Any Winning Double or Nothing Players with Strategy Advice?

[plutogon]

Hi Guys,

I'm in the bankroll building phase and have been trying double or nothing tournaments on carbon. I know some of you guys might be more experience or actually good at them....Right now I can't win enough to overcome the fee paid. Does anyone have any solid advice and pointers.

This may take long to write, so if maybe you could split it into multiple posts. It may take some time, so you might as well get as much points as you can for the benefit you will provide for me and players like me looking to learn more about double or nothing strategies that seem to be working for a winning player.

[Donkeyfish07]

I can't say I'm a reg at those but Play very tight and don't try to steal pots at all unless you have a good read on your opponent or the blinds get high. ABC poker all the way.

[matg281]

well i'm not very good at long essays but i would recommend playing a more math based game and brush up on ICM. i have a 4 part sit n go blueprint in market if you're interested, its really in depth and tells you most of the things you need to know about sit n gos. but once you get the math right and start winning more than losing then you should start adding more tables, maybe add one each session till you reach the amount you can handle without compromising play. mainly though you should just play tight and not get involved in too many marginal spots and try and maintain fold equity. chips lost are a lot more valuable than chips gained in sit n gos.

[IWASLION]

Personally I do very well in double-ups. I fold fold fold until its 7 handed or so, there are alot of players that will not respect raises in the earlier levels. Really your looking to avoid ANY showdowns. Its is not important to have chips, playing for 1st is irrelevant. By the time 3 players are eliminated blinds are high enough that the 6 other players will be more likely to respect your raises, because the looser more reckless players will either be busted or on a big stack. Its of vital importance to raise in unopened pots from late position to try and take 1 round of blinds per 5-6 hands. My ultimate goal is to die slowly of attrition, I really don't care if my stack ever goes over starting size. What I want to avoid is coinflips, or even getting it all in with AA vs. 99, why take a 20% chance of busting when you do not need a double-up to win. Limit pot sizes.

[plutogon]

well i'm not very good at long essays but i would recommend playing a more math based game and brush up on ICM. i have a 4 part sit n go blueprint in market if you're interested, its really in depth and tells you most of the things you need to know about sit n gos. but once you get the math right and start winning more than losing then you should start adding more tables, maybe add one each session till you reach the amount you can handle without compromising play. mainly though you should just play tight and not get involved in too many marginal spots and try and maintain fold equity. chips lost are a lot more valuable than chips gained in sit n gos.

Hey Matg281, I will definitely buy your blueprint once I rack up a comfortable amount of points. Props on providing it so cheap

I like your advice on not multitabling too fast...I feel like sometimes I end up making decisions I shouldnt make but do anyways because my concentration is split in too many directions. I'll work my way up.

[plutogon]

Personally I do very well in double-ups. I fold fold fold until its 7 handed or so, there are alot of players that will not respect raises in the earlier levels. Really your looking to avoid ANY showdowns. Its is not important to have chips, playing for 1st is irrelevant. By the time 3 players are eliminated blinds are high enough that the 6 other players will be more likely to respect your raises, because the looser more reckless players will either be busted or on a big stack. Its of vital importance to raise in unopened pots from late position to try and take 1 round of blinds per 5-6 hands. My ultimate goal is to die slowly of attrition, I really don't care if my stack ever goes over starting size. What I want to avoid is coinflips, or even getting it all in with AA vs. 99, why take a 20% chance of busting when you do not need a double-up to win. Limit pot sizes.

I think you hit the nail on the head. I find myself in a comfortable position but then I feel obligated to call people's all in's with my queens, Kings, aces, Ace kings...and a good percent of the time my stack gets crippled on the coin flip.

Ill play more tight and avoid these coinflips late in the game.

[jasonv12]

Something to think about is ICM. Lion covered this pretty well.

Here's a hypothetic I want you to think about: You are 6-handed and everyone has an equal stack size with fairly small blinds still. You are dealt KK. The small blind shoves your big blind. Should you call?

The answer surprisingly is no. While stack sizes and blinds may dictate otherwise in cases where blinds are bigger, think about ICM. For an example, in a $10 double or nothing, there is $100 in the prize pool. This means with equal stacks 6-handed, each of your tournament lives is worth $16.33 ($100 in pool / 6 people). By calling will KK you are risking $16.33 to win $3.67. KK doesn't have those odds against a random hand even.

Really dig down and think about is calling an all in worth it? You'll be surprised how often it isn't. If you acquire a big stack, best to just fold your way to the money. Chip accumulating past the amount needed to cash is pointless.

Just steal blinds to keep yourself afloat and avoid anything that requires cards to roll off, unless you absolutely have to.



Another tip, target those who are playing hands early. They are fish and don't understand the game dynamics. Don't try to steal their blinds. They will call way too lightly. By the same token, feel free to steal blinds from regs or players who are playing tighter like they should.

And lastly, don't enter tournaments with more than 5-6 regs because the money in these is purely based on fish eliminating each other without understanding the game. Same thing goes with entering higher stakes games, like $20+, avoid it. The regs there will mix up play and play looser to take advantage of regs moving up stakes and the game dynamics change altogether.

[Donkeyfish07]

Ya I agree..it's def harder to win if you get a table full of regs

[plutogon]

Very Solid Advice!

This might not be knew info to SnG veterans, but...I was analyzing my history of double or nothing SnG's while I was calculating win rates and etc, and I found I tend to lose ones that had 4+ same people in them every time.

Essentially, that means that I am not as good as the reg's at these SNG's and I should be more selective in choosing which ones to play.

For other people looking to improve their SnG's win percentage, I suggest they analyze the composition of players within the SNG's they win and the ones the lose and see if there is any correlation.

I only have a small sample size, but I believe for me it is valuable info, nonetheless. It may not be useful to everyone, but check it out guys.

[gundacker]

Most of the double or nothing tournaments I've played in involve me being the only one to play while everyone else blinds out.