How To Get Through Long Poker Sessions
Whether you play poker online or in real-life tournaments, we all have experienced trying to sit through a long poker game. Surviving a poker game requires you to know how to play until the end. If you need advice on how to do so other than get enough sleep beforehand, then be sure to read on! This includes general as well as some niche tips you can use in every poker game, beginner or advanced. For online players who want to earn some money, this poker room has zone cash games.
General tips
These are tips that you can and should apply to every stage of every poker game. Even for beginners, these should be helpful for you.
Firstly, since Poker is a game that requires skill and planning, it is helpful to know how to mute the sound around you so you can focus better. A poker tournament especially can be really noisy, but do not let it distract you. The other players are definitely not going to give you mercy if you don’t focus.
Secondly, you should remember that the enemy here is your opponents. Do not allow your emotions to control you such that you deviate away from your strategies. Sun Tzu aptly said in The Art of War, that knowing your enemy and yourself means that you do not have to be afraid of the outcome of your battles.
Thirdly, and this is the most rudimentary, you need to be very familiar with poker. If you don’t know what you’re doing, then you definitely will be eliminated early in the game. If needed, build your experience and play poker online so that you know how to play well.
Next, we’re going to dive into more detailed strategies so you know exactly how to survive and gain an edge over your competitors. They will be listed in chronological order as shown below.
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Pace it out
The game of poker requires skill, psychological game, and using statistics. However, many beginners usually disregard such necessary skills and gamble without thinking. This is a huge mistake because, in the first stage, you need to be conservative and focus on how to survive.
If you know the game is going to be a particularly long one, you should play it safe at the start. Do not make any fancy plays like bluffing or calling if you are not confident in your hand. So fold if you have to in order to survive the game. You need to go easy from the start so you have the energy and capacity to play well throughout the game. At this stage, you should only think of how to stay alive in the game and not to carelessly gamble away your money such that you’re out of the game fast.
The most important thing to note is to never ever go full tilt, especially at the start!
2. Steal the blinds
Now that the game has transitioned into the middle phases, the blinds have to become bigger, and this is where you start playing aggressively. This tactic is more useful when dealing with amateur players since they would have gambled away most of their chips in the beginning while you still have a significant portion of yours.
When you steal the bigger blinds here, you increase your profit and the number of chips needed for the final act. That is the stage where the number of chips is crucial. This middle stage is thus the part where you can earn most of them.
As with every stage and every poker game, you need to get a sense of the situation and strike only when it’s beneficial for you. Otherwise, your opponents could expose your bluff if they catch it. It would be detrimental to lose your chips here as stakes are higher.
One more useful tip you can use is to attack opponents with smaller stacks. They will be less likely to take the chance to call. Likewise, you need to keep a lookout for opponents with more stacks than you. They have more power to call or raise a bet, and that could lead to your loss.
3. Unleash your potential
At this final stage, it is time to go all out. If you are still in the game, then you should be playing to win. This is also where you should be the most active since the remaining players are highly skilled as well. All the plays should be out at this point, like bluffing, calling, raising, and bullying, particularly towards opponents who have lesser chips than you. There is no point holding back and giving mercy since you have the power to do so. With the tips given to you so far, you should have a considerable amount of chips to devour your opponents and steal the win.
As it goes without saying, you still need to play according to the situation, whether your hand is strong and whether the other players could outsmart you or not. Don’t raise a bet if your hand is weak, this will definitely not help you at all. Remember that poker is a psychological game, so do not reveal so much about your playing style. The point here is that out of all the stages, this is the one where you need to be the most aggressive. Don’t be weak and passive, poker is not such a game for that. You should aim to eliminate your opponents so you can take the win.
It is not the time to think about keeping your head afloat in the water. As with a lot of games, this is ride or die in the final moments. After all, you’ve already played till this point and the win is so near!
Conclusion
With all of these general and specific tips in mind, you should be able to survive at least before the final stages and have earned some money. The next thing to do is to take care of your body well. Eat and sleep well and definitely load up on that caffeine intake cause it’s going to be a long night!
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