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Winning Strategy For Multi Table Tournaments
Playing
multi-table poker tournaments or
"MTT"
for short can be a fun and exciting way to win
huge amounts of cash in online poker. Multi
table tournament poker tournament allows poker
players to feel the excitement of playing high
stakes poker without investing large chunks of
money. When you buy into a multi table
tournament online, it is basically like starting
at a medium stakes cash game and moving up
stakes with each tournament level. Even better
than that, when you win a multi table poker
tournament you have just successfully busted
every player; you are the last man standing with
all the chips and all the glory! Let’s talk
about some strategies on how to become a winning
MTT player.
Early Multi
Table Tournament Winning Strategy
Early on in
multi table poker tournaments is the best time
to observe your opponents carefully, and you can
best do this by playing very tight
poker. Watch others play carefully and take
mental notes on what cards your opponents play
and in what position. What did they call down
with? Did they call a raise out of position with
sub standard cards? All of this information
will help you win big pots in the later stages
of the tournament.
Now is a good
time to plan how to bet into, and when to check
raise weaker poker players. Take notes on any
player that calls raises pre-flop with weak
cards out of position as a calling station and
don't try to bluff
them. At the same time note the players that
are pushing around a lot of chips and playing
overly aggressively, these are the players
looking for a good gamble and you can trap them
with a big hand. They will usually even do the
betting for you!
In the early
stages of a multi table poker tournament I
really encourage players to play post flop
poker, don't get a
lot of your chips into the pot pre-flop without
Aces or Kings! Seeing the flop will allow you to
make well informed decisions and give you a
better read on what the other players in the
hand are likely to hold.
Tight is right,
and the reason for this is most pots will be
small at the early levels. We are gaining
information on the other players and most
importantly we are building a very tight image
to use to allow us to steal blinds and antes
with greater ease later in the poker
tournament.
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Other key
points:
Don't
play big pots early on with just one pair (even
if it is Aces).
Play made
hands very aggressively, made hands deserve big
pots.
Don't
risk a lot of chips on a draw, there will be
better spots to use the power of a big bet later
on.
Position, Position, Position:
Only play premium cards in superior position,
this will allow you to make better decisions
ever step of the way in poker tournaments.
Strategy For
Mid Levels In MTT's –
Steal Pots, Go All In, Bust Short Stacks
Once the blinds
have grown to 100/200 in multi-table poker
tournaments is the optimal time to start
shifting gears. Becoming more aggressive now
will confuse the opponents that see you as a
tight player and allow you to pick up a lot of
uncontested pots.
Continue to
play hands only in good position, and bet when
pots are checked to you. Use the table respect
you earned at earlier levels to pull off a
semi-bluff, and try a couple of tricky plays
like out of position check raises against
opponents you feel are good enough to fold.
Bust Short
Stacks
If you are
playing well and have managed to accumulate a
stack of 30 big blinds, now is the time to
consider calling desperate shoves from opponents
with stacks around 2,000 or 10-12 big blinds.
You can afford lose a few coin flips, and you
have the proper stack size to take a few small
risks to keep building your chipstack.
Let’s look at
an example of how this can play out:
A short-stack
opponent with 1,800 chips at the 100/200 blind
level (9 big blinds) opens the pot by shoving
all in from the cutoff (one before the
"button").
We need to consider his possible range of hands
including any ace, any pocket pair 22-AA, or any
high connecting cards all the way down to Queen
Nine suited.
We are in the
big blind holding King Jack off suit, what is
our proper play here? Let’s do the simple math
and figure this out.
King Jack
versus this range of hands is still 45% to win,
so you are effectively still in a coin-flip
situation. I think you will find reasonable
value calling with any two broad-way cards
(Ten-Ace) or any pocket pair.
We might even
consider calling with middle suited cards here
if we have over 30 big blinds, the equity of
calling our opponents range versus our 78 suited
still leaves us at 39% to win the hand.
While not
optimal odds, this is a good time to chip up and
take some risks while not risking large portions
of our stack. It's a
great time to gamble, but don’t take it too far
and call to light. Call in these situations only
in position, heads up, in the blinds, and with a
reasonable read on the other player. The
purpose of highlighting this play is to confirm
that it is indeed acceptable play to call
short-stacks a bit light when you have a big
stack to work with.
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Bubble Play
– Accumulate And Survive
Playing the
bubble is fairly standard in large field MTT
tournaments, they usually don't
last very long and there is a lot of chips to be
won. If you have made it this far you will want
to earn a return on your buy-in, so don't
play pots with opponents who are capable of
busting you unless you are short-stacked
yourself.
There is a lot
of chips in play to accumulate at this point,
and there will also be a lot of weak tight
players who will fold nearly any hand just
waiting for the bubble to pass. Use targeted
selective aggression to accumulate chips.
If you have been watching your opponents
properly throughout the poker tournament you
will know who to practice avoidance against and
whom you can easily steal blinds from.
There are two
key goals at the bubble, adding chips to your
stack and surviving to the money. Be patient
and play your position, it is ok to fold hands
like JJ and QQ here if there is aggressive
action in front of you involving a raise and a
re-raise. There will be better spots to gamble
and take a coin-flip after you reach the money.
A tip for
accumulating chips at the bubble:
Most poker
players know to try to take advantage of the
tournament bubble, it is in fact pounded into
any strategy piece or poker book they read. They
will try, but this doesn't mean they do it with
confidence. A very profitable play when
you have a 25+ BB stack is to re-shove on an
opponent that seems to raise just to pick up
blinds. The prime target to use this play on is
an opponent with 15-20 big blinds, which means a
pre-flop raise of 3-4 big blinds has not left
them pot committed as it would with a stack of
10 big blinds.
If you re-raise
these players to 10 big blinds in position
they are both likely to fold (to survive)
and to give you credit for a big hand. Be
careful not to overuse this play, but pulling it
off successfully can be very profitable because
you can pick up 4.5-5.5 big blinds for your
limited risk. I will use this play most
effectively with hands like Queen Ten suited in
case I am called I will not likely be drawing
dead.
Strategy For
In The Money Play
Nice work, you
played hard and made some money for your
efforts. You also had some fun while doing it!
Action will go fast in the first levels of in
the money play as short-stacks go all in trying
to get lucky and aggressive players try to chip
up for the win. For the most part you can avoid
involving yourself in a lot of pots and try to
grow your stack by stealing blinds and antes
when the opportunity is right, but you should
also be mindful that all the money is at the
final table.
The typical
payout for an online MTT
poker tournament is 100 times the buy-in for
first place, but only 4 times the buy-in for 11th
place – even in a field of 1,000 players! In
the money play is a great time to get all your
chips into pots with hands like Ace King
pre-flop, you will only be in horrible shape if
you happen to run into Aces. It does take chips
to win, and you will have to take some risks.
My absolute
favorite play to use once in the money is the
powerful semi-bluff. If I flop an open ended
straight draw, or a flush draw, I check raise
all in! I may only be 20-30% to win the hand if
my opponent calls, but I also might have some
fold equity to win a big pot without a
showdown. In this situation, I like to go all
in and cross my fingers while hoping for the
best!
You really need
to rely on your reads and play against your
opponents stack size at this point in the
tournament, your hands and position should
basically play themselves. The key point is to
forget the small incremental payout increases
and play with the attitude of
"final table or bust".
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Tips For The
Final Table
Final table
play is one part SNG and one part deep stack
cash game play, you will have to be willing to
change gears to short handed play just like in
an online SNG and you will also benefit greatly
from allowing other players to bust out.
Avoid stacks
that can bust you early on, be willing to call
short stacks light when in the blinds, and just
use some patience. Things tend to go very fast
for the first few players, and the payouts will
increase significantly with each player knocked
out.
Most of the
money is at the top three places, generally
around 60% of the whole tournament prize pool is
there so make that your immediate goal. If you
have a playable stack and little pressure from
the size of the blinds, there is simply no
excuse for getting enough chips to cripple you
in a hand with more than 5 players left in a
multi table poker tournament final table.
Once you have
reached the final three players, you have made a
big payday! Now is the time to play super
aggressively, raising every time the button is
yours and re-raising often out of the blinds.
Don't allow any
limping from the small blind on your big blind,
and apply constant pressure. You are rarely
worse than 40% getting all your chips in with
any reasonable hand, so don't
be afraid to do it.
Congratulations, you are now ready to win a
multi table tournament, but you should always
study and improve your game. Tournament poker
is a game where everyone makes mistakes, but
those who make the least are the players who win
the most. Study books, articles like these, and
talk to other players about pivotal hands that
happened. A winning tournament poker player
never stops learning, good luck at the tables! |
