similarly pre-flop – AK like aces and kings, and AQ like a pair of tens, for example.
- Small Broadway Cards
Small Broadway cards such as AT, KJ, QT, JT etc. must be played with extreme caution in this phase of a tournament. The first rule is: if the small Broadway cards are not suited, or if there has already been a raise, then fold! An exception would be the situation in which we are in late position with six players ahead of us who only paid the big blind or called a minimum raise: then, naturally, we could also play. The big problem with these hands is that they are often dominated by better hands. For example, K♦J♦ or K♣Q♣ will seldom win against hands such as A♠J♥ or A♣Q♦ . With small Broadway hands we mainly want to hit monsters like straights or flushes, which is why it's important to see the flop cheaply with these hands. If we only hit a weak pair or not at all then we can quickly fold.
- Suited Connectors
Hands like 6♥7♥ or J♠9♠ can be played similarly to small pairs. Obviously we are speculating on a flush or a straight here.
- Other Starting Hands
All starting hands not listed above are folded without exception.
Stealing the Blinds
In the early phase of a tournament the blinds are unimportant as they are very small in relation to our stack. In the early phase of a normal PokerStars tournament we have a stack of 1,500 chips and the blinds are 10/20. In other words, we have 75BBs, and winning the blinds increases our stack by only 2%. And this must be seen in conjunction with the risk of losing a lot of chips if we go wrong.
For this reason we should pass up on stealing the blinds with weak and marginal hands in the early phase of a tournament. However, this does not mean that we shouldn't attack the blinds when we have stronger hands such as pairs, aces with strong kickers and suited connectors.
The post-flop Game
The flop is a decisive moment in Hold'em, and the really important decisions are made here.
Just like the pre-flop game, the post-flop game is also very tight. In general we can, as mentioned above, keep to the recommendations made in connection with the full ring no-limit cash game (BSS) as our solid basic strategy. Nevertheless, let's look at some special situations.
Heads-up on the flop
- Pre-flop Aggressor
As the pre-flop aggressor we should make a continuation bet regardless of the flop and our position. How much to bet is a question of playing style; a continuation bet will normally be ½ to ¾ of the pot.
- Not the Aggressor, Out of Position
If we hadn't grasped the initiative pre-flop (i.e. we only called another player's bet), then as a rule we should fold weak hands when we're out of position. With strong hands we can decide whether to:
- check/call,
- check raise or
- bet out.
Check/call has the advantage of keeping the pot small and avoiding a re-raise if the hand isn't strong enough.
- Not the Aggressor, in Position
If we are not the aggressor and in position we have considerably more opportunities for playing our own game, but normally, we should still fold a weak hand.
With strong drawing hands like flush draws and straight draws it's a good idea to vary one's game. Let's assume that the pre-flop aggressor has made a continuation bet: we now have the following options:
- We can semi-bluff (i.e. raise), in which case we should usually also bet the turn if our opponent checks it.
- We can also simply call on the flop and wait to see the turn card. If this is helpful we can then bet on the turn or raise our opponent's bet.
With very strong hands such as top pair/top kicker or better we also have various options:
- If our opponent checks we should always bet, for the simple reason that the pot is still relatively small and we want to generate a big one. We can make a classic value bet here.
- If our opponent makes a continuation bet on the flop we should vary our game: sometimes we'll call, at other times we'll shoot back with a raise.
Multiway flops
- With the Initiative
If we didn't hit on the flop there's not usually much point in betting if we have several active opponents. This applies even more so if we're out of position.
However, if we're holding a strong hand we should always bet on the flop. It's a big mistake to risk everybody checking when we're playing a strong hand against several opponents. This gives away a free card, which could in the end give an opponent a better hand.
- Without the Initiative
Especially when we're playing against several opponents we should always fold weak hands. Playing on with hands such as small or medium pairs is a common beginner's mistake. Good hands, though, should be protected against drawing hands by means of bets and raises.
Drawing hands can often be played very well against several opponents. The reason for this is that the pot odds are better when several players call and we will possibly win more chips if we hit our draw.
- Limped Hands
In the early phase, merely calling before the flop is quite legitimate. Similarly, in an early position we can call with a variety of hands. Amongst these are small and medium pairs, suited connectors, and even hands such as [ahqh] or [kdqd]. Another possibility is calling when one or more players have already called before us. Depending on our position, we can do this with a lot of hands. In particular when we're on the button and several other players have called, we can limp with just about any cards.
If we're in middle or late position, the players before us have folded, and we decide that we want to play the hand, then as a rule we should raise. Casino de lisboa portugal.
In limped pots we should only continue playing if the flop is really good. It is hardly worthwhile bluffing in these pots because they're very small and it's difficult to gauge the opponents' hands as the range of limped hands is extremely broad.
Small pairs are especially suitable for limping, if possible when other players are already in. However, small pairs must always be folded if we don't hit our trips.
Turn and River
On the turn the pot is often very big in relation to our remaining effective stack.
'Effective stack size' is the term for the size of the stack of the player with the fewest chips who is active in that hand. If, for example, there are still three players left in the hand, and
- player 1 has 1,000 chips,
- player 2 has 500 chips, and
- player 3 has 200 chips,
then the effective stack size is 200 chips.
Rule: if the remaining effective stack is the same size as or smaller than the current pot, it is (almost) always right to play all-in if we want to bet again.
When the effective stack is small
With a strong hand we should always bet or go all-in. The aim is to get paid for our good hands. Especially in tournaments we will always see players who throw their chips around carelessly and who will also pay us if we show strength. The goal is of course to win as many chips as possible with our good hands.
With a weak hand we have to weigh up whether we want to go all-in or not. This problem can be solved mathematically:
- Assuming that the effective stack is exactly the same size as the pot and we're sure that we won't win the pot if we're called, then our opponent must fold at least half the time in order to make the push profitable.
When the effective stack is very big
If the effective stack is still very big in relation to the pot then the game becomes much more complex, especially if we're out of position.
- In Position …
… in some cases it's right to check even strong hands such as overpairs on uncoordinated boards. The reason for this is simply that we don't want to make the pot too big, and we thus avoid making a difficult decision if our opponent raises.
On coordinated boards there would be less sense in checking because if our opponent is holding a draw he would accept the free card right away.
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- Out of Position …
… we should often play carefully if our opponent shows a lot of strength, even when we're holding strong hands such as top pair. This keeps the pot small but doesn't stop our opponent from continuing a bluff. The disadvantage is that our opponent may use the opportunity to get a free card, or even that he ends up making a better hand after a (cheap) turn bluff.
Multiway
If there are several opponents in the pot we must obviously play more carefully. Draws with which we called the flop but which haven't hit will lose considerable value on the turn because only one more card will be dealt – the river. We should fold our draws on the turn against bets that constitute a substantial percentage of our stack and of the pot.
We should continue playing very strong hands such as sets and top two pair aggressively.
Conclusion:
In the early stage the aim is to win chips with our very strong hands and at the same time avoid marginal situations as far as possible.
Join us on our Discord channel.
There's a common misconception that the early stages of a no-limit hold‘em tournament are unimportant. The argument goes that the blinds are too small to be worth stealing, and consequently any pot you win or lose is generally too small to make much difference to your stack. After all, a medium-sized pot in level one will amount to nothing more than a big blind or two a few levels later.
This may be true for a certain type of tournament specialist who is an expert at stealing and restealing preflop but is inexperienced at postflop play. In truth, though, a skilled player's potential edge is highest when stacks are deepest. This is because he has more tools at his disposal and there is room for his opponents to make extremely expensive errors.
This article will introduce you to some of the tools that great players use to accumulate chips during the early stages of a tournament and help you to avoid some of common misunderstandings that can lead to big mistakes when playing deep.
Position, Position, Position
It's level one of a $10,000 main event. Everyone has roughly 300 times the big blind in his stack. There are several professionals at the table, and while some players appear weaker than others, none seem likely to make huge mistakes.
At such a table, I'm happier to be dealt a suited J-10 on my button than a pair of aces in first position. Granted, with the aces, I'm guaranteed either to steal the blinds or get money into the pot as a favorite on at least one street. Preflop is almost always the smallest betting round, though, and it's likely that I'll have to play out of position postflop, possibly against multiple opponents. That means that their decisions will generally be better than mine on the next three streets, when the bets are larger.
This isn't a matter of J-10 suited being a better deep-stacked hand than aces. I'd still rather have the aces if I get the button either way, and that's true no matter how deep we get (within reason – it's possible that at some insanely huge stack depth the fact that a big suited connector will make more nut-straight flushes than A-A becomes overwhelmingly important). The point is that I'd rather have a good hand and the best position than the best hand and poor position.
There's a point, probably when stacks are a little less than 100 times the big blind, when this changes. At that point, I'd rather have the aces in early position, because the preflop action becomes more significant. There's less room for opponents with position to outplay me postflop, so my preflop edge counts for more.
Implied Odds Matter More Than Immediate Odds
Early Stage Poker Tournament Strategy Bracket
At the same table, if I were in the big blind with an offsuit K-8, facing a minimum raise from a good player on the button, I would fold. This is true even if I knew he were opening any two cards, even though I know I'd be a 56 percent favorite against that range and getting 2.5-to-1 pot odds.
At that moment, there are 250 chips in the pot and 30,000 in my stack, so I need to be a lot more concerned about protecting the latter than the former. Playing out of position against a good player with a hand that will very rarely make anything stronger than a single pair with an uninspiring kicker is a recipe for tough postflop decisions. I don't want to end up putting thousands of chips at risk to protect my equity share in a pot of 250.
Those chips would be at risk because I'll virtually never make a strong hand with the K-8. On almost any board, the best I'll be able to do is check, make a guess about my opponent's bluffing frequency, and either call or fold. Good players will value bet well with almost any hand better than mine and bluff well when I have the best hand with king-high or third pair.
Against a weak player who wouldn't make such good use of his position, I would call here. My postflop decisions wouldn't be so difficult against such a player, making it easier for me to show my hand down when it's a winner and get away cheaply when it isn't.
Likewise, if stacks were much shorter, say 30 or 40 times the big blind, I'd be more inclined to defend against a good player. The potential downside of difficult decisions on lower streets would be much lower, and consequently I could give more priority to defending my equity in the current, small pot.
Shoot for Hands That Can Win Big Pots
When the effective stack is very big
If the effective stack is still very big in relation to the pot then the game becomes much more complex, especially if we're out of position.
- In Position …
… in some cases it's right to check even strong hands such as overpairs on uncoordinated boards. The reason for this is simply that we don't want to make the pot too big, and we thus avoid making a difficult decision if our opponent raises.
On coordinated boards there would be less sense in checking because if our opponent is holding a draw he would accept the free card right away.
Firewalls will sometimes fail to recognise upgraded party products, and block them. Open your firewall and ensure that party software is allowed access. Updates are additions to software that can help prevent or fix problems, improve how your computer works, or enhance your computing experience. Further, y ou may boot the computer in a clean boot state and check if the issue persists. When you start Microsoft Windows, typically there are several programs that start automatically and run in the.
- Out of Position …
… we should often play carefully if our opponent shows a lot of strength, even when we're holding strong hands such as top pair. This keeps the pot small but doesn't stop our opponent from continuing a bluff. The disadvantage is that our opponent may use the opportunity to get a free card, or even that he ends up making a better hand after a (cheap) turn bluff.
Multiway
If there are several opponents in the pot we must obviously play more carefully. Draws with which we called the flop but which haven't hit will lose considerable value on the turn because only one more card will be dealt – the river. We should fold our draws on the turn against bets that constitute a substantial percentage of our stack and of the pot.
We should continue playing very strong hands such as sets and top two pair aggressively.
Conclusion:
In the early stage the aim is to win chips with our very strong hands and at the same time avoid marginal situations as far as possible.
Join us on our Discord channel.
There's a common misconception that the early stages of a no-limit hold‘em tournament are unimportant. The argument goes that the blinds are too small to be worth stealing, and consequently any pot you win or lose is generally too small to make much difference to your stack. After all, a medium-sized pot in level one will amount to nothing more than a big blind or two a few levels later.
This may be true for a certain type of tournament specialist who is an expert at stealing and restealing preflop but is inexperienced at postflop play. In truth, though, a skilled player's potential edge is highest when stacks are deepest. This is because he has more tools at his disposal and there is room for his opponents to make extremely expensive errors.
This article will introduce you to some of the tools that great players use to accumulate chips during the early stages of a tournament and help you to avoid some of common misunderstandings that can lead to big mistakes when playing deep.
Position, Position, Position
It's level one of a $10,000 main event. Everyone has roughly 300 times the big blind in his stack. There are several professionals at the table, and while some players appear weaker than others, none seem likely to make huge mistakes.
At such a table, I'm happier to be dealt a suited J-10 on my button than a pair of aces in first position. Granted, with the aces, I'm guaranteed either to steal the blinds or get money into the pot as a favorite on at least one street. Preflop is almost always the smallest betting round, though, and it's likely that I'll have to play out of position postflop, possibly against multiple opponents. That means that their decisions will generally be better than mine on the next three streets, when the bets are larger.
This isn't a matter of J-10 suited being a better deep-stacked hand than aces. I'd still rather have the aces if I get the button either way, and that's true no matter how deep we get (within reason – it's possible that at some insanely huge stack depth the fact that a big suited connector will make more nut-straight flushes than A-A becomes overwhelmingly important). The point is that I'd rather have a good hand and the best position than the best hand and poor position.
There's a point, probably when stacks are a little less than 100 times the big blind, when this changes. At that point, I'd rather have the aces in early position, because the preflop action becomes more significant. There's less room for opponents with position to outplay me postflop, so my preflop edge counts for more.
Implied Odds Matter More Than Immediate Odds
Early Stage Poker Tournament Strategy Bracket
At the same table, if I were in the big blind with an offsuit K-8, facing a minimum raise from a good player on the button, I would fold. This is true even if I knew he were opening any two cards, even though I know I'd be a 56 percent favorite against that range and getting 2.5-to-1 pot odds.
At that moment, there are 250 chips in the pot and 30,000 in my stack, so I need to be a lot more concerned about protecting the latter than the former. Playing out of position against a good player with a hand that will very rarely make anything stronger than a single pair with an uninspiring kicker is a recipe for tough postflop decisions. I don't want to end up putting thousands of chips at risk to protect my equity share in a pot of 250.
Those chips would be at risk because I'll virtually never make a strong hand with the K-8. On almost any board, the best I'll be able to do is check, make a guess about my opponent's bluffing frequency, and either call or fold. Good players will value bet well with almost any hand better than mine and bluff well when I have the best hand with king-high or third pair.
Against a weak player who wouldn't make such good use of his position, I would call here. My postflop decisions wouldn't be so difficult against such a player, making it easier for me to show my hand down when it's a winner and get away cheaply when it isn't.
Likewise, if stacks were much shorter, say 30 or 40 times the big blind, I'd be more inclined to defend against a good player. The potential downside of difficult decisions on lower streets would be much lower, and consequently I could give more priority to defending my equity in the current, small pot.
Shoot for Hands That Can Win Big Pots
In a no-limit hold‘em game, your whole stack could be at risk at any time. Tough opponents will put you to the test with bets and raises that threaten your stack, and if you consistently hold cards that can't take that kind of heat, you're going to face impossible decisions.
This is especially true when you're out of position, with less control over the size of the pot. With the advantage of position, you can get away with making marginal hands postflop, because you'll have more information to figure out whether you can call, value bet, get to showdown, etcetera. When out of position against a tough opponent, you'd like to avoid murky situations, and that starts with not playing cards preflop that rarely make hands with which you'd want to play a big pot.
Depending on the texture of a given board, straights, flushes, and full houses will generally be the sorts of hands you'll want to hold when putting two or three hundred big blinds into the pot. Of course, those aren't easy to make, but they are what you want to shoot for. Even strong hands such as overpairs and top pair with a good kicker are more like consolation prizes. Although an offsuit K-J will amount to the same thing as its suited counterpart on most rivers, the suited hand is much better when you are deep because of the possibility of making a two-card flush. Even a draw to a nut or near-nut hand can be more desirable than a marginal pair with little hope of improving.
This is part of the reason to fold K-8 offsuit to the button's raise, but it should affect most of your preflop decisions, particularly when you're likely to end up playing out of position. At a tough, nine-handed table full of deep-stacked players, A-J offsuit is an open fold from first position, but J-T suited is a raise. It's better to flop an open-ended straight draw than top pair with no redraw when you're out of position against one or more players who don't give up easily. And if you do happen to flop top pair with the J-T, it won't be worth that much less than if you'd done it with the A-J.
Bluff
If your strategy for the early levels of a tournament is to play conservatively and wait for either good cards or blinds that are worth stealing, then you are easy to play against. You will never give your opponents difficult decisions. This strategy will work reasonably well against players who don't have the wherewithal to get out of your way on the rare occasion that you show interest in the pot, but the only way you'll ever take chips away from a good player will be with a suckout or a massive cooler.
You can make yourself a much tougher opponent simply by playing your best draws aggressively, not just when your opponent could have nothing, but when it seems clear that he has a marginal made hand. If he's just checking and calling from out of position, keep firing big bets with both your good top pair hands and your eight- and nine-out draws. This puts him in the impossibly difficult spot I've been trying to teach you to avoid.
Of course, in order to have eight and nine-out draws to semibluff with, you have to raise preflop with the sorts of hands that create those draws, namely suited connectors and suited aces. This brings us back to the point about shooting for hands that can win big pots. With 30 big blinds, your goal is to make a good pair and go with it. With 300, you're much better off making a nut draw if you don't make the nuts, and you need to adapt your preflop strategy accordingly.
Conclusion
Of course this only scratches the surface, and there are quite a few things that the best players do successfully when very deep stacked. These general principles, however, should you help you quickly conceptualize the difference between 30 big blind poker and 300 big blind poker and avoid the toughest spots altogether. ♠
Early Stage Poker Tournament Strategy Games
Andrew Brokos is a professional poker player, writer and coach. He blogs about poker strategy on ThinkingPoker.net and is co-host of the Thinking Poker Podcast. Andrew is also interested in education reform and founded an after-school debate program for urban youth.
