How You Choose A Tournament

[liladypokerpro]

What factors do you consider when choosing a tournament? I.E. Stack sizes, number of players, rebuy options, etc.

[Huskers314]

Obviously I look for a guarantee with overlay, but those are EXTREMELY rare in the buy-in range I can play, so I just look for one with a relatively small field since I usually lose concentration after a couple of hours. I'm more of a cash game/SNGer though.

[emoneypitt]

I play cash games mostly but when I play a tournament, I like the ones with smaller buy ins ($3-$15) range with large fields so that if you do get lucky and go really deep, you get a nice payout.

For example, if I didn't have to work on the weekends all the time, I'd be playing that $11 100k Guarantee on Stars every Sunday, $20k top prize. I really like the rebuy tournaments on Stars because even if you just place, you're still getting a decent return. I'm not someone who will buy constant rebuys though so it is worth it for me.

Midnight Madness and The Daily Double are my two favorite on Full Tilt, both $10 +fee tourneys.

[MikeyInc]

it is interesting the scheduled MTT are fairly low in contestants. so i would go with the Low entrys .. it seems to payoff .. other than that i stick to sit n go's

[123bird]

i think 1st its affordablity & then best value, time taken. number of people etc
for me the perfect online game is the 90 person $3.30 double stack KO with the $10 ds KO a good option if you can afford it.(only thing the $10 takes a little while to fill up)

[Vito_Nuccio]

I will not play in a re-buy event, it does not match my style, there is no punishment for calling my bet and an hour of re-buys is a long, long time.

I also avoid the bounty type tourneys. I find the payouts suffer tremendously due to the bounties. Too much emphasis on busting someone, not enough pay for finishing in the money.

I search for the guaranteed tourneys when the amount of players does not quite make the full amount, thus the cardroom has to put up some cash.

Other than that, I keep to my bankroll rules and play for a buy-in I can easily afford at either a single or multi table tourney.

Later,

[tstrachan22]

think 1st its affordablity & then best value, time taken. number of people etc for me the perfect online game is the 90 person $3.30 double stack KO with the $10 ds KO a good option if you can afford it.(only thing the $10 takes a little while to fill up)

I agree. Affordability and time are the greastest factors for me but I primarly stick to NL H. If I see a affordable tourney i may enjoy, i'll then calculate the time i assume it will take to go to th Full Tilt ( BECAUSE ISNT THAT THE GOAL?! ) and see if my schedule will allow it.

I guess the only other factor in choosing a tourney , and in my oppinion a very important one, will be how I am feeling mentally and physically at the deciding time . ( e.g. If I am not 100% mentally prepared to go the distance, I wont give it another thought to register)

By the way, I LOVE that 90 person 3.30 on FullTilt- I played it the first time yesterday and took 1ST!!!!

[stoffmakers]

everyone seems to be loving the 3.30 90 person KOs on tilt including me. i hope we all dont end up just knocking eachother out in one. although they are plenty of donks to pass around in those.

[gorden71]

I have to agree with Vito, re-buys are worse than freerolls in my experience. I do prefer the SNGs to tournaments just for the lower time investment alone. The payouts are never as good, but I do place a certain value on my time.

[stoffmakers]

the 8.70 18 person turbo sngs that give top 5 $26 tokens and 6th 14 bucks is pretty fishy.

[liladypokerpro]

I agree with Vito also...I prefer the freezeouts and guarantees that don't have multiple rebuys or add ons. However, the single rebuy tourneys (at least on Nordica) don't tend to stray too far from a general freezeout as far as the play goes, so I might play one of those on occasion, if nothing else is registering at the time I am ready to play something. Otherwise, definitely freezeouts...the short handed ones are okay as well. They go by faster it seems, so when short on time, those are good.