Last night was another tough game at $2/$4. After three hours, I only booked a win of about $7. Better than losing, I suppose. It was one of those nights where I started out losing a few big hands right away, then spent the rest of the night playing catch up. What was slowing down my progress was that I kept splitting big pots with other players. Four times there were four to five people in these huge pots with over $100 in them. I'd get a strait for the win, but then would have to split the pot with another guy who had the exact same strait. I also got involved in a huge pot when I had AA. I had to split that one with a guy who had the other two aces. Pretty damn irritating, but at least my bad luck took the form of splitting pots instead of losing them. I was on tilt for a little while, when I was down $100 and the split pots were preventing me from catching back up. But I managed to calm down, be patient, and the money eventually came back. Luckily, I ended $7 ahead right when I reached my raked hands goal for the night. So it all worked out in the end.
One of my friends may be joining me for the tournament at Casino San Pablo next month. It'll be his first real tournament, so I was thinking of a few beginner tips that might help him out. Playing no-limit tournaments can be difficult and if you make too many newbie mistakes, the other players will just pounce on you. So I'll cover a few of the basics, mostly relating to bet sizes.
Pre-Flop
In a tournament, you really should be either raising or folding. Just calling is a poor strategy. How much should you raise? A good standard is three to five times the big blind. The only time you should limp in is if you have a marginal hand, like Ax suited, suited connectors, or a small pocket pair. If you limp in with a hand like that, and then someone else makes a big raise, throw the hand away. They're only profitable if you can get in cheap. This is why you should stick to only great hands in early position, because you don't know if someone is going to raise you. But in late position, you can see if someone raised or not and can sneak in with some marginal hands if no one raised. Plus, most of the other players will act before you on the flop, which makes your later decisions much easier.
Everything else you play should be raised. Your default should be to raise three times the big blind when you have a good hand, and five times the big blind when you have a monster hand. But you don't want the raises to define your hand, so you've got to mix it up a bit.
If someone else already raised, you need a much better hand than normal to play. By default, you should just throw most hands away when someone else raises. If you happen to have a monster, you could just call the raise and see what happens on the flop. But if you have a monster hand that you feel you should re-raise with, you should re-raise about three times their raise. So if they raised it to $100, you'd re-raise it to $300. You want the pots large when you have a strong advantage.
Near the end of the tournament, the blinds will be so large compared to your stack, that you really can't afford to fold on the flop (unless you have a huge stack at that point). In those cases, you really want to have a hand that can win if the board doesn't help anybody... like a pocket pair or any ace. You really want to play those hands heads-up, that is with only one other player, so it's usually best to just push all-in. Usually you'll only get one caller, will get to see all five cards without folding, and have a decent chance of winning if no one is helped by the board (which happens most of the time). Sometimes everyone will fold and you'll just get the blinds, which is still a good thing.
Also, when the blinds are really large, you're in late position, and no one else has entered the pot, you should try to steal the blinds. Make a smallish raise with just about any hand (usually you want at least one high card in case you get called). A majority of the time, the blinds will fold and you'll get a nice little pot. You want to try to do that at least once a round, to pay for the times that someone will steal your blinds.
Post-Flop
Ok, so you're playing now and the flop has come up. You either got a piece of it or you plan to bluff at it. How much should you bet? A good standard is about half the size of the pot. This is usually the minimum amount you can bet while still giving drawing hands the wrong odds to continue. It's a good size to bluff with, since you can get away from it if someone re-raises you. And if you do have a hand, it'll build the pot up without laying your opponents the right odds. You can also bet 75% to 100% of the pot size, if you have an excellent hand and you're pretty sure you're going to get called. But usually that's so large, you'll just chase everyone out.
What if someone else already raised? Well, do you have a hand to continue? If you only have a drawing hand, you probably want to throw it away unless the bet was tiny. If you have a made hand, you have to decide if it's better than the guy who bet. Again, you should be either raising or folding. If you don't think you have a better hand, fold it. If you think you do have a better hand, raise it three times his bet.
Bluffing
You have to be very careful about bluffing. It's an essential skill to have, since it lets you win more than your share. But it can be costly if someone does actually have a hand. A few mis-timed bluffs can kill your chip stack. Make sure to only do a complete bluff if you're convinced no one else has a hand. If you don't like doing complete bluffs, then the semi-bluff will become your new best friend. A semi-bluff is when you bluff with a drawing hand. Say you have two spades and there are two spades on the board. You're pretty sure that you only need one spade to win. This is a great time to semi-bluff. You make a bet, representing a made hand. This gives you multiple ways to win: 1.) You can win when everyone folds to you. 2.) You can win if someone calls and you end up getting the card you needed. It's also great for deception if you make your hand, since most people won't put you on a flush draw if you were betting before the flush came up.
This in no way covers everything you need to know, but should give you an idea of how large your bets should be. When playing no-limit, most newbies just don't know what size their bets or raises should be. This should help give you an idea of where to start.