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Double your money S&G
I mainly play cash poker but played my first sit & go the other day. I really enjoyed it. Just curious what a people thoughts & advice on playing sit & Go's.
Do people have a strategy?
All advice welcome
Comments
hope this helps
webby
Elsa
Hi Elsa,
I'm not 100% sure that the Mods will allow those Links to that site, & to make it a bit more awkward, I'm, err, "connected" to that Site.
But if the Mods remove the Links, & they might, let me know, & I'll Cut & Paste the actual articles into here.
Wardonkey is a pal of mine, & the articles are excellent stuff. He worked in the Casino business for many years, & lives in Leeds these days. Top bloke, with very good ethical standards.
Agree with you about Wardonkey a nice guy. I knew him some years back on another site and as a fellow 1808gang member
. Happy days.....''sigh''
Single table tournaments have been my main source of income for the last 18 months and I’ve made a good living from them. I’ve occasionally given bits of advice on STT play on the forum, and I thought that writing this guide might help some members with their approach to this popular and potentially very profitable form of the game.
I play 9 seat $100 and $200 tables, up to 4 at a time. I use this system but, as I have a lot of regular foes, I have to vary my play a bit more than I would if I was playing on the smaller stake tables, where there is more traffic. The basic strategies remain the same no matter what the stake.
Most people approach the STT in the wrong way. They play loose early, splashing around in lots of pots when the blinds are small. Then they tighten up as the blinds rise and the money approaches. These tendencies are easily exploitable and lead to most of the profit.
I’ve tried to make this guide as simple as possible, it is by no means comprehensive but hopefully someone will find it useful.
As you start with about 30 big blinds in most STTs there is an illusion that you have got a bit of play. In fact the game is very fast and the big blind will often be 10% of your starting stack within 30 hands. Most often one of two things will happen to the players who start out playing fast; they either double up or they go bust. If you play very tight, and play your premium hands hard, you will rarely go bust and sometimes you will double up. Conserving chips and staying in the game are more important at this stage than winning chips.
The first 2 or 3 levels you should play very tight. Play your big pocket pairs aggressively; there are lots of bad players who will pay you off. A-K and A-Q should also be played aggressively but be aware that a pre-flop raise and a continuation bet on the flop will cost you up to one third of your stack. If you’ve missed the flop, or it looks a bit scary then don’t make continuation bets against more than one opponent. Against one opponent you can bet the flop (1/2 to 2/3 of the pot) if you’ve missed but if you get called then give up. Middle pairs should also be played aggressively pre-flop but even more cautiously after the flop unless you hit your set, be prepared to let your hand go if you meet resistance on a rag flop.
You can call with small pairs when in late position, you are trying to flop a set and when you miss the flop don’t try to bluff at it. Don’t call raises with small pairs except perhaps min raises when in late position or on the big blind. If you call in early position you will often find that you end up throwing away your hand to a raise behind you or calling a raise and investing more than you would like on the 8 to 1 shot of hitting your set.
Hands like A-J, K-Q etc can be dumped pre-flop, you don’t want to be messing about with these type of hands at this stage. This obviously isn’t very exciting, but don’t worry you’ll have plenty of fun soon enough.
Spend this time observing your opponents, try to determine the tight players so you can steal their blinds later, who will make loose calls to defend their big blind and who will fold to a reraise.
Stage 2 – Crank it up
There are two ways of playing in Stage 2, how you play will depend on how many chips you have.
By level 3 or 4 you will normally have lost a few players the blinds will now be starting to hurt if you haven’t doubled up yet. It is time to get busy. If you have 10 big blinds or less the method is simple - bet your whole stack any time you enter a pot.
The range of hands that you push with will depend on many factors. I’m not going to say ‘you have this hand so you should do that’, but I will go through some of the factors that need to be considered before you decide; push or pass. Your aim is to pick up the blinds uncontested most of time and to try and avoid being dominated if you are called.
Your cards, obviously if your hand is strong enough you can push from any position. Be wary of pushing with weak aces, as all too often the caller will have a stronger ace. You are better off pushing with K-Q than A-6.
Your position, the less players you have to get through the better, you need a much stronger hand to push UTG than you do on the button.
Short stacks, if either of the blinds is very short then you need a stronger hand, as you are more likely to be called. Also be aware when your push has to go through a very short stack before reaching the blinds, often these players have given up and will call with all sorts of hands.
Using your observations, work out which players are more likely to pass and attack them. The middle stacks are your natural prey as they have the most to lose by calling. Big stacks can be attacked providing you have enough chips to do them significant damage.
There is no need to panic until you get down to 6 or 7 big blinds, after that you need to be pushing at least once a round just to stay ahead of the blinds and retain your fold equity. Get down to 5 big blinds and you need to be pushing any chance you get.
In the words of Amir Vahedi: "To live, you must be willing to die."
Much of the time you will have a larger stack, then you don’t need to play move in poker just yet. You can start stealing from the medium stacks and using your observations about your opponents. Steer clear of the other big stacks - unless you have a massive hand, the potential loss is not worth the risk.
Don’t get too attached to your big blind, just treat those chips as chips in the middle, the same as any other hand. If someone is relentlessly attacking your blind then the resteal becomes a powerful play if you’ve seen him fold to reraises before, you don’t always need a hand to make this play. Some people won’t pass, you’ll need a much bigger hand to reraise these players, as it will likely go to showdown.
Getting your chips in first is vitally important, your calling requirements will depend on how loose the bettor is, but err on the side of caution - if you call, you only have one way to win the hand.
Stage 3 – The Bubble
So you’ve survived the middle game and got down to the final 4, which you should be doing just over half the time. There are 3 prizes and one poor s*d will get nothing. Players get nervous now and tend to tighten up too much; you can exploit this and attack their blinds.
How you play now is extremely important to your success as an STT player. Bubble play is very tactical and good players exploit the situation to put themselves in powerful positions for the end game.
Once again your play will largely be dictated by your stack size. Now, however, it's your stack size relative to the other players rather than the blinds that is most important.
You don’t have to be raising all-in every time now, but it will still be the default play. There will be very few flops and one raise will take the blinds most often. I like to raise 1½ to 2 times the big blind, if I have enough chips, the medium stacks will rarely call or reraise without big hands and you can attack them mercilessly
If there is no dominant stack, or if you already have the biggest stack, you can pick up a lot of chips here and take control of the game. Of course this can go wrong very swiftly, if you run into a hand or two you will find yourself very short or bust pretty quickly. Most of the time however you will build your stack enough to give you a good chance of winning the tourney. If you have a massive stack and all the others are tiny then it is often best to let them fight it out amongst themselves. If they raise your BB and you'r getting 2/1 or better odds, you can call with any two.
If you are the shortest stack then you need to get your chips in fast before the blinds gobble you up. Try to get your chips in first with anything reasonable and pray. You will double up, bust or, if you take 2 or 3 pots uncontested, then you might have shuffled up a place.
If you are one of 2 or 3 shortstacks and have position on the others, then you can afford to wait to see if they bust out first. If they have position on you then you need to attack them, when you have the opportunity.
If you have a medium stack and are not in immediate threat from the blinds then you can wait to see if one of the shortstacks busts out before you become too active. You can attack any other medium stacks, but leave the bigger stacks and the shortstacks alone unless they are very tight. In this situation you are at the mercy of the big stack. Fortunately, they are often merciful. You can’t always call the shortstacks' all-ins even when you have the odds. If it’s going to hurt you too much sometimes you have to pass.
There are charts available which give you the expected value of pushing and calling with different ranges of hands, in these types of situations. I personally don’t use them. I prefer to use a bit more feel, but if you play on a site that’s compatible with a tracker that gives you the calling and pushing ranges of your opponent then I can see how these would be useful, especially for multi-tablers.
Stage 4 – Just Win, Baby!
Well done, you’ve achieved your primary objective and made some money, but no one remembers who finished 2nd or 3rd, let’s win it!
Normally at this stage the blinds are usually colossal and it’s a bit of a crapshoot. Try to be the most aggressive player and adapt to your opponents' style. If you’re playing with familiar foes then learn their betting patterns. Most players will either be too aggressive and you can trap them or too tight and you can raise them out of the game.
Winning lots of small pots is usually preferable to trying to scoop the lot in one go, but if the blinds are very big and your opponents are capable of outplaying you then sometimes it is best to just shovel your chips in and hope for the best.
If you’re investing a significant amount of time and energy into poker, then it makes sense to keep records. I keep a record of every STT I play. I have a spreadsheet open as I play and I record the time each tourney starts (this is mainly to ensure I don’t miss one), the buy-in, the fee, my finishing position and my win/loss.
Using this information I can work out my ‘in the money percentage’ (ITM%) and my ‘return on investment’ (ROI). I have a separate session log that I use to calculate my hourly rate, then one last spreadsheet that I use to record my weekly results in all forms of poker.
ITM% is calculated by dividing the number of cashes by the number of tourneys and multiplying the result by 100.
You should be aiming for an ITM% of about 45%
ROI is calculated by dividing your total win/loss by your total cash investment and multiplying the result by 100.
Any positive ROI indicates that you are winning and ROI will be reduced if you play many tables at once. If you play only 1 or 2 at a time then you should be aiming for 15 to 20%.
Record keeping is not for everyone, and most recreational players do not bother. If crunching the numbers does not appeal and you play mainly for fun then you need not bother, but be aware that you may be missing valuable info, even fooling yourself that you are doing better than you really are. If you are serious about your poker or playing for larger stakes then I think that keeping accurate records is essential rather than optional. It should be noted that sample sizes of less than 500 are not very useful, you should have at least 1000 results recorded before they can be relied upon to give an accurate indication of performance.
Bankroll Management
How much money you need depends on your risk tolerance.
If you play for fun and poker money just adds to, or takes from, your recreation money then you don’t really need a bankroll.
If you wish to separate your poker money from the rest of your finances, but it’s not the end of the world if you go skint, you can get by with 20 buy-ins. Expect to have to top-up occasionally. If you don’t want to have to top-up then go for 50.
If you play for income and going skint would cause major problems then you should have a minimum 100 buy-ins.
These guides assume an ROI of 15% or more you’ll need more buy-ins if your ROI is less to deal with the increased variance.
That's All, Folks
Patrick ‘Wardonkey’ Taylor
Now then - you were a 1808 gang Member? WOW! We must have a whole bunch of mutual friends! Guess that would be back in the Tribeca days?
Tribeca was my hunting ground along with many if not all the above. I did very nicely out of it over a number of years until my accident put me out of action for a couple of years. I'm coming back slowly....very very slowly
Hope that's helpful to folks, it's a long article but well worth the trouble of reading it, Oh! and thanks for getting the ok on it Tikay.