FAO of MTT/SnG grinders

How do you keep your sanity when you play hours and hours every day, for days and days, or even weeks and see no decent results. I am playing alot of SnGs, and I find that not making top 5 in a large field SnG for 60 games pretty demoralizing lol.

I try to think of two things;

Variance & Long Term

Is it best to take a few days off, or have you got any tips for keeping focused?

What site do you play on, what buy ins and how many people are in the SnGs you play? I just switched to SnG from cash and am trying to rebuild.

one time when i was busto floofy staked me for $1 45 man tournaments (i was like 16 years old)

i lost like 35 or 40 of them in a row without cashing and floofy cut the stake short (LOL)

sngs are fucking brutal on your mind, i think they were way worse for my mentally than cash games ever were.

lol, that would suck

and from what I've heard, cash game grinding is usually more profitable too.

Only the higher buyin, bigger/soft tourneys are worth taking time out to grind?
Any highstakes players have an opinion on this?

Right now I am betting with a friend from home to see who can build from 50 up to 250 the fastest. I started with cash games for a while and got up to 195 and then immediately dropped back to 35. Do you think low limit SnGs to rebuild and then cash games would be a good plan?

if u play sngs and u want steady profit prepare to play many hundreds or even thousands per month

just play a bunch of tables and look at everything mathematically and don't even watch the results of ur allins and stuff

just keep playing the math game

how large are your fields?

Yeah. Playing the 180mans. I know the variance is high. I know its longterm. I really just shrug and move on when I loose All ins when i have a 5% edge. But I know its the right decision. Just curious how to keep mentality strong when playing these? Because I know that having long stretches of no results is totally standard.

I think the main thing with cash games, that all though you can go on downswings, you can cut sessions short when its going bad. You can also have lots of smaller shorter sessions so you are more focused. Where as with MTT sngs, you do not get much time to take breaks, especially when you are multi tabling, and tourney breaks overlap.

So best advice is, just keep focusing on the math, and it will all work out in the long run

On July 03 2009 00:21 deahttubb wrote: Right now I am betting with a friend from home to see who can build from 50 up to 250 the fastest. I started with cash games for a while and got up to 195 and then immediately dropped back to 35. Do you think low limit SnGs to rebuild and then cash games would be a good plan?

Play the 27 and 45man $1 sit+gos. Pretty soft.

won't speak of SNG variance b/c i don't play them, but for MTT's the variance is disgusting. The majority of the public has no idea how bad it can really be, which is why so many terrible tournament players are heralded as the greatest b/c of a couple heaters at the right time.

I usually mix in some cash to keep my sanity..... I don't know if its optimal but it sure helps to even it out if I've had a couple breakeven days at tourneys

On July 03 2009 00:17 SemPeR wrote: and from what I've heard, cash game grinding is usually more profitable too. Only the higher buyin, bigger/soft tourneys are worth taking time out to grind? Any highstakes players have an opinion on this?

I'd say SNG grinding is a faster way to build a roll then 2-5nl. It also depends if you wanna be a robot or not, look at that one guy who made 10k in a month playing low limit sng's. If you can put in the volume and keep your sanity they can still be very profitable.

It really depends on player's focus, experience, tilt control etc.

People say that in order to get an idea of player's ROI in SNG 9-man you need 2-3K games. I think that since the games got tougher, you would need 4-5K.

When it comes to playing 90 or 180-man you would need approximately 40-50K which might be a year to complete ( losing 100BI in 180-man is normal )

However, the bigger field, the bigger ROI, the bigger variance - you pick.

All in all, as long as you play correct ( ICM, reads ) keep playing. If you feel that downswing has an effect on you - stop. Take a break, do sth else, gtfo from computer and so on. The more you will play, the less of an effect it will have on you over time. In the long-run as you gain experience you will have a clearer view of wheter you play bad, or the math is picking on you. But whenever you're not quite sure then stop playing.

if u want to make money u can't cut ur sessions short when ur running bad because it's going to happen too often

just learn to look at variance differently. play say, 50 or 60 sngs for your day, and don't think about how u did until it's over

you can keep mentally strong by reminding yourself that variance in them is high, and what looks absurd can just be natural variance and it's easy to be down after 50 sngs and end up a lot after 60 (just 10 more)

good advice from asdf2000 I'm going to remember that if I ever start MTT's

Is the pain really worth it? To be fucked by fish for a million tourneys and eventually balance that out with one big score and have it attributed to luck. You MTT players must be huge masochists.

Well, I think the games (at least at lower stakes) are definitely easier to beat than cash games. Especially if you like to play many tables.

On July 03 2009 05:53 Chewits wrote: I think the main thing with cash games, that all though you can go on downswings, you can cut sessions short when its going bad. You can also have lots of smaller shorter sessions so you are more focused. Where as with MTT sngs, you do not get much time to take breaks, especially when you are multi tabling, and tourney breaks overlap. .

Very very wrong.You shouldnt cut ur bad cash game session because u end up stopping everytime u start off bad.Now im not suggesting that people shouldnt have stop losses coz they should but stopping at the 150th hand of the session just cause u r -3 buy ins is dumb and if u cant handle something like that u r prolly playing on higher stakes than u should be playing or u shouldnt be playing poker at all.Variance can only be controlled in the very long run and quitting lets say 1/3 of ur sessions in the very beginning wont let u have a long run.

I know this is a bit off ur main topic but still felt like correcting u

Also i've always asked myself why would u guys play 180 mans when u can just play like 50 9mans everyday isnt the profit pretty much the same in the end overally ?

&

Wouldnt really say stts are easier to beat than cash games ( lower stakes ). In fact i wouldnt say that there s a big difference and cash games are prolly more profitable coz the variance is lower.The players in both STT's & cash micros are ridiculously bad

I haven't played sng's that much, but the stt sng's are probably the once i find to be the least soft of the 1, 2, 5, 10 or 20 table sngs on stars. From what little I've played sngs I definitely prefer the 2 table ones. They are really soft, just as the other, but with less variance.

Yup... STT dead

Double or Nothings are where its at

On July 04 2009 15:28 Miller wrote: Double or Nothings are where its at

Errr, horrible way to grind.

On a serious note.. When I find myself in long breakeven/downswing periods, I go back into SnG wizard and review all my games to make sure I'm still playing optimally. It works almost every time.

i <3 sngs

but honestly high stakes HU sngs is where its at

i'm having fun 20 tabling the Dons right now though lol my goal is to make $4k within 2 weeks so i can go back to BKK asap

On July 03 2009 19:49 Spitfiree wrote: Show nested quote + On July 03 2009 05:53 Chewits wrote: I think the main thing with cash games, that all though you can go on downswings, you can cut sessions short when its going bad. You can also have lots of smaller shorter sessions so you are more focused. Where as with MTT sngs, you do not get much time to take breaks, especially when you are multi tabling, and tourney breaks overlap. . Very very wrong.You shouldnt cut ur bad cash game session because u end up stopping everytime u start off bad.Now im not suggesting that people shouldnt have stop losses coz they should but stopping at the 150th hand of the session just cause u r -3 buy ins is dumb and if u cant handle something like that u r prolly playing on higher stakes than u should be playing or u shouldnt be playing poker at all.Variance can only be controlled in the very long run and quitting lets say 1/3 of ur sessions in the very beginning wont let u have a long run. I know this is a bit off ur main topic but still felt like correcting u Also i've always asked myself why would u guys play 180 mans when u can just play like 50 9mans everyday isnt the profit pretty much the same in the end overally ?

I do it because the 180 man sngs take much longer to become shorthanded, so they are easier to multitable.

Also the rake hurts less when the field is bigger.

--- Nuked ---

even the very best players have >100 buyin downswings in MTTSNGs , wouldn't play these full time without a 250BI bankroll for whatever stake you're playing.

It's brutal

nuff said

I don't think there are more than like 5 sng players I know that haven't thought of and tried switching to cash at one point in their careers because of brutal variance (and then obv. moved back because donkaments lol)

I think it goes:

FR < 6 handed < HU < SnGs < MTTs

Variance wise, lowest at FR, biggest at MTTs... This is very demoralizing to play good and put massive hours and dont see results showing up.