chip leader early on

[rugz]

say within the first 10 hands you hit some hands and have about T2000 and everyone everyone else still has around T800. What is the best strategy for the next couple of levels where stealing the blinds doesnt really net any serious chips. Do I maintain the same tight starting hand requirements or do I loosen up a bit and see more flops with drawing hands hoping for a big score. This really confuses me. Thanks in advance.

rugz

[Potowame]

Well Look at it this way, your % to win with no other factors such as skill level, is based on the amount of chips that you hold to the amount of chips in play.

1000-10000 everyone has a 10% chance to win

2000-10000 you have a 20% chance to win.

My point is that if you start to bleed these chips off with marginal hands, you only decrease you chance of winning. I would play very tight/very aggressive, until the blinds got to the 25/50. Then I would start to pound on the small stacks. /images/graemlins/grin.gif

[ZeeJustin]

When the blinds are small, proper tournament strategy changes very little based on stack sizes, especially if you are far away from the money.

[stupidsucker]

I agree with ZeeJustin on this one. The last thing you want to do is blow your stack on trying to bully people with tiny blinds.

I think you can limp in with a FEW more hands, but for the most part you want to remain a constant tight image for when the bubble comes. Some very good players become fish when they have a stack early, dont be one of them.

[GoSox]

Stupid hit it right on. Limp on a few more hands, one gaps, etc.. Axs, but dont get too carried away.

[adanthar]

About the only change I make when I've 1500 chips vs. 500 is limping small pairs and Axs up front on levels 2 and 3. Other than that one change (which might cost you 50 chips or so) don't do anything different.

[rugz]

Thanks all. Much appreciated.