Re: Victory is mine!
 

Nah, they don't give you cash. They just give you an entry into the particular step, so that when you sign up for one there's a "pay with cash" or "use an entry"

Re: Victory is mine!
 

It's still interesting nonetheless. I never looked into it until just now. After I finish my bonus on AbsolutePoker, I'm going to try it out. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

The trick is...
 

After cashing out a pretty large chunk of my bankroll to care for the holidays and year-end family expenses back in November, I had to find a way to build back up. When I looked at the options, I simply didn't want to invest countless hours at the micro games clearing bonuses, so I looked to SNG's, partly because I wanted to develop my NL touney skills, and partly because I was sick of ring games.

I've usually done fairly well at the $11-$33 level, but the variance just seemed too steep for my meager BR, so I decided to try the mini-steps instead. I took my measely $220 I had left and gave it a go.

After a few attempts at the mini #1 (one buy-in, a couple freerolls), I looked at the structure again and came up with the following plan:

1) Buy directly into Mini #2 ($20+2)
2) Play for 5th place
3) Turn on the jets when I'm guaranteed a re-roll into my current step level.

Now, I have admit I've put in about 160+ hours this month into this, and had to play COUNTLESS re-rolls and a few dropbacks (twice from 4 back to 2) but I've had the following results:

10 Direct Buy-ins = $220
2 Bust-outs before Step 5
1 Finish OOM on Step 5 (Finished 7th)
7 Cashes on Step 5 - (2)5th=$400, (4)3rd=$2000, (1)1st= $2000

$4400 total winnings, $220 Fees = $4180 profit, at roughly 160 hours = $26/Hr.

Now, I know this doesn't seem like a lot to most people, but considering the bone-dry bankroll I started with, this worked out very well. Not only have I built up enough to be flexable again hunting the bonus $, but I've also given myself a cushion to deal with the variance again on the $11's and $22's.

For me, this was far more advantageous than grinding out bonuses playing micro-limits, and had a more manageable risk/reward factor than just playing the standard SNG's. I forced myself to play smarter poker overall when the game was still 5+ handed, and got to really work on honing my short-handed skills after I met my top-5 finish goal. And of course, once reaching the final table, I had to really focus on the game and play to the best of my ability against a wild range of competition (the same gentleman who took me out on my only non-cash final table was, ironically, the same guy I beat HU in my only victory two days later).

I'm going to continue next month with this strategy, so I'll fire up PT and crunch some hard numbers for you guys if you're interested. But I wanted to throw this little story out there because I've found it to be a very good alternative to the standard bankroll-building grind.

Thanks for listening,

MotorCityMike

Re: The trick is...
 

k I didn't read the whole thing...all I read was something like, "My roll was too small for the variance of 11s, so I decided to play mini-steps instead." That seems like 110% backwards to me.

Re: The trick is...
 

[ QUOTE ]
k I didn't read the whole thing...all I read was something like, "My roll was too small for the variance of 11s, so I decided to play mini-steps instead." That seems like 110% backwards to me.

[/ QUOTE ]

Don't bother reading the rest, he lucksacked not busting his roll.

But it's not necessarily a bad thing to do...just ridiculously time consuming and high variance.

Yugoslav

Re: The trick is...
 

[ QUOTE ]
That seems like 110% backwards to me

[/ QUOTE ]

I thought so too, at first, but found it much easier to accept lower finishes (usually 4th-5th place) when I knew, at the least, I'd get another freeroll into the same step. Granted, I found that I had to take a much different approach to each game than I would a normal SNG, but that wasn't all too bad.

[ QUOTE ]
Don't bother reading the rest, he lucksacked not busting his roll.

But it's not necessarily a bad thing to do...just ridiculously time consuming and high variance.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not really sure about the first statement. With the finishing structure above level 1, ensuring a "second chance" is fairly easy.

To Quickly summarize:

<u>Mini-Step 2</u>
Place - 1,2 - Entry to Mini-Step 3
Place - 3-5 - Entry to Mini-Step 2
Place - 6-9 - Entry to Mini-Step 1 *This is the most critical finishing spot to avoid
Place - 10 - Thanks for Playing

<u>Mini-Step 3</u>
Place - 1,2 - Entry to Mini-Step 4
Place - 3,4 - Entry to Mini-Step 3
Place - 5,6 - Entry to Mini-Step 2
Place - 7,8 - Entry to Mini-Step 1 *
Place - 9,10 - Thanks for Playing

<u>Mini-Step 4</u>
Place - 1,2 - Entry to Mini-Step 5
Place - 3-5 - Entry to Mini-Step 4
Place - 6,7 - Entry to Mini-Step 3
Place - 8 - Entry to Mini-Step 2
Place - 9 - Entry to Mini-Step 1 *
Place - 10 - Thanks for Playing

<u>Mini-Step 5</u>
Place 1-5 - $$$
Place 6-10 - Thanks for playing

Again, I had a two-fold reason for trying this, the main being that I simply didn't want to grind out the micros for bonus money and 2-4BB an hour. Sure, it would've probably been easier to just buy into 20 $11's and hope for a positive return, but I figured it was a lot safer to work on ensuring a top-5 finish and try to outplay a small table for 2 spots than it is to consistantly outplay an entire table for 3 spots.

FWIW, I don't claim to be any kind of expert on the subject. It was an experiment that turned profitable and got me back on my feet, so I thought I'd share the story. I'd be really interested to read more about the research into these structures, though, to see why all the negative press.

I'll never claim I wasn't lucky during my run, but I'd like to think I had a little skill and a good gameplan.

Re: The trick is...
 

so, you don't think you lucksacked in the Step 5's? If not, I'd start buying straight into those if you think you can money 6 out of 7 times with regularity.

Re: The trick is...
 

By your reasoning:

$4400 Prize - $220 buy-ins (10 Step 2) = $4180 profit
$4400 Prize - $4300 buy-ins (10 Step 5) = $100 profit

Let's say all I do is finish 5th twice out of my 10 buy-ins and 7 Step 5 tries:

$400 Prize - $220 Buy-ins (10 step 2) = $180 profit
$400 Prize - $4300 Buy-ins (10 step 5) = $3900 loss

Pretty easy to see why I would chose NOT to do that

(Not to mention that I never said I could finish in the money 6 of 7 times on a Step 5, and I only had a couple hundred bucks to start jackhole)

Re: The trick is...
 

well, we can all see that isn't your bankroll now, right?

So, you are saying that even though you weren't a luckbox in your 7 step 5's, you wouldn't continue to just buyin into them if you could finish ITM 6 out of 7 times on a regular basis? Wow, can't imagine anyone not doing that...well, good luck with your steps.

Re: **Official ADANTHAR $1k MiniStep Challenge** (Xpost)
 

Do you get rackeback on all the step entrys you win?