Tournament Play

[FerrisB]

Hey All,

When playing in a tournament do you change the way you play? I'm thinking not only do I need to beat the dealer, now I also need to win more $$$ than all others at the table.

Im interested in hearing about your experiences.

[Norm]

Tourny's are COMPLETELY different. Get Ken Smith's ebook.

[BigJer]

I have a question on tourneys. Should one utilize counting or just stick with B.S.?

[Zach Black]

I have a question on tourneys. Should one utilize counting or just stick with B.S.?

Neither. Tournament play has nothing to do with the cash game in the Casino. You need to have more chips than the other players to win. As Norm said get Ken Smith's book and or Stanford Wong's.

[BigJer]

Neither. Tournament play has nothing to do with the cash game in the Casino. You need to have more chips than the other players to win. As Norm said get Ken Smith's book and or Stanford Wong's.

Thanks.

[Three]

I have a question on tourneys. Should one utilize counting or just stick with B.S.?

You are not playing against the house but rather the other players. Your betting strategy is to play for swings to catch up by sizing bets differently than who you are trying to catch or bet similarly those trying to catch you to take advantage of covariance. You will be routing for the dealer to hit to 21 when you are betting small and the guy you are trying to catch has a big bet out. You may find yourself playing hands terribly different than basic strategy to open the door to catch those ahead of you near the end of the tournament.

I was on the last hand in a tournament and needed a swing of me winning and the others losing. Everyone stood on their stiffs versus a dealer 6. I hit my hard 16 because the only way I was getting to the next round was to win when the others lost. Basically I lost if the dealer busted and I needed to beat a dealer made hand. I caught a 3 for 19 and the dealer flipped an ace for 17. I thought I was moving on to the finals for a second as I am from an area that has no H17 games but the dealer announced they hit soft 16 and a few cards later busted his hand. I won the hand but lost the tournament since the two guys I needed to beat also won their bets. At the crucial points near the end of the tournament you will be doing all sorts of crazy stuff.

To move on from the previous round I doubled my hard 16 for less to get all my chips bet. The remainder were worthless if I lost the hand. I was only taking one card so the only move was to double my 16 to get it all on the table. I caught a 4 for 20 and doubled my chip count to move to the semifinals. I think you should see why counting is not as useful as it is when you play against the dealer.

[BigJer]

You are not playing against the house but rather the other players. Your betting strategy is to play for swings to catch up by sizing bets differently than who you are trying to catch or bet similarly those trying to catch you to take advantage of covariance. You will be routing for the dealer to hit to 21 when you are betting small and the guy you are trying to catch has a big bet out. You may find yourself playing hands terribly different than basic strategy to open the door to catch those ahead of you near the end of the tournament.

I was on the last hand in a tournament and needed a swing of me winning and the others losing. Everyone stood on their stiffs versus a dealer 6. I hit my hard 16 because the only way I was getting to the next round was to win when the others lost. Basically I lost if the dealer busted and I needed to beat a dealer made hand. I caught a 3 for 19 and the dealer flipped an ace for 17. I thought I was moving on to the finals for a second as I am from an area that has no H17 games but the dealer announced they hit soft 16 and a few cards later busted his hand. I won the hand but lost the tournament since the two guys I needed to beat also won their bets. At the crucial points near the end of the tournament you will be doing all sorts of crazy stuff.

To move on from the previous round I doubled my hard 16 for less to get all my chips bet. The remainder were worthless if I lost the hand. I was only taking one card so the only move was to double my 16 to get it all on the table. I caught a 4 for 20 and doubled my chip count to move to the semifinals. I think you should see why counting is not as useful as it is when you play against the dealer.

I get all that. BTW I won my first tourney a few months back.

[Gronbog]

There have been a couple of threads about tournament play here recently. A search should find them. One of them dealt with the (in?)effectiveness of counting.