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#1
06-21-2005, 11:34 AM
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Inexperienced MTT player looking for late-stage advice
I've been playing low buy-in STTs for a few months now, but just recently (in the last week or two) started seriously playing MTTs, also low buy-in -- usually the 15s or 20s that Party has every few hours.
Early play seems pretty simple -- play mostly conservatively, wait for big hands, play speculative hands here and there when position and action allow. Playing just pretty basic poker, I've been making the money nearly every tournament (though, of course, my sample size is tiny). But once it gets down to the last 50-75 and the blinds are climbing, I start feeling lost. I'm almost always a middle stack, don't feel like I can keep waiting for big hands, but I've more often than not got a much bigger stack in the couple of spots behind me, which seems to make too much stealing unwise. I feel like there's another gear I should be switching into, but I'm having trouble locating it. Should I not be as afraid of stealing from bigger stacks? Be playing more aggressively earlier so that I get to the late stages with a bigger stack (or not at all)? Or is this stage of the tournament, with most stacks with 10-20 BBs or so, just awkward for everyone? (If there's a FAQ for stuff like this, feel free to point me at it -- I looked but didn't find much.) 
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#2
06-21-2005, 01:18 PM
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Re: Inexperienced MTT player looking for late-stage advice
Hey, this is my experience also. I play conservative and get fairly deep in the tournament (~75% of the field remaining) and my stack is around average (or less). Then, I find myself going directly from conservative play to an all-in strategy when I get a decent hand (more or less... the blinds are high so I easily get pot committed at this point). Maybe I need to start more aggressively and hope for some luck. The levels are so short in these MTT there probably isn’t time to play conservatively and wait for premium hands anyway.
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#4
06-21-2005, 01:35 PM
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Re: Inexperienced MTT player looking for late-stage advice
Dan Harrington's second book is now out which deals with the later stages of the tourney. I suspect that would be a great place to start. I have not finished it yet, but it deals with just the situations you are describing.
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#6
06-21-2005, 05:47 PM
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Re: Inexperienced MTT player looking for late-stage advice
[ QUOTE ]
I play conservative and get fairly deep in the tournament (~75% of the field remaining)... [/ QUOTE ] err, I meant to say "~75% of the field eliminated"... duh I don't like edit time limits! [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]
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#7
06-22-2005, 01:46 AM
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Re: Inexperienced MTT player looking for late-stage advice
Cool, my first tournament after reading this thread and I place second out of 344. I never got in short stack trouble for the whole tournament. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]
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#8
06-22-2005, 05:06 AM
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Re: Inexperienced MTT player looking for late-stage advice
One thing to keep in mind is that if you are a shortstack late in the tourney, always raise all-in when yo got something. The reason for this is that a normal raise preflop will almost always be reraised by the bigstacks, and then you might feel forced to fold.
Also, people wont put you on a strong hand, so you might get lots of action. The worst play you can make as a short/medium stack is to open the pot with a normal raise (3-4BB) and then fold to a reraise. So either open the pot with all-in, or only open the pot when you have good enough hand to call a reraise with. Finally, steal blinds from position. Even if the SB/BB suspects you steal, its hard for them to call with nothing. And even if you are caught with rags, you arent that much of an underdog against 2 high cards, and as a shortstack you have to gamble a little.
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#9
06-22-2005, 09:10 AM
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Re: Inexperienced MTT player looking for late-stage advice
[ QUOTE ]
The worst play you can make as a short/medium stack is to open the pot with a normal raise (3-4BB) and then fold to a reraise. So either open the pot with all-in, or only open the pot when you have good enough hand to call a reraise with. [/ QUOTE ] Would you say that with an above average stack, late in the tournament, it would be okay to come in for the minimun raise and the fold to a reraise unless you have a monster? From my experience, the last few tables seem to be all about steeling binds until two players lock horns with big cards. I was doing things like raising the minimum amount (which could be 10 to 15% of my stack) with QJo from a middle position. Then if I got raised from another big stack I just folded.
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#10
06-22-2005, 12:12 PM
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Re: Inexperienced MTT player looking for late-stage advice
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ] The worst play you can make as a short/medium stack is to open the pot with a normal raise (3-4BB) and then fold to a reraise. So either open the pot with all-in, or only open the pot when you have good enough hand to call a reraise with. [/ QUOTE ] Would you say that with an above average stack, late in the tournament, it would be okay to come in for the minimun raise and the fold to a reraise unless you have a monster? From my experience, the last few tables seem to be all about steeling binds until two players lock horns with big cards. I was doing things like raising the minimum amount (which could be 10 to 15% of my stack) with QJo from a middle position. Then if I got raised from another big stack I just folded. [/ QUOTE ]seems fine to me. if i am chip leader at my table and folded around to me in LP i will raise with alot, a little different from MP though
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