Hi Everybody,
Would love to get your feedback about this situation.
In a mtt, you are fortunate to get the last 2/3 tables. More than half of the field are short stacked, however you have about 25 bb left.
Are you being very selective with your hands at this point?
I find you have to be careful at this stage because if you put a min raise or 3x raise with the blinds being 500/1000. Almost anybody who calls or 3 bets is shoving.
So, the question is; are you playing very tight so you can call the shove?

I would like to have an opinion from you on how to play an MTT at the beginning of a tournament and after half a tournament.

no i don't think i'm doing that but i focus a lot

Originally Posted by stil370

Hi Everybody,
Would love to get your feedback about this situation.
In a mtt, you are fortunate to get the last 2/3 tables. More than half of the field are short stacked, however you have about 25 bb left.
Are you being very selective with your hands at this point?
I find you have to be careful at this stage because if you put a min raise or 3x raise with the blinds being 500/1000. Almost anybody who calls or 3 bets is shoving.
So, the question is; are you playing very tight so you can call the shove?

With a stack of 25 BBs or less, you really don't have many options and you practically have to play a straight-forward basic strategy. Table dynamics does affect how you play as well but, in general:

• You should only be opening with hands, in any position, that you're comfortable calling of pre. So, if you have 55 MP1 and you plan on folding to a 3bet shove, don't open with 55. Assuming you do a standard open of 2.5x, folding to a 3 bet costs you 10% of your already short stack.
• A good opening range for 25 BBs is 99+, AQo+. You can be comfortable calling a jam with this range unless villain only 3bets KK+. You can open up the range as your BBs decrease and you can't always wait for 99+. With 25 BBs, you still have some time to manuever but not so much with 20 BBs or 15, so you need to open up your range.
• In late position, if it's folded to you, you can open up your stealing range against tighter players as they're going to fold most hands. Be careful about opening too light, though as shorter/equal stacks can start 3bet shoving light.
• 25 BBs is a great re-steal shove stack in the blinds facing a button open. This is especially effective against a button that has a wide steal range but a tight call range against a shove. But even if against a tight call range, we could still have some good preflop equity to win.
• For example, say button is opening with the 35% of hands when it's folded to them, but they're only calling top 10% of their open range against a 3bet shove. That means they're folding 29% of their opening range and your shove has a 71% of winning the pot uncontested.
• Say 10% of their open/call range is 77+, AJo+, A9s+ and you resteal shove with K10s, you still have ~35% equity to win. If you have 66, you have ~40% equity to win. Even if you want to get fancy and resteal shove with 27o, you have ~24% preflop. It's not a great jam but you still win 1/4 times if you get caught.

Originally Posted by stil370

Hi Everybody,
Would love to get your feedback about this situation.
In a mtt, you are fortunate to get the last 2/3 tables. More than half of the field are short stacked, however you have about 25 bb left.
Are you being very selective with your hands at this point?
I find you have to be careful at this stage because if you put a min raise or 3x raise with the blinds being 500/1000. Almost anybody who calls or 3 bets is shoving.
So, the question is; are you playing very tight so you can call the shove?

Yes & No. Yes - we are always looking ahead at all stacks left to act, knowing who we'll be priced in vs. to call it off against. And we look at which players these are. In some cases we can raise/fold vs. short stacks.
Always be looking to apply ICM pressure.

you have to be focused and play the best hands, it will depend on your stack at that moment of the tournament, but when you have to push you must go without fear.

Read between the lines in what Poker Orifice wrote. Good advice and he kept it simple.

If I think that in this situation you have to choose your hands and the points you play very well, at that stage of the tournament they are more wrong and where you can get a great result if you get those mistakes, regards

I'm typically really selective at this point... field is still pretty wide and I assume you're not ITM yet. If you are ITM, I'd loosen up a little bit and start to widen my range if I'm playing in position. I'll bully blinds if I can depending on how they previously played. It really depends upon the table dynamics but mostly I'm playing conservatively because there's still a lot of time before the final table. I'll let the other people knock each other out and try to grind my chip balance higher over time. Hope this helps!

Depends a lot of the field also. If they are passive players or aggresive. If they are passive I usually rise a wider range of hands and if they are loose i tighten my range . With 25 big blinds you usually raise and fold or raise and push all-in.
Also you want to be careful from whom you want to steal blinds, pay attention at the effective stack not only at your own stack. For exemple if you have 25 BBs in button and the small bling and the big bland have both under 10 BBs then is better for you to usually push al-in instead of rasing for stealing blinds.

I agree with you. Players with a small number of blinds are waiting for the best cards. You must be prepared for their response. To do this, you need to carefully monitor the number of chips at everyone's table.

Originally Posted by Fernet

If I think that in this situation you have to choose your hands and the points you play very well, at that stage of the tournament they are more wrong and where you can get a great result if you get those mistakes, regards

I get it Fernet, these situations can have many different answers depending on who you are playing against and their tendencies.

Originally Posted by Poker Orifice

Yes & No. Yes - we are always looking ahead at all stacks left to act, knowing who we'll be priced in vs. to call it off against. And we look at which players these are. In some cases we can raise/fold vs. short stacks.
Always be looking to apply ICM pressure.

Always appreciate your replies PO. The replies open up my mind to thinking about all the variables involved. I been searching for an EASY ICM model that I can use w/o thinking a whole lot or memorizing the whole damn thing.. Thanks again.

Originally Posted by ohshootmybad

With a stack of 25 BBs or less, you really don't have many options and you practically have to play a straight-forward basic strategy. Table dynamics does affect how you play as well but, in general:

• You should only be opening with hands, in any position, that you're comfortable calling of pre. So, if you have 55 MP1 and you plan on folding to a 3bet shove, don't open with 55. Assuming you do a standard open of 2.5x, folding to a 3 bet costs you 10% of your already short stack.
• A good opening range for 25 BBs is 99+, AQo+. You can be comfortable calling a jam with this range unless villain only 3bets KK+. You can open up the range as your BBs decrease and you can't always wait for 99+. With 25 BBs, you still have some time to manuever but not so much with 20 BBs or 15, so you need to open up your range.
• In late position, if it's folded to you, you can open up your stealing range against tighter players as they're going to fold most hands. Be careful about opening too light, though as shorter/equal stacks can start 3bet shoving light.
• 25 BBs is a great re-steal shove stack in the blinds facing a button open. This is especially effective against a button that has a wide steal range but a tight call range against a shove. But even if against a tight call range, we could still have some good preflop equity to win.
• For example, say button is opening with the 35% of hands when it's folded to them, but they're only calling top 10% of their open range against a 3bet shove. That means they're folding 29% of their opening range and your shove has a 71% of winning the pot uncontested.
• Say 10% of their open/call range is 77+, AJo+, A9s+ and you resteal shove with K10s, you still have ~35% equity to win. If you have 66, you have ~40% equity to win. Even if you want to get fancy and resteal shove with 27o, you have ~24% preflop. It's not a great jam but you still win 1/4 times if you get caught.

Dear ohshootmybad,

Thank you for giving a semester's worth of education with your answer. It was only The second time that I read it did I fully grasp what you were saying. Its one of those answers I should copy and paste and then print out so it is in front of my PC when I am in a tournament. Many thanks.

Thanks everybody for taking the time to respond. It is quite evident that poker is very situational. In this case the answers you have provided are all along the same lines. My game has improved greatly since getting involved in this forum!

I think that this is the only correct way out in this situation. Here you can’t play on the middle map for sure. This can result in the loss of half or the entire stack.

Yesterday I play two freerolls.
The first tournament 750 players 7 player were awarded and I finished in 8th place.
The second tournament 650 players
8 player were awarded and I finished in 10th place
I only played good cards but I have not enough lucky.

Originally Posted by sarvari_ati

Yesterday I play two freerolls.
The first tournament 750 players 7 player were awarded and I finished in 8th place.
The second tournament 650 players
8 player were awarded and I finished in 10th place
I only played good cards but I have not enough lucky.

Congratulations nonetheless sarvari.

a raise or 3bet game is not possible. Only all in in the side of the weak opponents or hand (KK-AA-AK).

A chance to go in from the big or small blind to find the best hand and take the pot. What other tactics are possible? I don't think ...

Good luck guys Tournaments are long and difficult