My first Day at Empire

So basically my story goes that I started Stars at the micro limit no limit games and worked my way to the 25-dollar tables. I steadily increased my bankroll to $600 and then moved 500 of it to Empire to take advantage of their bonus and play at what I thought would be an a more profitable site. Well I'm not sure if it is yet. I started at 500 and I'm currently at 501.48 after playing 2 and 3 tables for about 3.5 hours.

The games are totally different at party poker than they are at stars. I think the greatest difference between the two results from the difference in the blinds. At Poker stars the blinds are .1/.25 with a 25 dollar stack. At Party poker the blinds are .25/.5 with a 25 dollar stack. This may not seem like a big difference but it results in a totally different game. At stars the game is all about camping out and waiting for monster hands to finally take a big portion of someone’s stack. Everybody tries to sneak in with just about every hand they can because of the extra implied odds that are offered with the reduced blinds and a great deal of the pots end up being won with straits and flushes from people that snuck in with Kxs. or 78 offsuit. The majority of the time the pots are small and people are just waiting for their flush to get a big pot. Its dangerous to bet with semi-big cards in this environment because everyone is on a draw and they all have implied odds against you.

Anyway my first day at party was an eye opener. The game is totally different. No longer are the majority of the pots unraised or baby raised. Most of the pots are raised by big hands and there are less drawing hands to see the flop, hoping to steal it with a weak flush. Instead big cards actually rule this game. They raise big and the 4xbb raise which is worth 2 dollars actually scares people out of the pot and you don’t see as many people with K4s winning pots. The pots end up being bigger as well. At stars you would constantly see people winning 2 dollar and 3 dollar pots with the occasional huge pot taken down usually by a flush or sometimes a fullhouse. At party the pots are very often big with people quite often loosing their whole stack on one hand. If it goes to the river somebody often ends up all in.

So anyway my point is this. I try to adjust my play quickly to the different situations that come up. At stars I was constantly changing the size of bets pre and post flop depending on the situation. At party I found myself throwing out a standard 4xbb pre-flop and betting pot-sized almost every time I think I have the best of it. I am also playing tighter because I don't want to end up throwing away fifty cents with on K10 or calling another 1.50. I am thinking that in this type of game I am going to make most of my money from big cards instead of waiting around for that super flush pot. Am I acting and thinking correctly?

And another thing. A great deal of the pots end up being raised so I am wondering if it is worth it to call in early position with small and medium pocket pairs because I will have to just toss most of them when it is raised preflop or pay 4xbb to see the flop.