180 man turbo sit and go strategy

#1 11th April 2012, 12:45 PM

My apologies if this has come up recently, I was reading an article here: Exclusive Strategy for Smashing 180 man turbo sit-n-go's, and was curious to know really what the more experienced players here thought of this early stage advice?

i.e.

Quote:

From the start I’m looking for hands to double up with. This includes mainly pairs, suited aces and big Ax hands. With small pairs I’m looking to see a cheap flop and hit a set. If someone opens before me ill most likely fold unless it’s a small raise or more than one player has called. If it’s folded around to me I will limp in with the same strategy in mind. If I don’t hit a set I’m almost always folding unless its heads up and I can fire a small bet to take the pot down when my opponent shows weakness. If shown any sort of resistance I’m done with the hand unless of course we make a set on later streets. The same concept applies for suited aces. I’m looking to see a cheap flop in hopes of making a flush or possibly 2 pair.

To me it seems very much OTT, and counter intuitive when compared with other SNG articles I have thread which encourage you to play a very much tighter game earlier on, when the blinds are small and there's minimal benefit gained from blind stealing.

To me the strategy seems a bit like betting your entire tournament life on coin flips without necessity? It makes far more sense in my head to wait for the stronger hands and shove (i.e. AA/KK/AK/AQ/AJ/QQ/JJ) - so that at least you're approaching 65/35 or something to win. Am I missing something here?

#2 11th April 2012, 12:47 PM

whats the main differance between the 180 man SNG and the 9 man SNG?

#3 11th April 2012, 12:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pokerb0t

My apologies if this has come up recently, I was reading an article here: Exclusive Strategy for Smashing 180 man turbo sit-n-go's, and was curious to know really what the more experienced players here thought of this early stage advice?

i.e.

To me it seems very much OTT, and counter intuitive when compared with other SNG articles I have thread which encourage you to play a very much tighter game earlier on, when the blinds are small and there's minimal benefit gained from blind stealing.

To me the strategy seems a bit like betting your entire tournament life on coin flips without necessity? It makes far more sense in my head to wait for the stronger hands and shove (i.e. AA/KK/AK/AQ/AJ/QQ/JJ) - so that at least you're approaching 65/35 or something to win. Am I missing something here?

This strategy may have been written with pokerstars 180 games in mind, as these are turbos and accumulating chips fast is a priority as waiting for the big hands may not come fast enough.

Other strategies you had read are optimal for regular speed SnGs.

#4 12th April 2012, 4:28 AM

My strategy for these is to not play them at all. More chips and longer blind levels is the only way to go in MTTs...imo

#5 12th April 2012, 6:20 AM

Waiting for 65/35s isn't going to work.

#6 12th April 2012, 11:50 PM

My strategy for those 180 turbos; don't pay attention until you have value preflop, then go for value. Otherwise fold everything and don't even watch the table until you get around 10 bbs and have to start looking for places to shove. I'm usually watching TV or reading a book until then. The tourney is my fav way of using up T$ from FPPs but the first 2/3s of the tourney I view as a crapshoot.

If you get down to 4-5 tables then you can start paying attention. Go for the win; cashing means almost nothing and most of the players are pretty awful and some get pretty scared at the final table.

So yeah, bad article, imo.

#7 26th April 2012, 8:50 AM

pokerBot,

You and the quoted writer seem to be mixing a couple issues. Blind stealing in the early levels of any tournament is indeed not worth it. Getting all in preflop in the early levels is also a bad idea (AA and KK being exceptions). What can be an excellent idea in the early levels is to play hands speculatively with high implied odds. Axs and Ax are not usually hands we say have great implied odds, so this statement is a bit edgy. Personally, I executed a similar strategy when I first started playing reg speed turbos in 2008 and it worked very well. My thinking was most players are TAG and play top pair like the nuts in the early levels.

#8 26th April 2012, 8:01 PM

180 and 360 mans SNG are all in fest, and all depened on your luck...Blinds are very very fast, and u kinda dont have time to w8 good cards...Expecially if u play on PokerStars...

Get some bankroll and try to move to more valuable tours where u can rlly play some poker, am working on same thing.

#9 28th April 2012, 6:15 AM

OP,

Dug this up for you. A complete 180 man guide from one of the best 180 players in history: Shaun Deeb.

http://archives1.twoplustwo.com/show...Number=9209807

It could be a bit dated now in 2012, but as I remember, it is much higher quality than the article you quoted.

#10 28th April 2012, 2:33 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sagiPOTM

180 and 360 mans SNG are all in fest, and all depened on your luck...Blinds are very very fast, and u kinda dont have time to w8 good cards...Expecially if u play on PokerStars...

Get some bankroll and try to move to more valuable tours where u can rlly play some poker, am working on same thing.

All-In Fest, Just depends on your luck... Does everyone believe this in these smaller MTT's ?
Yes I agree it's worth taking a chance on a good draw board to double up early but I in know way think they are "All-In Fests". Like a previous post said. Play solid, look for your spots and when approaching 10 to 15 BB's start thinking about good all-in positions to steal.

#11 28th April 2012, 2:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by beanstalk

pokerBot,

You and the quoted writer seem to be mixing a couple issues. Blind stealing in the early levels of any tournament is indeed not worth it. Getting all in preflop in the early levels is also a bad idea (AA and KK being exceptions). What can be an excellent idea in the early levels is to play hands speculatively with high implied odds. Axs and Ax are not usually hands we say have great implied odds, so this statement is a bit edgy. Personally, I executed a similar strategy when I first started playing reg speed turbos in 2008 and it worked very well. My thinking was most players are TAG and play top pair like the nuts in the early levels.

Would definitely avoid this. It's 1.5k starting stack and fast levels, you want to conserve your stack in the early stages - play tight aggressive, only good hands. As it moves to 30bb average, look to maintain your stack through stealing spots, and at 20bb look for restealing and 3bet shoving spots. Average will be short so try and maintain a decent stack and bully people. If you end up being shorter, look for spots to shove and steal the blinds/antes. You should be shoving wide, but be careful about shoving too wide especially versus the better regs who will have excellent calling ranges. Also be aware that other people will be shoving very light and so your calling range should widen.

#12 29th April 2012, 12:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pascal-lf

Would definitely avoid this. It's 1.5k starting stack and fast levels, you want to conserve your stack in the early stages - play tight aggressive, only good hands. As it moves to 30bb average, look to maintain your stack through stealing spots, and at 20bb look for restealing and 3bet shoving spots. Average will be short so try and maintain a decent stack and bully people. If you end up being shorter, look for spots to shove and steal the blinds/antes. You should be shoving wide, but be careful about shoving too wide especially versus the better regs who will have excellent calling ranges. Also be aware that other people will be shoving very light and so your calling range should widen.

great post, sums everything up really

#13 30th April 2012, 2:04 PM

Early stages of tournament is best time to looses up with the attempt flop big hand. You are looking to flop set, straight, 2pair against top pair top kicier type hand. Saying you dont play loose early really says you never play loose at all (which is fine). Personally i play loose for the first few levels in hope to flop monster and to create image that makes people always guessing what i have. When i tighten up ppl will remember that loose early image i created and hopefully ill get paid off cause of it.

#14 30th April 2012, 2:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by flatcaller

Early stages of tournament is best time to looses up with the attempt flop big hand. You are looking to flop set, straight, 2pair against top pair top kicier type hand. Saying you dont play loose early really says you never play loose at all (which is fine). Personally i play loose for the first few levels in hope to flop monster and to create image that makes people always guessing what i have. When i tighten up ppl will remember that loose early image i created and hopefully ill get paid off cause of it.

my range is def way way wider later than earlier

#15 30th April 2012, 2:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by NineLions

My strategy for those 180 turbos; don't pay attention until you have value preflop, then go for value. Otherwise fold everything and don't even watch the table until you get around 10 bbs and have to start looking for places to shove. I'm usually watching TV or reading a book until then. The tourney is my fav way of using up T$ from FPPs but the first 2/3s of the tourney I view as a crapshoot.

If you get down to 4-5 tables then you can start paying attention. Go for the win; cashing means almost nothing and most of the players are pretty awful and some get pretty scared at the final table.

So yeah, bad article, imo.

Yes. Play tight until the field has narrowed down to a few tables. Then, hopefully whatever value hands you've played have worked in your favor (as per the stats, this will be more often than not) and now you can bully around stealing the blinds. I've played 60, 33, 27, 22, and 7 SNGs and can state from experience that this basic idea with varying degrees of competence works everywhere.

#16 30th April 2012, 6:09 PM

180 Turbo, everyone is always shoving with anything. You need to get in fast to build your stack. It's a matter of winning coin flips. Waiting for value hands is as risky. The blinds go up fast..

#17 30th April 2012, 7:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AllInDom

180 Turbo, everyone is always shoving with anything. You need to get in fast to build your stack. It's a matter of winning coin flips. Waiting for value hands is as risky. The blinds go up fast..

Fast? It's a turbo, not a hyper-turbo. Still plenty of time to pick hands/spots, and if not and you get chipped down, you still can find spots for your stack size and situation. Let the players who think it's a hyper turbo take each other out.

#18 30th April 2012, 10:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by duggs

my range is def way way wider later than earlier

that's fine the only thing that stinks is if you have under 30 blinds one slip up can really hurt you. You run bad with 100+ BB early it will not have as huge of an effect, it sucks but you still have room to play your game.

#19 1st May 2012, 2:28 AM

winning lots of small pots early on isn't going to achieve much given the structure, you'll win a ton more by picking an extra few shove spots later in the game than you will playing post flop spots and your hourly will suffer because post flop decisions are much harder than pre

#20 1st May 2012, 2:42 AM

Play tight ABC poker pre-antes and shove/raise/resteal optimally once antes come in.

#21 2nd May 2012, 12:42 PM

Not to change direction of this thread... But where is the best site for these 180 person SnG's. I play at Bovada, Cake, and Carbon and it seems to take forever for one of these to fill up if they ever do at all. I'm a U.S. Player and used to play alot of these at FT and PS.
Thanks

#22 18th July 2012, 4:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by nc_royals

Not to change direction of this thread... But where is the best site for these 180 person SnG's. I play at Bovada, Cake, and Carbon and it seems to take forever for one of these to fill up if they ever do at all. I'm a U.S. Player and used to play alot of these at FT and PS.
Thanks

I talk to a US player pretty regularly that plays at Carbon.. Takes a while to fill up at times, but says he tends to do okay during peak times. (Sorry for the late reply, only just checked up on this!)

I play at PS, but know that's not really an option for you. (Unless you want to cross some borders )

#23 19th July 2012, 1:06 AM

I really hate these $2.50 180mans on Stars nowadays, they are poison for the bankroll in my opinion. Too much variance, regulars, gambling and faster than ever. Some years ago, these were $2.20 and slower turbos and i won 20 tournaments of those, but now its impossible. And only the first 3 prizes are good prizes, so you need a large bankroll, good nerves and a huge volume to grind those...

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