Your First Live Rebuy Tourney Part 1

YOUR FIRST LIVE REBUY TOURNEY - Part 1

By "Lorinda"

So you want to play live tourneys? Scared you'll make a fool of yourself?
Scared you don't know what to do?
Want to get a feel for the game to see if you like it?
Well PLAY dammit, and enjoy it too (when you've stopped shaking)

A few tips to get you through your first (no limit) tournament. I shall try to post follow ups to this, covering your second tournament (etc etc) I will always mention no limit and pot limit in the same breath, and Granny (an online player and friend of mine) will prevent me from trying to talk about fixed limit because I am incredibly bad at that format.

1....Dont take more than 2 rebuys with you.

Why only 2 rebuys? Well... After your first tournament, your head will be spinning, you will want to tell everyone everything that happened to you, the 2 rebuy rule saves your head, and everyone elses ears!
Seriously, you will have a lot to think about, and losing 3 entry stakes is enough for the ammount you will learn.
Also, if you follow the next few rules, you will probably not need more than 2 rebuys anyway to last a substantial portion of the rebuy period.

2. PREFLOP HAND SELECTION

Only play Ace-Picture and Pocket Pairs.
Yes, really, KQ sooooted? very nice, throw it away.

Ace-Picture RAISE THE POT (Same for PL/NL) (We will talk position at a later date, this is your first tourney, you are going to play good cards and see what happens)
Pairs 22 - JJ FLAT CALL
QQ, KK, AA RAISE THE POT
If you want to try some funky positional stuff at this point, you can raise with TT or JJ if you are on the button and JJ if you are next to the button.
Ace-Ten is not allowed, it is crap, throw it away.

3....YOU GET RAISED, OR RERAISED PREFLOP

a) They Raise. (or have raised before it gets to you)
Assuming a pot sized raise when you have a small pair, if there is another caller CALL, if not, THROW AWAY.

b) They Reraise.
You did follow my raising rules?
Thats okay, it's easy now...Throw away AJ and AQ, go all in with any other hand.
QQ is a bit scary here, shut eyes, grab chips, shove stack into pot.
Sacrifice chickens, or any other available animal and pray they have AK or JJ, you must stick chips in though..... you brought 2 rebuys along for a reason.

4. THE FLOP

a) You raised preflop, good, here's what we do...
You got top pair, or an overpair to the flop, or an open ended straight draw or an Ace flush draw (FOUR CARDS not THREE)
ALL IN
You haven't
CHECK/FOLD
(I'll let you call a very small bet here with Ace-King or with 2nd pair, but dont try to be clever, if the bet is going to hurt you THROW AWAY)

b) You called preflop with a small pair JJ or smaller usually.

You have trips or overpair?
ALL IN
You havent
CHECK/FOLD.
(You may call if you have an open ended straight draw here, but only if you have another rebuy and only if all the flop cards are different suits (rainbow))

5. THE TURN

Usually you will have no cards, or no chips at this point (If you have no chips and have followed my rules, you should be about to double through)
If however you have been allowed to get this far, and there is only one other person in the pot, you are now allowed to bluff (assuming your hand hasnt improved...if it has ALL IN)
You can bluff now (ALL IN) if you have:
Ace King
2nd highest pair (IE you have 88 and the board is Q752)
The reason is: You are probably not bluffing.
If they have trap checked you, then they are morons, it's your first tournament, you should be expected to do nothing tricky.
Remember, you have a couple of rebuys for a reason.

6. THE RIVER.

Well, you got to the river, so you have AJ, AQ or a little tiny pair.
You must check this.
IF you have a little tiny pair, and they make a little tiny bet, you can call, otherwise you are going to have to let them bluff you.
This is okay, they will pay you in your next tournaments, and you still have most of your chips anyway.

7. AFTER THE REBUYS.

Okay, now it gets tricky, you have got through the rebuys, and hopefully doubled your stack.
You are on your own.
When the blinds go up, dont flat call, raise with hands you think are good.
It's your first tourney, telling you too much now will be a waste...
come back, tell us what happened, and read my next article.
You will have gained experience and have taken the first step towards being a winning player.
One note. If you find yourself in the final and a deal is offered, rate the deal out of ten.
If it scores three or more, it is probably a deal you should take, newbies ALWAYS think they are being ripped off in deals, sometimes they are, but getting something from your first tourney is a feat...and just 'cos you have a big stack, you are not a world beater yet.

8... AFTER THE TOURNAMENT

Write down any hands you found interesting, don't worry if you think we won't find them interesting, POST THEM.
Write down funny things other people did, anything that you didn't understand, POST THEM TOO.
You think you might look silly? Well, you probably will, but it will cost you a lot more money if you don't ask questions, we have all done very silly things. POST ALL QUESTIONS, you haven't done anything we haven't seen before, believe me.
You ignored a rule and made your own play? Well it's your money!! POST what you did and why, and I'll let you know if you did the right thing (If I can )
Don't be biased by what result happened in the pot, if you won a pot or lost a pot, if it was interesting, let us know.
You will sometimes play perfectly and get thrashed, and sometimes play like a moron and win, thats poker.

GOOD LUCK,

Lorinda