subject: Choosing The Poker Game That's Right For You [print this page] There are a ton of poker formats, and for a new player it can be tough to decide what format is the best fit for the, Here are a few key personality traits that you can use to help determine what particular format of poker (cash, tournament, SNG) is likely to work best for you.
Patience: If you're a twitchy person who finds it difficult to sit still for more than a few minutes, then cash games are probably for you. There's a steadier flow of action at cash games than at tournaments or SNGs, and they have the added advantage of allowing you to exit whenever you see fit a great feature for the focus-challenged.
Multi-tasking: If you feel very comfortable with multi-tasking, you might be better suited to a career in tournaments or sit and goes. Especially SNGs most people agree that the only way to make a living playing them is to play a disgusting amount of volume, something your multi-tasking skills will allow you to do. Sure, many people play multiple tables of cash as well, but it's not as essential to profitability as multi-tasking is for SNGs and MTTs.
Emotional stability: If you're a person with a hair-trigger temper, you might want to consider avoiding poker altogether it's a brutally frustrating game at points. If you decline my advice, then at least consider only playing cash games. The downside of tournaments is that you can't just walk away whenever you want well, you can, but you're wasting your buy in by doing so. With cash games, if you find your temper getting too hot, you can easily walk away, take a break or abandon the game entirely until you're feeling more stable. Doing that regularly in tournaments will put you at a serious disadvantage.
Tolerance for loss: Some people can handle violent swings in fortune, and some can't. If you don't like watching your bankroll drop and grow minute by minute, then you should avoid cash games, because that's what's going to happen. At least with tournaments, your entire risk is well-defined (and limited) as soon as you enter it's your buy in, and no matter how bad or well you play, no matter how lucky or unfortunate you happen to be, it doesn't matter that buyin is still the most that you're going to lose. If that sounds like a comforting fact to you, then you might be better suited to tournaments and SNGs than cash games.
Not all poker games are created equal at least not from the individuals point of view. It's important to think about not only the person you are (and to do so honestly) but to also think about how those characteristics are going to interact with the inherent nature of the game you're considering playing. By giving this matter some thought before you begin to play, you can save yourself a whole lot of time and money learning the lesson the expensive way.
