salim271
Legend
Silver Level
A lot of advocating goes on for always raising. I usually support this in almost all situations except for one.
Early in tournaments such as the Daily Dollar you're big stacked with low blinds. With this stack you can play it very safe and only raise with JJ+, AJs+.
This will usually work out well, there is a high probability that you will get a good hand like KK and double up against someone who 3bet and called your shove down with AT. The blinds rise slow enough that this double up will be significant as the blinds do not eat at your stack that much when you start with 3000 chips and 10/20 blinds.
Like I said, this works. There are a few problems:
1. You lose to AT about 30 percent of the time when you have KK.
2. You only get KK once, and everyone folds to you. Similar things happen when you raise with AJ+.
3. After you double up you continue to play tight waiting for big hands as you are not near enough to the blinds to open up with other hands. Your stack dwindles as the blinds rise and antes show up. You're out near the bubble because you simply could not find a good hand or spot to play.
Does that mean this way is wrong? No, its just that probability rules that you arent always going to pick up legitimately big preflop hands. AA only comes around about once every 5 hours.
Here's another way I like to play the daily dollar. Most of the people you're gonna play are donkeys. You're going to see a lot of limping, and a lot of all ins preflop with Ax and postflop with top pair any kicker. They will ignore tight play, but they will also ignore tricky play.
From middle position on I like to limp with Ax suited and any pocket pair. I hit trips I try and create as much action as possible, I hit a flush draw I try and get to it as cheaply as possible. No one is usually shoving the flop even with a flush draw on board so even with some raising I can get to the turn pretty cheaply. If I dont hit there, I dont like to move on to the river unless no one is shoving or betting too big too call on just a draw.
This strategy can get you a lot more chips, but it has its problems:
1. You spew too much and call too many raises with draws, chipstack diminishes too fast.
2. You limp/call with Ax, hit an ace and lose too many chips to a better ace.
3. You try and do this when the blinds are too high relative to your chipstack.
I've suffered from all three problems, but if you plug these holes up and with a little luck you can easily become a chip leader early on and breeze past the bubble. Once ITM you have to focus on getting deep... this strategy can work, but only if you have the stack to support all of the limping.
Edit: Strangely enough I just noticed this was my 1100 post... haha kind of weird that I didn't see that but w/e.
Early in tournaments such as the Daily Dollar you're big stacked with low blinds. With this stack you can play it very safe and only raise with JJ+, AJs+.
This will usually work out well, there is a high probability that you will get a good hand like KK and double up against someone who 3bet and called your shove down with AT. The blinds rise slow enough that this double up will be significant as the blinds do not eat at your stack that much when you start with 3000 chips and 10/20 blinds.
Like I said, this works. There are a few problems:
1. You lose to AT about 30 percent of the time when you have KK.
2. You only get KK once, and everyone folds to you. Similar things happen when you raise with AJ+.
3. After you double up you continue to play tight waiting for big hands as you are not near enough to the blinds to open up with other hands. Your stack dwindles as the blinds rise and antes show up. You're out near the bubble because you simply could not find a good hand or spot to play.
Does that mean this way is wrong? No, its just that probability rules that you arent always going to pick up legitimately big preflop hands. AA only comes around about once every 5 hours.
Here's another way I like to play the daily dollar. Most of the people you're gonna play are donkeys. You're going to see a lot of limping, and a lot of all ins preflop with Ax and postflop with top pair any kicker. They will ignore tight play, but they will also ignore tricky play.
From middle position on I like to limp with Ax suited and any pocket pair. I hit trips I try and create as much action as possible, I hit a flush draw I try and get to it as cheaply as possible. No one is usually shoving the flop even with a flush draw on board so even with some raising I can get to the turn pretty cheaply. If I dont hit there, I dont like to move on to the river unless no one is shoving or betting too big too call on just a draw.
This strategy can get you a lot more chips, but it has its problems:
1. You spew too much and call too many raises with draws, chipstack diminishes too fast.
2. You limp/call with Ax, hit an ace and lose too many chips to a better ace.
3. You try and do this when the blinds are too high relative to your chipstack.
I've suffered from all three problems, but if you plug these holes up and with a little luck you can easily become a chip leader early on and breeze past the bubble. Once ITM you have to focus on getting deep... this strategy can work, but only if you have the stack to support all of the limping.
Edit: Strangely enough I just noticed this was my 1100 post... haha kind of weird that I didn't see that but w/e.
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