MTT trainer- Not able to make it to final table- Hardest level

azlanjp

Hi,

I have been practicing with the MTT trainer choosing “Online Million” and skill level “Hardest” for months now. I have made it to “In the money” multiple times but never made it to the final table. This worries me as I am not able to beat the bots. So, it makes me question my skills. Are there other members in this forum who consistently made it to final tables at the hardest level? Also, is the Hardest level a true reflection of the general poker field?Is it a realistic goal or should I use some other setting which is more realistic. The bots always seems to drastically adapt to my playing style at different stages.

Any suggestions or inputs would be appreciated.

Thanks

monkeysystem

If you're playing against 5,000 players your average expectation for making it to the final table is one in 5000 / 9 = once in 555 times. If you play once a day, that's once in over a year-and-a-half.

Many of the pros recommend you avoid min cashes and take the risks needed to make it that far. The Online Million on APT pays down 450 places, only the top 9%. If you're min cashing more than once in 11 times but never progressing much beyond that, you may need an adjustment to your game.

There are as many approaches to this as there are coaches/writers. But generally you need to take chances. In a large tournament with a slow structure you can start things off on the tight side. Or you can play loose and see lots of flops in the very early levels with emphasis on large implied odds situations. But you can't nit your way to the final table in a large tournament. Also try the Kenna James combat scenarios for bubble play here on APT.

azlanjp

Thanks for the detailed response @monkeysystem. This is very helpful.

Does the stats listed above vary depending on the difficulty level of the trainer- easy/medium/hard/hardest?

What is your experience against different levels? What do you think is the ideal setting which reflects the skill level of the average poker field.

Thanks

monkeysystem

@azlanjp the stats I gave are just hard numbers taken from the format of the tournament. They don't change based on the difficulty level.

I play a lot of the daily casino tournament, with adjustments to the parameters to make it more similar to the live small-stakes games I play. I play at both the intermediate and hardest levels. I've dabbled in the bigger formats in the APT simulator, but not enough to have a meaningful sample size. I've normally gotten fairly deep, but always either get coolered or just quit because I have to go mow the lawn or something. In my one experience in a mid-stakes tournament I made it to day 2 with about half the average stack and didn't get to the money.

At the intermediate level the players have leaks in their games that you can detect and exploit. Their play is much better than the kitchen poker found at the easy level. The intermediate level represents a lot of the poker found at a casino playing small stakes tournaments.

At the hardest level the players play much closer to GTO poker. They have solid starting ranges and use good frequencies postflop. They play like some of the players I run into, who are practicing in my small stakes events in the Midwest.

The hand linked below is an example of something you might play differently at the intermediate level and at the hardest level. While the way I played the hand preflop and flop is debatable, with this runout V has to make a really deep dive to find enough bluffs to keep his frequencies healthy. Playing at the intermediate level, I made the exploitative fold here, believing that he likely had the goods. Typical small-stakes players don't bluff often enough here. This is where they check back when they don't have it. At the hardest level it would've been a tougher fold because of the preponderance of Ace-highs in his range.

https://advancedpokertraining.com/poker/game.php?replay_id=173978&advisor_id=-1