With the World Series of Poker taking the world by storms a few years ago and the huge success they have had on ESPN. Multi Table Tournaments popularity has skyrocketing giving people a chance to win a considerable amount of money whether on a gambling boat, on ESPN, or in the thousands of online tournaments played daily.
One of the biggest question that is asked is what is the best strategy for winning a Multi Table Tournament? Of course there is no flat strategy that will work every time there are some sound principles that I am going to lay out here which will drastically improve your chances. Many play with no plan at all so this will put you ahead of the majority that you are up against especially at the smaller tables.
Beginning stages of the Tournament
You should start out and play very tight with your hands and your chips. Some actually suggest just playing three hands AA, KK and QQ and to push to go all in immediately instead of playing slow play. This strategy is to avoid getting knocked out of the tournament by some of the loose money players who will be out quick themselves but always manage to take out a few good players before they go out themselves. Do not waste chips in the beginning stages trying to catch a draw. Play the best cards and play them hard and aggressively. You should be folding alot in the early stages and playing only 3 hands might be a little extreme but be extremely careful with your hand selection.
The Next Stage in the Middle
Now that about 25% of the field has left the buidling you can start to get a little more comfortable. This is the stage where we are looking to dominate and build a nice stack of chips. We are hoping to catch the cards of course and the blinds are worth a bluff attempt now and then so you can get a rock image of yourself built up. If at any point you are willing to take a few risk this is the stage you want to do it in, but be smart about it. We don't want to get by we want to be forced to the final table with some momentum going our way. You will see the people die off (hopefully) and the small stacks will start to really tighten up on their hands holding on to the few chips they have. Use this to your advantage. Try to keep from going head to head with the big stacks they can call you down unless you have a great hand.
Final Table
With your discipline focus and some luck that came your way you are sitting with the big dogs and you have a decent amount of chips to win this tournament with. At this stage in the game chip strength is very important and you should continue to take on the smaller stacks while staying away from the big ones going head to head with them. Unless you have a huge chip stack its not smart to be speculative with your hands. If you have a short stack you have two options and one is just as good as the next. You can go aggressive on the first pair or big card and go all in or you can play meekly for awhile and try to catch that big hand you can double up on. Look for the big stacks that have folded and then if you ar small and the rest of the table is small to average stacks going all in is less risky.
If you get to a heads up situation, you must stay aggressive. If you call, check or fold your opponent needs to just some pressure on you to win. Don't let him do it put the pressure on him with your own raises. Any face card merits a raise, and any ace, king or pair can be an all in hand. Most hands at this stage are won by the preflop and the aggressor wins. The only and most crucial time to act limp to trap them give him a chance to bluff at the ot and then blitz him for a good portion of his chips.
These are some golden tips to being effective at muli table tournaments. These are the same skills that have won people across the country a lot of money. If you have s successful multi table strategy I would love to here it and we can post it on this site. E-mail me @ kaufmanjsk@yahoo.com
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