How do i play the late stages of an online MTT more effectively

Hi, I am a relatively new user to this forum, however had read a lot of posts from other members with both interest and intrigue. At this point, i am currently a low stakes mtt grinder on pokerstars and PKR. I have done quiet well at this, although have endured both up and down swings due to variance appalling bankroll management skills, while suffering strings of tilt when i take bad beats which causes me to make illogical decisions at the tables. Anyway, one of the things which i hoped to acquire from this community when i first signed up was insights into how to play the late stages of online MTTs most effectively. I would like to think of myself as a solid early/middle stages player as i more often than not can breeze past these stages by playing a solid Tag style of poker.

However, as my games descend into the late stages this is where the problems in my game start to arise regardless of my stack size. If i am one of the bigger stacks of a game, every time i try to steal the blinds by opening up my range from the CO and Button from middle stacks one of a few things will happen.


Sometimes they will fold which is what i want from my prospective, although more often or not i will get hero called or 3 betted by someone who ends up having a monster hand who cripples my stack. However, if im the short stack and ahead and i shove i have some donk catch 4 running card straight or flushes even when i am lucky enough to have aces or kings.

Also, if i happen to be ahead pre flop more often than not my opponent hand will hold up or improve to crush mine which is a demoralizing feeling which causes me to tilt. If i am middle stacked much of the same nonsense will occur if i am big stacked as explained above.

It's just bad because i find myself a lot of the time making money in online MTTs, but find myself, consequently, i have difficulty maintaining or building a stack because of my poor late stages MTT ability.This is why i would like insight from other members of this site who are successful MTT players who would obviously have a lot of late stage experience who could possibly help me improve by providing tips and strategy advice.

This is the best of the info i can provide in a tired state, although it might be a bit vague in a sense, i hope to hear from members of this forum with experiences in this area to provide me with appropriate advice and strategy, in order for me to address this leak in my game.

Post HH ( and not where you shoved all in with AA with 5bb). A thread where you just say you lose most of the time you get it in good is pretty pointless tbh and very hard to offer constructive advice on.

This section -

redvulture61 said:

........i shove i have some donk catch 4 running card straight or flushes even when i am lucky enough to have aces or kings.

Also, if i happen to be ahead pre flop more often than not my opponent hand will hold up or improve to crush mine which is a demoralizing feeling which causes me to tilt.

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.. of your remarks is worrying. In order to be a successful tournament player, you must become as far as possible indifferent to beats. If you get your chips in the middle in a favourable situation, that`s always a success whatever the outcome. Emotional tournament players are almost always bad players.

It will not usually be possible to get to the final table in a sizeable tournament without playing three or four all-ins. Even assuming that you always exercise good judgement and are never all-in unless you are at least a 70-30 favourite, the mathematically most probable outcome is that you will lose one and be knocked out.

Therefore, you must recognise that there will be many occasions when you will play well but finish up with nothing to show for it. You need to remain unaffected by that, keep your focus, and continue to play well until the cards run your way and you pick up the big score which covers all those small losses.

If you hold your game together and keep a cool head, you can beat tournament variance and be a winning player, but you won`t do so if you tilt.

BlueNowhere said:

Post HH ( and not where you shoved all in with AA with 5bb). A thread where you just say you lose most of the time you get it in good is pretty pointless tbh and very hard to offer constructive advice on.

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agreed.

Late stages of a HUGE MTT

I understand your frustration when your steal gets re-stolen or you get it in with the best of it only to get your hand cracked.
Lets talk about those two things, if someone steals your steal and you suspect that's all they are doing.
Next time just DUNK it in their face, (all of it) "the key to the game is putting a player on a decision for all their chips"
If they are good, they wont want to gamble for all their chips on a coin flip.
When you get it in with the best of it try not to forget that no matter how much you know, your gambling.....
And BTW
The best thing to do when your tilting out is to DO SOMETHING ELSE.
DO NOT PLAY, get up, go chill with your friends, basically do ANYTHING else.
At first I agreed that there wasn't much I could say about your post, then I changed my mind.

avoid the tagfish habits as they will never allow your game to progress

Okay how about 1)defending your blinds and restealing the from the D or CO? try to see who folds to 3bets and make 3bet from the blind next time you feel the steal comin on.
2)Stealing too much from the CO or D position....you can do all day with a passive players to the left.....but once their stacks gets low they are going to shove. I get selective (rather than ATC I have to play premiums cards to raise with) when I see BB is about 10BB from blinding out as I am expecting an all in shove.

you have to be able to risk your chips but at the same time wait for premium hands. You don't want to go out with a terrible hand and regretting what you could have gotten a few hands later.

Thanks for the all the responses thus far some helpful advice from some notable members such as, EganTowst, and Sloba. Don't know how one member got the inference i was a tagfish, although if that's all you can contribute to the thread because of lack of knowledge of the subject then fair play to you.

Some more indepth knowledge of when to steal blinds might be helpful. Although when i do try to steal blinds, i only like to steal from the middle stacks as a i stated in my original post.

Why you may ask? There are a few reasons i don't like to target big stacks, or short stacks. For starters, if you try to steal from the short stacks i find they tend to call you down more often because there very survival depends on winning an all in when under 10bb or close to it.

However, if i try to steal from the big stacks, they are more likely to call you down because they can afford to do so. Furthermore, when i target the middle stacks, they are more likely to fold because they are most often reluctant to put their tourterment life on the line without a monster hand.

Some more advice on hand selection when stealing blinds would also be useful when middle and big stacked. At the moment, in the late stages of an MTT i prefer to play more of a LAG style than TAG style opening up a wide range of hands from the CO and Btn especially against passive players.

Why do i prefer LAG over TAG in late stages of an MTT? Well, if i try to play a Tag style excluding the the start of a final table, i will find myself extremely card dependent which can limit my ability to build a stack which is not good for late stages of an MTT if you want to win it like i do.

Is my strategy wrong? Am i just unlucky to get beaten by 4 running card flushes as stated in my last post?

Finally, one last thing about the tilting, i find myself having serious problems with this. Nobody likes to lose when your ahead 70-30, some more than others. I am sure many of you have experienced it, even the best players do, and anyone who saids they haven't is most probably a lier.

Geez, i have heard of people smashing keyboards and breaking computers when on tilt, though i don't think id ever take it that far.

if you think they are shoving really wide already you can tighten your range to only value for steal into 20bb stacks, 10bb stacks are much less of a worry so you can tighten up some, but if they are shoving air a good portion of the time it can be free chips with average to above average hands. dont steal with a hand without deciding what you will do if each player 3bets or shoves first.
if a player tends to flat alot of bets but fold to cbets alot then I would widen my range and bet any board and give up on my air if he calls the cbet.

you have to remember the odds of winning with a given hand vs a given hand are predetermined, how a hand wins is really irrelevant if its all in before or on the flop. I generally dont tilt too much, i tend to get much more upset if I put myself in a stupid or awkward spot or misread stacks or action etc, or if my computer/internet connection is having a tantrum. winning/losing all in hands is largely irrelevant.

Red

I love to bully the everlasting crap out of smaller stacks.
If you need chips in your END GAME I highly recommend it.
The words card dependent will have me philosophyizing for hours today.
=)

slobasaurus said:

I love to bully the everlasting crap out of smaller stacks.
If you need chips in your END GAME I highly recommend it.
The words card dependent will have me philosophyizing for hours today.
=)

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Well becoming card dependent is an inedible occurrence if you only plan on playing premium hands in all your games. Although you might not be prone to being dominated, even when your ahead in say 5 hands, the chances of a player win all 5 of them is only about 17%.