Cash games or tournaments?

[DevilToad]

hello everyone! This is my first post here so please dont hurt me. I tried a quick search before posting but couldnt find any threads related to my question.

The day before yesterday i finally succumbed to the craze that is online poker. Armed with a chart of starting hands and odds, as well as a quick flick through of 'small stakes poker winning big' by ed miller et al i took $20 into the micro stakes limit games on poker stars and after stupidly losing 60c in the first half dozen hands managed to find find some discipline and turned the overall session into a small profit.

Today i felt a little tired and not up to playing for real money but noticed that they do freeroll tournaments for small cash prizes. So i entered one just to see how id do and came 200 and something out of around 1800 players netting me 10c in prize money, hey free money can't be sniffed at.

So now im a little confused as to what i want to do, i really enjoyed both formats, ive played a lot of home NL holdem STT games over the past couple of years with mates so im no stranger to the whole NL tournament thing although i am new to limit cash games. My original plan was to try and get good at limit cash as thats where i thought there was less luck involved and more steady long term profit available but if i can play freeroll tournaments no matter how slim the pickings are i get free experience and if im paying nothing i get 'infinite odds' on my investment no matter what the prize money is. If you've read this far on this rambling first post then i congratulate you and summarise my questions below.

1. Will it hurt my rate of learning if i attept to play both NL tournements and limit cash games at once?

2. Which would you recommend to a beginner, micro limit cash games or micro buy-in/freeroll tournements? Which would give the best 'learning experience'?

3. What are the advantages and diasadvantages of limit cash and NL tournement in general? Which is it better to be 'expert' at and where does the most money lie? Are there any transferable skills between the two?

4. Finally id be happy to accept any other advice you could give to a new online like myself.

Thank you in advance for any replies!

[Baby Mantis]

1.I believe that most would suggest that you attempt to master either Limit or NL first, whichever you prefer. Once you have mastered one then you can try the next. As far as cash or tournament play they different in some aspects, (you can always reload in cash games), so it would prob. be recommended to once again master one first and then move on.

2. I would suggest tournaments for the learning experience because they have a built in stop/loss. You only lose your buy-in and can play for hours on your buy-in in some cases. If you play free-rolls then you lose nothing, but in freeroll tournies you may not get a good feel for real play with people pushing in constantly. I would suggest the micro-stakes SNG (sit and go in case you didn't know) tournies. They fill up quick and give you the most experience for your buck!

3.In my opinion it just kinda depends on which stlye fits you as far as playing cash or tourney. I personally like tournament play and it really strokes my ego to win a tournament and be the last one standing. I just don't quite get that same feeling from the cash game side of things. So it is kinda up to you.

[grapabo]

From what I've seen in NLHE freerolls, they become a pushfest early by people whose strategy is to double or triple up in the first ten hands, or spend their time doing something else. Tournaments like that don't help you develop your post-flop play much, though I guess if you play the STTs, it may help your preflop push decisions.

This suggestion may be out of left field, but a good way to combine a tournament experience without risking money, developing post-flop skills, and not having to put up with some jerk capping a play money ring game every round, is to play limit freerolls. I haven't seen these in Hold 'em, but on the weekends, FTP will have some Stud or Razz freerolls. Last night, just for hell of it, I entered the Razz freeroll with 2400 players. I only know a little bit of specific strategy (tight play = only play w/3 starting cards 8 or under), but I applied strategies general to poker and finished reasonably well.

Getting to see cards without the constant threat of a push all-in exercised a different part of the brain to try to figure out what opponents were betting with on each round, and helped me make better decisions in later rounds of betting. It may take a little time to learn the basics of the other game, but reading the behavior of players relative to their possible hand strength is translatable to your limit hold'em cash games.

[Harv72b]

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1. Will it hurt my rate of learning if i attept to play both NL tournements and limit cash games at once?

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At this point, not really. The main skills you need to beat either these freeroll/$1 buy-in NL tourneys or the penny-ante limit tables are pretty much the same: play tight, stay focused, and work on your value betting. Somewhere down the road when you've moved up to higher stakes & are working on more advanced skills, then it pays to specialize for a while. Basically like a young athlete: as a kid you can play & do well at all sports, by high school you've probably narrowed it down to two or three sports, and once you hit college and/or the pros you generally need to narrow it down to one.

FWIW, I started out exactly like you did ($20 initial deposit) & split my time between $2 buy-in NL Sit & Gos and .02/.04 limit cash games. I tend to believe that helped me in my development, but at the least I'd say it didn't hurt.

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3. What are the advantages and diasadvantages of limit cash and NL tournement in general? Which is it better to be 'expert' at and where does the most money lie? Are there any transferable skills between the two?

[/ QUOTE ]

NL tournaments are the big craze right now, especially at those stakes offer some insanely weak fields, and dangle that chance at a single big payout in front of your nose. Cash games offer lower variance, and you will more often end your sessions as a winner for the day (good psychological boost); however, none of your single session wins will come to close to what you'd get for winning an MTT.

There are quite a few excellent players at the highest levels who make very comfortable livings in either discipline. And there are far too many transferable skills between the two for me to even attempt listing them.

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4. Finally id be happy to accept any other advice you could give to a new online like myself.

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Play within your bankroll. Surf around & take advantage of as many bonuses & other payouts as you can. If you decide to play primarily cash games, set a goal each day in terms of hours or hands, not amount of money won. Don't tilt. And never underestimate your opponent's willingness to pay you off with a worse hand.

[Maliant]

Keep playing small stakes and working your way up, it really doesn't matter what you play right now since you are just learning the game, just learn hand values and general reads on other opponents and general stuff like that, you will be able to focus on the more specific elements later.

[CmnDwnWrkn]

To answer your question about whether you can play limit and no limit at the same time - I guess it depends. I know that I tried this when I first started out, and I wasn't able to play both successfully. The problem is, the games are similar enough where you can get tricked into thinking that they are the same, but they are different enough where if you try to play them in the same way, you won't be very successful.

If you think you can separate the two games and treat them as separate games and adjust your strategy accordingly, by all means give it a try. But if you find yourself getting into weird situations because you are trying to play one game like the other, I would recommend just focusing on one to start. Remember that you can always play with free chips first to get a sense of which one you like better.

Also, I would definitely NOT recommend multi-tabling limit and no-limit at the same time. I think this is much too confusing.

[Nairb]

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Keep playing small stakes and working your way up, it really doesn't matter what you play right now since you are just learning the game, just learn hand values and general reads on other opponents and general stuff like that, you will be able to focus on the more specific elements later.

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[DevilToad]

Thank you all for your comments. I decided to stick to limit cash in the end, hopefully i'll grind a decent bankroll up, i don't have the financial security to jump in at the deep end. I might still play the odd freeroll tourney for a change or to try some of the other variants of poker but ill spend my serious study and learning time on limit cash.

@ Harv72b are low stakes SNG's profitable? I've watched and advised a friend playing a few and we made a slight loss. So i've generally avoided them. To me the payout structure and tournament fees mean that you have to win a high percentage of them to make any money ... or do i just suck at SNG's [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img]

[Harv72b]

[ QUOTE ]
@ Harv72b are low stakes SNG's profitable? I've watched and advised a friend playing a few and we made a slight loss. So i've generally avoided them. To me the payout structure and tournament fees mean that you have to win a high percentage of them to make any money ... or do i just suck at SNG's [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img]

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't play very many, but there are plenty of folks on the STT forum who do & do well at them. I agree that the payout structure & fees aren't so hot on most sites, but in my own experience that's been more than offset by the generally godawful play you encounter in them.

I haven't tracked my sit & go performances and from looking myself up on sharkscope neither have they, but I'd estimate that I'm up a decent amount overall from low buy-in STTs.

[CasinoR7]

You should play both if you have an adequate bankroll. But since you only have 20$, playing limit is the better option. You can play limit cash games and occasionally play a low buy-in MTT SNG. Winning a MTT is good for your bankroll. The $1,20 STT SNGs aren't worth playing, because you'll only get $4,40 for first price. When there is 200$ in your account, start playing any game type you like.