How do you succeed in SNG's and MTT's with Donks?

Mmm.. I just want to know how do you play your SNG's and MTT's especially against donkeys! Any advice would be nice. Thanks

That's about as vague as anything I've read on here. I guess you just give all your money to the donk and go find a table that has no donks. (hahaha) Ok. So that wasn't funny. Sorry. I hope someone has an answer so I will understand the question and learn something.

When playing less skillfull players you have to play solid poker. You can't bluff they will call you. Put your tricks aside and play solid poker. Most importantly be patient. Many people think they know what that word means. Well read this anyway.
This article is about the state of being. For other uses, see Patience (disambiguation).

Patience, engraving by Hans Sebald Beham, 1540


Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: patience
Patience (ˈpā-shənz) is the state of endurance under difficult circumstances, which can mean persevering in the face of delay or provocation without becoming annoyed or upset; or exhibiting forbearance when under strain, especially when faced with longer-term difficulties.

Protect your chips, use patience, play solid, take your time, and most of all make sure you are not the DONKEY in the SnG or MTT.

• Patience is not only a virtue, but an acquired trait.
  • Christian Calhoun, The Story of My Life

• Patience, that blending of moral courage with physical timidity.
  • Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d'Urbervilles

• Let him that hath no power of patience retire within himself, though even there he will have to put up with himself.
  • Baltasar Gracián, The Art of Worldy Wisdom, (1647)

• Patience makes lighter / What sorrow may not heal.
  • Horace, Odes, 15

• Patience is the guardian of faith, the preserver of peace, the cherisher of love, the teacher of humility; Patience governs the flesh, strengthens the spirit, sweetens the temper, stifles anger, extinguishes envy, subdues pride; she bridles the tongue, refrains the hand, tramples upon temptations, endures persecutions, consummates martyrdom; Patience produces unity in the church, loyalty in the State, harmony in families and societies; she comforts the poor and moderates the rich; she makes us humble in prosperity, cheerful in adversity, unmoved by calumny and reproach; she teaches us to forgive those who have injured us, and to be the first in asking forgiveness of those whom we have injured; she delights the faithful, and invites the unbelieving; she adorns the woman, and approves the man; is loved in a child, praised in a young man, admired in an old man; she is beautiful in either sex and every age.
  • Bishop Horne, Discourses on Several Subjects and Occasions Patience Portrayed

• We have only to be patient, to pray, and to do His will, according to our present light and strength, and the growth of the soul will go on. The plant grows in the mist and under clouds as truly as under sunshine; so does the heavenly principle within.
  • William Ellery Channing letter 2 September 1826

• He that will have a cake of the wheat must needs tarry the grinding.
  • William Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida Act I, scene ii

• Patience is a nobler motion than any deed.
  • C.A. Bartol, Radical Problems 1872

• Patience is the ballast of the soul, that will keep it from rolling and tumbling in the greatest storms: and he, that will venture out without this to make him sail even and steady will certainly make shipwreck, and drown himself; first, in the cares and sorrows of this world; and, then, in perdition.
  • Ezekiel Hopkins Death disarmed of it Sting Of Patience under Afflictions

• Il n'y a point de chemin trop long à qui marche lentement et sans se presser: il n'y a point d'avantages trop éloignés à qui s'y prépare par la patience.
  • Translation: There is no road too long to the man who advances deliberately and without undue haste; there are no honours too distant to the man who prepares himself for them with patience.
  • La Bruyère, Les Caractères (1688) Des jugements, aphorism 108

• If the wicked flourish and thou suffer, be not discouraged. They are fatted for destruction; thou art dieted for health.
  • Thomas Fuller Introductio Ad Prudentiam no. 844

• Patience is sorrow's salve.
  • Charles Churchill The Prophecy of Famine

• There is, however, a limit at which forbearance ceases to be a virtue.
  • Edmund Burke, Observations on a Late Publication, Intituled, "The Present State of the Nation"

• Blessings may appear under the shape of pains, losses, and disappointments; but let him have patience, and he will see them in their proper figures.
  • Joseph Addison The Guardian no. 117 25 July 1713

• He that can have patience can have what he will.
  • Benjamin Franklin Poor Richard's Almanack June 1736

• Patience, my lord. Why, 'tis the soul of peace.
  Of all the virtues 'tis near'st kin to heaven.
  It makes men look like gods; the best of men
  That e'er wore earth about him was a sufferer,
  A soft, meek, patient, humble, tranquil spirit,
  The first true gentleman that ever breath'd.
  • Thomas Dekker and Thomas Middleton The Honest Whore Part One, act V scene II

• Though patience be a tired mare, yet she will plod.
  • William Shakespeare - Henry V Act II, scene i

• We shall sooner have the fowl by hatching the egg than by smashing it.
  • Abraham Lincoln White House speech 11 April 1865

• Patience and diligence, like faith, remove mountains.
  • William Penn Some Fruits of Solitude In Reflections And Maxims (1682) no. 234

• Patience is the art of hoping.
  • Marquis De Vauvenargues Reflections and Maxims (1746) no. 251

• Patience, n. A minor form of despair, disguised as a virtue.
  • Ambrose Bierce The Devil's Dictionary

• Beware the fury of a patient man.
  • John Dryden Absalom and Achitophel (1681)

• Our patience will achieve more than our force.
  • Edmund Burke Reflections on the Revolution in France
  • Abused patience turns to fury.
    • Thomas Fuller
  • All command patience, but none can endure to suffer.
    • Thomas Fuller
  • At the bottom of patience there is heaven.
    • Anonymous
  • If we could have a little patience, we should escape much mortification; time takes away as much as it gives.
    • Madame de Sévigné
  • Muddy water is best cleared by leaving it alone.
    • Alan Watts
  • Never think that God's delays are God's denials. Hold on; hold fast; hold out. Patience is genius.
    • Buffon
  • Nine women can't have a baby in one month.
    • Anonymous
  • No school is more necessary to children than patience, because either the will must be broken in childhood or the heart in old age.
    • Richter
  • Patience is a bitter plant but it has sweet fruit.
    • German proverb
  • Patience is the best of qualities; he who possesses it possesses all things.
    • Anonymous
  • Patience is the support of weakness; impatience is the ruin of strength.
    • Colton
  • Patience is the virtue of asses.
    • French proverb
  • Patience with others is Love, Patience with self is Hope, Patience with God is Faith.
    • Adel Bestavros
  • Pulling at an olive won't make it ripen faster.
    • Italian proverb
  • We usually learn to wait only when we have no longer anything to wait for.
    • Marie Ebner-Eschenbach
  • You can't set a hen in one morning and have chicken salad for lunch.
    • George Humphrey
  • Patience is the universal equalizer in life between now and eternity.
    • Jesse Gause

Red = my favorites
maroon = good stuff
Green = A "maniac's" opinion of patience

just start playing tighter and stay aggressive

choose your spots and play position

position, position, position!!

But they (inexperienced-fish-donk-whatever ) don't care about position.

Am I totaly off base here?

that is just all the better when you play position properly

I usually play tight and let them knock each other around, but still playing aggressive when the right spot happens. You can give away maybe a few blinds or whatever, then rake in some huge pots from them. But then again I have been known to donk it around a little. Trying to get away from that though. Good Luck.

Except for the minor bump last night, playing very tight and betting aggresively does work. Don't bluff, no fancy moves. ABC poker. Stay patient. Try not to let the suckouts get you down.

Good luck.

I tend to play very tight early and watch players tendencies. After some observations on table play I will adjust my game accordingly. Best, in my view, to not have a game plan going into the tournament but strategize your game plan as you learn who you are playing against and their play.

I'm no expert, though I'm coming off a $1 SNG win that took a long time but in which I felt like I knew what a lot of the players were going to do, and could get reads on them. Which was pretty new to me.

That said, the only time I could really deploy any "tricks" were with the kind of players who would keep calling small bets down to the river (but whom you'd scare out if you bet the amount all at once).

In other words, if you're playing $1 SNGs, you might get to get cute with bad players. There was a super loose-aggressive player who was throwing chips around, and bluffed me off a couple hands, including a made heart flush (he was to my right, and threw out a bet bigger than any he'd made before, so I laid down my pocket 9-4 because there was only one overcard on the board.) He flashed 6c 2s and (I assume) gloated. I just stayed patient, didn't try to "show him" or anything and banked away what I learned because it was worthwhile.

Iwound up busting him 20 minutes later when my pocket 9s made a set to beat his AK.

I busted the next guy (a tight player who didn't bring it in without the goods, but who wasn't above buying the blinds with a shove) on the next hand thanks to the advantage afforded me by the cocky bluffer's chips, and viola! I'm one latte richer.

So this is a long and somewhat self-aggrandizing way of saying: Yeah, patience and solid poker.

brilliant!

Details please...


I'm offering free sweat sessions if youre interested, I'd be more than happy to help you out http://www.cardschat.com/f11/sng-sweat-coaching-139757/

Interesting that pretty much all the answers above assume that all donkeys play the same.

In reality, this is a long way from the truth. So the answer for the OP is this: it depends on the type of donkey you're playing.

If you're up against a hyper-aggro donk, you'll need to wait for a solid hand and will probably want to give them a chance to shove over the top of you.

If you're up against a calling station donk, you'll want to value bet them to death and never bluff them.

If you're up against a weak-tight donk you'll want to be stealing their blinds at every opportunity.

If you're up against my personal favourite, the loose-passive preflop weak-tight postflop donk, you'll want to be raising them from position then c-betting regularly on the flop.

It's about reading and reacting to your opponents, not finding one magic formula and never deviating from it.

exactumundo dude, that means they'll call your raises from the CO when they're utg with garbage and more than likely will not hit the flop, then pressure them and they fold, obv don't blindly cbet a whole table of callers but if your getting tables full of limp-callers then u just need to up ur preflop raises or observe 'til you find a size that they fold to. Also for the first few times you get involved fire on the flop and turn so they know that your not scared to fire another bullet on later rounds. You've gotta embrace the donks cuz they should be the source of most of your chips, if they luck out and river you just replay through the hand, make sure you made the right moves and they were the ones making the bad calls and mistakes.... n then fire up another one because it's all about the long term

This is pretty easy. You play better cards than them and value-bet them to death. Don't bluff.

By the same token that's why it gets really frustrating (at times) when i don't do well against these people. You run across the same 4 types of players (ref: Ozexorcist post above) over and over and over again.

I am guilty of sometimes over-thinking the game. But 80% of the players are from those 4 categories. Now towards the end of a tourney, even the freerolls, the last 5% of the players left seems to be a cut above and that's when the real game starts. The first 95% of the game is avoiding land mines.

Yeah Play very tight and when you get good hand, Raise with it and play the hand well. Dont call donkeys stupid bets , if you got 10 Q or hand like that.

I dont call anything.I only play hands I can raise with.Usually people play sit-n-go's very loose.I play the opposite pretty tight.I let them knock each other out and usually play turbo so the blinds go up quicker and people are not as patient then.

I have been very succesful in the long run with playing sng's on various sites.
I usually only play the 5.00 +.50 or the 10.00 +1.00 limits.
But I have been running around 85% Itm for A little more than 2 years now.
And all I can say is patience,patience,patience,,,
Pick your spots to move.

Because more people associate donks with players that play any two cards anytime, especially ugly junk hands. it hurts losing to very inferior holdings. anyways.....

I'm surprised after your post that people not focus more on the DIFFERENT types of weak players out there that they can take advantage of.

My strategy is simple - wait for really strong hands, and then bet more than I normally would. If they call, I make enough to pay for that waiting time.

Donks can be good.If you are patient and wait on your hands they will take them selves out.the hand that u say hes bein a donk and you try to play A rag on a raise by him/her that is usuall ywhen they got a premium hand,atleast for me.

It also helps to make sure you are in a game in which the blinds allow you to play patiently . . . trying to play patiently in an Ultra Turbo game with 2 minute blinds is um . . . hard!

A little side note: You can play a great game--wait for premium hands, good position, correct bet size,etc.....and still lose. You have to remember you are going up against 5,6,7 people who are relying on luck. And sometimes they do get lucky.

When this happens and you go into a losing streak, do NOT go on tilt and lose your bankroll !! Controlling your emotions when running bad is a skill that isn't talked about a whole lot, but it is absolutely critical.

well the best strategy is the be really patience.. wait until you have a really good preflop cards or you flop the nuts at the flop, other thing to keep in mind is the buy-in.. buy into sng that you feel comfortable with

as frisellan so eloquently said "patience"

ABC Poker..mixed with patience. When you get a hand you will get paid off. or donked( thats OK..it happens))

valuetown is the way to go.

Play very tight and double up with good hands!
At a full table the donks will be out very fast...
Do not worry if you get a bad beat, it will happen to you many times!
You will get used to it....

Welcome them to the table.. makes for a more interesting game
Know they will be out soon and hopefully have donated some of their chips your way.
Dont over anylize there play, because it is a waste of time. Focus on the good players at the table and play your game

Yeah Choose Your Hands Wisely when Playing them Don't push to hard unless you have the nuts let them chase but not give out the good pot odds and if there pushing to hard and you might be beat let it go the only reason why you bust out on them is if you like me get sick of being pushed around and you make a stupid call that pisses you off the rest of the night so i would rather not make that call so i can feel better about my play and know i made the right choice

learn to love the donkeys. they're where your winnings come from.

Seriously? 85% winrate over a 2 year span? that can't be right.

does sound a little too good ,doesnt matter how good you play ,sngs are subject to massive variance and 85 % does sound a little high