Tag Archives: tournaments
4 Tips to Winning Double or Nothing Tournaments
Double or nothing tournaments are much different than normal poker tournaments because they have a very unique payout structure. In a double or nothing tournament half of the players in the field double their buy-in and half lose theirs. The fact that so many players cash combined with the fact that there is no difference in prize amount between first place and the last casher means the strategy for these tournaments is very unique.
Tip 1 Play Tight in the Early Stages of the Tourney At this stage of a double or nothing tournament you want to play very tight and only play big hands. The less experienced double or nothing players will likely be playing a lot of hands and you want to let them. If you do find a good hand you should play it aggressively in order to keep from allowing your opponent to suck out on you.
Tip 2 Maintain Your Stack through the Middle Stages In the middle stages of a double or nothing tournament the blinds will start to increase and you will need to steal blinds on occasion to maintain your stack size. You cant have your stack getting too small at this stage because you want it to carry you through the later levels.
Tip 3 Survive the Late Stages In the late stages you should just be focussing on surviving. At this point there will be about two-thirds of the field remaining which means there will only be a few more busts before you cash. If you have a big stack at this stage you should just hold onto it and not risk any chips when you dont need to. If you have a short stack you will want to compare your stack size to the other short stacks and if you are in a non-cash position you should get aggressive and try to gain some chips. If you need to get aggressive you should try to use your position to your advantage and you should also attack the blinds of the medium sized stacks. These players with about an average stack at this point will be wanting to fold their way into the money and you can take advantage of this by stealing their blinds.
Tip 4 Avoid Coin Flips in the Early Stages In double or nothing tournaments it is best to avoid coin flips in the early stages because they are negative expected value. This is simply because if you lose the coin flip youre out of the tourney and you lose the buy-in, whereas if you manage to win the coin flip you just have double the amount of chips and you arent even guaranteed to cash. This theory holds true only because the top prize you can win is only double your buy-in and by winning the 50% coin flip you havent even guaranteed yourself this cash.
Double or nothing tournaments are a grind and once the non-experienced players go out in the early rounds it all comes down to who can best adjust in the late stages and get the cards when they are needed.
Luck Versus Skill in Playing Poker Games
Is poker a game based on luck or skill? This debate has been going on for quite sometime now. The group of people who are into the game, say that the rules and strategies are required to play this game. Without skills, one cannot dream of winning this pot. Whereas the other group who are watching poker from a distance, feel that it’s a game totally driven by luck and probability. They feel that it just another game of gambling or lottery requiring no skills.
But if you think harder then poker is a game which has tournaments. We never heard of any other so called gambling tournaments like say blackjack tournament. The famous poker legends definitely didn’t win the World Series of Poker, twice by fluke. From various studies it is clear that a player with knowledge of the game fair better compared to a layman. In Pennsylvania where gambling was being prohibited, a judge named Thomas A. James Junior, declared Texas Holdem to be a game driven by skill and thus does not fall under the category of gambling. This clearly spells out that poker requires much more than sheer luck.
But again if you see it from the other side, then a lucky player with the right cards will go a long way and even win a particular game. And you will have to agree that a bit of luck is required everywhere. Even a skilled poker player will need some luck to push him further towards winning the pot. But poker is generally badly confused with gambling. Moreover it is difficult to say that it’s a game of skill, when a game of payer is played only once. At such a situation it is difficult to predict that which of the two (luck or skill) contributes to the game.
The most rational thinkers will not bother getting into the debatable topic of luck versus skill. They know that poker players should be well aware of the rules, bets and strategies to be able to make the best hand of five cards. A completely ill-informed player cannot go a long way. Luck is again a factor that ensures an easy win. A great set of cards does have an advantage. Where skill can be relied on, luck is not reliable. One cannot go on winning consecutive games on the basis of luck. A player with both good luck and good skill will definitely win the pot but a player with both bad skill and bad luck shouldn’t hope much. So let’s just say that poker requires both luck and skill in the right combination.