Saturday, June 2, 2007

Hold'em Arena

Tournament Strategy
Tournaments are a fun and interesting way to play poker. For beginners, someone who has played less than 1000 to 5000 hands, it's better to play smaller buy in tournaments. 1-10 dollar buy ins are small tournaments. This way you can observe how to play poker for a small amount of money for a long period of time.

First stage
There are 2 strategies for the first stage of play;

1. Play real tight, only with the top 5-10 starting hands and don't chase
Or
2. Play loose/aggressive trying to build your chip stack by outplaying weak/looser players.

Online tournament have tons of inexperienced players and you can easily trap them in the beginning of a tournament.If you are an inexperienced player, use strategy number 1. If the flop does not help your hand, throw it away. Do not chase a hand if it is going to cost you most of your chips. You objective is to double up your chips. If you have lost your chips in a small amount of leaks and chasing then when those aces do hit your pocket you will not have any chips to double up.

Another good reason to play tight is because the blinds are fairly small. When you bet in poker you are essentially saying you are going to compete for the blinds. If the blinds are only 15 chips then you are competing for pennies of what is needed to win the tournament. You want to have a hand that the weaker players will risk all of their chips against and you have the best of all possible worlds. Remember not to go after the unnecessary stuffs.

Middle Stage
The middle stage of the tournament is where people start to shift gears, turning on the aggressive button. There is a clear chip leader and usually half of the entrants have been eliminated. The blinds are starting to get larger and hopefully your chip count is large enough where you don't have to worry about the blinds eating you away. The money places are still far away but you have gotten past the loose players and are heading into the stretch run. In other words, show me the money babeh! Remember to shift your gears because you want to double up.

Final Stage
It's getting hot in here! And you are in the money round or at a final table. People will go all in at any time. Since everyone is going to make some money the play gets looser. Premium cards are what you need and want when you enter a pot. You must loosen up but you must also ask yourself, would I call an all-in raise with these cards? If the answer is no then throw them away (remember the first stage lesson). A majority of the hands will have all-in bets pre-flop or on 4th street. This is why you should NOT panic in the middle part of the tournament if you are not the chip leader or even in the top 20. If you have the average amount of chips then a double up or a triple up from a pivotal hand will happen. After the first bubble pops the all-in bets get more frequent until the next bubble level.

Hope this helps in your poker journey. Do bring us some feedbacks. Have a pleasant weekend! =)

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