Learn the Differences in Poker Tournaments: Live Poker & Online Poker

Learn the Differences in Poker Tournaments: Live Poker & Online Poker

Playing live poker tournaments are incomparable to playing online.  For exclusive online players, there are a lot of differences between the two types of tournaments apart from the fact that one is done in the comfort of your own home, while the other is done face-to-face with your opponent.

Structures in live tournaments are more difficult in live tournaments compared to those online.  Live tournaments tend to have longer blind levels and chip stacks start larger compared to its online counterpart.  Casino tournaments, much to some people’s disappointment, are not as skill-dependent as they thought it would be because of the blind jumps and hands per hour.

Differences in Tournament Structures


Typical in casino tournaments, blinds increase faster than the chips you hold compared to the online tournaments.  The blinds, for example, would start off at 25/50 where the big blind would jump to 2,000 once you reach Level 10.  This is a high 13% jump on the blinds.  For this tournament, levels are played at 25 minutes each and start off with 15,000 chips.

Online, taking Full Tilt Poker’s $750,000 Guaranteed weekly tournament, blind levels last for 12 minutes and chips start off at 5,000 chips.  Here, Level 10 rise by 4% of the starting chip stack equivalent to 200.

Casino live games differ from one to the other, some even have lower starting chips and shorter play time on blind levels, but still increase blinds exponentially.  An example of this is the Imperial Palace in Las Vegas where the starting stack is at 4,500 chips (or 3,000 if you don’t avail of the rebuy option).  Each level is played at 15 minutes, where each level increase blinds.  In this particular tournament, Level 10 reaches up to 8,000.  The optional 2,000 chips amount insignificantly compared to the three big blinds.

What makes it even harder is that in live poker, fewer hands are dealt per hour compared to the online version.  For online games, the hands are faster, probably more than twice as much as that of the live version.

The Matter of Style


Poker being poker, players from live games tend to take more precaution and want to make the most of their game early on.  Their goal has more to do with how long they will be able to stay on the game and how far they will be able to keep their money than winning the game outright.

Compared to the live tournaments, online tournaments occur faster than the live ones.  People play one game and have another game lined up right after their game finishes.  They don’t worry too much about running out of “chips”.  It is even normal to have large raises online as compared to live tournaments.

Another difficulty in live games is that bluffs don’t happen that often since people tend to pay safe and be tight towards their stack.  It will also be easy to notice that when they raise in live, it only means that they are holding significant cards.  For online players, there is no fear of losing, nor do they have to go home without anything since they are already home, nor would they feel the difficulty of facing other people after losing when they play online.

The Factor of Environment


Online games have a variable environment, but it will definitely be at a place where you are comfortable at.  Basically, the high pressure involved in live games are eliminated.  Live games are often nerve racking.  The live games often involve the five senses.  This means that the live environment elevates all senses adding to the pressure of the game.  Console yourself though because you won’t be the only one who’ll be feeling that way.  Poker is a game to experience, whether live or online, you just have to learn which one works best for you.

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