Are freerolls really worth it?

[aorodrigo]

First thing you may answer is: "of course, they are free", but what about wasting time, your stress?
Yesterday I've lost: AK x A3 / KQ x 98 / TT x 87s / AQ x 38 (all preflop)

Again, you may say "of course, it's a thing called variance"
But I desagree. Of course variance exists and we should deal with it, but no where in the world a player would call an all in (over 20~30bbs) with A3 or 38. That really piss me off!!

Here's my graph that says that I mainly play freerolls, Yeah, it's only "for fun",but thinks really stress me out.
Paying a USD2,00, even if is an insignificant ammount, would chance things?

 

[pavel1111111]

in my opinion any freeroll is well receive , especially with money prizes , not tickets ..so wher do i play

 

[MK_]

Well no a 2 dollar game wouldn't really change things too much,

...but why not play a few games with the money you win playing

freerolls and branch out a little😎👍

 

[bullishwwd]

Yes, Freerolls are worth it, at least for me. But, one should take into consideration that they are just that, "freerolls" which "cost no money" to enter and play. Thus, all players will play them quite differently (usually...at least I do) compared to League play, cash games, MTTs, Single table SnGs, etc that they invest money into to play.

Being a "freeroll", many players will take ""unnecessary risk"" they would not ordinarily take in a poker game where they have actually invested their own money. For example, the going "all-in" prior to seeing a flop with hole cards like AK, KQ, TT, AQ much less "calling" the all-in with A3, 98, 87, 38. I do not see "much difference" between your playing (pre-flop) with those cards and your opponent's calling your "all-in" with his cards. Neither should have been played!

"First thing you may answer is: "of course, they are free", but what about wasting time, your stress?
Yesterday I've lost: AK x A3 / KQ x 98 / TT x 87s / AQ x 38 (all preflop)"

Observationally and generally speaking, I have noticed that players from some specific countries will tend to play quite differently than the average or normal, whether in a freeroll or in other type poker games. Thus, some general "playing tendencies" can usually be discerned from the player's country of origin, especially TAG or LAG playing.

My best, Wally

 

[Leandro6803]

The variance in freerolls is greater because players call with more speculative hands and end up getting it right, and it's difficult to realize this at first for those who are still learning to play.

 

[Suns of Beaches]

You want others to play bad against you. Yes between a $2 tournament and a freeroll, especially a public freeroll is a difference.

 

[Flyer35]

I think freerolls can teach us that it makes very little sense to play most hands all-in pre-flop. I say 'can' teach us because as with most things in life we have to actually be willing to learn.

The examples cited above prove this. And there are many, many, many more.

There are no serious books and no serious courses about poker that advocate playing all-in as the go-to default tournament style. So where do we pick up this very bad habit? The poker sites generally encourage it with their blind structures. They want amateur players to see poker as pure gambling rather than a serious skill based activity. Freerolls and low stakes tournaments almost always have higher blinds and shorter blind intervals. I don't know if they still do it but pokerstars used to have 'school' titled games with atrocious blind structures that taught the exact opposite of what a poker 'school' should teach.

As the buy-ins go up the blind structures become more conducive to playing more seriously. We here at Cardschat are lucky because the blind structures of the Replay Poker freerolls are reasonable.

 

[Propane Goat]

If you're looking for entertainment and some poker practice, then freerolls can be worthwhile. If you're looking at them solely for the money then they're a waste of time - I can make more per hour picking up cans on the side of the road for recycling and get some exercise on top of that.

 

[pentazepam]

The good thing with freerolls is that you can do other things on the computer, and you don't have to feel bad if you don't put 100% concentration into the game.

I probably play my C- or D-game when playing a freeroll, just because my focus can be elsewhere a big part of the time.

 

[fundiver199]

It depends on your goals and also on the freeroll, since some have a better structure and price pool than others. In general the best freerolls are those, where you need to earn an entry by completing challenges, making a deposit etc. The CC platinum freerolls are also fine, especially those, that are still left on real money poker sites. But in general I agree, that freerolls are a waste of time.

For someone completely new to the game any practice is good. But if you have ambitions to become a winning player, you need to get into regular games as soon as possible and spend most of your time there. This forum is full of people, who played for several years and are still stuck in freerolls putting in like 90% of their volume their. And this is not, where you want to find yourself, if you are serious about online poker.

 

[Pokerpoet2]

Is "Coarse Fishing" really worth it? You spend all day looking at a Tiny Float bobbing in the water, catching the occasional fish, that you put in a keep net, then weigh them at the end of the day just to throw them all back?
Of Course it's worth it to the Anglers that love to fish, They will spend a small fortune on Equipment and bait, along with License Fees, So they can sit for hours catching fish they are going to release.
It is no different than wasting your time playing Freerolls, But! Is It? Wasting your time if you love the game of Poker,
If your only motivation is to make money, then yes you are wasting time playing Freeroll's, But many players love them because they can play for hours, a game they enjoy, and it doesn't cost them a small fortune to do it.
Not everyone is playing On-line Poker to make Money, Many play simply because they get pleasure from it, I can buy-in to a game in a Casino and play my Heart out trying to win big, but I still play the odd game on-line for free because it's there, it's Free and I get the same amount of pleasure from it as I do in a Casino.
So to the Question "Are Freerolls Worth it?" I would have to answer "YES!"

 

[AzdajaD]

Hmm, yes, they are, especially CC games - you can learn so much (we have some great players, not all of them...😄 ), it's not big field with so many players, you can see how everyone is playing, learn something/laugh sometimes...that's a + 😉

 

[fundiver199]

Is "Coarse Fishing" really worth it? You spend all day looking at a Tiny Float bobbing in the water, catching the occasional fish, that you put in a keep net, then weigh them at the end of the day just to throw them all back? Of Course it's worth it to the Anglers that love to fish, They will spend a small fortune on Equipment and bait, along with License Fees, So they can sit for hours catching fish they are going to release.

But maybe they would prefer to do coarse fishing in a place, that have many fish as opposed to one, where the average catch is like once in a week? And its the same with online poker, because time spend in a freeroll could alternatively have been spend on a game, which would be more fun to play. Can you think of anything else in life, where the cheapest option is also the best? Not really right? So why be a cheap-skate, when it comes to poker?

 

[Huntre]

If you have more opportunities to play is it good? If no freeroll, i think we meet a situation then amount of players will go down or i make big mistake, because i don't have all required data...

 

[ROYALROAD]

Whether you value freerolls or not depends entirely on your perspective. You can think of them as a way to practice high stakes cash games for free...

 

[hilary antonik filho]

90% I play the freerolls, what's left, I divide it into money and the tickets I have, the important thing in freerolls is patience, good luck

 

[MishkaZL]

I assure you, there are such players in almost all tournaments. It's just that there are a lot of them in freerolls, and there are also a lot of them in tournaments with buy-ins up to $5. If you think that you will play in tournaments with $2 buy-in and there will be no such players, then I assure you that you are mistaken, they will be there. There won't be so many of them, but they will still be there

 

[Igor G]

First thing you may answer is: "of course, they are free", but what about wasting time, your stress?
Yesterday I've lost: AK x A3 / KQ x 98 / TT x 87s / AQ x 38 (all preflop)

Again, you may say "of course, it's a thing called variance"
But I desagree. Of course variance exists and we should deal with it, but no where in the world a player would call an all in (over 20~30bbs) with A3 or 38. That really piss me off!!

Here's my graph that says that I mainly play freerolls, Yeah, it's only "for fun",but thinks really stress me out.
Paying a USD2,00, even if is an insignificant ammount, would chance things?

View attachment 364760

For me, poker is entertainment and an opportunity to earn extra income. I see freerolls solely as a chance to increase my bankroll, and that's why I play freerolls whenever I have free time. I'm not going to become a professional thanks to freerolls, but I never miss an opportunity to earn at least a little money. An important clarification: if I have time for freerolls, I also play 2-3 more tables in other tournaments that I consider promising based on my bankroll.

 

[mr.fers_one]

First thing you may answer is: "of course, they are free", but what about wasting time, your stress?
Yesterday I've lost: AK x A3 / KQ x 98 / TT x 87s / AQ x 38 (all preflop)

Again, you may say "of course, it's a thing called variance"
But I desagree. Of course variance exists and we should deal with it, but no where in the world a player would call an all in (over 20~30bbs) with A3 or 38. That really piss me off!!

Here's my graph that says that I mainly play freerolls, Yeah, it's only "for fun",but thinks really stress me out.
Paying a USD2,00, even if is an insignificant ammount, would chance things?

View attachment 364760

It's a freeroll, I found something to be upset about... you played poker and didn't lose anything, since your buy-in was 0 ... you'll win, be happy, you lost, well, it's okay, because you didn't lose anything in money))

 

[makisaa]

Freerolls are good to make a start. If you have deposited a few money, freerolls can be a valuable repair of your bankroll or why not to build or rebuild a bankroll.

 

[puzzlefish]

Getting to the point where playing poker doesn't stress you out, no matter what the boards end up being, is a mental game goal. Once you get there, you'll see freerolls are just a simple way of trying to win something from nothing. They just require some slight adjustments from games that have something at stake.

 

[fundiver199]

Getting to the point where playing poker doesn't stress you out, no matter what the boards end up being, is a mental game goal.

And not only for freerolls I might add. Avoiding bad beats is never a good reason to move up, because they are part of the game. And in general its also not a good reason to move up, that you want to avoid bad players. But with that being said there are times, where it might be more enjoyable to play against slightly better players, who care a bit more about not losing.

If for instance people regularly just ship it in with 50BB preflop, that does take away the option for everyone else to play a more normal game, where they get to see some flops, turns and river and make more complex decisions. And this is why, it might be more enjoyable as well as more educational to play for instance a $5 tournament rather than a freeroll, even if your main goal is not to make money. Plus the fact that the excitement of potentially winning $300 from a $5 investment is arguable larger for most people than the excitement of potentially winning $10 from a $0 investment.

Or lets put it this way. If you were very rich and did not need any more money but really enjoyed poker for the competitive element, would you go to Las Vegas and play the wsop main event, or would you play online freerolls? Or if you did not have time to go to Las Vegas, would you play freerolls, or would you play tournaments like Sunday Million on PokerStars, or Venom on ACR? Lets be honest now and admit, that the main reason, people play freerolls or microstakes games "for fun", is because, they cant afford more expensive games

 

[TeUnit]

I think they can be useful for learning and they can be a great way to help fill your monitor/s, and if you get too many games going and want to focus on the buyins you can just close the freeroll/s.

 

[Ogma]

We're privileged to have them here. At lot of us would soon miss them when they are gone.

Very time consuming, yes, but decent practice against an eclectic mix of some good players and some clowns.

 

[pentazepam]

We're privileged to have them here. At lot of us would soon miss them when they are gone.

Very time consuming, yes, but decent practice against an eclectic mix of some good players and some clowns.

And what category are you in?