O8 Limit MTT's

[phidelt799]

What is the general strategy in these? Do you want to play very loose in the beginning and tighten up later?

Once you become short stacked it seems like you have to go in cockroach mode and just try to double up every orbit or two. Most of the players with big stacks were pretty bad imo, however it could be they really know what they are doing and I am playing it wrong.

Any thoughts?

[morphball]

Hmmm, why do you ask? Seems to me some one selling himself as a LO8 coach should know the answer...

I am not sure what good O8 tourney strategy is. I get the feeling that without a rush of cards you really have to use a cockroach technique once the blinds move up. That is, playing very tight and just trying to double up every couple of orbits.

[phidelt799]

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Hmmm, why do you ask? Seems to me some one selling himself as a LO8 coach should know the answer...

I am not sure what good O8 tourney strategy is. I get the feeling that without a rush of cards you really have to use a cockroach technique once the blinds move up. That is, playing very tight and just trying to double up every couple of orbits.

[/ QUOTE ]

Thank you for your helpful response.

As I am sure you already know, it wouldn't be very smart for me to take my cash game strategy into a MTT. I have never played O8 MTT's before and I am unaware of any commonly accepted and proper strategy. I was hoping somebody with more experience in this area could give a helpful post. The real reason I am curious about O8 MTT's is that I won a WSOP preliminary event satellite and I will be playing the $2,000 O8 event.

[morphball]

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Thank you for your helpful response.

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You're welcome

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As I am sure you already know, it wouldn't be very smart for me to take my cash game strategy into a MTT.

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That's because (and I am surmising this from your website) you're a nut peddler.

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The real reason I am curious about O8 MTT's is that I won a WSOP preliminary event satellite and I will be playing the $2,000 O8 event.

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Congrats!

[greatwhite]

I've played 3 o8 MTT's in my life. All had between 80-95 players or so and it was a $5 buyin. However, I finished 1st, 5th, and 20 somethingth. The best advice I can give is draw to the nuts. People seem a lot looser then in even cash games. When on the shortstack play pretty tight. Wait for your A2's, good A3's, and high hands, then push after the flop. When I was on the shortstack there was no point in raising preflop, even to build, because I wanted to get all my money in on a good flop or even wait until the turn. If your playing a higher buyin tournament the play might be a little more advanced, but I'm sure its easy money in the beginning, since the play is so bad.

[TheStation]

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The real reason I am curious about O8 MTT's is that I won a WSOP preliminary event satellite and I will be playing the $2,000 O8 event.


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After I looked at the linked blog i had a couple questions for ya...

Why the O8 event, there is significantly more value for most good players to play a NLHE tournament and there is one two days before the O8 one - I love playing O8 but I only play ring games and if picking my spot for any $2k tournament during the WSOP I think most could find a better spot...

Also I saw you mention in there you were going to go check out the $4-8 limit O8 game at canterbury... I lived up in minneapolis for 8 months ending about 7 months ago, that game is by far the rockiest O8 game I have seen in my life, the lineup at the $20/40 & 30/60 games at Bellagio are softer, or in the $10/20 or $20/40 games during the WSOP at Rio... simply the worst game ever, if they do happen to get the $10/20 O8 going there jump in as it will be good, the 4/8 rocks dont play it

[phidelt799]

Great White- thank you for the reply. I think playing really loose the first couple of orbits might be the way to go. If you do happen to hit your hand, you will get paid off well. I agree that once the blinds get up you really have to pick a hand and go with it.

The Station- good to know about the Canturbury game. My main intention of going down there was just to get a feel for the actual playing of O8 live. I played a lot of HE there but I have never played O8 live. Hopefully the 10-20 game will be going.

My thinking for playing in the O8 event at the WSOP is this-I think I have a better relative advantage over the field compared to my NL tourney game. While I am confident in my NL game, I have only played about a dozen tourneys in the last year. I think there are many players who have an advantage over me in a NL event compared to the O8 event. I could be wrong though, just my thoughts. I am interested in hearing why you think there is more value for a good player in NL than O8.

[MarkGritter]

I have won a couple of low/mid-stakes O8 MTTs (including one of the Full Tilt bracelet race events--- is that the qualifier you're referring to?) But in my opinion I still suck, so take the following with a grain of salt.

You should not loosen up early and tighten up later, but in fact the exact opposite.

In small-buyin tournaments with a lot of loose players you need to stick to nut-peddling in the early levels. Stay out of the pots that get jammed preflop, even if they're doing so with utter crap--- your edge over the field comes postflop. It is not vitally important to build a big stack early (though it helps.) You can see flops with more speculative hands if you are pretty sure the pot is going to be unraised.

In the mid levels you will be able to see flops more cheaply but need to commit more of your stack. But a good hand can easily turn a small stack into a big stack since hands are still being contested multiway. Have patience and don't loosen up yet.

Sometimes you're just not going to be able to find a good hand and you'll get blinded off as soon as the blinds get large, or commit all your chips to a quality draw that bricks out. That's tournaments for you. [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

In the later levels it is vitally important to get pots heads-up and to play well heads-up. You can pull some amazing suckouts HU or escape for half much more easily than if there are three or four players seeing showdown.

Steal liberally and remember the Gap Concept. (If you haven't read Sklansky's tournament book, do so.) Raise your stronger HU hands (pairs, A2-big-big) to try to isolate a single limper. Even in Omaha most flops won't hit a single opponent very well and you may be able to pick up the pot on the flop.

I found this post to be helpful, but again applies to small-stakes tournaments:
http://tom-bayes.livejournal.com/17775.html

I don't have experience with the larger buyin events. I would suggest trying some of the Stars $215 tournaments to see how the play goes. I'd imagine there will be fewer donkeys building up big pots with crap in the beginning, so you will need to build your stack by identifying other players' less obvious weaknesses and exploiting them. The expert plays Ray Zee mentions in his book, like driving out a player going the same way as you (or opposite!) to pick up an extra 1/4 or 1/2 of the pot, will become more important. Your edge will have to shift from merely starting good and reading the board well to reading the other players.