I know the flow of most MTT is for the first few levels to have the lunatics go at it and many get away with a large stack but many go bye bye really quick as well.
As for how tight I play.... I'll usually only raise with JJ or higher and will only smooth call 3 bets. With small pairs I won't call many 3 bets or large raises. I have no problem tossing small pairs all together depending on position.
this is good, but you should also be willing to call some raises with pairs in position and set mine early on when stacks are deep When I do have position I still wait for premium hands and don't call with anything just because I am on the button.
this sounds like a leak...a nitty leak. If you're going to play tight then you simply MUST use your position whenever you can because nobody gets enough premium hands on a regular basis to make enough money that way. Basically, open up on the button and cut-off....probably the hijack too. when somebody limps and you have a medium or speculative hand; don't fold your button or limp along, RAISE them to isolate and play a pot in position against a passive player.From the SB I will fold is I have crap even if it hasn't been raised or only the BB is left. When I am the BB I won't try to defend my blind by calling a raise with junk. That kind of tight. lol
that is good to do early on, theres not enough in the pot worth stealing. later, you'll need to wage war for the blinds and antes just like everyone else.
My style is more suited to post flop play.
if this is the case, you should read up on "small ball" a style that Daniel Negreanu plays well and teaches wellI find all the young players these days think that being super aggressive all the time is how you should play poker. They shove all their chips in with hardly no chips in the pot and when they have plenty of chips to play with and aren't to the point I would say push with anything you can get decent to play. The style today seems to be more gamble pre-flop and less game post flop. Which to me is stupid because we all know even AA can look like crap after the flop. Sure I will push in some spots when I have the nuts and want to try and get people off their draws but I see it done on boards that would never call for it IMO.
This brings me to drawing and calling bets with a draw. I do feel like a part of my problem is my reluctance to call a bet of any size with a drawing hand unless I have at least 8+ outs.
probably only a small leak. got to consider implied odds when you are drawing to a well disguised monster. For example, gutshots are well disguised...you don't want to go crazy with gutshots all the time, but for example if you flop bottom pair with a gutshot on a raggedy board and you and villain are both deepstacked? implied odds are there....Only to toss them and see I would have made my hand. But of course you can't know that before you toss right? lol I understand pot odds etc but I find it hard to call off chips to see a card when all I have is a draw working.
I also find it hard to get to steal many blinds and often the cost of doing so seems negative to the chip stack.
later on you simply MUST scrap for the blinds when they are high. Even if it ends up costing you a little bit of your stack, it will earn you action when you finally do pick up a nice hand. if you play super tight only premium cards then everyone has an easy fold when you finally enter a pot. People will fold their AQ to your AK, people will fold their TT to your QQ because you are too transparent.I try not to even get involved with hands that I know will cost me a lot to see a showdown so I prevent this by not playing many to begin with.
I've only been back to online poker for a few months now and I thought it was full of lunatics before all those years ago and now it seems even worse
My style works well for me still I just think I need to widen it a bit with more suited connecter hands etc and try to get more action when I do have hands. Need to start thinking like they do with regards to calling not like I do. IE I don't push it enough because I think I won't get any action when I should be pushing it harder because people are expecting lots of action from others with all sorts of hands. The biggest problem with being so patient and picking your spots with premium hands is that many times you wait for those cards a long time only to get them and get no action.
exactly why playing pots in position with medium hands is a good idea. you might smash the flop, you might win with aggression when they are weak, you might earn free cards because of position, and at the very least you might get called later on when you have a real hand! A few of those types of hands and you don't get any chips then you are back to card dead slowly being blinded away to short stackville.
I think of everything in %'s with regards to my chips and the amount of calling a bet raise etc in relation to my stack. Perhaps I need to stop being so tight on that with myself and play more of the situation than the math. I try to use both of course but the situation online is often hard to determine.
