Arriving Late?

Hello! I did a search on this topic but didn't find much, so my apologies if it is a duplicate.

When I am visiting family back in Western NY, I like to play cash games at the local Native Indian casino. They also have daily tournaments there that I play in (usually 2-3 every summer). They are most definitely low-stakes tourneys.

What I noticed is that only about half the field start the tournament on time. They allow late buy-ins for up to an hour or so. For example, about 30 of us will start on time, and another 30 will end up joining by the end of late registration.

Some players claim that it's just "not worth it" to play when the blinds are low. To me, they are at a great disadvantage by joining late; fewer hands = fewer chances to earn chips, seeing how they are your lifeblood in a tournament.

What are your thoughts on the matter? Should you start tournaments on time or is it better to wait?

My input.

I like starting tournaments on time. This is because the blinds get up there when your late and you only have a few hands to calculate the point where you win before getting blinded out. You really have no in site so you just bet good hole cards. The problem is your getting blinded so you do'nt have many chances of getting good hole cards.

UncleConRon said:

I like starting tournaments on time. This is because the blinds get up there when your late and you only have a few hands to calculate the point where you win before getting blinded out. You really have no in site so you just bet good hole cards. The problem is your getting blinded so you do'nt have many chances of getting good hole cards.

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Good points here. I like starting on time not only for the cards (as mentioned) but also to start and get a feel for the competition. Good practice sizing up your opponenets, calculating M levels, etc.

If you really have to late reg,make sure your stack wont be less than 20bb upon registration.

I also prefer late reg.

Some tournament players feel more comfortable playing 30BB than 200BB and think late regging increases their hourly rate.

I believe it has to do with style, personally it depends when the antes kick in, if you come late, and the antes kick in, you could be forced to over value your hands early.

I prefer to start from the beginning also, by being everybody deep, then gives to know the playing style of the players at your table and the like, but many prefer to start later because the pots are too small in the beginning.

I always register to tournaments early to pick up some chips early on

When it is a long live tournament, it might be a good idea. Mainly because some tournaments have long days, ranging up to 12 hours and no player on planet Earth can hold his best concentration for such long time. Better to miss some early levels than make costly errors when blinds are high due to tiredness.

But there's certainly some downsides with late reg, most notably that during early stages in tournament there's usually few whales who lose all their chips quickly.

I usually late register in MTTs just because I don't think that playing at the start when blinds are low really gives me an advantage over any of the other players. Also, I play very nitty at the start, so more often then not, I'm folding a lot of hands and maybe winning a few small pots here and there. Once in a blue moon, I might pick up a ton of chips early, but what usually ends up happening is I'm below average stack by the time blinds get to 50/100+.

So, if starting stack is 5K, by the time blinds get to 50/100 or higher, I might be sitting on a 3.5K or 4K stack. Where, if I had late registered, I can start with a 5K stack at 50/100 or higher blinds.

To add, starting with blinds higher and fewer starting BBs makes playing a little bit easier as I'm probably folding a lot of small pairs early, and playing my big pairs and big hands very aggressively in mid-late position. Also, a lot of players at the micro-stakes tend to play very passively around the mid-stages and/or they over value small pairs and weak hands. So, it's easy to pick up pots and double off of them in the mid-late stages.

I don't think I'm giving much up not playing the early stages because I feel my mid-late stage game play is good enough where I can enter an MTT late with 25+ BBs and still do well.

I think the interesting and relevant point in this subject is the timing of the late registration relative to the level of blinds at that time.

it is important to watch the dynamics of the late registering players and see how they play once they are in the game. One game I played in the last few days, I late registered one minute before the cut off time, as did about ten other players, and it was generally an all in fest for about ten minutes with them trying to double up....some successfully, others not.

Different tactics work for different players so keep an eye on how the game changes as late registrations join in and include that in your own strategy.

BentleyBoy said:

it is important to watch the dynamics of the late registering players and see how they play once they are in the game. One game I played in the last few days, I late registered one minute before the cut off time, as did about ten other players, and it was generally an all in fest for about ten minutes with them trying to double up....some successfully, others not.

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LOL. I do this sometimes.

Usually, I try not to late register with less than 25+ BBs, but sometimes it happens. I might find a game that's been running and late reg is near closed, and if no other games are running or starting up soon, I might say 'what the heck' and join and see what happens.

philthy
100% agree. I often late register with 10 15 minutes of an hour left. Most of the bingo players are gone by then. Usually come into the game somewhat tight but aggressive. Not a big fan of the extended re-buys.

For example in the 100k Freeroll which no longer exists really been meaning to register late. Just stall for time to earn a few cents. In other cases, is risky do a late check especially if it is not a freeroll

If you don't plan on rebuying in e tournament of adding on then come at the beginning. Your gonna be able to have a better handle on reads and how people have been playing thus far. And have a better chance of getting a big hand earlier in the tournament and catching action. Might get folded to showing up late and trying to raise people after just showing up

I don't like late registration than I play nervous,other players have advantage playing on time....

always depends on starting stack to me.... I tend to play way to loose when i have more than 100 bb's so I typically wait about half the allotted late reg time. especially in online play. Now when I play live I am watching the active tables and noting what hands people are playing.

I like being there for the whole thing especially a live tourney, I think it's not so important for online tourneys and sometimes I register online late. At a live event there is so much information you pick up from other players, some of it is subconscious and you don't even realize it, but if you are not there you don't see it and you don't have that info to inform your game later on.

It usually depends on what kind of the tournament it is. Based on it type, I decide if it's worth registering late or on time.