bonycamel's poker diary

Last weekend, I played some satellite to wsop. I stopped at SNG step 4, what pity!
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1. The following benefits from PokerStars are available to (1) Cash qualifier entrants to the Event that agree to sign our Terms & Conditions and wear PokerStars branded hat and t-shirt/fleece exclusively throughout the entire duration of the Event and (2) entrants to the Event that have qualified via a non-cash Qualifier (the "Sponsored Option"):
• Receive the benefit of either: (i) 8 nights accommodation at the Palms Hotel, Las Vegas from July 2nd 2008 at PokerStars' expense provided that a player collects the 2008 *WSOP Player Bag from the PokerStars main representative office at the Palms Hotel, Las Vegas prior to the commencement of the Event. If a player fails to do so the player will be deemed to have rejected the Sponsored Option and, as such, will be fully liable for their own accommodation costs. Or (at the entrant's option) (ii) US$1,000 in cash provided that the player first collects the 2008 *WSOP Player Bag from the PokerStars main representative office at the Palms Hotel, Las Vegas prior to the commencement of the Event and the cash will be deposited in the player's PokerStars' account within 5 businbess days of such collection.
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• 2008 *WSOP PokerStars Player Bag containing approved clothing to be worn at the Event
• Cash bonus incentive for Event TV Table appearances as follows:

Days	Bronze	Silver	Gold	Platinum	Supernova & Elite
Day 1 (4)	$5,000.00	$6,000.00	$7,000.00	$8,000.00	$9,000.00
Day 2 (2)	$6,000.00	$7,000.00	$8,000.00	$9,000.00	$10,000.00
Day 3	$6,000.00	$7,000.00	$8,000.00	$9,000.00	$10,000.00
Day 4	$10,000.00	$11,000.00	$12,000.00	$13,000.00	$14,000.00
Day 5	$12,000.00	$14,000.00	$16,000.00	$18,000.00	$20,000.00
Day 6	$15,000.00	$17,000.00	$19,000.00	$21,000.00	$23,000.00
Day 7	$20,000.00	$25,000.00	$30,000.00	$35,000.00	$50,000.00




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Alright been trying to figure out a way to write this well,with enough helpful information for anyone who's looking to either add in 180s to their MTT daily routine or switch to them from SNGs or cash games.


Alright here are just same basic reasons why you should play 180:

A Volume, you can't beat the frequency these tourneys run during the peak hours you can get 2-3 at the 10 and 20 level while 5-6 at the 4 level

B Time commitment, I would guesstimate the time till the end of a 180 to be an avg around 3 hours 20min which is 2-3 times shorter than your avg tourney with 15min blind levels.

C Payouts, They pay 10% but it is very top heavy 10-18th get double the buyin while 1st gets 54 times the buyin.

D Preparation, The good thing about the 180s field size being capped at such a low number is you get to be invovled many endgame situations. That means when you start getting to the FT of 5fig+ for first tourneys you won't be such a beginner at that stage.

E. The players, You get such a wide range of players that you get much stronger as a player against the spectrum of fish as well as mtt experts. This will help a player learn how to adjust to table conditions as often you are moving tables and needed to readjust and reconnect with the flow of the table

F. Cost, you can't really beat 180s for their low buyins which are great for anyone trying to build up a roll and with the 3 different levels as well as the increasingly popular 50/90s you can grind out a nice roll very quickly to move on to bigger tourneys

Alright now for some strategy tips I will try to hit most of the important moves and ideas behind each move you make. I would recommend that if you don't have pokertracker and pahud to go and get them since some advice I give you you need that for the information. Also, one thing I like to do is every time the blind levels change to try to figure out where you want to be stack wise etc by the next level. So I will break this down by blind levels for 180s.

Level 1 10/20
Now, everyone stars with 75bbs don't be shy with your strong hands a big mistake I see people make is open raising 5-6x with 10s or AQo etc hands that are most likely to be best PF but are rarely hands you are very confident post flop with. I would advise making some over limps with SCs small pairs etc, this is the only stage where it's not a big mistake to be passing PF. Most likely the players you will be playing many pots against are the fish and weaker players since many of the better players are prob multitabling and thus folding a lot of marginal hands. So seize this great time to take chips off those who will give them up easily. I am not afraid of big pots on any hand because remember it's a 180 and another one prob is 1/3rd of the way registered.

Stack goal 2000

Level 2 15/30
Alright now you should be noticing whose been limping half the hands and prob dwindled theirs tack down to 800 and those at 1450 who haven't played a hand yet. Use that knowledge when playing hands notice what type of opp you are against and adjust. Pay attention to stack sizes too when you are against 1 of those weak players bleeding chips as you should be trying to do they prob have less chips so be keen on that when you are getting to the turn and the pot has eclipsed their stack.

Stack goal 3000

Level 3 25/50
Alright now like 1/4th of the field is gone and it's going to get tougher but hopefully you were able to win lots of small pots by raising the weak limpers and c-betting or got lucky to stack someone. Players aren't as deep anymore and expect a few of the tight players to open up a little more at this level. There still will be plenty of spots to take a flop vs one of the weak players who hopefully doubled up like you so you can be 60bb deep with him and hopefully win a monster pot. Be warry a lot of PF 3bets start to commit people. Also notice the stack sizes to your left

Stack goal 3500

Level 4 50/100

Alright this is when it starts to switch to less postflop play and more raise/shoving so adjust your PF opening range to hands that do better with short stacks AIPF. Again I echo look at stack sizes when you raise 3x which should be your standard open with no limpers ask yourself what do you do if player X shoves or if he raises half his stack etc. Ask yourself those questions before you raise. It may help you make a better decision if it's worth it to try to steal from that position. Also, around this level you prob will be down to half the field in a 4 and 10 and prob 100 left in a 20.

Stack goal 4000 and a 5min break to focus on other tourneys

Level 5 75/150
2nd hour now things are def starting to kick in gear hopefully you are slightly above avg stack right now as it gives you more breathing room as for next 15min you will battle those nits who've folded their way down to 600 chips. The only postflop play you should be apart off is when you raise and someone calls you. Most of your pots for now on you should be the aggressor makes it much more effective. Also, don't be afraid to shove your stack in there if a squeeze appears or someone won't leave your BB alone. Don't shy from races at this stage they are necessary in tourneys even in these middle stages

Stack goal 4500

Level 6 100/200
This is actually my favorite level in a 180 due to the fact most of the other regulars like to wait till antees kick in to start stealing and restealing a lot, so while they are waiting 15 more min I start to really have fun. The fields have thinned by now and the avg player left is much stronger but still plenty of soft spots by now you should have a good idea of each player at your table and with pt and pahud using that info and extrapolating your plans before going into a hand. As effective stakcs keep getting shorter the distance a hand goes until all the money gets in obv gets shorter most pots are taken down on the flop if you even see one.

Stack goal 5500

Level 7 100/200/25
Ante time a decent sized ante for an online tourney being 1/8th a bb so most pots are going to be 525 before cards are dealt. there will be plenty of sub 10bb stacks right now and you need to be careful when you open 3x you are getting odds against most players who are under 10bb to call their shove unless they have been really tight. I personally don't like to steal that much at this level as most players expect you too and they also will be stealing as well. So I would suggest restealing more from those multitabling regulars who open in LP when folded to them. Depending on how deep you are shoving and a 3bet are fine. It's also time to start defending your BB more. As most of you should know if it's folded to you in the SB you should be raising/shoving almost any 2 depending on effective stacks. That is the position I feel like I keep my stack afloat the most either restealing from a LP opener or stealing from the BB to get those coveted antes.

Stack goal 6000

Level 8 200/400/25

Alright this is the inflection point/level of a 180 everyone is forced into short stack mode as rarely will 2 people with more than 20bbs collide. There are prob 40-50 left so avg stack is under a M of 7 and also about half the stacks at the table will prob be under 10bbs. Knowing that you should often be shoving when first in even if you have 16bb stack if those to the left of you are under 10. Also remember to go by effective stacks not just yours or theirs. Restealing is harder at this blind level as very few people are deep enough to raise/fold. So expect your shoves to get called more as people are getting more desperate to double even if they have to take the worst of it.

Stack goal 8000

Break #2 getting very close to the money now start to figure out whose playing to win and whose playing to cash

Level 9 300/600/50
Alright now the field is getting short ITM bubble is approaching and the avg stack is around 15bbs but there probably is a gigantic stack hopefully yours so as with the previous level about half your table is under 10bbs make note of those who are short and why they got short. You should be stealing less from the guys whose short because he was aggressive and got caught stealing and/or make a resteal and got called. While stealing from the guy whose short who has been folding a lot even when folded to him in LP and is def waiting for solid hands to continue with only. Remember at this stage at a 9 handed table theres 1350 in the pot so try to take that down whenever you can where ever you are.

Stack goal 10000

Level 10 400/800/50
As the skill level of the avg 180 player is increasing like it is lately the bubble has been bursting later and later and I've noticed a lot lately this is the level where we get down to 20 people a lot. Remember when this happens your table is now 6-7 handed therefore your opening ranges even from UTG should be much wider. Also, notice that often what you are doing others at the table are trying to do as well so try to knock them down to where they aren't a formidable foe and you can easily call their shoves getting over 2 to 1 therefore they can't push as lightly since they know they have 0 FE. I always try to punish those I fear by attacking them and their stack because the shorter they are the easier/cheaper it is for me to take a shot to knock them out. Hopefully by the end of this level you are top 3 in chips and now down to final 2 tables and ITM.

stack goal 15000

Level 11 600/1200 75
Alright this is a bigger jump than most players realize now the game has truly become pushbotting when effective stacks under 10bb and there are very few flops seen where both players aren't all in. Since often with this level you are just ITM and prob playing 7-8 handed still don't be too aggro and give away chips now that people are in the money they are going to loosen up and go for first more likely than earlier. So tighten up while they loosen up.

Stack goal 20000

Level 12 800/1600/75
Alright this is often the blind level for Ft bubble your table will be 5 handed now with some decent sized stacks prob a few 25k stacks prob a 40k stack and a few 10k stacks. You should be opening any chance you can get unless getting restolen from a lot. You are trying to win these remember 54x the buyin for 1st place so every chance to pickup chips count.

stack goal 30000

Alright if you've made it this far hopefully you got some firepower to start working your way to the top. You have 5 min to get your gameplan for FT ready

Level 13 1000/2000/100
Notice at this level the blinds are large but the ante is just 1/10th a SB also be wary live and online of the antein relation to the BB it should effect how often you are opening. By now you are at the FT remember this is a constant bubble so abuse the middle stacks at all chances. You are there to win they are there to fight for 2nd. Remember you are most likely the best player at the table you have more weapons than anyone else.

Stack goal 50000

Level 14 1500/300/150
Alright this level I am going to use to give you some ways how to play a shortstack which often endgame you will end up having due to either a bad beat or a call getting proper odds. You should be restealing PF with 11-15bbs with decent hands depending on opener, when 7-10 stop and go is your most deadly weapon. Also when 20bbs you can do whats called a go and go where you raise about 30-40% of your stack PF OOP and stick the rest in on any flop.

Stack goal 75000

Level 15 2000/4000/200
Alright some tourneys are done by this level while others are still 2-3 handed this is where the most crucial point of your ROI comes from. The difference between a 1st and a 2nd is 18x the buyin so you are playing for more than some people realize in the spectrum of the buyin. Be aggressive 90% of the time neither of you have a real hand make him go on his heels whenever you can. Don't get too discouraged if you get this far and don't win because getting here is a goal in it's self and now that you've done it a few times your shorthanded and endgame will be much more solid as I alluded to earlier in the post for when you get to fts of tourneys with 10k+ for first.


Alright some other things about 180s what can be expected from them. They 180s do give good TLB scores I don't have the link off hand for a calculator it's a favorite on my other comp but I'll edit that in later. Off the top of my head a 4/180 gives 218, a 10 gives 255, and a 20 gives 309.


ROI numbers are asked a lot of what a good player should be making when I responded to that question 3 months ago my answer was quite different that what it is now because the avg player has improved but they still have many leaks and ways for you to abuse. I'd expect the top 2-3% of players could expect to make about 130% ROI in the 4/180s over a decent sample size. 110% for the 10/180s is what prob the top players could make though I'm sure if a mtt expert got into them they could easily hit 150-200 but thankfully they don't waste their time playing so low. As for 20s I'd say a good number of players are making 100% ROI. Now for a proper sample size I would say 250 at any level but obv the more the better judge even though some of your games may be from a time when they are softer.

Also, don't just rely in PAHUD if you notice something odd either a line or a betting pattern tell make a note of it so you will have it in the future. Part of the small fields of 180s is you see the same players often so they are prob taking notes on you so you should be doing the same.


Any other questions more specific comments you have about 180s ask and I will have a mod edit them into the original post. Remember this is a beginners guide to 180s this is just breaking the ice there is much more in depth thought at times during each hand but that is too complex to put into words most of the time.

In “No Limit Hold’em: Theory and Practice,” under the chapter titled “Sizing your Pre-flop Raises” (p. 111) David Sklansky and Ed Miller advise against automatically making uniform or “table standard” pre-flop raises, suggesting that by doing so the player gives up too many advantages that come with being able to vary his or her bet size. They then provide the counter argument for this point, which is that varying your pre-flop bet size may provide too much information about your hand to your opponents, allowing them to play much more accurately and reducing your expected rate of return. Sklansky and Miller then suggest that you need only occasionally randomize your play in order to overcome this disadvantage, and while their advice does seem sound it is extremely rare for players to randomize their bet sizes in the majority of hold’em games.


There are two types of environments in poker. There are information saturated environments, wherein players interact with one another frequently and a lot of information may be exchanged between players. In this sort of an environment there may be quite a bit of value in playing in such a way as to manipulate an opponent’s perception of your play, as you can leverage those perceptions for gains in future hands. Secondly, there are information sparse environments, wherein players interact with one another rarely. In these sorts of environments there is often very little value in attempting to change your opponent’s perceptions of your play, as you will have little to no opportunity to leverage those perceptions for future gains. Note that an environment is never simply information saturated or information sparse, but can be either strongly or weakly so as well as somewhere in between.

Most no-limit games are very information sparse environments, largely because very few hands are shown down. For example, a player who plays 15% of his or her hands and sees a showdown 25% of the time he or she sees a flop will take as few as or less than 3 hands to showdown for every 100 hands he or she plays. Many poker games, particularly at the low and mid stakes levels also operate in a “revolving door” atmosphere, where many opponents will sit for short periods and then are never or very rarely seen again, giving you little opportunity to leverage information you gain about them and giving them little opportunity to attempt to leverage information they gain about you. This may additionally mean that there is little incentive for your opponents to pay attention to and remember the particulars of your play, and much of the information you might provide them with will simply be ignored.

What this means is that there is often little or no value in randomizing your bet size with different holdings to try and convince your opposition that you are raising with a somewhat balanced range. This is because your opponent’s perception of what you are doing is not based off what you are doing in actuality, but what he or she believes you are doing. In information sparse environments your opponents will seldom treat you as an individual, as your opponents will receive very little information about how you, as an individual, play. Instead, your opponent’s assumptions on what your actions are likely to represent will be based on what your opponent believes players who he or she perceives as being similar to you are likely to do, on average.

Note that being unable to effectively alter how your opponents perceive your actions does not mean that you should never vary your bet size, as different sized raises may have drastically different rates of return based on how your opponents will interpret and react to those raise sizes. This only means that it is usually ineffective to randomize your bet size in an attempt to alter how your opponent’s will perceive your actions. Most opponents, for example, will treat your range as being one thing when you raise a large amount and another thing when you raise a smaller amount. There will be little or no correlation between what you are actually raising with at each raise size and what your opponent's will perceive your raise size as representing, which will be based on what the community does as a whole. When very little communication occurs between players, it is often best to simply play your hand for the highest immediate rate of return based on what you believe your opponents are likely to do, and so in these environments very little manipulation or balanced play on your part is necessary, or even possible, as it is extremely difficult to inform your opponents to be aware that you are randomizing or balancing your play.

As an example, it may be suboptimal to make small, pot-building raises with small pocket pairs, or larger field-clearing raises with overpairs if your opponents will often correctly perceive these actions as representing the hand you hold. Randomizing what sorts of hands you make particular raise sizes with will have no impact on what your opponents perceive your raise sizes as representing if they are not aware that your range is randomized. Of course, if your opponents will play no differently against one raise size than another then varying your raise size in such a fashion may yield the highest expected rate of return. It is also worth mentioning that these concepts apply not only to pre-flop raise sizes, but to every bet you make.

Finally, however, it is important to be able to identify information saturated environments where quite a bit of communication does occur between players and where it may be quite advantageous to randomize your bet sizes. Common examples of information saturated environments in no-limit include heads up games and extremely short-handed games which you expect to stay short-handed, or when playing against opponents on a regular basis whom are attentive. In these environments not only can you communicate to your opponents that your range of hands is somewhat randomized when you make a particular action, and therefore have him or her interpret your actions differently, but you will also have many opportunities to leverage those perceptions in the future. How much you bet on earlier streets in no-limit can make an enormous difference in the size of the pot you play on later streets, and so there is quite a bit to be gained by being able to adjust your raise size according to your immediate needs if (and only if) your opponents will actually react in a manner which is advantageous to you.

One of the most difficult and yet crucial decisions you will make when playing no limit Texas holdem will be whether to even play your hand. This decision should not be made haphazardly. Hitting your card on the flop only to end up with the second best hand can be very costly. Playing mediocre cards can cost you if you are not able to let them go later in the hand. So, first of all, you should only be looking to play the best hands possible. David Sklansky and Mason Malmuth, co-authors of Hold’em Poker and Advanced Holdem Poker, were the first to apply rankings to the starting 2-card hands, and place them in groupings with advice on how to play those groups. This is a great starting point to help with your decision on which hands to play. We absolutely recommend that you read Advanced Holdem Poker, and keep it as a reference that you can refer back to you.



There is group of folks at the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon that developed a Texas holdem computer simulation and tested Sklansky’s hand rankings. They created multiple table environments, ranging from extremely tight to loose and crazy, and let them play millions of hands. They’ve suggested some alterations to Sklansky’s hand rankings and groupings.



However, both rankings and grouping are based on the game of limit poker. I believe there are further adjustments to these starting hands for the game of no limit poker. This is because of the implied odds of hitting certain hands, particularly hitting trips or better when holding a pocket pair and hitting flushes (the nut flush in particular). The cost of playing these hands is very cheap compared to the potential pot and payout. For example, at the tables I play, I can see a flop for $.50 when the average pot size can be $20. This means that you can play more hands in more positions, but you must still be cognizant of the fact that all your chips could be at stake on any one hand, and you must still play very disciplined after the flop to let go of weaker hands.

So here is a summary of the playable hands:

Group 0: AA KK

I’ve pulled out these two particular powerhouses and put them in their own group. These two hands are by far the strongest hands possible, and have the best odds of beating any other hand. These are hands you should feel comfortable going ALL-IN on pre-flop, however that usually isn’t the best way to play them since the other players will be likely to fold, leaving you with just the blinds ($.75 at the tables I play).

I also recommend that you do not slow-play these two hands, in whatever position, in hopes of keeping more players in. There seems to be a lot of debate on this particular subject, but I can only speak to my own experience, and clearly raising with these two hands is a must in my strategy. I personally prefer winning a smaller pot with reduced risk than potentially losing a larger pot by accepting more risk. Not to mention, if I lose AA to a junk hand, I could go on tilt which would adversely affect the rest of my play.

The amount of the raise depends on my position, the number of players already in (assuming no raises yet), and the general table environment (loose, tight). Ideally, I like to play these hands against 2-3 opponents. So based on all that information, I’ll try to make a raise that is likely callable by 2-3 opponents. In practice, that ends up being a raise of $2.50 - $5.00, possibly more in late position if there are already several callers and I know the table to be loose. If the pot is raised prior to my turn, I will look to re-raise the pot by a margin larger than what it was raised. If the pot is then re-raised back to me, depending on how much money I have or my opponent has, I will possibly go all-in.

However, the situation does arise where my KK may be up against AA. Yes, this happens more often than you would think (when you play multiple tables online, you come across every situation routinely). Up to this point, I have not yet successfully laid down my KK against AA pre-flop, I’ve lost that particular scenario a handful of times. However, I’ve also never laid down my KK against QQ, JJ, or TT pre-flop that have been played similarly. So, overall, I think you stick with your KK unless you really think you know a player has AA – ie. – a tight, conservative player goes all-in for $50 preflop, it probably isn’t worth the call.

Group 1: QQ JJ AKs

These are the next three strongest hands (in order). I will also raise with these hands, call raises with these hands, and maybe re-raise once. I will also consider folding them pre-flop if I sense I am beat – ie. – player raises $2.00, I re-raise another $2.00, if I am then re-raised huge, like $15 or all-in, I’ll possibly let my QQ go, and probably let my JJ, AKs go, depending on the opponent and what I know about his play.

The situation above, folding QQ pre-flop, is obviously rare. But I have, on two occasions, folded QQ to a better pocket pair pre-flop (AA, KK).

Sometimes, it becomes obvious your opponent has AA or KK, they are normally tight, conservative players but are re-raising or going all-in pre-flop – they appear to have no sense of fear of losing the hand. In that scenario, you should consider folding your hand, AA vs. QQ or JJ, you are a 82% to 18% underdog, AA vs AKs, you are even worse at 88% to 12% underdog. Sklansky also rates these top five hands in this same order.

Group 2: TT AK AQs AJs KQs

The Carnegie Mellon group ranks AK above KQs in overall power, this is a slight change to Sklansky’s rankings. I further moved AK above AQs and AJs, I believe AK plays stronger than these suited hands in the no limit arena. And, clearly, AK is a dominating hand over AQs, AJs, and KQs heads up.

Again, I raise with all the Group 2 hands, usually between $1.50 - $3.00 depending on the action, my position, and the table environment. My raises tend to be a little less when I am in early position. I am very sensitive to re-raises with these hands. Depending on the player and the size of the re-raise, I will usually call, sometimes fold, and rarely re-raise.

These are the top ten starting hands and I look to raise with each and every one of them from all positions.

Partial SNG book

Introduction to SNGs

Measuring success

In cash games, players quote their profit and losses in terms of big bets per 100 hands, or sometimes big bets per hour. This allows comparison of win rates across different limits. In SNGs, win rates are quoted as a percentage, called Return On Investment, or ROI. This is simply total profits divided by total buyins, including the vig. For example, if you have made a profit of $660 over 100 $50+5 SNGs, then your ROI will be 660/5500 = 12%.

Standard prize distribution

In most 10-man SNGs, 50% of the prize pool is paid to the winner, 30% to second place and 20% to third place. This prize structure will be assumed throughout this book.

The difference between tournaments and cash games

In a cash game, if a player stands to either lose $500 or win $500 on a given hand, with an equal probability of each outcome, then his expectation is exactly neutral. The axiom underlying this is that a dollar is always worth a dollar, in any context.

In tournaments, chips are not always worth the same amount. Consider a 10-man $100 buyin SNG where everyone starts with 1,000 chips. In total, the 10,000 chips in the tournament therefore have a value of $1,000. At the end of the tournament, someone will have 10,000 chips, but they win only 50% of the prize pool. The value of those 10,000 chips has diminished to $500.

To determine the correct plays in tournament situations (especially in SNGs), we need a way to find out the exact value of chip stacks in a given tournament situation. This will enable us to answer questions like how many chips we should be willing to put at risk to achieve a theoretical gain of 500 chips. Answering these type of questions is the purpose of equity modelling.

Equity modelling

A player’s equity in a tournament is her expectation at a given point at the tournament expressed as a fraction of the prize pool. This is calculated by multiplying together the percentage chance that she finishes in each paid position and the percentage of the prize pool which that position pays, and then summing the resulting numbers.

For example, say a player has a 20% chance of finishing first, a 25% chance of finishing second, a 30% chance of finishing third, and a 25% chance of finishing out of the money. Her equity is:

0.2 * 0.5
+ 0.25 * 0.3
+ 0.3 * 0.2

= 0.235, or 23.50%. The decimal and percentage can be used interchangeably, but in this book we will be expressing it as a percentage.

The total amount of equity in a tournament is constant, because the sum of all players’ equities should always be 100% - the whole prize pool. Therefore, any play which increases one player’s equity must necessarily decrease the equity of one or more other players.

Since your equity is a summary of your money expectation in a tournament, it goes without saying that the goal of every play you make in a tournament should be to increase your equity. You should never “play for first”, or “play for third”. Always aim to simply increase your equity and you will be winning money.

An equity model is a method for estimating players’ equities, given the current chip stacks. In just a second we’ll introduce the Independent Chip Model, or ICM, the equity model which we’ll be using throughout this book.

Why does equity modelling matter more for SNGs than MTTs?

SNGs and Multi-Table Tournaments, or MTTs, are just different varieties of tournament. Equities could be produced for MTTs using the ICM, although the sums would be much more complicated. However, the differences between cash games and tournaments are more pronounced in SNGs than they are in MTTs, for two reasons:

Harsher bubbles in SNGs

The jump from fourth to third place in an SNG is 20% of the prize pool, a huge change in fortune which often has a dramatic effect on the correct play. No MTT has a bubble with that extreme a jump.

Payout structure

The top 30% of players in SNGs are paid. MTTs typically pay out to only the top 10-15% of finishers, with the top 5% collectively getting about 75% of the prize pool. This makes the MTT prize structure a lot more top-heavy. The more top-heavy a prize structure, the more the tournament should play like a cash game. Winner-take-all tournaments play almost identically to cash games.

Conclusion

In MTTs, equity modelling is both more complex to do mathematically and harder to intuitively approximate at the table, because payout structures differ so widely. Because using an equity model often doesn’t affect the correct play in MTTs, most authors of books about no-limit tournaments have chosen to ignore equity modelling and use simple pot odds calculations.

This won’t do for SNGs. Pot odds calculations often give answers which are wildly wrong, especially on the bubble. Using an equity model like the ICM is essential.

The Independent Chip Model (ICM)

The ICM is an equity model that works well for SNGs. This section describes the method used to calculate equities in the ICM. If you would prefer to think of it as a magic box where you put the current chip stacks in and get equities out, that’s fine – skip to the section on ICM tools.

Suppose in a standard SNG, three players remain - A, B and C – with stacks of 10000, 6000 and 4000 respectively. We assume that all players play with equal skill. The process starts by assigning them a first place finish probability equal simply to the percentage of total chips in play contained in their stack. So:

A: 50%
B: 30%
C: 20%

Now we take each of those possibilites in turn, and mentally eliminate the player from the game, leaving two players. Then we repeat the original process for second place. So taking A first, if we eliminate A from the game, that leaves stacks of 6000 and 4000, with 10000 total chips. That means that along this branch, B finishes second 60% of the time and C 40% of the time. However, we want to know the probability of this finish sequence as a whole. A only finishes first 50% of the time, so to get the overall probability, we need to multiply the B and C second place finishes by 50%, giving:

A, B, C: 30%
A, C, B: 20%

If we had four players, we would need to go down another level, eliminating the second-place finisher from the game, repeating the process for players C and D, then multiplying together all the probabilities we obtained (first place, second place, third place) to get an overall probability for that finish sequence.

Repeating the process for B and C finishing first yields:

A, B, C: 30%
A, C, B: 20%
B, A, C: 21.43%
B, C, A: 8.57%
C, A, B: 12.5%
C, B, A: 7.5%

All these possibilities should sum to 100%, since they represent all the possible orders in which the players can finish.

Supposing we want to determine the overall equity for player A. We need to multiply the chance that A finishes first, second and third by the prizes he receives for each placing (expressed as a fraction of the prize pool).

Equity(A) = 0.5 * (0.3+0.2) + 0.3 * (0.2143 + 0.125) + 0.2 * (0.0857 + 0.075)
Equity(A) = 38.39%

A’s stack of 10,000, according to the Independent Chip Model, is worth 38.39% of the tournament prize pool.

ICM tools

At the time of writing, two commercial tools are available which calculate the correct play in all-in or fold decisions, based on ICM equities. The programs require you to enter hand ranges for your opponent(s).

These programs are:

SNGPT – http://sitngo-analyzer.com/
SitNGo Wizard – http://sngwiz.com/

A free online ICM calculator, which calculates ICM equities based on inputted stack sizes, is available at http://www.bol.ucla.edu/~sharnett/ICM/ICM.html.

Consequences of the ICM – the Bias Against Confrontation

Earlier we discussed the fact that in tournaments, a chip earned is always worth less than a chip already in your stack. One consequence of this is that there is a natural bias against putting any chips in the pot. In a cash game, to call an allin raise, a player only has to be the barest favourite to justify a call. In an SNG, we are going to need to be a more substantial favourite. Thanks to the ICM, we can calculate exactly how much of a favourite we need to be.

Suppose you are playing a SNG where everyone starts with 2,000 chips and the blinds are 10-20. You’re in the big blind the first hand and everyone folds to the small blind, who moves allin. He then accidentally exposes his cards to you. He has the AcKd. You have the 2h2d. Should you call?

If you fold, you’ll have just lost the blind and will have 1980 chips, almost your starting stack. The ICM values this at 9.91%, very slightly less than the 10.00% you started with.

If you call and lose, your equity is pretty obvious: zero. You’ll be out of the tournament.

If you call and win, you’ll have 4000 chips, while your remaining 8 opponents will each have 2000. The ICM values this stack at 18.44%.

Suppose that we wanted to know what our probability needed to be of winning the hand before it would be a breakeven call. Breakeven means that the equity of calling would equal the equity of folding.

Let:

E[call/win] = the equity of calling and winning
E[call/lose] = the equity of calling and losing
E[fold] = the equity of folding
P[win] = the probability of winning

For simplicity, we will ignore the possibility of a split pot. For most hands this minor factor can be safely ignored.

Now:

E[call/win] x P[win] + E[call/lose] x (1 – P[win]) = E[fold]

Since E[call/lose] in this hand is zero, we can ignore that term and end up with:

0.1844 x P[win] = 0.0991
P[win] = 53.74%

According to the ICM, we need to win 53.74% of the time to make this a call. Since 2h2d only beats AcKd 52.34% of the time and ties 0.31%, this would be a fold.

Furthermore, we can calculate exactly how much making this call would cost you. The equity of calling is:

P[win] x E[call/win] + P[tie] x E[call/tie]
= 0.5234 x 0.1844 + 0.0031 x 0.1000
= 0.0994

Subtracting this from E[fold] gives 0.18% of prize pool. In a $100 buyin SNG, calling here costs $1.80.

Since the player with the AcKd is a dog to us, he fairs much worse:

P[win] x E[call/win] + P[tie] x E[call/tie]
= 0.4730 x 0.1844 + 0.0031 x 0.1000
= 0.0875

This is a loss of 1.16%. This hand would cost him $11.60 in a $100 buyin SNG.

Alert readers might recall that the total amount of equity in a tournament is constant. But in this hand, both players involved in the hand have lost equity. Where has this equity gone?

The answer is that it is distributed evenly amongst all the other players in the tournament. In an SNG, every player has a stake in every hand. If you have ever been short stacked and heaved a sigh of relief at someone else busting on the bubble, you will be intuitively familiar with this idea. Even though you weren’t involved in the hand, it’s obvious that your equity in the tournament just took a big jump. Similar effects are taking place on every hand of the tournament, albeit usually in a much more minor way.

This net equity loss isn’t limited to hands where the participants are allin. Suppose two players have a confrontation on the first hand of a 2000-chip SNG where they are both exactly 50% to either win or lose 500 chips. Their possible equities after the hand are:

2500 chips: 0.1223
1500 chips: 0.0767

Averaging these gives 0.0995, so each player has lost (on average) 0.05% of the prize pool, or about 50 cents at a $100 buyin tournament. That money has been redistributed amongst all the other players in the SNG. Having another identical confrontation just makes the problem worse. There’s a 50% chance that they’ll both end up with 2000 chips again, returning everyone’s equity to 0.1. But the other 50% of the time, the stacks will become even more unbalanced:

3000 chips: 0.1438
1000 chips: 0.0524

For the player who started with 2500 chips, his average equity after this hand is 12.19%, a further loss of 0.04%. The player with 1500 chips gets an average equity after the hand of 7.62%, a further loss of 0.05%. Once again, the equity is distributed amongst players not involved in the hand.

Of course, we could alter the victory percentages so that there is a net gain in equity by the two players. For instance, if the short stack was 100% to win the second confrontation, the outcome of the first hand would be reversed, leading to a net equity gain. But then, if the big stack was 100% to win, the equity loss would be proportionally larger again. Over the course of many hands, all things being equal, win percentages will average towards 50%.

This brings us to the theorem of bias against confrontation:

In an SNG, confrontations between players result, on average, in a net loss of equity from those players and a net gain in equity by players not involved in the hand.

To get involved in a hand, you must first be sure that you stand to gain enough chips to overcome the bias against confrontation. The more chips you commit to the pot, the worse the loss of equity will be.

So far, our examples of bias against confrontation have been mild. Before you start to think that the concept is a technical one which doesn’t matter in the real world, here is a hand offering a more extreme example. This hand was taken from actual play in a $100+9 SNG.

Cutoff: 460
Button: 550
Hero (SB): 13650BB: 5340
Blinds were 300/600. Cutoff and button both folded and our hero raised allin. His hand is not important since he should make this raise with any hand. His opponent in the big blind called with pocket twos. Here are the ICM equities for all possible outcomes:


Opponent folds
Cutoff: 0.1063
Button: 0.1267
Me (SB): 0.4393
BB: 0.3278
Opponent calls and loses
Cutoff: 0.2502
Button: 0.2600
Me (SB): 0.4898
BB: 0.0000


Opponent calls and wins
Cutoff: 0.1032
Button: 0.1232
Me (SB): 0.3733
BB: 0.4003
Opponent calls and we tie
Cutoff: 0.1053
Button: 0.1256
Me (SB): 0.4328
BB: 0.3362



Versus a random hand, our hero’s opponent stands to win 49.39% of the time and tie 1.9% of the time. This gives these weighted average equities for calling:

Cutoff: 0.1749
Button: 0.1899
Me (SB): 0.4312
BB: 0.2041

By calling instead of folding, our hero’s opponent lost a massive 12.37% of prize pool. This represents $123.70 in a $100+9 SNG. He lost much more than the tournament buyin in a single hand!

Unfortunately, our hero didn’t benefit from this generosity; he lost substantially as well, although much less than his opponent did. The benefactors were the two short stacks, who were both handed huge amounts of equity on a plate.

In SNGs it is quite common for poor decisions made by your opponents to cost you money. The flipside is that if your opponents don’t understand the bias against confrontation, then you will be able to sit back and watch equity get shovelled in your direction as your opponents needlessly clash with each other.

You will see throughout this book that the bias against confrontation is a strong influence in SNG strategy.

Limitations of the ICM

It’s important to realise that the ICM is just a tool for estimating tournament equities. It’s a very useful, very important tool, but the equities it gives out are still just estimates. A player’s true equity may differ from the ICM’s calculations. There are three reasons this might occur:

Skill equity

Hidden in the section about calculating ICM equities was an important sentence: “We assume that all players play with equal skill”. If a player’s skill is above average, then an extra amount of “skill equity” should be added to all equity estimates. The amount of this skill equity is highly variable. For example, if I win the hand above where my opponent calls with 22, then it is highly unlikely that my equity is much higher than the ICM’s 48.98%, since it’s impossible for me to do better than 50.00%, which is what first place pays. On the other hand, if my stack is very short relative to the blinds, I won’t have many decisions to make and my skills will be wasted.

To consider the effect of skill on your equity, think about how much your skill will come into play with various possible stack sizes. For example, going back to the AK versus 22 first hand all-in, obviously our skill will have no effect if our stack size is zero. Our skill equity is very unlikely to double with 4000 chips compared to 2000, because the effective stack size will still be 2000, and the blinds are small enough that 2000 is plenty to be able to play effectively anyway. So we will lose more skill equity going from 2000 to 0 than we will gain going from 2000 to 4000, biasing us even more against confrontation.

In general, if you are a good player, you should avoid allins which are breakeven or slightly positive according to the ICM, unless your stack is very small or very large compared to the size of the blinds. Your skill equity loss will make them into losing plays.

Manipulating blind equity loss

A player who is about to face the blinds has a lower equity than the ICM suggests he does, because he is about to be forced to put money in the pot. It is sometimes correct to make plays which will decrease the equity loss which results from taking the blinds. For example, consider the following situation:

Blinds 200/400

UTG (You): 1480
Button: 2840
SB: 2840
BB: 2840

Let’s assume that no matter what you do, you’ll be forced to fold the next two blinds to the buttons each hand, who will steal successfully. The ICM suggests your equity is 17.31%. But if the button for each hand steals successfully for the next three hands, the stacks will look like:

Cutoff: 2840
Button (You): 880
SB: 3040
BB: 3240

Your equity then will be 11.46%, for a loss of 5.85%. But if you steal successfully by pushing UTG for 1480, then the stacks will be:

Cutoff (You): 2080
Button: 2840
SB: 2640
BB: 2440

With an equity of 22.15%. Then after the buttons steal for the next two hands again:

Cutoff: 2840
Button (You): 1480
SB: 2440
BB: 3240

Where your equity is 17.42%, for a loss of 4.73%.

The upshot of this is that if you successfully steal UTG, then your equity loss from moving through the blinds will decrease from 5.85% to 4.73%. Another way to put this is that because the blinds are about to hit you, the larger stack is worth 1.12% more than the ICM suggests. This in turn suggests that if ICM-based calculations have you losing 1.12% by pushing a hand UTG, then the push is actually a breakeven play.

Of course, it isn’t that simple. You won’t always fold your hands in the blind and sometimes by waiting a hand or two, you’ll even get the other players to eliminate each other. The effect of decreasing blind equity loss is not easy to quantify, but it is certainly something which you should take into account when evaluating situations in which the blinds are a large percentage of your stack.

Fold equity

A corollary to the theorem of bias against confrontation is that having the capability to avoid confrontations increases your equity. If your stack is so small that you will be called anytime you go allin, then there’s no way to avoid a confrontation and the resulting equity loss.

Quantifying fold equity is again very difficult, but all experts agree there is a lot of value in maintaining a stack of around 3 to 4 big blinds. Any less than 3 and you will find it quite difficult to ever get the blinds to fold. A very rough guide would be to assign about 0.60% of equity to maintaining a stack that is capable of making other players fold.

The concepts of fold equity and decreased blind equity loss often combine to make the correct play with a very short stack in early position an allin raise, even though a naïve look at ICM equities would dictate a fold.

Conclusion

The ICM is a useful model and you should not ignore what it suggests unless you have a good reason for thinking that it is wrong. But it is only a model and from time to time there are factors which have been left out of the model that you will need to take into account.

THE EARLY GAME

Definition of the Early Game

The early game encompasses any hand in which effective stacks are 27BB or more.

General Strategy

The right strategy early in SNGs is a tight one. There are a couple of reasons for this:

- The bias against confrontation. Consider a 2000-chip SNG, with 20/40 starting blinds. Successfully stealing the blinds gains you 0.27% in equity. Risking big chip fluctuations can cost significantly more than that – for example, getting allin costs you 0.78% in equity if you are 50% to win. You will not successfully steal the blinds every time, so your expectation is much less than 0.27%. If your opponents routinely put up resistance, trying to steal the blinds with modest hands quickly becomes a losing proposition.
- Skill level. Remember that, in the early game at least, being a skilled player exacerbates the bias against confrontation. Note that it is your skill level relative to the other players that matters, which means that the worse they are, the less you should want to play marginal hands. This is especially true if your opponents are ignorant of late-game strategy.

A note about pocket pairs

In no-limit, small or medium pocket pairs are often played for set value – called preflop to look for a set on the flop, with the hope of winning a big pot. In SNG, the bias against confrontation means that we need better implied odds. You should never call just for set value for more than 1/15th of your stack. In the following sections “have set value” will be used as shorthand for “can see a flop for less than 1/15th of your stack”.

A note about AK

In cash games, you should often reraise with AK preflop. In early game SNGs, you should usually cold call raises. Why the difference?

In cash games, getting AK allin preflop against a pair (say queens) is a slight loser, but no big deal. In SNGs, thanks once again to the bias against confrontation, the loss is far more severe, so we much prefer not to end up allin preflop with AK. And the bias against confrontation doesn’t just apply to allins – it encourages us to avoid big pots in general.

Reraising AK also causes dominated hands like AJ, AQ and KQ to fold. In cash games, where stacks are generally deeper, there’s not as much to lose from this. Good players will be reticent about putting much of their stack in the middle without the top kicker to go with their top pair. You also stand to lose a lot of money should your opponent be fortunate enough to make two pair. In SNGs, where stacks are shallower, players are more likely to feel committed to going all the way if they flop top pair. Letting dominated hands see a flop can therefore be advantageous.

Postflop play

A discussion of postflop no-limit play is outside the scope of this book. The “Harrington on Holdem” series and “No Limit Holdem: Theory And Practice” by Sklansky and Miller both provide excellent discussions of postflop NL play.

A Simple Preflop Strategy

Playing Against Raises

The guidelines for playing against raises in the early game are identical for all positions.

If it has been raised before you, call with small and medium pairs if you have set value. Call with AK, JJ and TT, unless the raise is for more than about 1/10th of your stack, in which case reraise allin or fold. If the decision between calling and moving in is close, lean towards calling in position and reraising allin out of position.Reraise with QQ-AA, except against very tight players just call with QQ. Against perceptive, strong players, you will need to vary your strategy and sometimes reraise with hands other than QQ-AA.

If it has been raised and reraised before you, fold everything except KK and AA. Whether you call or reraise with those hands depends on the exact situation. Versus loose opponents, you can also play QQ and sometimes AK. JJ and TT will not be playable unless your opponents are bona fide maniacs.

If you raise and are reraised, against typical opponents you should call AK, reraise KK and AA, and either call or reraise QQ depending on the player. All the remaining pairs can be played if you have set value. Against particularly loose aggressive players you might want to play back at them with JJ and TT.

Late Position

When open raising, always try to steal the blinds with these hands: any pair, AT-AK, KT-KQ, QJs. Against tight opponents add these hands: A8s, A9s, K9s, QJs, QT, JT.

After limpers, raise these hands: 99-AA (also 88 if you wish), AJ-AK, KQ. Limp other pairs. You can also limp speculative hands (like suited Ax) behind several limpers if you wish. Against a single limper, raise hands like AT and small pairs.

Middle position

Open raise these hands: 77-AA, AJ-AK, KQ. Limp smaller pairs if you will still have set value if someone raises behind you.

After limpers, raise the same hands as in late position (99-AA (also 88 if you wish), AJ-AK, KQ) but don’t play any other hands.

Early position

Open raise these hands: TT-AA, AQ, AK. Limp smaller pairs if you will still have set value if someone raises behind you.

If someone has limped, guidelines are the same as for opening.

The guidelines for playing against raises and reraises are the same as for late position.

In a particularly loose aggressive game, you can choose to just limp TT and JJ. In a particularly loose game, you can limp AQ if the game is passive and fold it if the game is aggressive.

In the blinds

Against limpers, raise TT-AA, AK and perhaps AQ. If only the small blind has limped, raise a lot of your hands – somewhere around 50%.

To play against late position open raisers, you will need to put your opponent on a range of hands and decide what to do accordingly. There are no hard and fast rules since correct play in these circumstances varies a lot depending on your opponents’ play styles.

Summary

You should be tight. Experienced no-limit players might find the tightness of these recommendations surprising. But you are at a full table, often not particularly deep stacked, with the bias against confrontation – aided by your skill equity – to contend with. Stay solid and only get involved when you will have a clear advantage.

The recommendations above are just that, recommendations, and for maximum profitability you should tailor them to meet the game. Against very bad players you might be able to play significantly more hands, and against good players you will want to mix your strategy up a little to avoid becoming predictable.

THE LATE GAME

Definition of the Late Game

The late game encompasses any hand where effective stacks are 12BB or less and 4 or more players remain in the tournament.

General Strategy

The common thread running through all of SNG strategy is the bias against confrontation. In the early and middle games we achieved our aim of avoiding confrontations by simply not playing many hands. In the late game that is no longer possible or desirable. A player who sits there folding all his hands will be rapidly eaten up by the blinds. Additionally, even players largely ignorant of the bias against confrontation understand that it is bad for them to be stacking off when only 4 players remain and the next one out will miss the money. Many in fact play the late game too tight. Curiously, many SNG beginners play the game exactly back to front – splashing around in the early game, and then shutting up shop in the late game, when they need to aggressively steal blinds.

In the late game, the vast majority of the time you should be moving allin or folding. The confrontation against bias should be wielded as a weapon, in a strategy of brinksmanship. A lot of your SNG profits will come from aggressively stealing your opponents’ blinds in this phase, moving allin against them and forcing them to be the ones to back down.

The focus of this chapter is when to move in and when to fold, and what factors you should be looking at when making your decision. The first question to consider is how short a player’s stack should be before he is simply making a choice between open-raising allin and folding.

The 10BB Rule

The 10BB Rule is a rough guide to follow when considering open raising a hand. The rule says that if you are going to raise, then you should raise allin, rather than making a smaller raise, if effective stacks are 10BB or less.

The justification for this is that if you are flat called, then the pot will be roughly the size of your stack and the vast majority of the time you should be betting allin on the flop, trying to take the pot down. If you instead face a reraise, you will be getting at least around 2:1 pot odds, which is virtually always good enough to call. For instance, the matchup A2o versus 22+, A8o+,A6s+,KJ+,KTs,QJs might look like an ugly one, but actually the A2 is almost 35% to win. If you raised 3BB with a 10BB stack, you will be getting roughly the right odds to call.

This justification is given in terms of pot odds, and it’s true that in SNGs we are concerned with ICM equities of different outcomes, not with pot odds. However, this is not the end of the story. Since your aim in SNGs is to avoid confrontations, there is advantage to moving allin straightaway and not giving your opponent the illusion that he can make you fold. Usually this will significantly decrease the range of hands he plays. In general, the more ICM considerations come into play, giving you more incentive to fold a reraise, so too it becomes even more important to keep your opponents’ ranges tight and avoid confrontation if possible, making it more attractive to simply move in. The stack size at which you want to start moving in therefore stays reasonably constant.

Not Pushing With Less Than 10BB

There are two circumstances where you might decide not to push, even though you have less than 10BB:

Your hand is extremely good

If you have something like pocket aces, you may want to raise small to induce your opponents to call or reraise. This can be a useful play, but you should be careful not to overuse it. For one thing, you need to stay aware of what constitutes an excellent hand. In the right circumstances, even pocket kings can become a hand that you don’t want action on! Also, if there is a skilled opponent in the small blind who is aware that you are a knowledgable SNG player, and you (for example) minimum raise on the button with an 8BB stack, then you might as well be turning your hand face up. Of course, it might still be worth it if the player in the big blind is bad enough!

Your opponent’s range is both tight and invariant

If your opponent’s range is tight, then if you make a small raise, you might be correct to fold if reraised. However, it will still frequently be better to move allin because it forces your opponent to become even tighter. But if your opponent’s range is also reasonably invariant, meaning that he plays essentially the same range versus both a small raise and an allin raise, then all justification for moving allin disappears and you are better off with a small raise.

This may occur if one of your opponents is weak-tight and will not try a resteal against you even after he has seen you steal blinds with small raises several times. It may also occur versus good players. If you reach the bubble with a very short stack present, you might be correct to start making small raises (with all your raising hands) against other skilled opponents with shorter stacks than you. Your opponent mostly can’t take the risk that you have a hand that will call a reraise, since that would be disastrous for him, so he will play virtually the same range that he would play against a push, with the plus that you get to avoid taking a hit when he is dealt a big pair. However, if you don’t want your opponent to reraise and don’t think he will fully grasp the risk involved in doing so, then you would be better off pushing to make it clear to him that he will be playing for his stack.

Pushing With More Than 10BB

There are many hands that are strong enough to show a profit pushing for larger amounts than 10BB. The reason it’s not normally right to just move in with those hands is that they can be played even more profitably by raising small. But there are two situations in which that isn’t the case:

When the bias against confrontation is very large

Suppose you are on the bubble in this situation:

UTG: 2200
Button (You): 4800
SB: 6500
BB: 6500

Blinds are 200/400. UTG folds and you have AQ. Earlier in the tournament, it would be best to raise small, inviting a reraise from one of the larger stacks, hopefully with a weaker hand than yours. In this situation, though, the bias against confrontation is intense, and you just want to take the pot down without any fuss, so you should move in, hopefully forcing hands like small pairs to fold.

When you are out of position with an awkward hand

This situation commonly comes up when open-raising from the small blind with a hand like A8. With a stack of 12 BBs, if you raise small and are called then the hand will be awkward to play. Most of the time you will flop no pairs and be forced to choose between pushing allin and checking, neither choice being very attractive. It is better to negate the disadvantage of position by moving in preflop.

Similar situations occur with a good but not excellent hand in early position. If you are dealt AQ under the gun with more than about 5 players remaining, frequently your best option is to move in with anything up to 12 or 13 blinds. Raising small risks being reraised by a small or medium pair, or flat called by someone with position on you.

Introduction to Push/Fold Strategy

Suppose you are playing the bubble of an SNG – it’s 4 handed, everyone with 5000 chips. Blinds have risen to 300/600. You’re in the SB, your opponents are all skilled, and your opponent in the BB plays perfectly – making the most profitable play every time. The CO and button fold to you. What hands should you push with?

If you’re not familiar with late game strategy, it might surprise you to learn that the answer is any two cards.

We’ll start by looking at the hand from your opponent’s point of view. How much of a favourite does he need to be to call? Here are the ICM equities for each outcome:

Fold: 0.2300
Call/win: 0.3833
Call/lose: 0.0000

To break even we want the overall equity of calling to be equal to the equity of folding. Call the probability of winning P(win). Then:

P(win) x 0.3833 = 0.2279
P(win) = 0.2279/0.3833
P(win) = 60.01%

Now assume that your opponent knows you are going to push with any two cards. What hands are 60.01% or better favourites against a random hand?

Not many! These are the hands your opponent can call with:

55+, A9+, A7s+, KJ+, KTs+, QJs

Now let’s assume you actually have the hand that fares worst against this range, which is 72o. Versus your opponent’s range, you will win 26.17% of the time. Should you still push?

The ICM equities for each outcome are:

Push, not called: 0.2688
Push, called/lose: 0.0000
Push, called/win: 0.3833

If you have 72o, your opponent will be dealt one of the hands in his calling range 15% of the time. The overall equity of calling is:

(P(opponent dealt hand) x P(win) x 0.3833) + (P(opponent not dealt hand) x 0.2688)
= (0.15 x 0.2617 x 0.3833) + (0.85 x 0.2688)
= 24.35%

The ICM equity of folding is only 24.02%, so you should push with 72o and therefore with any hand.

You can see now how the bias against confrontation can be used as a weapon in the late game. Your opponent is well aware that you are a thief, but the strength of the bias against confrontation on the bubble renders him powerless. He can’t hurt you without also hurting himself.

Of course, most opponents don’t play ideally. If you have reason to believe that your opponent will call looser than the range given above, then you should push tighter. Most of the time, when calculating whether you should push with a hand, you will start at the point where we assumed you had 72o – that is, you will give your opponent a range of calling hands, and look at whether your hand should push.

ADVANCED TOPICS

The Stop-And-Go

The stop-and-go is a play made when facing a non-allin raise out of position in the blinds. The idea is to just call preflop and bet allin on any flop, hopefully increasing your chances of avoiding an allin confrontation. The prerequisites for making this play are:

Your hand must be good enough that you wish to go allin
Your hand should not be so good against the hands that your opponent will fold postflop that you lose from him folding.
There should be a significantly better chance of your opponent folding on the flop than preflop. (Normally the play is made when you think there is no chance of your opponent folding preflop).
You must be first to act postflop.

Rather than betting allin on literally any flop, it is better to check to trap your opponent if you flop a strong hand, such as a set, or sometimes top pair.

The stop-and-go is not very commonly the best play in SNGs. The reason is the difficulty of simultaneously satisfying conditions (1) and (2) above. The bias against confrontation means that your hand must be very good against your opponent’s range before you will want to go allin. If, after the flop, your opponent is so dismayed with his hand that he will fold to whatever bet you have left, then you are likely to be crushing him and would like him to call.

Nevertheless, the stop-and-go is sometimes the right play:

CO: 5800
Button: 5800
SB: 5800
BB (You): 2600

Blinds are 200/400. The CO folds and the button raises to 1000. He is, reasonably, not raising allin so that he can fold if SB reraises – or because he is trapping SB with a strong hand. Suppose you think his raise represents top 25% of hands (22+,A2+,KTo+,K8s+,QTs+) and that he has no intention of folding any of them if you reraise preflop.

You hold 66. If the button had moved allin preflop, you would have a call (+0.6% of equity). Reraising allin preflop is therefore better than folding. Is the stop-and-go even better?

If you call and bet your last 1600 into the 2200 pot on the flop, then if the button calls and you win, your equity will be 26.65%. If he calls and you lose, your equity will of course be zero. If he folds, your equity will be 20.82%.

Therefore, to break even:

P(win) x 26.65% = 20.82%
P(win) = 20.82/26.65
P(win) = 78.12%

You will benefit from the stop-and-go if, on average, you are less than a 78.12% favourite when you make your opponent fold. It is very implausible that you will be that much of a favourite. For example, if your opponent’s folding range on, say, an AK8 rainbow flop is only 22-77, then the stop and go is still the best choice, winning 1.4% in equity compared to moving in preflop whenever he was dealt a hand in that range.

Here are some tips for recognising good stop-and-go opportunities:

The stronger the bias against confrontation, the better. The profit in a stop-and-go comes from the bias against confrontation. If there was no equity gain in picking up the pot without a showdown, it would be a bad play because it gives your opponent the opportunity to see a flop before committing his chips. The stronger the bias against confrontation, the higher your profit will be. Hands on the bubble are likely candidates. Of course, the stronger the bias against confrontation, the less likely it is that you will be willing to go allin in the first place.

Pick hands where your opponent might fold a hand that beats you, and is unlikely to have hands which you are a huge favourite against. The best hands for stop-and-gos are small pairs, because sometimes you can make your opponent fold a hand which beats you (e.g. 7c 7h on an Ad Kd Jd flop) and since you will be checking sets, you’ll never be a big favourite when your opponent folds. Hands like KQ are also quite good, since you can get folds out of small pairs on flops like AJ9, and can check flops containing kings or queens to avoid making your opponent fold hands you are a huge favourite against. Hands such as strong aces (AT, AJ) and large pairs (TT, 99) are never candidates for stop-and-gos, since it is likely that many of the hands your opponents fold will have very few outs against you.

The less chips you have remaining on the flop, the better, as long as there is still a chance your opponent will fold. The downside to a stop-and-go is loss of value from doubling the rest of your chips when you are winning. The less chips you have remaining, the less this matters. In the example of your opponent holding 7c 7h on an Ad Kd Jd flop above, even a 500 chip bet into a 2000 pot will be sufficient to get many opponents to muck their hand in disgust.

Stop-and-gos are rare, and when they do arise, win very small amounts of equity because most of the time the result is identical to moving in preflop. The amount of discussion this play has generated online is way out of proportion to its value. If you are not already an advanced player, forget about stop-and-gos and concentrate on developing flawless basic skills. Once you have mastered the basics, it makes sense to add at least the risk-free stop-and-gos (such as the 22 example in the paragraph above) to your repertoire.

Posted by Chris V at 4:22 AM

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Lots of guys said, Pokerstars has too many good players, it's not easy to get profit. The answer is nope. Thousands of small stake players are not very skilled. Just improve your own skill, you could win a lot of money. Also, FPP program is awesome. If you could be a SuperNova, then you could really enjoy the VIP status.

Let's face it; nobody takes up poker because they love the idea of sitting idly at a table

while folding for hours on end. But, in a full ring game with eight or nine other players

holding cards, it's proper to spend most of your time folding because there's too great a

chance that one of your opponents holds a powerful hand.

But, in short-handed play when only three or four people have cards, you're forced to open

up. With the blinds coming around so frequently, you need to be playing and winning a number

of pots just to stay even. And, with only a couple of opponents, you can be less concerned

about running into a big starting hand. On most deals, everyone's holding trash.

Here's some advice for altering your strategy for short-handed no-limit cash games. Keep in

mind that all the advice here is geared toward short-handed play while players have deep

stacks. The advice given here won't work especially well in a tournament, or against players

who come in with less than 100 times the big blind.

My love of short-handed play is one of the reasons I play online so much. It's rare to find

a three- or four-handed table in a casino, but online, I can find short-handed games any

time I want.

Pre-Flop Strategy

Three- or four-handed games are usually very aggressive, and I will never limp in. I open-

raise or I fold. In a typical short-handed game, I'm raising one in every three or four

hands when I'm not in the blinds. I recommend raising with every hand you'd raise with in a

full ring game (big pair, AK, AQ). In addition, I raise with any pocket pair, including twos

and threes. I'll also raise with suited-connectors, such as 4s-5s.

What might be something of a surprise is that I'm extremely wary of hands that seem to hold

some promise. Hands like A-J, A-T and K-J, are hands that most know to treat cautiously in a

full ring game, but I will often fold these in a short-handed game as well. Why? Well, these

are hands that are likely to get me in a lot of trouble. For example, if I were to raise

with K-J, and the flop came K-T-3, I'm either going to win a small pot, after betting my top

pair and seeing my opponents fold, or I'm going to lose a much larger pot as my decent hand

goes down in flames against two-pair, a set, or an out-kicked top-pair.

It's also important to note that A-J, A-T are just about useless against re-raises and must

be mucked against most opponents. With a hand like 4s-5s, however, I can call a re-raise

with hopes of catching a big flop (two-pair, trips) or a big draw, and then taking my

opponents entire stack when I hit. If I miss a flop with a suited connector or manage to hit

only bottom pair, I can easily fold to a flop bet. But if I call a re-raise with A-T and

then catch top pair on a Ten-high flop, I may get in real trouble against a bigger pair. Or

if I flop an Ace, I could be out-kicked.

Post-Flop Strategy

If a pre-flop raise from the cutoff or button has been called by one of the blinds, it's

important to make the most of your positional advantage. Keep in mind that in a short-handed

game, your opponent isn't likely to hold much of a hand and that even if he held something

decent, chances are he missed the flop. (In hold 'em, unpaired hole cards will fail to make

a pair on the flop about two-thirds of the time.)

So, if I missed the flop completely while holding something like 6-high, I'll almost always

bet the flop. If I get called or check-raised, I'll happily shut down. But, I pick the pot

up often enough to make the bet in this situation worthwhile.

If, however, I'm holding a decent Ace and miss the flop, I'll usually check. In a short-

handed game, Ace-high can win at showdown, and taking a free card gives me a chance to hit

my hand on the turn.

I'll also bet most of my draws on the flop. Often, I'll win the pot with a bet. Even if I'm

called, I've got the added benefit of building a large pot. If I happened to hit my draw on

the turn or the river, there's a good chance I'm going to take my opponent's stack.

Value bets
There's nothing mysterious or deceptive about a value bet. It is what it appears to be. You started out with two good cards before the flop. The flop helped you in some way, and now you have a hand which appears to be best, such as top pair. How should you proceed?There's no need to be particularly clever here. Unless you've flopped a monster, you don't generally want to slowplay. Just lead out with a hand like top pair and hope that someone with the second-best hand comes along for the ride and pays you for the privilege. I like to vary my bets in this situation between half the pot and the whole pot. If I've assessed the situation accurately, I'd make more money with the larger bet. But, as I've emphasized before, you need to pursue a balanced strategy so your opponents can't read you easily. Betting just half the pot blends in with the continuation bets and the probe bets (discussed below) and serves as a good way to disguise strength while still getting money in the pot.
How strong a hand do I need to slowplay? Trips can be slowplayed, but I wouldn't slowplay any weaker hand except in unusual circumstances. You hate giving someone a free card that beats you, so I believe in just betting top pair or two pair.
If you watch a lot of final-table action on television, you may get the impression that players always check a good hand after the flop. This isn't really the case. On television you're seeing people at the final table, where the field is small, the blinds are large, and many of the players are desperate to keep accumulating chips to stay in the game. Under these circumstances, it's very rare for a hand to be checked around after the flop. If you're the first to act, and you have a good hand, and you check, the second player will almost always bet to win the pot that's out there. He's aware that you may be checking a good hand, but he probably doesn't have time to wait around for a better situation. So in these circumstances, checking top pair with the idea of raising later is a high-percentage move. But early in the tournament, your opponents won't
be so desperate to go after the pot, so betting out for value is generally more profitable.

Here we'll look at some of the basic concepts involved in proper Sit and Go tournament play.

In the next installment of this two-part series we'll explore some additional ideas that

should help to improve your results.

One nice thing about Sit and Go's-and, for that matter, all tournament play-is the fact that

a player can usually expect strong results after only having mastered a couple critical

ideas. Here we'll look at three of those concepts, and explore how they should inform your

play.

Concept 1-Don't 'gamble' early on the tourney.

What we mean by this is that you shouldn't go all in, or commit the majority of your chips,

on those hands where you believe you only enjoy a marginal edge. This is because the best

thing that can happen if you win is that you double up, while the worst thing that can

happen is that you bust out. If you bust out, you've lost your buy-in. But if you double up,

you haven't guaranteed yourself of doubling your money (i.e., coming in third).

Consider this- we each put twenty bucks in the pot, and we agree to flip a coin for the full

forty bucks. In a case like this we'll both expect to break even over time, since half the

time I'll lose, and half the time I'll double my money. Make sense? Of course it does. But

now let's extend this logic to a Sit and Go. For example, let's say it's the second hand of

the tournament and you have 7c 7d. It's folded to you, you raise to $50, and now the next

guy goes all in. All fold to you. Now, because of some quirk in the software, your

opponent's cards are exposed and you see he has the As Ks. Even though you're a mathematical

favorite to win the hand, you're only favored by a few percentage points. Thus, you're

basically in a 'coin flip' situation. Which means you should fold, even though you know

you're a favorite. Why? Because if you lose you're guaranteed of losing your buy in, but if

you win and double up you're not guaranteed of doubling your money since you could still

bust out before you finish third. Thus, even though you'll win about half the time, you're

not getting 'even money' or better on your bet, which makes calling here a -EV play.

Situations like this come up all the time in these tourneys, and you'll be doing yourself a

huge favor if you learn to spot them. Another example would be flopping top pair with a

good-but-not-great kicker (e.g., holding AJ on an A96 flop, or JT on a T75 flop) when an

opponent who has at least almost as many chips as you moves all in. As long as you still

have most of your original chips left in front of you it's usually a good idea to get away

from these hands and look for a better spot for your money.

Concept 2-So long as you have a decent sized stack, and the blinds haven't yet escalated,

don't be afraid to take flops with some marginal hands-especially in late position.

One problem that winning limit players have in the tourneys is that they don't take enough

flops when the pot hasn't been raised. In a normal ring game you wouldn't limp in on the

button with a hand like A7o, or Q6s or 74s, even if only a couple players have yet entered

the pot. But in a no limit Sit and Go's these types of hands are usually worth taking a

flyer on if you're in the cut off or on the button. The reason for this can be seen in the

fact that you're getting huge implied odds before the flop-which means you can get away from

your hand if you miss the flop, but can often double through if you hit the flop hard. With

a hand like 6h 3h, you're only paying ten or fifteen bucks to see the flop. But if you get

all the flop (by flopping two pair, a straight, or trips) you can frequently bust one of

your opponents. Another bonus is that if everyone misses the flop you can often steal it

with a small bet (by which we mean a bet that's sized at about ? to ? of the pot). To borrow

from Vince Lombardi-'in limit poker the button is everything; in no-limit it's the only

thing'. Position is so important in no limit that you can take flops with all kinds of wacky

hands on the button provided that it doesn't cost you much (relative to your stack size) to

call.

Concept 3- Get aggressive in the middle stages of the tournament.

As the tournament progresses the size of the blinds begins to become significant. This means

that it becomes essential to take some risks, since you simply can't wait around for the

nuts. So long as your stack is at least moderately sized, you should be making more than

your share of blind-steal attempts, even with hands that wouldn't appear to warrant it. Of

course you can't try this if someone else has already limped in, but so long as everyone has

already folded you shouldn't be afraid to take a shot at the blinds with some fairly weak

hands (for example, hands like J8s, or 97s, or K9o). When the tournament gets into the

middle and late stages, most players make the mistake of folding too much in the blinds.

When the tournament gets into the late stages this phenomenon no longer exists, since you're

usually down to four handed (or less) and everyone is 'on the lookout' for blind steals. But

in the middle stages most players are still entertaining dreams of sneaking into the money,

which means they don't want to lock horns with crappy hands. Obviously you'll have to

pattern you blind-steal play after your opponents-if they're loose cannons, for example, you

can often just wait around and break them once you catch a real hand. But the typical Sit

and Go player starts getting real risk averse after about five orbits or so, which allows

you to help yourself to their blinds.

Sit and Go Strategy Part II: Other concepts
By Guy Downs

Here we'll look at a few other winning concepts that are often overlooked by even advanced

Sit and Go players.

Mistake #1) Re-raising all-in before the flop when you're short stacked.

You see this mistake made time and time again-both by novices in the small online games, and

even by tournament pros on T.V. who ought to know better. Now there are times when you would

reraise all in pre-flop with a good hand; for instance, if you thought your raise would get

the pot heads-up with the original raiser, you'd probably want to do it. But in a typical

hand the original raise is substantial enough to get virtually everyone to fold, and since

your short stacked it's unlikely that the little extra your adding to the price to see the

flop will be enough to persuade someone to fold who was originally thinking of calling.

The problem with re-raising all-in pre flop is this: By doing so, you're not giving yourself

a chance to fold out a hand which a) missed the flop, but b) still has outs to your hand.

Let's look at an example.

Say you have 1000 in chips in front of you, and the blinds are 50-100. Your playing five

handed, and except for one very small stack everyone else has about $2000 in front of them.

You're in the big blind with As Jd. Everyone folds to the button, who has about $2000 in

front of him. The small blind folds, and the action is on you. What should you do?

First, notice that by re-raising all in, your opponent is getting proper odds to call with

any hand that doesn't contain an ace with a lower kicker. Every other hand he could have is

worth a call in this spot, since he's never worse than a 2-1 dog to your hand. Further, note

that your opponent could have just about anything here. Hands like T8s, J9o, even 65s-none

of these hands can be eliminated from contention. Now if you re-raise all in, you'll be

getting the best of it. However, by doing so you'll be unable to to anything to keep your

opponent from seeing the turn and the river; thus, if he does have a hand like T9s, and the

flop comes K75, you'll have to sit back helplessly and pray that a nine or a ten doesn't

drop-something that's going to happen about 25% of the time.

But what if you just call pre-flop? Now, with that same flop, you can bet your remaining

$500. This amounts to the same thing as going all-in pre-flop, only now you can get your

opponent to fold some of those hands that he would call with if he could see your hand. In

other words, you're now playing your hand in a way that allows your opponent to make a

mistake. When you go all-in pre-flop, he's correct to call. So what good does that do you?

But if you wait to the flop, you can often make him play his hand incorrectly.

Obviously if you flop a pair you check, since your opponent will bet your hand for you 95%

of the time. But if you miss you can get your money in on the flop, and hopefully persuade

your opponent to fold a hand that he should call with.

If you need to re-raise to get the pot heads-up, then do so. Also, if you think your re-

raise will be big enough to get your opponent to fold, then you should do so. Otherwise,

however, you're betting off waiting for the flop to push all-in.

Mistake #2-Trying to sell a big hand.

What we mean here is betting a very small amount with a monster hand in hopes of enticing an

opponent to call. Let's say your opponent raises to $40 in the early stages of the

tournament, and you call with pocket 6's. Now the flop comes T64. Assuming neither of your

are short stacked, you should not play your hand slow. Check the flop, and then check-raise

when your opponent bets. How much to check raise is up to you, although you should at least

double the bet. If your opponent calls, he probably has an overpair. In this case, you

should push all in on the turn. You will probably get called, and be able to bust him right

there.

Bad players will often just bet a small amount on the turn, hoping to 'suck in' their

opponent. They figure that there's close to a 100% chance that he'll call a smaller bet, say

$200, then there needs to be a 25% chance that he'd call a bet of $800 for the bigger bet to

be worth as much as the small bet. That may be true in a cash game, but it's sure as hell

not true in a tourney. Why? Because in a tourney, you also gain extra by virtue of the fact

that you now have one less player in between you and the money. Getting your opponent's

first $200 is not worth as much as getting his last $200, since getting his last $200 means

that there is one less player who could break you. Thus, you should look to bust a player

whenever possible-and this means often over-betting a big hand. If he folds, but would have

called a small bet, it's a bummer but not a disaster. If, however, he would have called the

big bet, but you only forced him to call a small one, you've lost a golden opportunity to

send another player to the rail.

In 2006, I went to US to work. I went to casino several times. Then I viewed some web pages to obtain more knowledge on gambling.
Because I searched Chinese Google, I found preferpoker.com. It recommended Poker as the best gambling game. Playing other casino games, you will always be loser to the casino. However, poker is the way to play against other players, casino doesn't have any edge.
It's not easy for me to deposit. It also costs time to learn to play. I didn't spend much time on it.

Back to China, I accidentally read some articles written by "Cha-Yi-Tui". His PokerStars ID is "freeman", a MTT regular. Reading his motivating poker blogs, I decided to study poker and began to play.
Preferpoker.com also helps me a lot. I aquired the basic knowledge and received the only Chinese poker book. I prefered to play MTT. It costs less and if lucky enough, gain more. Pokernel.com is another good Chinese poker forum. It hosts by freeman. Also, best Chinese SNG player Bigmao is a regular in the forum.
I downloaded lots of poker books. After reading them, I am more skilled.

I’d like to start out by explaining exactly what continuation (or C Betting) betting is. C Betting describes a bet on the flop that follows your preflop raise. There are different opinions when it comes to C betting, but I’d like to share mine.

First of all, when exactly should you C bet? When I take the lead in the action by raising preflop I make a continuation bet about 80% of the time. It is my opinion that you should C bet most flops. What I want to discuss is when it often makes sense NOT to C bet. First of all there are players that rarely ever fold. If I come across a player such as this, I usually just give up on C betting and wait to connect with a flop before I C bet. Another example is in a case where you flop a medium strength hand against an aggressive opponent. Let’s say for example that you raise AcTd from the button and get called by the aggressive big blind. The flop comes down JhTh5c. Your hand is going to be good here on the flop a very high percentage of the time when you factor in the big blinds range. But since he is aggressive and your hand is certainly not worth felting with at this point, it makes sense to look to play a smaller pot and to increase your chances of seeing a showdown. So I advocate checking behind on a flop like this with the intention of calling any turn bet. If he does fire the turn AND the river and you don’t improve you will have a decision to make, but you will usually be able to safely fold against most opponents. If you C bet the flop here, you may get check raised and be in a dicey spot by a huge range of hands, the majority of which you beat. He could check raise any straight draw or any flush draw. He could also check raise as a bluff. If he does check raise you are going to be either throwing the best hand away too often, or getting involved in a large pot where you have no idea what you are up against. In this example, checking behind on the flop has the added benefit of sometimes inducing a bluff on the turn.

Another time where I often avoid C betting is when you are out of position. For example let’s say I raise from first position with AQ and the button calls. The flop comes down 789 with a flush draw. This type of flop crushes my opponent’s calling range from the button. The button will most likely be calling with a speculative hand like a suited connector or a small to medium pocket pair. This flop just smothers his range and I just can not expect him to fold often enough to make C betting profitable. Better players who may float you with a hand like QJ suited will often float you on the flop here as well just because they know that if the flush or straight comes in on the turn or river they can bluff you off of your hand. Those types of opponents will almost never fold to your flop C bet on this board. So check/folding is your best option here.

There is one more time where I feel most players feel compelled to 3 bet where I think check/folding is best. Let’s say the somewhat predictable, tight and aggressive button opens and you have 66 in the big blind. You reraise. The button calls and the flop comes down JT7 with a flush draw. I think it is perfectly acceptable to check/fold this flop. This flop just hits way too much of the button’s hand range. You will not get a fold often enough to justify C betting here. Your hand has only 2 outs when called and chances are that on a flop like this he will either be folding or shoving so you will have zero outs as you will almost never get called. If he has 77-AA he’s going nowhere. KQ is shoving. AK and AQ may get frisky and shove but those are the only two hands that possibly fold to your C bet. I know many good players who will C bet 100% of the time when they 3 bet preflop. However I am certain that this is a leak. I also think that C betting every time after you 3 bet preflop is a leak as well. You will be giving your opponents too great of implied odds when they know that you will C bet the flop every time and will likely call a shove light due to the fast paced action in the hand. Additionally, there is a big difference between C betting in a 3 bet pot (the bet is a much larger percentage of your stack), and c betting in only a raised pot.

C betting is a very important aspect of No Limit hold em. C bet too little and you people will know that you must have a hand when you C bet. C bet too much and you will become exploitable. In addition you will often be playing large pots with marginal hands. As is usually the case in No Limit hold em, it is best to find a good balance and always keep your opponents on their toes.

You are going to get different responses on this - so take my advice with a grain of salt - since no one on this site agrees with me on this.

My brother was on a long losing streak one time and was complaining about losing AK to AJ and other situations similar to your beats. I analyzed his HH and found that, while he did take a string of bad beats, he was often all in with 8-10BB's and the villains were priced into calls.

The losing streak had caused him to tighten up so much that he was just playing premium hands, which meant that he couldn't get value when his hand was big and was often in situations where it was all-in or fold.

To aviod that, I suggested he play MORE hands in the early stages and try to build his chipstack by playing flops early. He did that and his "luck" turned around.

I love playing flops in level 1,2,3 at the $11 buy-ins because you can take advantage of other peoples mistakes without losing a whole lot of equity. I sometimes raise just to get a pot going and see who I can take advantage of later in the game, and just by building a big pot for people to play for, I can get others closer to elimination.

Position is vitally important to the game of poker, so when you enter a pot, always note your position in the table. For example, KTs is a pretty mediocre hand UTG, but a powerfull hand on the BTN.

So my advice is, work on your flop game and enter pots in the early levels to get reads and set your table image. Follow your pot odds too. If you are getting 5:1 odds for a 3:1 shot to hit your hand, you must call. Also, bet the exact value of your hand at all times. This is a little trickier but if you bet the value of your hand most of the time, you will be able to pull off bluffs and slowplays much easier. I estimate that 90-95% of my bets reflect the exact value of my hand (the other 5-10% being overbets [bluffs], or underbets [slowplays]). This is remarkably difficult to read.

If you improve your flop play, you will find that the bad beats you are taking don't bust you, since you will be ahead more often.

IMHO, STT's are uniquely geared towards flop-play as opposed to MTT's and cash, where you are usually playing for all your chips on the hands you play. In STT's you can lose chips in a hand and actually gain equity in the form of others being eliminated.

Also - DO NOT PLAY POKER WHEN YOU ARE IN A FRUSTATED MOOD

For me - this is the only emotion that causes me to play poorly - if I don't have patience I can't win