Heads-up duel in Stars freeroll (Intro)

[Fishy McDonk]

This post is an intro to my heads-up duel in a Pokerstars freeroll stud tourney.

I entered several of the "freeroll to win a seat in another freeroll" on Stars. There are several of them each day and they go by various names (Hubble, etc.). Most of them are NL and have around 5000 entrants. The final 27 of each of these win a seat in a "real money" freeroll with a $1000 prize pool that is scheduled at the end of the week. After trying to play well and getting knocked out in several, in the last one I entered, it was getting late and I wanted to eat dinner and watch TV so I just moved in with a garbage hand and ended up doubling up. I went and ate dinner, came back and moved in with another garbage hand and doubled up again. This gave me enough chips to coast to the finish without playing any more.

I discovered, to my surprise, that the freeroll I won a seat in was 7C stud. It must have been a surprise to many others too, because at Level 3, an entrant typed this into the chat box:

dognutzzz said, "how did i get here"
dognutzzz said, "where is the no limit tournament"

Many of the 1700 contestants had never played stud before and were playing and bluffing with the craziest of hands. Around level 5, one monkey at our table asked, "How does the bring-in work?".

I thought I would be playing 3 hours or 4 at the most. What I didn't know was that at a certain level, the limits stopped increasing. At the final table, when we were still 5 handed, I noticed that the blinds and antes had been the same for over 30 minutes, and upon inquiry, I was informed that this was the last level.

Around 7 hours into the tourney, 3 of us remained. The villain had about twice as many chips as myself and #3, who were about even. Knowing that the levels were not going to increase, I asked if it was possible to make a deal in a freeroll. The player who was about equal with me was interested but the chip leader said he didnt' think it was possible and added, "as if I would make a deal anyway!"

My equal eventually became the short stack and, realizing that the tourney might last awhile longer and I might be heads-up soon, I decided to make a dash to the liquor store for a 6-pack while I still had time. When I returned, I discovered that #3 had been knocked out and I had been heads-up for about a dozen hands. The chip leader, having no honour, was helping himself to my blinds and antes.

The heads-up duel began. Although I have played alot of stud and played in a few stud tourneys, I had never played heads-up before. After a while, I settled on a strategy and got comfortable with it. I don't know what the correct strategy is, but I decided that if I was the bring-in, I would only call opponent's raise if I had 2 overcards to his upcard or a 3 flush or 3 strait. If I had 3 overs to his upcard, I would raise him. I also raised occasionally with weaker hands. Otherwise I would call and sometimes slowplayed a good hand. On rare occasions with 3 unrelated cards, I would fold.

Early on, the villain tried to talk me into giving up and remarked at how tired I must be since it was so late in the USA. He said that he was wide awake, having just woken up before the tourney. At one point, I became the chip leader and gained a substantial lead over the villain. He typed in the chat box, "can we make a deal now? lol".

I didn't know if he was serious, but I emailed Stars support, giving the tourney # and asking them if it was possible for us to make a deal. About 2 1/2 hour later, a support person offered us the option to make a deal in the chat box. By that time, the tide had turned and the villain's stack was back to double my own. He said, "No deal".

After suffering a couple draw-outs and having some good hands beat by better hands, I blew off my remaining chips in frustration in the final hand. We had been heads-up for 4 hours and 42 minutes.


Tourney start:

Level I (15/30) - 2006/06/25 - 14:00:00 (ET)



Heads-up duel begins:

Level XVIII (15000/30000) - 2006/06/25 - 21:57:22 (ET)



Tourney end:

Level XVIII (15000/30000) - 2006/06/26 - 02:39:46 (ET)



Although it was an interesting experience, I don't plan to ever enter another Stars freeroll.


The duel will be in a seperate posts for anyone who is interested. I believe it is over 400 hands, so you have been warned.

[PoorLawyer]

Do you get anything for 2nd? At some point I probably would have just got bored out of my mind and just hit raise till i won or lost.

[Fishy McDonk]

1st - $ 220
2nd - $ 130
3rd - $ 85


Link to next:


http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showfl...e=0#Post6356160

[Andy B]

When I said you could go ahead and post the whole thing, I thought that you would just be making one long, annoying post which people could then ignore. I didn't think that you would be making sixteen long, annoying posts which, along with Jon's vocabulary lessons, would be taking up most of the first page. Use some common sense next time.

I left work to clean up this mess, as gambling sites are blocked at the office (I get moderator notifications via my personal email, which I check once in a while at the office). This basically cost me an hour of overtime. I am not happy.