Help with playing a big stack very early in a tourney.

[sharkscopeaholic]

I'm a much better short stack player since i've played so many turbo sng's so i tend to do fairly well when the avg M's go down in the large entrants tourneis but...I've been playing cash games lately and am getting better at getting a big stack earlier in a tourney. I HAVE NO IDEA HOW TO PLAY WITH THE BIG STACK VERY EARLY THOUGH.

I know you're supposed to play according to your table but I feel lost as to whether i should bully people out of small pots that dont mean much or just to sit back and wait for big hands/everybody else to catch up stack wise.

Last night i got 6000 chips in first ten minutes (1500 chips starting, 1500+ people tourney) and then basically stayed at about 6000 for the next hour and half.

What is the best strategy in this situation?

[benneh]

well, you can limp a little more often and try to make big hands with little cards, but when I do that i tend to leak a lot of chips by "making tough calls" and tough decisions after the flop.

when i get a big stack early, i just continue to play my normal game because I know no matter where i am now, i'm still going to have to double up some more. early on is no time to try and bully chips off of people because the blinds are so small and there aren't any antes, and no one has a sense of commitment to the tournament.

i suggest sticking to normal slighlty lag/tag game until the 150/300 level with antes. i've found i tend to get a little less credit when i have a big stack early on, so you may as well use that to your advantage when you get big hands.

[erc007]

Having a big stack early enables you to open up your game if you normally play tight. You can play almost any hand with high implied odds, (any PP;SC;suited 1-gapper, etc.)from most positions without worrying about whittling away your stack. At most SSMTT tables a loose preflop/tight postflop strategy will yield good results, assuming that u know when to get away from a speculative hand postflop. You can call raises with these hands in position, but i would try to be conscious of position preflop, esp with some of the weaker SC's and suited 1-gappers.

[levAA]

the situation you had with your 6000 stack doesn't matter at all, if all the other guys on the table still have the 1500 stack.

Adjustments to stacks have to be oriented at the lower stacks - so play your usual game (with the bonus you can apply more pressure - so i would not limp more but open my preflop range a little bit still playing aggressive).

It's something different when all or most of the stacks are that deep - there the game is more similar to a cash game - and how to play there is impossible to answer in one thread.

[tomek322]

The only way I alter my play with a big stack early is to make looser calls OTB or CO to try to bust someone. Other than that, I just play same as usual.

[Pokerfarian]

I recommend browsing SSNL, definitely help your cash game play and hence your play in these situations. Check out their anthology & whatever else is useful.

[sharkscopeaholic]

[ QUOTE ]
I recommend browsing SSNL, definitely help your cash game play and hence your play in these situations. Check out their anthology & whatever else is useful.

[/ QUOTE ]

I've actually been posting alot on uNL forum and you're right it does help alot with mtt play.

[Dunkman]

The best suggestion is to go read uNL and SSNL to learn some more of the aspects of playing deep. Some of it is just general adjustments, like unpaired high cards lose a lot of value, and pairs/suited connectors gain more value. This will be even more true in a MTT where the average villain is going to be terrible when deep and will likely stack off an ungodly stack with TPTK.

[Wish]

Don't a lot of those adjustments fail to apply in your average tournament? Even if you, say, triple up to 225 BB in the first level, you're still no deeper than the next biggest stack at the table. If that's just 90 BB, the other 135 are really nothing more than padding against a bad beat, right? And by the time other stacks have caught up to you, the blind levels will likely have caught up as well, and you're no longer terribly deep.

[erc007]

[ QUOTE ]
Don't a lot of those adjustments fail to apply in your average tournament? Even if you, say, triple up to 225 BB in the first level, you're still no deeper than the next biggest stack at the table. If that's just 90 BB, the other 135 are really nothing more than padding against a bad beat, right? And by the time other stacks have caught up to you, the blind levels will likely have caught up as well, and you're no longer terribly deep.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is true if the table is playing tight, but if it's loose u can get in more pots (and thus get paid off when u hit.) You can do this with an avg stack as well, but this style does take a toll on a normal stack if you don't make a hand or two. If you splash around (loose pre/tight post) the 1st two levels and don't double-up, you go into level 3 with only 20BBs, which is a tough stack to play against loose players. With the big stack, u still will get paid off with the same frequency, but the impact (of not winning big pots) on your stack's playability will be negligible.