Tired of making it just ITM

[PokerVic]

The problem with a lot of these big MTTs, is that when you get into the money, 60+% of the field is technically a shortstack, and in a push-or-fold situation. It's not uncommon to see an all-in every 2nd or 3rd hand. (not necessarily called, just someone pushing) As much as I'd love to be aggressive here, it's a lot more difficult than earlier in the tournament, say right before the bubble.

 

[feitr]

Aggressive is the way when you are REALLY deepstacked, but if the blinds are huge you do have to be careful. I would tend to focus on stealing the blinds when in position (since you can steal with min raise you get v good odds), but don't get involved in pots with marginal hands. Ppl are in shoving mode in later stages, and even if you are a large stack, if you get too attached to a hand then you might find yourself losing 3/4 of your stack.

In the later stages, essentially everybody is short stacked, since even the chip leader probably only has 25xBB.

So steal blinds whenever you can, but don't try to steal blinds from really shortstacks with marginal hands since they will shove and don't play anything out of position unless you have a hand with which you might as well shove.

I tend to play late stage MTTs by folding alot, picking up blinds whenever i think i can (or im willing to call a shove by a short stack), and then waiting for a big hand. You can't be playing too aggressive unless you are a huge stack or every man and his dog is going to shove vs you and even losing 2 BB is huge at that stage of an MTT. So pick your spots, and don't get attached to a pot without a very good hand. But picking up the blinds is priority #1 in late tournament stages so you absolutely cannot ignore that.

But robwhufc summed it up the best...simple fact is it doesn't matter how well you play it you have to get a little (or lot) lucky to make a FT with >1000 ppl.

 

[donkeykiller]

Great post and some even better reasons to do certain things
I beleive that both of the responders have good points
Diferrent situation dicate a different playing style
like philth was saying if a short stack pushed and i got 2:1 I would call
becuase you are getting odds to call and a possible emlimination of
another player which meanoved up I just moved up to better money
position.

Anyhow great post and even better responces.

 

[aliengenius]

Your M is lower than you think...

 

[shinedown.45]

A couple of quick points:

1) You sound like you are playing good tag poker, problem with the later stages, when only the better players remain is they recognise your game and will bully constantly. You have probably shown that you will lay down and big stacks will push you off hands.(This is what I think has been happening to me, I raise and get reraised when first to act and player/s raise before me almost all the time. So I should really be pushing back when this happens when holding K-10 or better?)

2) You also say yor regularly get to 'itm' with average chips, again this is no good. it sounds like your whole play is to survive and conserve chips instead of all out stack building. The vast majority of winnings available are on the ft and top 3 especially, so risks have to be taken earlier. Far better to play 6 mtts, crash out early in 5 and make ft on 6th. This will make you more than 6 just scraping into the money.

If you use fulltilt, look for a high buy in mtt and watch some of the pros early stages, you will be shocked as to pot sizes versus blinds. They are best at getting deep so take note.

Your M is lower than you think...

This is a little confusing for me so I'll just stick to Harrington's "M" and calculate it after every blind escalation.

 

[Brann6]

Wow! Ugh! Your stats are...wow, ugh! Just a quick glance tells me you're not taking enough chances as evidenced by the HUGE bulge in the stats where you go out in the middle. Yep, right about the end of the second hour or somewhere during the third hour. You're so tight you make TJ Cloutier look like a maniac.

Let me guess, you rarely bet in position unless the flop hit you. You raise PF with premium hands but don't often cbet. You get a free ride from the BB, hit a broadway card on the flop but have a weak kicker, so you don't bet and fold when someone else does.

If all the above is true, then you're my old self.

If I'm wrong, then disregard, lol

Brann

 

[flint]

Remember its better to put up a fight with a fair stack and almost any two than yo let your stack dwindle to a situation where you have to have to double up many times.

Also once you get into the money your game should get more aggressive, you should be taking more chances since most of the money is at the top. Remember that the bigger the blinds get, the better odds you get on your hands so you should be stealing quite a lot especially if others are very tight.