Originally Posted by msc0015

I usually play at the $5 or $10 buy in table. Top 3 get money $25,$15,$10. !0 people at the table to start, blinds raise every 10 hands.

10 hands isnt much just like one orbit of the table - My advice would be to play loose - ie limp early on if the flop hasnt been raised with almost anything, and fold if the flop doesnt help you. For instance if you limp with your looking for a flop that corresponds with those cards, simply put you want 2 hearts or something like since with a flop like this youll get a lot of people willing to play Kx or even Ax - Not to mention the lower ends of that possible straight. A lot of the time flops like that just wont happen and youll have to fold your hand but youll lose only 20 or so chips compared to a lot if you followed the hand through when you only had a pair of 7s or 8s...

Then in the next few levels tighten up somewhat - avoid calling raises and confrontations unless you have a strong hand.... whats a strong hand? well anything better than what you think your opponent is raising with, for instance if you think they will raise with Pocket 7s for all of their chips then a call with pocket 10s wouldnt be such a bad move - thats very important in SNGs - You need to have some idea about how tight/loose/manicidal your opponent is.

If you have the oppoturnity to double up like JJ vs AK then it is basically a coinflip and sometimes I will make this call othertimes I wont - it depends how far into the tournament I am, among various things. Thats another case to discuss anyways.

Below is a hand I played from a recent 45 man SNG, I noticed that the SB was raising quite a lot and could easily have had anything from AA to A2 or even A4 - but the preflop raise made me think hes got AK-10 luckily for me I was right.

PokerStars No-Limit Hold'em Tourney, Big Blind is t50 (8 handed) converter
Button (t980)
SB (t2435)
Hero (t1995)
UTG (t1070)
UTG+1 (t1875)
MP1 (t2595)
MP2 (t1305)
CO (t3485)
Preflop: Hero is BB with , .
4 folds, CO calls t50, 1 fold, SB raises to t150, Hero calls t100, CO calls t100.
Flop: (t450) , , (3 players)
SB checks, Hero bets t300, CO calls t300, SB raises to t1200, Hero raises to t1845, CO folds, SB calls t645.
Turn: (t4440) (2 players)
River: (t4440) (2 players)
Final Pot: t4440
Results:
SB has Qh Ad (two pair, aces and twos).
Hero has Kd Ah (two pair, aces and kings).
Outcome: Hero wins t4440.

<sarcasm> your amazing read helped you protect your weak flop hand of TPTK</end sarcasm>

Sorry bro, I just laughed, cause what else were you going to do with that?

I guess you can play either way, but I would respectfully disagree with Dizzy here. I would actually play very tight in the early levels and establish that reputation. Then, I would try to steal the blinds with All-ins in the later levels. Let the bafoons knock each other out for the first 30+ hands