Real Money Poker: Tournaments vs. Cash Games
Playing online poker for real money presents two major opportunities for poker fans – the chance to play poker tournaments, and the option to play cash games. While the majority of online poker players will revert from tournament to cash game play, it is important to know which is better suited to your style of online poker play.
Simply hopping back and forth from one tournament type to the next, one variable limit/stakes of cash games to the next, isn’t the ideal way to play winning poker. Unfortunately, this is what a lot of the less experienced online poker players do. Finding your niche and sticking to it is the best way to ensure a positive ROI (rate of investment).
Online Poker Tournaments
There two major types of online poker tournaments – Sit’n’Go tournaments (SNGs) and Multi-Table tournaments (MTTs).
SNG are shorter and involve less players, but the prize pool is only as high as the buy-in + number of players, therefore lower than an MTT. SNGs can be single-table or multi-table events. A single-table SNG will have only 9 or 10 players in the mix, and don’t usually last more than an hour or two, sometimes much shorter depending on the level of competition.
MTT can have hundreds or thousands of players, last for hours (if not days), but offer a massive prize pool in relation to your actual cost of entry. MTT poker tournaments aren’t for everyone. The fact is, more often than not, you’ll be competing against a lot more players, and your patience will be tested time and again due to the extensive time frame of MTT online poker tournaments.
With the right poker strategy and plenty of time on your hands, online poker tournaments can have an awesome payout, especially the MTTs. If you find poker tournaments to be easier than cash games, but don’t have a great deal of time, SNGs are the better route. They start up instantly, as soon as enough players are registered. MTTs run on a schedule, with open registration up until the start time.
Online Poker Cash Games
Cash games are the most intense way to play online poker. The amount of money you spend is your choice. There is a mi minimum and maximum buy-in for every table, defined by the size of the blind bets, but as long as you bring an amount within the min/max limit, you the bankroll size is up to you.
Unlike a tournament, once you’ve scooped a large pot, you have the option of walking away from the table with your winnings. Cash games can be extremely lucrative for online poker players with the discipline to wait for a solid starting hand, conserving their chips for the right moment to cash in big. You could bring $50 to the table and fold every hand for the next half hour, spending only $5 or so in blind bets over that time period; but when the cards finally fall in your favor, a little psychology and a good poker strategy could multiply your $50 bankroll several times over in a single hand!
Tournaments vs. Cash Games
The choice is yours – tournaments or cash games. If you’re not sure which would suit you the best try your hand at both and see how it goes. Your final decision should be based on which one nets the most profit.
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