In my last blog, I told you all about the ups and downs I have experienced playing online high stakes heads-up competitions. As promised, in this blog, I am going to give you some details of my exerience playing short-handed one-table competitions aka Sit 'n' Go's ('SNGs').
Short handed poker and creative play
In basic terms, the more players there are on a poker table, the more likely it is that at least one will have a strong hand. By implication, as the numbers reduce, the more the quality of the starting hands reduce. Thus, playing on a full table, it can be costly to play creatively as the odds are more likely that you will run into a big hand. Whereas with a short-handed table, weaker average starting hands encourage and often reward creative play. Thus, as a naturally creative player, I have always preferred playing short handed poker against 4-5 opponents.
Where to play
Several of the top featured sites on Poker Verdict offer short-handed tournaments. UltimateBet spread six-handed SNGs with a buy-in ranging from $1 to $500. Paradise Poker spread a very similar range of games except their SNGs are five-handed. This is also true on Pacific Poker who spread an excellent range of five-handed SNGs with buy-ins going up to $750. Like UltimateBet, PokerStars and PartyPoker both offer six-handed MTTs with a great volume of players but they are for lower stakes players with maximum buy-ins of $112 and $100 respectively.
Betfair Poker offers the highest limit short-handed MTTs with a £500 six-handed option. It also offers the most 'aggressive' prize structure with the winner taking 75% and just 25% for second. The chance to play at the highest stakes and the biggest reward for outright victory have made it my recent site of choice when playing short-handed MTTs.
A success story
Playing as 8dg8 over the last 12 months I have successfully shown a gross profit of over £17,500. This equates to a net profit after fees of over £12,000. In that time I have played 275 games. Based on an average of 1.5 tables concurrently and an average game time of 30 mins, this equates to 90 hours play, giving an hourly rate of £130. Not bad eh?
I am relatively happy with this return but feel it can be improved further with improved focus and refinement of strategy. I'll keep you posted!
Key factors
In order to help guide those of you who want to make a profit playing regular short-handed SNGs, I believe that the following are key factors.
Profit from the early levels. Many players are content to play tight in the early levels rather than take unnecessary risks. I advocate a more open game early on. By making small raises and applying pressure while others are passive you can often add 30-40% to your stack. While this may not win you the game it gives you the protection needed to lose a bigger pot later on (sometimes unavoidable) but stay alive.
Speed and structure. It is key to open up your game and start to play more and more aggressively as the blinds increase and the player numbers reduce. Your timing in this area will mainly improve through practise especially as each site has its own unique structure. It may be worthwhile to master your knowledge of the structure by playing a few games at lower levels
Player Notes and Analysis. Taking details notes on your opponents is worthwhile in all varieties of poker but particularly so in these games. For example, many opponents play several tables at the same time and those that do often use a set formula in the first couple of levels where they play tight and only come in raising with big hands. This is definitely worth noting!
The all-in raise. Once the blinds start to escalate, it is essential to keep up momentum through stealing blinds. This can often require you to raise, sometimes all-in with minimal holdings. As always you are better being the aggressor and raising all-in than calling all-in. Again, keep notes on your opponents and their end game strategy and adjust your calling hands accordingly. While Justin Bonomo was recently tainted by poker scandal, he is still undoubtedly a talented player and he has written a high level strategy piece on the all-in raise in this situtuation (called 'Dissecting a Hand 2'. It's well worth a read.
I hope you find these notes of some use. You can also read my guide on the best short-handed SNG players I have encountered.
Until next time...
12 August 2006
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1 comment:
Just want to add, that when taking notes that it important that you use some form of shorthand that you can quickly type in. And of course you want to be able to understand what the shorthand means when you read it again several months after taking the notes.
I don’t want to suggest a list of abbreviations. It is essential that you think of your own abbreviations and shorthand.
But as an example, one of mine is OBORWS. This means On button, only raises with strength. It gives me a fairly good indication of how that person plays when on the button, and also lets me know how to defend my blinds against him.
If you need something more sophisticated than the note taking facilities provided by the poker rooms, you can search the internet for 3rd party poker software which allows you to take notes on poker players.
Look for features that allow you to add your own individual abbreviations, notes and traits.
Lots of top professional poker players have admitted that they keep poker notes and that the notes give them a winning edge.
Poker-Player-Notes
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