Casino Live MTTs

I know a few of my readers like to play in live poker MTTs at local casinos and I admit to liking the occasional punt in them as well. However these play differently to online games and it isn’t an area I have covered or seen covered anywhere so I decided to write a short article giving some general tips from my past experiences of these games. As with any article you read or video you watch you should not take this advice as gospel since the most important skill in poker is to be able to adapt to your current dynamics, with that word of caution heeded, there may be some pointers in here that help you with your casino donkaments.

Will you get lucky?

 

First off I will define what I class as a casino tournament; it may or may not be in a casino (but it usually is), more important than the venue is the buyin which is typically anything from a £5 rebuy up to £50 (or even £100) and the blind levels are quite short (15 to 20 minutes). The main player pool will be entirely recreational players who mostly see poker as another form of gambling, these events usually start in the middle of the evening and are finished in the early hours of the morning.

It can help you tremendously to do some fact finding before you even register to the tournament, particularly if you have never played at the venue before. Some things to try and find out include:

• The structure
• What is the starting stack?
• How long are the levels (do they stay the same length throughout or do they go from say 30 minutes to 20 minutes after the break?)
• Are there any rebuys, is it a triple chance?
• Are they likely to be lots of levels missing?
• Are re-entries allowed?
• Are there cash games that start soon after the MTT has started
• Are deals likely?
• How flat is the payout structure?

All of this information gathered beforehand can sway your decision in a marginal spot, maybe you are deciding whether to make a huge river call, if there is re-entry then the call is more favourable as you can re-enter but also your opponent is more likely to have a wider range as they can also re-enter. The faster the blinds the more you will need to gamble, you should always be aware of the next blind level in casino games as it is not uncommon to go from 100/200 to 200/400 for example which slashes your effective stack in half and you can go from 30bb to 15bb without realising if you are not paying attention and this often means you should me more inclined to push marginal spots towards the end of the 100/200 level that you may not if there is a 150/300 level. If there are cash games running some players use the MTT as a time filler until the cash action starts so will gamble more once the cash table is open.

With flatter payouts you can generally call a little wider in the end game as well but also should not be open shoving quite as much. This is due to the fact that people are more likely to gamble with flatter payouts as they aren’t so aware of big pay jumps which often bring out a tendency to play tighter.

Once the game has started listen to table chat as often you can pick up info on players, maybe they are new or they might be a regular talking about their win last week. You will identify who knows each other and might find out things about their playing style before seeing it in a hand. Of course a lot of the table chat at these tables can be quite annoying but it can still be useful if you can tolerate it.

Try to spot who the complete fish are, who are regulars that are maybe at least a little competent, those that are there to last as long as possible and playing very tight and also see if there are any real good players. See who is drinking and who is on coffee etc as those drinking alcohol are more likely to be 'gambling' as a general rule.

Early on in these MTTs it is usually hard to isolate players as any raise will get numerous callers so generally I find it best to limp in with a wide range of hands to utilise my skill edge and get value postflop, generally bluff very little but value bet hard as you will get called down by a lot of hands, people will pay over the odds to chase their draw so make them pay as much as possible but always be wary when the draw hits. This approach means you will see lots of flops without paying too much with the chance of winning a big pot if you hit and can value town a calling station. As the blinds go up rather quickly the cost of a few bb in the first level may only be 1bb in a couple of levels time so the loss of a few calls is not always that significant.

In these games players tend to be very showdown orientated, that is they want to show their cards on the river so they won’t usually bet with a wide range of hands, nor will they turn medium strength hands into a bluff. This usually means that they will have a polarised range when they bet the river so your top two pair hand may effectively be the same as top pair against their range, this point is even more apparent if you are the aggressor on the river and they raise your bet, this will often be completely polarised to air or the nuts, more likely the nuts depending on the type of player.

Look out for sizing tells, often players will raise a larger amount with hands like JJ, AK as they are scared to see the flop and the size of their bets can help you narrow down their ranges, of course if there is not a lot of raising you will not have a decent sample size to judge this on but if you are in a marginal spot a little bit of guesswork in this regard can help you make the right decision.

As the blinds start to increase it becomes easier to steal preflop, particularly if you are getting close to the money. Even when you get called it is often only by one or two players and c-betting at the right times will help you accumulate chips whereas c-betting in the first couple of levels will rarely get through. Don’t be afraid to shove your stack in as you will be surprised how much fold equity you can have against the same players who were seeing every flop in the first hour. One big weakness of these casino standard players is they do not pay attention to their stack sizes so they will make very bad decisions such as calling for half their stack preflop then folding the flop so don’t assume they are pot committed as they won’t necessarily understand that concept. They will also setmine for large portions of their stack even with baby pairs.

To wrap up in one sentence, play small ball poker preflop in the early stages and gradually increase the aggression as the blinds go up and your opponents start to tighten up.

Remember your opponents may well be playing 'Poker Roulette'

 A word of caution regarding these types of games; be prepared for lots of ugly beats, most people there play with no knowledge of stack sizes or pot odds etc and just want to gamble in the same way as they might gamble at roulette. Don’t berate these players as it is important to keep the poker economy going and abusing players can only serve to put them off poker, you want them to make mistakes and you should accept it will happen, the bigger mistakes your opponent makes then the uglier the beat will look when it happens. The variance in these games is astronomical as they have a fast structure, with showdown type players and you are single tabling. Having said that, they can be good fun and profitable (depending on the rake etc) but should not be treated to seriously. As always, have fun and good luck!