Early MTT strategy

[JDMcNugent7]

I think the very best advice is to try to adapt to the way the table is playing and play a strategy that will work best against that table. If they are tight get in there and pick up small pots with dead money, if they are loose tighten up and make them pay when u hit a big hand.

I use both all the time. Generally, if the tournament has ALOT of entrants(which decreases your chance of winning it), I'll loosen up some and take calculated chances early, limping in multiway pots looking to flop monsters and playing drawing hands. If you want to play this way you have to be sure you are a good postflop player tho and remember not too get too caught up in any one hand. If this doesnt work and I can't hit anything I stop playing this way and tighten up once I lose about 1/5h of my stack.
In smaller tournies I generally start out pretty tight, not looking to force any pots and increase in aggressiveness as the higher blinds and antes come into play.

[Boobie Lover]

I also think it's important to play according to the structure of the tournament. As TP has said, he will employ strategy #1 with the slow methodical blind structure of the WSOP, and I would do that likewise.

If it were just another online tournament, I usually go with strategy #2 because I really don't want to get to a point of push or fold mode. And when it becomes that time of mostly short stacks and I have a reasonable stack, the people that are in push and fold mode I can bully around.

[Van_Broke]

On a somewhat related note, how willing are you to take what you think is a coinflop early in an internet tourney (relatively fast blind structure)? Do you feel the advantages of having a big stack outweigh the obvious chance of busting out early?

BTW, I usually use Strategy1, with very limited success. I find this strategy gets you to the bubble or just in the money a lot of the time.

[Zybomb]

Note than for Strategy 1, this strategy is aborted once the 'early' stages end.

[Nikita]

I started out with Strategy 1. It always worked well for me and has always led to me getting very deep in tournaments. I've recently started dabbling with the second strategy. It works, but not as well as I like. I think part of it, it doesn't fit with my playing style so it's hard to for me to use that style well. Basically, I was looking to improve my game, so I figured trying out a different way of playing could help me improve my play when I switch back to what I'm more comfortable with.

[melioris]

Because my schedule is messed up, I can’t commit large blocks of time to anything and so I don’t play many tournaments and when I do they are usually 3 or 5 table SNGs. In these environments strategy #1 works great until the ft. At the ft there is generally one or two people who have large stacks because they are lucky donkeys and they can’t wait to double me up the first time I get a hand (assuming the poker gods didn’t decide I need to suffer). Usually after that hand is shown the rest of the table puts me as a tight rock and that image is good for at least a couple steals.

Then I bubble out and get pissed I wasted that time in a tournament and not a ring game. Or I am clip leader and some disaster strikes (one of the kids wakes up, dog pukes on the floor, etc) and by the time things settle down I have blinded out and I am pissed I wasted that time in a tournament and not a ring game.

[fluxer]

Players like Phil Hellmuth use strategy #1.

Players like Daniel Negreanu invariable end up using strategy #2.

I'm not a tournament player, but if I try I can do very well in tournaments (I get impatient sometimes, which is my downfall in those things). I've used both strategies and have experienced limited success with both, albiet a small sample size.

Like JD says, you have to adapt to your table and the tournament that you're playing, but I usually find that if I'm at a table full of weak players, it's best to see a lot of cheap flops and crack someone who wont fold top pair; play it more like a cash game, minus the aggression unless you have a big hand.

I think the first strategy fails to exploit the weakness of some of the horrible players, but both are viable obviously.

[Talking Poker]

Again this depends on the tourney for me. At the WSOP with extremely deep stacks, there is NO WAY I would take a coin flip in hopes of doubling up early. Ohhh... I got my 10k to 20k. Only 79,990,000 chips to go! It's just not that big of an advantage to be worth the risk of being out.

However, certainly in a 180 SNG and even in a lot of the bigger online tourneys with much faster blind increases, I am willing to take this risk. I'm definitely willing to PUSH in these situations, but I'm not as willing to call.

Example: If I'm holding JcTc and the flop comes AcQc9h, I am holding Jack high, but I have an absolute monster. If I led at this pot and my opponent makes a healthy raise, I'm pushing. Even if he turns over AA, I'm in good shape. If I lead at the pot and he pushes though, it a much more difficult decision (I'd rather just take the pot down uncontested), but I'm probably still calling.

[X-Longshot-X]

Someone wrote an article (I think iit was Mike Sexton) about how newer players are doing well in all sorts of tournies use a higher risk to reward strategy....i think that # 2 would work well in the WSOP because there are prolly 7900 people using strat #1 and its gonna be easy to bully.....and build a stack quick

[Talking Poker]

75 chips at a time?

I completely disagree. If what you are saying is true (about the 7900 using Strategy #1), you're not going to be bullying anyone. You'll pick up a bunch of small pots (adding less than 1% to your stack) and then you'll lose a big one and it will all be for nothing. You're only going to get action when you're in trouble. Seems like a bad idea to me...

Again, I think the most important part of this discussion is the word EARLY. I'm taking that to mean the first few levels, not the end of Day 1.

[Zybomb]

Yes EARLY is the key word here.

I think too many beginning players, who grasp some strategy, use strategy one FOR THE ENTIRE TOURNAMENT.... this is a huge mistake. As it likely will leave you out of the money, on the bubble or just in the money, depending on the cards you get.

Like TP said the main issue is determining exactly when the 'early stages' end and knowing when to switch it up -- or if you are just completely card dead, knowing at what point a change needs to be made.

Im gunna give what I think is the pluses and minuses of each strategy in another post -- although I don't know which one is more effective. JD made a good point of knowing your table -- but in a MTT it's early, you don't really have a lot of information about the table