^{The Complete Guide to Online Poker Tournaments}

Whether to experience the thrill or to make a name professionally, the world of online casino does have lots of temptation to win a high-stakes poker tournament. Success in any poker tournament is not completely dependent on your chance but is a result of elaborately evolved strategy planned for every stage of the competition. Adopting the right approach will go miles in enhancing your possibility of reaching the final table and eventually securing the championship.

This comprehensive guide goes deep into three of the crucial stages any online poker tournament would present one with and provides a step-by-step strategy to manage each stage effectively in the competitive world of online poker.

The Three Stages of Online Poker Tournaments

Early-Stage Strategy

Early in an online poker tournament, the field is always full of participants with relatively small stacks of chips. The early part of any large online poker tournament is always filled with a number of players still getting familiar with nuances in optimal poker strategy or committing other more serious blunders. You will also often find somewhat less experienced players overplaying their hands or making suboptimum decisions.

What is necessary is an approach early on that's real tight but opportunistic at the same time. This way, with a strong hand, the raise should be something in the order of 3x to 4x of the big blind to ensure a build-up in stack that is small without being susceptible to excessive risk. Patience here is very important since it is best to wait for premium hands such as high pairs or strong suited connectors in order to maximize your bet value. Therefore, this stage does not invite bold moves, so avoid getting into unnecessary conflicts or high-risk plays.

Observe player tendencies also and play accordingly. Suppose you observe that opponents overvalue their hands by calling pre-flop with marginal hands or overbetting with pretty marginal hands. Notice these and apply them to chip accumulation much better.

Middle-Stage Strategy

Once the tournament draws closer or has just passed its halfway mark, the numbers get reduced and the chip stacks become uneven. Some will be sitting on big stacks, while others will have a marginal stack. This is the stage requiring subtle changes to strategy based on your chip position and table dynamics.

If you are lucky enough to have a big stack, you must utilize your chip advantage to pressure the smaller stacks. Employ mini-raises with aggressive playing in order to make decisions difficult for your opponents and build your stack with as little risk as possible. Contrarily, if you are among those surviving small stacks, just conserve your chips and wait for good opportunities to double up. In particular, watch out for the shorter stacks who go all-in; they most likely have a strong hand, and this is their one last desperate heave to try and stay in the competition.

Think about the table dynamics. If you are at a table with more conservative players, then this is the time you can use to your advantage by employing certain strategic plays that will put them out of their comfort zone.

Late-Stage Strategy

The late stage of an online poker tournament consists of two important stages, mainly the bubble and the money stage.

The Bubble Stage

This is a very important stage of the tournament and usually happens just before the players reach payout. A lot of the players with more mediocre stacks will start to tighten up, trying to avoid elimination before payout. Because of this, you can often exploit their conservativeness and chip up on them. Players do not like to risk their tournament lives. Apply pressure to create opportunities in your favor when they are in weaker positions.

The Money Stage

When the players make it into the pay, the table dynamics completely change. Gone are concerns about merely surviving the bubble; thus, players will now be much looser and more apt to gamble. In this stage of the game, you want to make the proper adjustments in order to exploit the now highly volatile table. You still want to play tight and continue to wait for your premium hands to maximize your gain.

During the late stage, your stack size means everything. The bigger you are, the more you can pressurize others, and take over the game flow. However, there isn't a general strategy for this stage that works for everyone; it's everything about observing what happens during the tournament and adjusting your strategy to learn from what other people are doing.

Integrating Online Casino Strategies

It is very important to tune poker strategies in a broader context of online casinos. The mechanic of various casino games, knowing various casino games and odds, will make a person aware of the better risk vs. reward that he/she is putting into poker playing. For example, learning how to calculate the pot odds and expected value will dramatically enhance your decision-making in a poker tournament.

Most online poker sites are part of a larger casino, offering a variety of promotional and bonus opportunities. Use them

Conclusion

The fact that making any online poker final table is an accomplishment, yet you also have to feel that by doing so you have knocked out just about everyone else. But the huge difference in prize money between first place and the first person to be knocked off the final table makes the need for a more subtle approach quite apparent.

Of course, your success will very much depend on the nature of the tournament and the size of your stack versus how many better players you face. Make fewer stupid decisions; play tight if you must, and wait patiently for premium hands-you'll be able to rake in far more that way. Moreover, constant self-analysis of your gaming performance, capitalizing on online casino promotions, and learning from successes and failures will further strengthen your strategic skills and, therefore, take you closer to that coveted top spot.