NL tournament poker requires little skill.

[Tim Sullivan]

Pot limit or limit requires far more skill then just pushing all your
chips in pre flop. Since poker is basically a battle for the blinds
when you start with 1500 and the blinds are 10-20, you should play no
hands except AA or maybe KK. Wait until the blinds are a significant
part of your stack, then keep going all in whenever you have a decent
hand(pairs and face cards since you are likely to be heads up). With
this simple startegy you will do better then 90% of people who piss
their chips away,won't be giving up too much to the "professionals"
and don't need any post flop skills.

[Johndaigle1]

>Pot limit or limit requires far more skill then just pushing all your
>chips in pre flop.

no way, i rule at limit, but am probably at least 1000 hours away( if ever)
from playin pot or no limit for real money

free online poker tournaments with real cash prizes, no gimmicks
go to: http://www.geocities.com/puddingskin2001/classic_tan.html

[Gregory Raymer]

If you're willing to play with a simplistic style that leaves you as a small
loser overall, then yes, NLH tourneys are easy. If you want to play with a
significant edge over the field, then no, NLH tourneys are very hard to get
good at. Harder than limit.

Now, of course, pot limit is actually the hardest form of all. You can make
bigger and bigger bets throughout the hand, but the simplistic strategy of
waiting for a premium hand and then going all-in preflop is unavailable.
This means that you have to really play throughout the hand, not just
preflop. And the decisions are more serious, because it's not just one more
bet to win a handful of bets.

Later, Greg Raymer (FossilMan)

"Tim Sullivan" <timsullivan2003@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1d62d428.0308120400.e1fa41d@posting.google.com...
> Pot limit or limit requires far more skill then just pushing all your
> chips in pre flop. Since poker is basically a battle for the blinds
> when you start with 1500 and the blinds are 10-20, you should play no
> hands except AA or maybe KK. Wait until the blinds are a significant
> part of your stack, then keep going all in whenever you have a decent
> hand(pairs and face cards since you are likely to be heads up). With
> this simple startegy you will do better then 90% of people who piss
> their chips away,won't be giving up too much to the "professionals"
> and don't need any post flop skills.

[Bone]

On Aug 12 2003 1:01AM, Tim Sullivan wrote:

> Pot limit or limit requires far more skill then just pushing all your
> chips in pre flop. Since poker is basically a battle for the blinds
> when you start with 1500 and the blinds are 10-20, you should play no
> hands except AA or maybe KK. Wait until the blinds are a significant
> part of your stack, then keep going all in whenever you have a decent
> hand(pairs and face cards since you are likely to be heads up). With
> this simple startegy you will do better then 90% of people who piss
> their chips away,won't be giving up too much to the "professionals"
> and don't need any post flop skills.

LMFAO - tell that to the tourney experts that keep appearing at darn near
every final table!

_________________________________________________________________
Posted using RecPoker.com - http://www.recpoker.com

[Tim Sullivan]

"Gregory Raymer" <raymers@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message news:<uL5_a.97842$0v4.6734446@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>...
> If you're willing to play with a simplistic style that leaves you as a small
> loser overall, then yes, NLH tourneys are easy. If you want to play with a
> significant edge over the field, then no, NLH tourneys are very hard to get
> good at. Harder than limit.
>

You will have a significant edge playing this way because you will be
playing far better then 90% of players which fall into 2 categories:
1) Loose. will play all sorts of hands when blinds are small and will
call your all-in AA.
2) Tight scared. While playing correctly in the earlier portions of
the tournament, give up huge pot equities by not playing more hands as
the blinds go up and by folding to all-in bets too easily(especially
in the blinds).

What will usually happen is Group 1 will be eliminated in the 1st half
of a NL tournament, while the second group will get blinded away in
the last 1/2 of the tournament. With all this dead money from these 2
groups it is very easy to have positve expectation in a NL tournament.
Limit tournaments are a lot harder as there is a lot of information
about playing limit poker and the strategies are similar to ring
games. Pot limit is the hardest of all because there is little
information about strategy and there are no easy good strategies like
there are in NL tournaments.

> Now, of course, pot limit is actually the hardest form of all. You can make
> bigger and bigger bets throughout the hand, but the simplistic strategy of
> waiting for a premium hand and then going all-in preflop is unavailable.
> This means that you have to really play throughout the hand, not just
> preflop. And the decisions are more serious, because it's not just one more
> bet to win a handful of bets.
>
> Later, Greg Raymer (FossilMan)
>
> "Tim Sullivan" <timsullivan2003@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:1d62d428.0308120400.e1fa41d@posting.google.com...
> > Pot limit or limit requires far more skill then just pushing all your
> > chips in pre flop. Since poker is basically a battle for the blinds
> > when you start with 1500 and the blinds are 10-20, you should play no
> > hands except AA or maybe KK. Wait until the blinds are a significant
> > part of your stack, then keep going all in whenever you have a decent
> > hand(pairs and face cards since you are likely to be heads up). With
> > this simple startegy you will do better then 90% of people who piss
> > their chips away,won't be giving up too much to the "professionals"
> > and don't need any post flop skills.

[Gregory Raymer]

In most tourneys of significant buyins, you will not be better than 90% with
this strategy. In low limit NLH tourneys, you will be better than 90%, but
you will still be in the group of about 95% who have -EV in the event.
Your -EV will simply be smaller than most of the other losers.

Plus, the fact that there are lots of books on limit holdem, even lots of
people reading those books, doesn't mean that all that many players know
what they're doing. It's amazing how many people will buy a book like that,
and never read. And then, those that buy it, don't ever come close to
following it's advice.

Later, Greg Raymer (FossilMan)

"Tim Sullivan" <timsullivan2003@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1d62d428.0308121522.21314f26@posting.google.com...
> "Gregory Raymer" <raymers@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
news:<uL5_a.97842$0v4.6734446@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>...
> > If you're willing to play with a simplistic style that leaves you as a
small
> > loser overall, then yes, NLH tourneys are easy. If you want to play
with a
> > significant edge over the field, then no, NLH tourneys are very hard to
get
> > good at. Harder than limit.
> >
>
> You will have a significant edge playing this way because you will be
> playing far better then 90% of players which fall into 2 categories:
> 1) Loose. will play all sorts of hands when blinds are small and will
> call your all-in AA.
> 2) Tight scared. While playing correctly in the earlier portions of
> the tournament, give up huge pot equities by not playing more hands as
> the blinds go up and by folding to all-in bets too easily(especially
> in the blinds).
>
> What will usually happen is Group 1 will be eliminated in the 1st half
> of a NL tournament, while the second group will get blinded away in
> the last 1/2 of the tournament. With all this dead money from these 2
> groups it is very easy to have positve expectation in a NL tournament.
> Limit tournaments are a lot harder as there is a lot of information
> about playing limit poker and the strategies are similar to ring
> games. Pot limit is the hardest of all because there is little
> information about strategy and there are no easy good strategies like
> there are in NL tournaments.
>
> > Now, of course, pot limit is actually the hardest form of all. You can
make
> > bigger and bigger bets throughout the hand, but the simplistic strategy
of
> > waiting for a premium hand and then going all-in preflop is unavailable.
> > This means that you have to really play throughout the hand, not just
> > preflop. And the decisions are more serious, because it's not just one
more
> > bet to win a handful of bets.
> >
> > Later, Greg Raymer (FossilMan)
> >
> > "Tim Sullivan" <timsullivan2003@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> > news:1d62d428.0308120400.e1fa41d@posting.google.com...
> > > Pot limit or limit requires far more skill then just pushing all your
> > > chips in pre flop. Since poker is basically a battle for the blinds
> > > when you start with 1500 and the blinds are 10-20, you should play no
> > > hands except AA or maybe KK. Wait until the blinds are a significant
> > > part of your stack, then keep going all in whenever you have a decent
> > > hand(pairs and face cards since you are likely to be heads up). With
> > > this simple startegy you will do better then 90% of people who piss
> > > their chips away,won't be giving up too much to the "professionals"
> > > and don't need any post flop skills.

[mccaffo]

At the start of the tournament everyone starts with a set amount of chips. For example, everyone starts with 2000 chips. At this time the blinds are only about 10/20 chips. If the table you are at is quite passive it is generally worth calling the blinds just to see the flop. It is not costing too much in relation to your stack and if the flop gives you a monster hand quite often you can catch a player intent on grabbing an early chip lead. Only go all-in when you are at least 90% sure of winning the hand because if you lose your 2000 chips you are out of the tournament. If you win and double your stack to 4000 you are still a long way off winning. You must realize that in the later stages of the tournament the blinds will be up to 4000/8000 so why risk all your chips at this stage unless you are fairly sure. Avoid bluffing too much at the early stages because you are not really getting value for your risk. You still have to play in hands to build up your stack because the blinds will start eating away at them. Progress steadily, don't worry too much that the chip leader has 10000 chips at this stage because they are probably taking far too many chances and with patience you will start to claw their lead back. Just concentrate on taking small low risk pots.

Now when you reach the middle stages of the tournament you must alter your strategy slightly. The blinds are getting bigger in relation to players stacks. There is now much more to play for. You need to start introducing the concept of stealing blinds to survive and avoid being blinded out. It takes a weaker hand than usual to raise and steal the blind but stronger hand to call a raise. If you find yourself in a good position at this stage you may be able to bully shorter stacked players into folding because they are intent on protecting their remaining chips just to stay in the tournament. Take control of the betting but don't steal too many pots because some players who are short stacked will go all in pre flop with pocket 2's or A-10 so why gamble on the mercy of the flop. So just keep picking up the occasional blind to keep ahead of the game and wait for a monster hand to trap someone.

Towards the later stages of the tournament, due to the size of the blinds people are more likely to go all-in pre flop. When you do go all-in make sure you are sitting on at least an Ace with a good kicker or pocket pair. Holding pocket 2's against someone with A-K, you have about a 55% chance of winning the hand pre flop. At this stage you have to be very aware of player position and the other players stack. At this stage in the tournament you cannot wait for a perfect hand or you will soon be blinded out of the tournament. Make sure you now exactly how many position gets paid out. You can play more aggressively against those just trying to survive the blinds to reach the payout but be very wary of those with a large stack or you can be knocked out of the competition, missing out on the money with your tail between your legs.