Poker Strategies for the Dummies You Encounter in Freerolls
So you are confident in your knowledge and skills as a poker player. Still, you have to suck on the fact that youre getting robbed by bad beats. A loose definition is in order: bad beat is a subjective term describing a poker hand that appears to be strong but loses nevertheless to a stronger hand. The definition itself makes it inescapably clear that you cant avoid a bad beat now and then. But it does get worrisome when you start getting one once too often.
People are quick to blame luck, but that has little to do with it. More often, its just that youre playing, regularly, with the wrong kind of players. These are players who just dont know what theyre doing. Thats specially the case with freeroll tourneys. With nothing to lose, these players throw caution and strategy to the wind and just risk it all. Normally wed advise to stay away from those, but if you do want to play with them anyway, we have something for you.
So lets talk about a poker strategy to overcome these players. Ive noted that the freeroll luck fest usually takes place early on in the game. After a while, it dies down and people actually start playing poker. It means that very early in the tournament, some players will have a huge stack while the majority will still be near their starting chip counts. Its certainly a disadvantage for some. But think of it as a challenge to overcome, as part of the tournament. Super aggressive players with big stacks bluff a lot. If you are patient, you can use their tactics against them and double up when you have good cards. Patience is key. Be tight early on, especially in the initial few hands (when sometimes half the table goes all in).
Next, pick the hands youll play carefully because youll want to push people out of the hand pre-flop. That means youll need to be very aggressive in your bets, but at least you have a tight player image backing you. Dont bluff just yet unless that is your only hope of success. If you get caught bluffing early on after having been patient and building a table image, that image will lose its value quickly. As the tournament progresses, the good players generally stick around after having eliminated the not so good players who were causing you headaches. Now, take the time to examine the mood of your and start changing your play style to be a little more aggressive. You survived the initial luck fest, but you have a long way to go. Put pressure on small stacks and get those chips!
Ultimately, theres no hard and fast way to get away from those bad beats. Youll have to observe and improvise. Youll need to back away from some hands by playing tight, and when you do pick a hand you want to play in, youll need to come out aggressive in an effort to bully out as many players as possible. When faced with all-in situations, you should always try and be all-in against a single opponent unless you have an unbeatable hand, which is generally not the case. This wont avoid all bad beats, but it will surely reduce their frequency. You can also look into using a poker HUD or other very helpful poker tools [http://www.pokersirens.com/]. Happy playing!
People are quick to blame luck, but that has little to do with it. More often, its just that youre playing, regularly, with the wrong kind of players. These are players who just dont know what theyre doing. Thats specially the case with freeroll tourneys. With nothing to lose, these players throw caution and strategy to the wind and just risk it all. Normally wed advise to stay away from those, but if you do want to play with them anyway, we have something for you.
So lets talk about a poker strategy to overcome these players. Ive noted that the freeroll luck fest usually takes place early on in the game. After a while, it dies down and people actually start playing poker. It means that very early in the tournament, some players will have a huge stack while the majority will still be near their starting chip counts. Its certainly a disadvantage for some. But think of it as a challenge to overcome, as part of the tournament. Super aggressive players with big stacks bluff a lot. If you are patient, you can use their tactics against them and double up when you have good cards. Patience is key. Be tight early on, especially in the initial few hands (when sometimes half the table goes all in).
Next, pick the hands youll play carefully because youll want to push people out of the hand pre-flop. That means youll need to be very aggressive in your bets, but at least you have a tight player image backing you. Dont bluff just yet unless that is your only hope of success. If you get caught bluffing early on after having been patient and building a table image, that image will lose its value quickly. As the tournament progresses, the good players generally stick around after having eliminated the not so good players who were causing you headaches. Now, take the time to examine the mood of your and start changing your play style to be a little more aggressive. You survived the initial luck fest, but you have a long way to go. Put pressure on small stacks and get those chips!
Ultimately, theres no hard and fast way to get away from those bad beats. Youll have to observe and improvise. Youll need to back away from some hands by playing tight, and when you do pick a hand you want to play in, youll need to come out aggressive in an effort to bully out as many players as possible. When faced with all-in situations, you should always try and be all-in against a single opponent unless you have an unbeatable hand, which is generally not the case. This wont avoid all bad beats, but it will surely reduce their frequency. You can also look into using a poker HUD or other very helpful poker tools [http://www.pokersirens.com/]. Happy playing!