How will you make 10$ grow?

[Poker Orifice]

Is small ball effective in cash games? or live home games?Just really wanna know.. were playing today at my neighbors house .. 10$ buy in for 50 chips lol 1/2 blinds

So you've got 25bb's each in your stacks? (there's actually a guy I know, who plays on Fulltilt, has a home game & also has it something similiar to this... I've never gone & played).. I asked him some questions .. ie. they were playing $20 buyin 50c/$1 (similiar.. only 20bb's). I asked him why he wouldn't make it 10c/25c (or 5c/10c) if you're only able to buyin for $20 at a time (and get this.. you can't rebuy until your stack hits zero.... & this is a cash game??? wtf?).
Small Ball is for deepstack Tournament play. Don't get it confused with shortstack play cuz it's entirely different.
If you're playing in a homegame that has 25bb stacks.. you should basically be looking at reraising allin preflop... open with hands you're willing to 4bet shove over villain's 3bet. Stacks aren't deep enough to play poker with.
ie. say a player opens in MP to 3x... you raise on BTN to 10x (~3.5x his raise).. you have only 15bb's left in your stack, that's not even a pot-sized shove on the flop... in other words you're obv. never folding (even if he flats and you wiff the flop).
OR.. another examp. -> you raise to 3x in MP... BTN calls.. BB calls. Now there's 10bb's in the pot. Let's say you cbet 6or 7bb's.. you'll have like 15bb left in stack which (if ur called) won't even be a pot-sized bet on the turn.
Get it... you can't really play poker with stacks this deep.
Tell ur buddies that if they're buying in for $10.. make it $0.05/0.10 so you'll be at least 100bb's deep (so you can actually play poker). OR.. if they want to buyin for $25, make it $0.10/0.25 blinds.

sum it up.. if you do choose to play this game.. you're looking at playing a strategy that is about as much the opposite of small ball that you can possibly get... 3bet shove, raise -> shove flop, etc.

 

[NoWuckingFurries]

You can't play small ball with the micro tournaments. Most online tournaments don't start with a big enough stack in relation to the blinds.

I think that PS do 25c tournies with 90 players that are double stack, and FT do $1 + $0.10 tournies with 90 players that are double stack.

 

[TPC]

even with the double stack, after round 3 you have less than 100bb's, still not a big enough stack to play small ball. You need a deep stack to play small ball.

 

[NoWuckingFurries]

even with the double stack, after round 3 you have less than 100bb's, still not a big enough stack to play small ball. You need a deep stack to play small ball.

That's interesting, I wasn't aware of that. So I went to do some reading up on small ball strategy, but the only article I have found so far that mentions effective stack size for small ball says this:

Playing a short stack

Unfortunately the small-ball strategy of liberal raising goes out the window when your chips dwindle. For small-ball to be effective your preflop raises need to represent a very small portion of your chipstack. If a small-ball raise would account for 15% of your chips you should consider limping instead.

http://www.pokerplayer.co.uk/how-to.../daniel_negreanus_small_ball_masterclass.html

Can't believe that they appear to be encouraging people to limp!

 

[NoWuckingFurries]

One type of tournament that I have found quite useful for a low BR is the $0.50 + $0.05 satellites to the BLT that run at 8 minutes past every hour at Full Tilt. Very soft, and once you win your ticket to the BLT you can unregister for $2.20.

You only need to win a ticket once in every four tournaments to break even. I am using these for my Iron Man One-a-Day.

What I have found works well in these is to build my chip stack up to about 6,000 then just sit out. Because the top 20 (or more) win tickets there is no advantage to building a really big chip stack.

 

[Poker Orifice]

That's interesting, I wasn't aware of that. So I went to do some reading up on small ball strategy, but the only article I have found so far that mentions effective stack size for small ball says this:http://www.pokerplayer.co.uk/how-to.../daniel_negreanus_small_ball_masterclass.html

Can't believe that they appear to be encouraging people to limp!

Why not? They're talking about hands they'd like to be playing but if they raise & get 3bet they're not deep enough to be getting imp. odds to play the hand... therefore > 'limp'.

In Negreanu's most recent book "Power Holdem Strategy" (not that 'recent' now), he has a lengthy session devoted to discussing 'small ball'. It's an excellent part of the book (unfortunately the rest of the book is somewhat lacking imo.. but obv depends upon what the reader is looking for in a poker book). His section (the 'small ball' section) is 191 pages in length & has quite a few HandHistory examples in it.

 

[NoWuckingFurries]

Why not?

Because so much poker advice seems to try to drum in the message "never open limp".

 

[TPC]

You shouldn't open limp, unless you are playing small ball.

There isn't many spots to play small ball online, just due to stack sizes. The structure of most online tourneys just wont allow it.

 

[MrSpades12]

These are all good tips i just started playing online havent made a deposit yet tring out the freerolls any advice.

 

[FORZA MIKE]

imo i dont think you can make 10 grow into alot ....ya i think you can make maybe 50 or 60 but realisticly i think you need to deposit atleast 100 to 200 to get into bigger cash games or bigger tournaments to make some descent money.....i dunno just my opinion

 

[LuckyChippy]

26 black imo.

 

[jazzaxe]

Play one table SNG for 10%. If you don't cash in ten tries stick to the freerolls until you improve.

 

[aprig]

SnG's or micro stakes,the thing at micro stakes is people rarely bluff and you learn good poker at a low expense of your bankroll.

 

[Poker Orifice]

imo i dont think you can make 10 grow into alot ....ya i think you can make maybe 50 or 60 but realisticly i think you need to deposit atleast 100 to 200 to get into bigger cash games or bigger tournaments to make some descent money.....i dunno just my opinion

I think you can (although obviously it'd be a grind). I know alot of players new to online poker take it upon themselves to attempt a 'zero - to - hero' thing (& know of many who have been able to do this.... I'm sure there's quite a few here on this site).

When I first started out online I deposited to a couple of sites immediately but then would also spend some times in some priv. league stuff, including their freerolls (some days I'd play micro stuff... other days I'd get into 'freeroll mania' < not the reg. ones on the poker sites but the 'priv.' ones).
There'd usually be a bunch of them going on & it was something to do pass time but with the challenge in the back of the mind >> win a few pennies & see what you can do with it.
A few small freeroll cashes & a couple of moderate wins as well (ie. two digits as opposed to single digit or just pennies,... but mostly pennies) & within just a few short months I had 3 separate accounts built up to be rolled ok for 25nl.
In other words... it can be done and many have & are doing it. Would I go that route again today... umm.. no, but it was probably a good thing that I did as I've never had a problem with bankroll management. (pennies seem more valuable when you've initiallyl taken hours to earn them, lol)

 

[NoWuckingFurries]

SnG's or micro stakes,the thing at micro stakes is people rarely bluff

Really? That's certainly not my experience.

and you learn good poker at a low expense of your bankroll.

Actually I would argue that you are not learning good poker at microstakes, you are learning what a donkfest looks like.