Do people play differently in freerolls compared to cash tournaments?

[braveboat]

I find free rolls to be almost completely luck driven. People are getting it in with up to 40% of their range early so every hand is basically a flip. I haven't had much luck with them, but I keep playing these damn things. I alternate between playing too tight to getting bored and pushing with a marginal hand. Oh well...

 

[spartacus]

The freeroll's player count and payout structure usually determines how I approach it.

If there are 15k players and only the top 100 get paid, I will go all-in with marginal hands. If I try to play those freerolls normally, I can usually make it pretty far (like top 25% or better), but as the tournament goes on, I always run into these Uber Donks that have 20x more chips than me. They're the ones that survived the all-in shove fests at the start. At that point, you have to win like 5-10 shoves in a row just to be on their level, which is very unlikely. So I usually just go all-in near the start and save myself some time. If I win the all-ins and get a decent chip stack, I will play normally. If I lose, I haven't wasted much time.

However, if the freeroll has a flat payout structure and like 3-5k players or less, I will try to play normally.

 

[bluejay2220]

Yes. People will call things in cash games that they would other wise fold in a tournament. Tournaments are more about duration, where as cash games are not.

 

[money677]

i play tight sometimes sometime i play lose in the beginning

 

[TeUnit]

in freerolls they tend to play looser, call more oop, limp more, and they tend to value ace rag higher

 

[noellepaige]

Yes, in freerolls people usully play careless... they go all in, and they pin just on luck. If you try to play a freeroll like a normal tournament, you have to have a lot of patiente.

 

[Jonathan Bradenton]

I think the worst tournament to play is the $0,02 buy-in, the blinds rise too fastly, so you have to go all-in to not get out of chips soon.

In the freerolls people might have two perspectives: play completely loose just for fun or play tight waiting for that good hand. Players call a lot of all ins, so it would be a smart way of playing waiting for that great hand to raise a lot in the pre-flop and do the c-bet/go all-in if the flop is not bad.

 

[PLAYFUL1]

Low stakes = low caliber players but u still find donks in the higher stake players:deal:

 

[lilnewtdog]

Make adjustments after adjustments.

 

[crazyangel88]

yes but why you have this question ? you dont find you place freerols tournaments or cash game ?

 

[Frank Burnette]

I've noticed that players are a lot more aggressive in free rolls, especially early in the game. You know, they don't have to put anything up, so they just go for broke and throw caution to the wind. I occasionally make calls in freerolls that I wouldn't make in tournaments. There's so many aggressive players early on, and I try to make it work in my favor. Sometimes it pays off, and if it does, then I've got a little room to really get into my game later in the freeroll.

 

[Adubzz]

YES! People will be going all in a lot more with trash in freerolls. Thats why its a good idea to push all in with medium pocket pairs.

 

[Poker Orifice]

Are you joking?

 

[cis77]

If you just start play playing poker, freerolls are good to learn the game. But the moment you start playing real money tournaments, the game changes. The higher the stakes, the better the players become. At this moment you start learning the game