Reading a set or two pair

[mciz]

Hey guys this is my first post so take it easy on me. I have been playing 10+1 SNGs for a while, about 400 of them, and while I dont make money I havent lost anything either . I feel like I have the basics of the game and like many other people here I find myself getting to level 4 or 5 with 600 chips or so very often. My play after this point is not very good and I am hoping to improve it by reading and playing more. My question is I constantly find myself in situations where i have the top pair with a good kicker after the flop and no pairs on board and I lose to two pair or a set. What can I do to or how can I understand when my opponent has a set or two pairs against my high pair-good kicker? Thanks

[Unarmed]

You can't.
If its a drawless flop and you pot it and get called, alarm bells should start going off. Still, there's not much you can do but go down with the ship as more than half the time you're up against a calling station with TPWK.

I wouldn't worry about it until you start to play against better opposition.

[skirtus]

These are not my words. I was having similiar troubles to spotting sets. I searched the boards and cut and pasted the best advice into documents so I review later. Here is what I have on spotting sets.

"Basically, a set is almost impossible to read in a Party SnG because you don't have deep enough stacks for these reads. Also, the stacks in a SnG are never deap enough, nor the game ever long enough that you can worry about sets. If you worry too much about sets youll worry about them too often. if you see monsters in every wardrobe and you'll start to get scared of the dark. Being fearless is one of the skills of a great tourney player, especially a great SnG player. If your are beat, so what, start another. There aren't many times I pass AK preflop, and there are fewer times I pass on it when the flop hits. Sometimes you gotta take the beat. The pendulum swings both ways remember. Occasionally you can get saved by holding a vulnerable enough hand that you can fold, but it doesnt happen too often. By passing on most hands in the early stages you by definition pass over the biggest risk area of running into a set on the flop so it shouldnt happen to you too much. With an Ace on board in the lower limits, spotting a set is near impossible. If you get unwarranted action on a very non-scary board with no ace or king, then the alarm bells should start ringing. Hope this helps. Getting pushed all-in by a set is frustrating but fortunately it doesn't happen very often."

These are combined excerpts from some of the top players.

[Phill S]

wow

the thread here (http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=1214515&page=&view=&sb=5& o=&vc=1) shows my and loris contribution. not sure who the third voice in your quote is.

im really happy for two reasons. one a post of mine actually helped someone (im sure it doesnt happen often). but second that im lumped in with lori, who is one of the better voices on this forum.

ill skip over the 'top players' bit. im pretty sure it was your error to think im a good, let alone top player, i dont think ive given that impression before /images/graemlins/grin.gif

glad to know i can be of help to people.

Phill

[skirtus]

I thought your post was very good. I have no idea where the different threads originated. I cut and paste any info I find useful from various boards and website.

[lorinda]

I really like the montage idea for storing stuff.

It means you can brainstorm a subject in ten quick lines rather than re-reading a lot of posts.

I've never seen it done quite that way before, it looks to be a winner.

Lori

[Phill S]

ive been thinking about doing something like this, a cross of the FAQ and just an easy to see cheat sheet (for the want of a better term) for a while.

im pondering knocking up something book size from the info on here (all properly referenced) and dropping it on some webspace.

which reminds me, im meant to be typing an essay for my course /images/graemlins/smile.gif

Phill

[skirtus]

I do the same for hand reviews. Keep them all in a file and subfile. I kinda log anything I find interesting or informative. I edit some of it and than file it.

[tolbiny]

in all likelyhood you are playing to many hands.
way to many hands. I am assuming that when you say you ar not losing or winning money that you ROI is between -5% and 5%, and that when you say "god kicker" you don't mean top kicker, you mean J or higher, right?

Ok- so stop playing KJo with more than 6 players left. Don't play AJo with more than 7 players left, same for KQ.
Stop playing hands that make top pair "good" kicker. They are bad for you. You end up risking your whole tourney for almost no reason, jsut stop it, fold all but the best hands untill you get to 6 handed or less and then start to be more aggressive.

[mciz]

Thanks for all your help guys. tolbiny when i said good kicker i was talking about an A to Q usually. like you suggest I try stay away from AQ or KJ off and try to play the best hands and limp in with medium pairs in late position if possible. I usually end up playing only 2 or 3 hands until 4 people are knocked out. I think i play horribly after this point though because my ROI would be much better even if I was an average player. I am not sure if this is because I am not agressive enough after 6 people are left, or because of something else. I have been trying to improve my game for awhile now and I feel like I have been getting too unlucky placing 4th %18 of the time over 360 tournaments. I placed 8th,9th or 10th only %10 of the time combined however. I think I have been getting stuck at 6th to 4th too often and havent been able to find out the next step to make it into money more regularly. Again thanks for all your help