This is the reason many decent players avoid re-buy tournaments due to the obvious likelihood that their solid game is at some stage going to be busted by an inferior players utter stupidity. Yet it is these same decent players that go sitting at a cash table wanting to play these fish! Nobody with any sense wants to jump on a cash table full of players with the same ability and style as theirselves or the only winner is the rake. So players hunt out tables with loose fish and want them to be calling down pocket aces with pocket 2′s.

I have found through my time of playing MTT’s that re-buys are often the most bang for the buck due to the fact many carry a guarantee and good players steer clear of them! I will happily pit my wits against a bunch of blithering idiots that want to play 27os allin on the 1st hand. The fish to solid ratio is well over 5-1 from experience and I am sure most of you cash players would be happy to sit at the table with only one other player of equal ability and 8 muppeteers!

Here are some tips in my basic strategy that I have followed in my pursuit of re-buy glory.

1. Enter the game with an upbeat frame of mind and expect to lose a hand or 2. If you are expecting to lose, you will find yourself laughing rather than tilting when your aces are cracked by 45 suited.
2. Do not be tempted to play hands you normally wouldn’t just because the play is looser. You should not join the feast!
3. Play only premium hands for the rebuy period unless you have amounted a solid stack and can start pushing your weight around!
4. If you find you have not played a single hand in the first hour it is far from a bad thing as most of the fish are starting to ween out. The blinds have been low so you haven’t lost too much of your stack plus you can easily purchase an add-on to boost your chips.
5. And the final rule of thumb is to never re-buy past the final cash spot. If 10th spot is worth $20 you do not want to spend $30 rebuying!

Hopefully this has helped you to understand the re-buy format a bit better and the possibilities of financial reward should you be willing to put in the time and take the beats in a positive manner! Good luck with it all and happy pokering!

Ali-G is a walking book of knowledge when it comes to poker sites, forums, and freerolls. He knows the ins and outs of what is occuring in the world of online poker, and is happy to share his secrets.

You have already made mistake number one by downloading and depositing at a room you have no idea is right for you. The best way to find an ideal poker room is by leaving this decision until last. First, there are many factors that need to be taken into account in order to give you the best chance at being profitable which we will now analyze.

First, you need to know what variant of poker is best suited to you! Some of the most popular games include Texas Hold Em, Omaha, 7 Card Stud, 5 Card Stud, 5 Card Draw and Razz. Some of these games also have twists on themselves like hi/lo formats which need to be considered! Different people will play different variants better than others and other variants worse. It is up to you to find which of the variants best suits your play and also entertains you. It is important you find a game that you won’t tire of in 30 minutes.

Once you have selected your game your next step is to decide upon your preferred betting structure. No Limit is possibly the most enticing as it involves the greater risk and allows you to bet at your pleasure. Pot Limit has a maximum bet depending on the chips bet and can make those bad calls less painful while still offering juicy pot sizes! Fixed Limit is the safest way to bet as you know every hand the maximum amount you have to put into any pot!

Now we have our game and our bet type selected we move on to blind levels. Most sites will offer you tables with blinds as low as 1 and 2 cents and max out in the hundreds somewhere. The most important factor when selecting your blind level is to play an amount your comfortable with and an amount your balance can handle. If you have a fear of losing then I would say your playing too high a level!

With blinds out the way we move onto table sizes. Some games will come with a standard table size only, others will give you the option of full-ring, usually 9-10 player tables or half-ring, 5-6 player tables. Full-ring tables are best suited to the more patient players that will wait out for premium hands. Half-ring allows the less patient players to see more hands as it moves a lot quicker and with less players it’s less likely you will need an absolute monster to take down a pot.

We have now decided exactly what we are going to play and are able to move onto site selection. In this instance let’s say our player has chosen he wants to play 5 card Draw at Pot Limit on 10 and 20 cent blind levels which has a fixed table size. We need a site that has 5 card Draw in it’s software. Once we have that we need to know what time of day we are most likely to be playing. Chose a site where there are plenty of players online at our selected timeslot. We now need to know that of the 4,000 players online, enough of them are playing 5 card Draw at PL and on our blind level that we will get a game. Finally we are ready to download the site, make our deposit and begin our online experience! Happy Pokering!

Ali-G is a walking book of knowledge when it comes to poker sites, forums, and freerolls. He knows the ins and outs of what is occuring in the world of online poker, and is happy to share his secrets.