raise > fold > call
except where fold > raise > call
however in some cases call > raise > fold
but definitely sometimes fold > call > raise
it depends
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Monday, 27 April 2009
Tuesday, 31 March 2009
Calling to Re-Evaluate
Just quit it. Or at least stop misapplying it.
Evaluate: to determine or set the value of;
Re: A prefix added to the start of a word. Indicates "again;"
25NL – 100BB stacks
Hero is dealt Ah Ks on the BTN
Preflop: Unknown UTG calls $0.25, 5 folds, Hero raises to $1.25, 2 folds, UTG calls $1
Flop ($2.85): Ad 9s 4d
UTG checks, Hero bets $2.25, UTG raises to $7, Hero ???
Hero doesn’t know what to do, so he “calls $4.75 to re-evaluate the turn?”
George: Should I call and re-evaluate on this table?
Jerry: What do you need to call and re-evaluate for?
George: Call and re-evaluate is now the number one line in poker.
Jerry: You know why? Because people like to say "call and re-evaluate." "Excuse me, do you want to call and re-evaluate?" "We should call and re-evaluate here." "What? No call to re-evaluate?"
Based on the definitions above, re-evaluating implies that we are going to determine the value of our hand again. This means we would have already thought about the value of our hand at some earlier point.
How do we evaluate our hand?
Step 1
- Put villain on a range.
- Compare our hand (or more accurately, our range) to villain’s range.
- Determine how to maximize value (or minimize loss) against that range.
Step 2
- Figure out how villain’s range will react to your action.
- Decide what you’re going to do based on his anticipated reaction and his range.
You already know what’s going to happen a high percentage of the time in the hand posted above:
Turn ($16.85): x
UTG shoves, Hero???
You’re exactly in the same spot with exactly the same information as you were on the flop. But you went ahead and put money in without a logical reason for doing so – your only plan, if you can call it that – was to fold to a shove because $17 is scarier than $7 and you thought folding the flop was weak. If you’ve played any amount of poker you know that’s what he’s going to do probably 80%+ of the time. That’s not calling to re-evaluate. That’s spew.
Calling to re-evaluate requires that you are going to gain new information that will help you make a better decision after villain’s next action. In the above example, you already had all the information you were going to get. c/r flop = strength/air and lead turn after c/r flop = strength/air. If you cbet and then don’t know what to do when you get raised, you have failed to think through Step 2. If you’re reading this, I assume you at least always think through Step 1.
So how do we use call and re-evaluate effectively? We use it in situations where villain’s future actions will give us information that will help us make better decisions.
25NL – 100BB stacks
Hero is dealt JJ in the BB
Preflop: UTG fish raises to $1, TAG BTN calls $1, Hero calls $0.75
Hero calls because he wants to keep UTG fish in the pot and doesn’t want to play a big pot OOP against BTN who probably has a decently strong range of broadways and PPs with some SCs.
Flop ($3.90): Qh 9s 4d
Hero checks, UTG checks, BTN bets $2.75, Hero re-evaluates turn and calls $2.75, UTG folds
Hero knows that BTN will stab here with 2nd pair, an OESD and overcards based on reads and stats. Hero also knows that BTN will not continue to stab with those hands on the turn and will only bet for value with TPTK+ and check behind everything else. Hero knows that BTN will call down for showdown with good 2nd pair type hands when weakness has been shown and our line looks bluffy.
Hero’s plan is to c/f to any turn bet (non-J of course). If villain checks behind turn, Hero will valuebet/fold the river because 9x/77-88/TT will call along with the Qx hands that beat us.
Notice how hero logically re-evaluates the turn even before he makes the flop call. We all know that betting or raising purely for “information” is a terrible reason to put money in the pot. Calling purely for “information” is far worse.
Any time that you are in a spot where you don't know what to do, "What do I do now?" is not the important question. "What did I forget to think about at a prior point in this hand?" is the important question. If you consistently plan your hands, you can avoid nearly all of these situations where you don't know what to do and put an end to the practice of using poker cliches to justify your actions.
Evaluate: to determine or set the value of;
Re: A prefix added to the start of a word. Indicates "again;"
25NL – 100BB stacks
Hero is dealt Ah Ks on the BTN
Preflop: Unknown UTG calls $0.25, 5 folds, Hero raises to $1.25, 2 folds, UTG calls $1
Flop ($2.85): Ad 9s 4d
UTG checks, Hero bets $2.25, UTG raises to $7, Hero ???
Hero doesn’t know what to do, so he “calls $4.75 to re-evaluate the turn?”
George: Should I call and re-evaluate on this table?
Jerry: What do you need to call and re-evaluate for?
George: Call and re-evaluate is now the number one line in poker.
Jerry: You know why? Because people like to say "call and re-evaluate." "Excuse me, do you want to call and re-evaluate?" "We should call and re-evaluate here." "What? No call to re-evaluate?"
Based on the definitions above, re-evaluating implies that we are going to determine the value of our hand again. This means we would have already thought about the value of our hand at some earlier point.
How do we evaluate our hand?
Step 1
- Put villain on a range.
- Compare our hand (or more accurately, our range) to villain’s range.
- Determine how to maximize value (or minimize loss) against that range.
Step 2
- Figure out how villain’s range will react to your action.
- Decide what you’re going to do based on his anticipated reaction and his range.
You already know what’s going to happen a high percentage of the time in the hand posted above:
Turn ($16.85): x
UTG shoves, Hero???
You’re exactly in the same spot with exactly the same information as you were on the flop. But you went ahead and put money in without a logical reason for doing so – your only plan, if you can call it that – was to fold to a shove because $17 is scarier than $7 and you thought folding the flop was weak. If you’ve played any amount of poker you know that’s what he’s going to do probably 80%+ of the time. That’s not calling to re-evaluate. That’s spew.
Calling to re-evaluate requires that you are going to gain new information that will help you make a better decision after villain’s next action. In the above example, you already had all the information you were going to get. c/r flop = strength/air and lead turn after c/r flop = strength/air. If you cbet and then don’t know what to do when you get raised, you have failed to think through Step 2. If you’re reading this, I assume you at least always think through Step 1.
So how do we use call and re-evaluate effectively? We use it in situations where villain’s future actions will give us information that will help us make better decisions.
25NL – 100BB stacks
Hero is dealt JJ in the BB
Preflop: UTG fish raises to $1, TAG BTN calls $1, Hero calls $0.75
Hero calls because he wants to keep UTG fish in the pot and doesn’t want to play a big pot OOP against BTN who probably has a decently strong range of broadways and PPs with some SCs.
Flop ($3.90): Qh 9s 4d
Hero checks, UTG checks, BTN bets $2.75, Hero re-evaluates turn and calls $2.75, UTG folds
Hero knows that BTN will stab here with 2nd pair, an OESD and overcards based on reads and stats. Hero also knows that BTN will not continue to stab with those hands on the turn and will only bet for value with TPTK+ and check behind everything else. Hero knows that BTN will call down for showdown with good 2nd pair type hands when weakness has been shown and our line looks bluffy.
Hero’s plan is to c/f to any turn bet (non-J of course). If villain checks behind turn, Hero will valuebet/fold the river because 9x/77-88/TT will call along with the Qx hands that beat us.
Notice how hero logically re-evaluates the turn even before he makes the flop call. We all know that betting or raising purely for “information” is a terrible reason to put money in the pot. Calling purely for “information” is far worse.
Any time that you are in a spot where you don't know what to do, "What do I do now?" is not the important question. "What did I forget to think about at a prior point in this hand?" is the important question. If you consistently plan your hands, you can avoid nearly all of these situations where you don't know what to do and put an end to the practice of using poker cliches to justify your actions.
Thursday, 26 March 2009
Home Game Trip Report: Part 2
Final Table
Clockwise around the table:
Blinds: 40/80
Me: 3700
Structure set-up guy: 1300
Weak-Tight Nit: 1200
Agro Reg: 2300
Tilty Host: 700
Loose-Passive Reg: 800
So I decide I'm going to start abusing my stack right off the start. 2 hands in I raise AJs UTG. It folds around to Tilty Host and he sits there looking like he's steamy and ends up shoving. I snap since it's like 450 more and he flips QQ yet again for the 3rd time in 20 minutes. I spike an A and he's quite tilty until he re-spikes a Q on the turn.
Blinds get traded around for a bit until a funny hand comes up:
Folds to Structure Guy on the BTN who limps, Nit folds, and Agro Reg checks the BB.
Flop is 998, Agro Reg checks, Structure Guy checks
Turn is 9988, Agro Reg checks, Strucutre Guy checks
River is 99889, Agro Reg checks, Structure Guy laughs and says "all-in" jokingly while having a Tilly moment.
Agro Reg falls out of his chair laughing as he calls and flips the case 9. gg Structure Guy!
Me and Agro Reg start to chip up and everyone else is just folding and folding. Finally I minraise JJ on the BTN and SB Weak-Tight Nit shoves his last 5 bb in. I call and he flips TT and does not improve.
Tilty Host eventually blinds out with most of his chips going to Loose-Passive Reg and it's down to me, Agro Reg, and Loose-Passive Reg. I start stealing every single time I'm on the BTN. Finally Loose-Passive Reg catches on and starts shoving over my raises 4 times in a row.
So I decide it's time to adjust.
Homegame - 40/80
Hero (BTN) is dealt Ah5d
Hero: 5000
Agro Reg: 3500
Loose-Passive Reg: 1500
Preflop: Hero limps 80, Agro Reg folds, Loose-Passive Reg checks
Flop (200): 2h3c9h
Loose-Passive Reg bets 80, Hero calls 80
Turn (360): 4d
Loose-Passive Reg bets 80, Hero raises to 300, Loose-Passive Reg calls 220
River (960): Td
Loose-Passive Reg checks, Hero bets 1150, Loose-Passive Reg calls 1120 all-in
Loose-Passive Reg shows JJ and says "I didn't know you could use an Ace as a low in a straight!"
HU
Hero: 6500
Agro Reg: 3500
So now Agro Reg wants to win this thing and starts going crazy on me at first. Then I start shoving back and he slows way down and starts folding to all my cbets. His next adjustment is to start floating me and shoving every time I check the turn or bet 1/2 pot.
Homegame - 50/100
Hero is dealt Ac 3c on the BTN
Preflop: Hero raises to 300, Agro Reg calls 200
Flop (600): 2c 9c 7d
Hero bets 300, Agro Reg shoves, Hero has him covered and calls - Agro Reg flips up J6o no club.
Turn: Jd
River: Ts
I say nh.
He continues with this strat and tries to be very tricky:
Homegame - 50/100
Hero 3000
BB 7000
Hero is dealt Ad 8s on the BTN
Preflop: Hero raises to 300, BB calls 200
Flop (600): Ad Ts 9d
Hero bets 250, BB sho--- Hero Hellmuth calls ---ves all-in
BTN shows KK. I say nice hand, very sneaky. He doesn't improve. He feels kind of silly for flatting preflop.
Final hand for the tourney, Agro Reg appears to be getting tired of it since we've been HU for 1/2 an hour. I left the option up to him if he wanted to raise blinds or not once we got HU. He declined to raise blinds for obvious reasons:
Homegame - 50/100
Hero 6500
BTN 3500
Hero is dealt Qd Ts
Preflop: BTN calls 50, Hero checks
Flop (200): As Qs 9s
Hero bets 100, BTN shoves, Hero tanks for 2 minutes and calls - BTN flips up Kd2s
Turn: 2d
River is... a K... of spades!
gg guys. Ship the $80. Unfortunately I missed 3 hours of LAN Halo 3 due to feeling like I should win this thing lol. But they had moved on to NHL '09 which was fun - I haven't played an NHL game since '06. My team managed to win all 3 games including the last which ended in a 15 round shootout. Shootouts are too hard imo.
I loled on my way out of the city while listening to more Krantz and Whitelime at 4am. The slogan on the Thank You for Visiting sign is "It's worth the trip!" Good times!
ty to Tilty Host for providing beverages and an awesome cubed cheese and SlimJim platter! Snap into a SlimJim! Oooohhh Yeaahhhh!
Clockwise around the table:
Blinds: 40/80
Me: 3700
Structure set-up guy: 1300
Weak-Tight Nit: 1200
Agro Reg: 2300
Tilty Host: 700
Loose-Passive Reg: 800
So I decide I'm going to start abusing my stack right off the start. 2 hands in I raise AJs UTG. It folds around to Tilty Host and he sits there looking like he's steamy and ends up shoving. I snap since it's like 450 more and he flips QQ yet again for the 3rd time in 20 minutes. I spike an A and he's quite tilty until he re-spikes a Q on the turn.
Blinds get traded around for a bit until a funny hand comes up:
Folds to Structure Guy on the BTN who limps, Nit folds, and Agro Reg checks the BB.
Flop is 998, Agro Reg checks, Structure Guy checks
Turn is 9988, Agro Reg checks, Strucutre Guy checks
River is 99889, Agro Reg checks, Structure Guy laughs and says "all-in" jokingly while having a Tilly moment.
Agro Reg falls out of his chair laughing as he calls and flips the case 9. gg Structure Guy!
Me and Agro Reg start to chip up and everyone else is just folding and folding. Finally I minraise JJ on the BTN and SB Weak-Tight Nit shoves his last 5 bb in. I call and he flips TT and does not improve.
Tilty Host eventually blinds out with most of his chips going to Loose-Passive Reg and it's down to me, Agro Reg, and Loose-Passive Reg. I start stealing every single time I'm on the BTN. Finally Loose-Passive Reg catches on and starts shoving over my raises 4 times in a row.
So I decide it's time to adjust.
Homegame - 40/80
Hero (BTN) is dealt Ah5d
Hero: 5000
Agro Reg: 3500
Loose-Passive Reg: 1500
Preflop: Hero limps 80, Agro Reg folds, Loose-Passive Reg checks
Flop (200): 2h3c9h
Loose-Passive Reg bets 80, Hero calls 80
Turn (360): 4d
Loose-Passive Reg bets 80, Hero raises to 300, Loose-Passive Reg calls 220
River (960): Td
Loose-Passive Reg checks, Hero bets 1150, Loose-Passive Reg calls 1120 all-in
Loose-Passive Reg shows JJ and says "I didn't know you could use an Ace as a low in a straight!"
HU
Hero: 6500
Agro Reg: 3500
So now Agro Reg wants to win this thing and starts going crazy on me at first. Then I start shoving back and he slows way down and starts folding to all my cbets. His next adjustment is to start floating me and shoving every time I check the turn or bet 1/2 pot.
Homegame - 50/100
Hero is dealt Ac 3c on the BTN
Preflop: Hero raises to 300, Agro Reg calls 200
Flop (600): 2c 9c 7d
Hero bets 300, Agro Reg shoves, Hero has him covered and calls - Agro Reg flips up J6o no club.
Turn: Jd
River: Ts
I say nh.
He continues with this strat and tries to be very tricky:
Homegame - 50/100
Hero 3000
BB 7000
Hero is dealt Ad 8s on the BTN
Preflop: Hero raises to 300, BB calls 200
Flop (600): Ad Ts 9d
Hero bets 250, BB sho--- Hero Hellmuth calls ---ves all-in
BTN shows KK. I say nice hand, very sneaky. He doesn't improve. He feels kind of silly for flatting preflop.
Final hand for the tourney, Agro Reg appears to be getting tired of it since we've been HU for 1/2 an hour. I left the option up to him if he wanted to raise blinds or not once we got HU. He declined to raise blinds for obvious reasons:
Homegame - 50/100
Hero 6500
BTN 3500
Hero is dealt Qd Ts
Preflop: BTN calls 50, Hero checks
Flop (200): As Qs 9s
Hero bets 100, BTN shoves, Hero tanks for 2 minutes and calls - BTN flips up Kd2s
Turn: 2d
River is... a K... of spades!
gg guys. Ship the $80. Unfortunately I missed 3 hours of LAN Halo 3 due to feeling like I should win this thing lol. But they had moved on to NHL '09 which was fun - I haven't played an NHL game since '06. My team managed to win all 3 games including the last which ended in a 15 round shootout. Shootouts are too hard imo.
I loled on my way out of the city while listening to more Krantz and Whitelime at 4am. The slogan on the Thank You for Visiting sign is "It's worth the trip!" Good times!
ty to Tilty Host for providing beverages and an awesome cubed cheese and SlimJim platter! Snap into a SlimJim! Oooohhh Yeaahhhh!
Tuesday, 24 March 2009
Homegame Trip Report: Part 1
We finally got a home game together again. Our regular one hadn’t run in a while since 4/6 regulars moved to another city an hour away last year. So I made the trip over there and we had 10 people show up. This turned out rather nice as we got 2 shorthanded tables going where we normally only have 1.
On the way, I listened to a couple of DC podcasts to break the boredom of miles and miles of snow covered fields and found the interview with Krantz quite interesting. I just signed up there and think it will compliment my Stox subscription quite a bit. Can't go wrong for $29/month amiright?
When I got there I stopped in at their Staples store and picked up a new Acer 23.5" Widescreen LCD which is perfect for multitabling with less overlap and got a nice deal. Everyone else was sold out and I think this was the store display model but, meh, got a good deal at $229. 24" and up are $500+
Had some interesting spots come up in the homegame so I’ll write a report. You all love reading about home games don’t you? =)
General Rules:
A non-reg and I decided on 1000 bb stacks and 5/10 blinds which is much better than the normal 38bb or some odd shortstack number we usually start with after dividing out all the chips in the case and assigning random chip values. Fortunately everyone else thought that NASCAR > figuring out optimal structure this time.
Blinds normally increase whenever we feel like it, but we managed to put in a ½ hour time limit this time, yay this game won’t take 6 hours.
Each table starts with 5 and runs until they are down to 3 people and then waits for the other table, which freezes blinds at that point, to combine. Sort of a shootout I guess.
There’s 1 rebuy allowed until the tables are merged and all rebuys get tacked on to the winner’s payout.
$10 (lol) buyin. $70 / $20 / $10 payouts.
My table:
Out of 10 people total, there is 1 reg that understands the game, and from what I can tell early on, there are 2 non-regs that do as well. As we are getting set up, 2 non-regs request the hand ranking card out of my deck, lol. Both of them are at my table. For some reason after 2 years of home games, no one realizes that I actually play quite a bit and play online. Even when we use my chip set and a deck from Stars or FTP.
So to my left is a nitty weak-tight non-reg that would actually do well at 25NL imo. Next is one of the donks (Donk #1) that requested the hand rankings, he has apparently played 1 time. Next is the other hand ranking donk (Donk #2) that has absolutely no clue. Last to my right is the host, a tilt-prone reg.
Tilty reg, weak-tight nit and myself take on dealer duties obviously.
We try to explain the check/fold/call/bet/raise situations but Donk #1 absolutely can not grasp the fact that he can check and starts firing random sized bets into the pot with anything whenever it’s checked to him. Not so surprisingly this actually works out for him. Plus he starts to river weird 2 pairs in large pots where most of his money went in as a 4:1 dog. Donk #2 continues to call down with 9 high until he runs out of chips.
Donk #1 manages to get the host on tilt fairly easily after A9o no pair no draw rivers an Ace vs host’s QQ.
Very next hand, I pick up KK after running card dead for the first 45 minutes and generally avoiding the gong show of bottom pair call downs.
Homegame – Blinds 10/20
Donk #1 UTG: 1700
Donk #2 CO: 400
Host BTN: 700
HeroSB: 900
Nit BB: 1300
Hero is dealt KK
Preflop: Donk #1 raises to 40, 1 fold, Host shoves 700 all-in, Hero calls 700, 1 fold, Donk #1 folds
Host shows QQ and gets up to go get money for a rebuy before flop is even dealt
A few hands later after Donk #2 has busted out with J high, saying “This game is all luck, this happens every time I play.”:
Homegame – Blinds 20/40
Donk #1 BB: 2100
Host CO: 1000
Hero BTN: 1600
Nit SB: 1300
Hero is dealt Ad 8c
Preflop: 1 fold, Hero raises to 100, 1 fold, Donk #1 calls 60
Flop: As 8s 4s (220)
Donk #1 bets 100, Hero raises to 350, Donk #1 calls 250
Turn: 4d (920)
Donk #1 bets 100, Hero shoves 1150 all-in, Donk #1 calls
River: Tc (3220)
Donk #1 shows AJo, no spade
I busted him a few hands later TT > 99 AIPF and we went to the final table. Someone found a chiprack to help me carry all my chips to the other table. I laughed but said ty.
to be continued in Part 2...
On the way, I listened to a couple of DC podcasts to break the boredom of miles and miles of snow covered fields and found the interview with Krantz quite interesting. I just signed up there and think it will compliment my Stox subscription quite a bit. Can't go wrong for $29/month amiright?
When I got there I stopped in at their Staples store and picked up a new Acer 23.5" Widescreen LCD which is perfect for multitabling with less overlap and got a nice deal. Everyone else was sold out and I think this was the store display model but, meh, got a good deal at $229. 24" and up are $500+
Had some interesting spots come up in the homegame so I’ll write a report. You all love reading about home games don’t you? =)
General Rules:
A non-reg and I decided on 1000 bb stacks and 5/10 blinds which is much better than the normal 38bb or some odd shortstack number we usually start with after dividing out all the chips in the case and assigning random chip values. Fortunately everyone else thought that NASCAR > figuring out optimal structure this time.
Blinds normally increase whenever we feel like it, but we managed to put in a ½ hour time limit this time, yay this game won’t take 6 hours.
Each table starts with 5 and runs until they are down to 3 people and then waits for the other table, which freezes blinds at that point, to combine. Sort of a shootout I guess.
There’s 1 rebuy allowed until the tables are merged and all rebuys get tacked on to the winner’s payout.
$10 (lol) buyin. $70 / $20 / $10 payouts.
My table:
Out of 10 people total, there is 1 reg that understands the game, and from what I can tell early on, there are 2 non-regs that do as well. As we are getting set up, 2 non-regs request the hand ranking card out of my deck, lol. Both of them are at my table. For some reason after 2 years of home games, no one realizes that I actually play quite a bit and play online. Even when we use my chip set and a deck from Stars or FTP.
So to my left is a nitty weak-tight non-reg that would actually do well at 25NL imo. Next is one of the donks (Donk #1) that requested the hand rankings, he has apparently played 1 time. Next is the other hand ranking donk (Donk #2) that has absolutely no clue. Last to my right is the host, a tilt-prone reg.
Tilty reg, weak-tight nit and myself take on dealer duties obviously.
We try to explain the check/fold/call/bet/raise situations but Donk #1 absolutely can not grasp the fact that he can check and starts firing random sized bets into the pot with anything whenever it’s checked to him. Not so surprisingly this actually works out for him. Plus he starts to river weird 2 pairs in large pots where most of his money went in as a 4:1 dog. Donk #2 continues to call down with 9 high until he runs out of chips.
Donk #1 manages to get the host on tilt fairly easily after A9o no pair no draw rivers an Ace vs host’s QQ.
Very next hand, I pick up KK after running card dead for the first 45 minutes and generally avoiding the gong show of bottom pair call downs.
Homegame – Blinds 10/20
Donk #1 UTG: 1700
Donk #2 CO: 400
Host BTN: 700
HeroSB: 900
Nit BB: 1300
Hero is dealt KK
Preflop: Donk #1 raises to 40, 1 fold, Host shoves 700 all-in, Hero calls 700, 1 fold, Donk #1 folds
Host shows QQ and gets up to go get money for a rebuy before flop is even dealt
A few hands later after Donk #2 has busted out with J high, saying “This game is all luck, this happens every time I play.”:
Homegame – Blinds 20/40
Donk #1 BB: 2100
Host CO: 1000
Hero BTN: 1600
Nit SB: 1300
Hero is dealt Ad 8c
Preflop: 1 fold, Hero raises to 100, 1 fold, Donk #1 calls 60
Flop: As 8s 4s (220)
Donk #1 bets 100, Hero raises to 350, Donk #1 calls 250
Turn: 4d (920)
Donk #1 bets 100, Hero shoves 1150 all-in, Donk #1 calls
River: Tc (3220)
Donk #1 shows AJo, no spade
I busted him a few hands later TT > 99 AIPF and we went to the final table. Someone found a chiprack to help me carry all my chips to the other table. I laughed but said ty.
to be continued in Part 2...
Wednesday, 11 March 2009
Back to spewboxing
It's kind of funny how I mention I'm not spewing and then go and do exactly that. I've been running kind of card dead and getting drawn out on a lot the past couple of days. Add the fact that I really haven't had too many opportunities to stack people either with a flop set of 4%.
So I ended up donking off 3 buyins at 100NL yesterday on stupid bluffs and tilt. Running 3 buyins below equity didn't help either. Then I sat out and sat there for about 15 minutes trying to figure out what was going on. I decided that for some reason or another I had gotten back into spew mode and needed something to keep me in line.
So obviously move up to where they respect my raises ldo. That wasn't my reasoning but I did go and sit at 6 200NL tables for about 1/2 an hour to force myself back into playing solid, spew free poker. Guys like threads13 who I was sitting with will put you back in your place pretty quick if you get out of line. I managed to survive the 1/2 hour for a profit of $0.04. =)
So tonight my goal is going to be a solid 2 hours of spew-free poker.
And this game is incredibly addicting. And oddly relaxing. I think it's the music...
Play Games at AddictingGames
So I ended up donking off 3 buyins at 100NL yesterday on stupid bluffs and tilt. Running 3 buyins below equity didn't help either. Then I sat out and sat there for about 15 minutes trying to figure out what was going on. I decided that for some reason or another I had gotten back into spew mode and needed something to keep me in line.
So obviously move up to where they respect my raises ldo. That wasn't my reasoning but I did go and sit at 6 200NL tables for about 1/2 an hour to force myself back into playing solid, spew free poker. Guys like threads13 who I was sitting with will put you back in your place pretty quick if you get out of line. I managed to survive the 1/2 hour for a profit of $0.04. =)
So tonight my goal is going to be a solid 2 hours of spew-free poker.
And this game is incredibly addicting. And oddly relaxing. I think it's the music...
Play Games at AddictingGames
Sunday, 8 March 2009
Continuing to play well
I've been playing pretty decently for the past few weeks now without any major downswings, almost all of it at 50NL and 100NL. I'm keeping my sessions a lot shorter which helps since I've noticed I tend to plateu after about an hour at which point the downswing is inevitable.
Sometimes I'll just close the client, and other times I'll take a 5 minute break and fire up new tables. I think one of my biggest problems is leaving tables once they became unprofitable with too many regs and/or shortstackers. So since I suck at table selection while playing, I just automatically uncheck my blinds on all tables regardless of whether the table is good to stay at or not after an hour. I'm thinking about adding a 2nd monitor where I can keep the lobby open at all times to spot good tables to possibly fix this leak of mine.
And I've been in the non-spew state of mind which plagued me a bit during February and December. I finally thought, "You know what? It's not personal when they 3bet you. It's not personal when they float you. I do it to other people not because I'm trying to tilt them. It's all just strat." And that seems to have gotten me out of the tilty-spewy mode that I sometimes find myself in. Filter your databases to see how profitable just calling river bets and raises is. Then filter to see how profitable calling turn raises is. It's quite an eye opener.
And on a political note, I found this interview quite interesting:
Sometimes I'll just close the client, and other times I'll take a 5 minute break and fire up new tables. I think one of my biggest problems is leaving tables once they became unprofitable with too many regs and/or shortstackers. So since I suck at table selection while playing, I just automatically uncheck my blinds on all tables regardless of whether the table is good to stay at or not after an hour. I'm thinking about adding a 2nd monitor where I can keep the lobby open at all times to spot good tables to possibly fix this leak of mine.
And I've been in the non-spew state of mind which plagued me a bit during February and December. I finally thought, "You know what? It's not personal when they 3bet you. It's not personal when they float you. I do it to other people not because I'm trying to tilt them. It's all just strat." And that seems to have gotten me out of the tilty-spewy mode that I sometimes find myself in. Filter your databases to see how profitable just calling river bets and raises is. Then filter to see how profitable calling turn raises is. It's quite an eye opener.
And on a political note, I found this interview quite interesting:
Friday, 27 February 2009
Month End Heaters Tradition Resumes
Update: I've run pretty decently most of this week. Actually, I shouldn't say that. I've actually played really decently this week despite running what I believe to be average. 18ptBB/100 for the past few days, but super small sample: 20ptBB/100 at 100NL and 17ptBB/100 at 50NL since Tuesday. 8ptBB/100 for the week in total.
Project: I've done a ton of thinking about my game and strat in general and I've been trying out a few things very successfully like adjusting bet sizes more and really really thinking through hands and maximizing against ranges. The less tables I play, the more I can put people on narrower and narrower ranges which is huge for me. So much of this game is counter-intuitive.
The one thing I am definitely working on right now is blind defence. I think this is one of the bigger leaks in my game right now and I'm watching a 10 part series (long yes?) by Ed Miller regarding this topic.
It's probably not the most important thing out there in the micros since there's so much value to be had in other spots that make up for it by far. But my goal for this year is to improve each part of my game wherever I am finding leaks and trying to plug them. There's probably much bigger leaks that I have than giving up blinds to easily, but I've been thinking about this topic and this week it sounds interesting to me, so that's what I'll be working on.
I'm trying to put together a list of skillsets and theoretical topics that are involved in this game. I'm in the process of organizing everything into categories right now and how they inter-relate. Then I can go through them and rate myself on each skillset and figure out how knowledgeable I am about each topic, then pick one and read and watch and study everything I can find regarding that for 1-2 weeks. Then put it into practice, re-rate that skill, and move on to the next.
It gives me a sense of tangible/optical progression, rather than seeing a 1ptBB/100 increase in winrate and thinking, gee, does that mean improvement or am I running good? I won't know for another 50k hands without something tangible to back it up. Build confidence in your game regardless of whether you are running good or bad.
Kind of like leveling up your characters' skillsets in the old SNES RPGs for those that were born in the 80s like me. FF3 (FF6 to you non-N. Americans) FTW. Level 80 Mog is going to kick ass regardless of whether or not he takes some unlucky beats. I want to be a Level 80 Mog.
Project: I've done a ton of thinking about my game and strat in general and I've been trying out a few things very successfully like adjusting bet sizes more and really really thinking through hands and maximizing against ranges. The less tables I play, the more I can put people on narrower and narrower ranges which is huge for me. So much of this game is counter-intuitive.
The one thing I am definitely working on right now is blind defence. I think this is one of the bigger leaks in my game right now and I'm watching a 10 part series (long yes?) by Ed Miller regarding this topic.
It's probably not the most important thing out there in the micros since there's so much value to be had in other spots that make up for it by far. But my goal for this year is to improve each part of my game wherever I am finding leaks and trying to plug them. There's probably much bigger leaks that I have than giving up blinds to easily, but I've been thinking about this topic and this week it sounds interesting to me, so that's what I'll be working on.
I'm trying to put together a list of skillsets and theoretical topics that are involved in this game. I'm in the process of organizing everything into categories right now and how they inter-relate. Then I can go through them and rate myself on each skillset and figure out how knowledgeable I am about each topic, then pick one and read and watch and study everything I can find regarding that for 1-2 weeks. Then put it into practice, re-rate that skill, and move on to the next.
It gives me a sense of tangible/optical progression, rather than seeing a 1ptBB/100 increase in winrate and thinking, gee, does that mean improvement or am I running good? I won't know for another 50k hands without something tangible to back it up. Build confidence in your game regardless of whether you are running good or bad.
Kind of like leveling up your characters' skillsets in the old SNES RPGs for those that were born in the 80s like me. FF3 (FF6 to you non-N. Americans) FTW. Level 80 Mog is going to kick ass regardless of whether or not he takes some unlucky beats. I want to be a Level 80 Mog.
Monday, 16 February 2009
Quick Update: Thoughts on Multi-Tabling
I haven't posted an update in a while. Basically because I've felt like not much has been going on. I slacked off way too much in January and didn't get my 10k points in (lol) to maintain Supernova, so I can't miss another month or I'll lose it.
I'm back on track for that now mostly by playing a good deal of 50NL. I've finally also accepted that my priorities wrt my goals are actually backwards. Thanks to The Data Kid for pointing a lot of this out to me. He's helped me out a lot with discussions on improving and tilt and all sorts of other stuff.
My goal is to be reg'ing it up at 100NL and 200NL by the end of the year at which point I think I will have found my full ring home. So in order to achieve that you obviously need the bankroll for it. My take on this until recently has been to mass table (18-24) to build the bankroll. This is just wrong, because my game is not up to standard to be able to be a 100NL-200NL reg and even if I do achieve the required bankroll by mass tabling, it won't help me anyways because the skill is just not there yet.
So I've cut down on tables to work on improving my game. I dropped down to 8 at first and ended up getting really spewy because I had too much time to think about decisions and I was outleveling myself a lot and making a lot of FPS plays. The change was too drastic. So I went back up to 12 and I've found that to be relatively comfortable and I'm picking up on a lot more spots where I can bluff profitably without it involving FPS.
Other than that, I thought I was running fairly decent lately. I have obviously broken the habit of looking at my graph and cashier box due to the fact that I had no idea until yesterday that I was on a massive breakeven swong for 35k hands. That's oddly discouraging and encouraging at the same time. I'll just look at the positive =) Most of it is running hot at 50NL, downswinging at 100NL, and breakeven at 25NL.
I can honestly say that I've only spewed 2 buyins this month which is also encouraging and after reviewing my database pretty much everything else is coolers and beats, by far the majority being coolers (set over set, KK vs AA, flush < flush). So overall I'm starting to like the mindset I'm in of the graph/money doesn't matter as long as I feel like I'm playing well and improving.
Oh and I'm almost finished clearing my $1500 bonus so that will be nice to have. I suspect a bout 1/2 of it my be going to new tires on my car though which I have been putting off for a while.
I'm back on track for that now mostly by playing a good deal of 50NL. I've finally also accepted that my priorities wrt my goals are actually backwards. Thanks to The Data Kid for pointing a lot of this out to me. He's helped me out a lot with discussions on improving and tilt and all sorts of other stuff.
My goal is to be reg'ing it up at 100NL and 200NL by the end of the year at which point I think I will have found my full ring home. So in order to achieve that you obviously need the bankroll for it. My take on this until recently has been to mass table (18-24) to build the bankroll. This is just wrong, because my game is not up to standard to be able to be a 100NL-200NL reg and even if I do achieve the required bankroll by mass tabling, it won't help me anyways because the skill is just not there yet.
So I've cut down on tables to work on improving my game. I dropped down to 8 at first and ended up getting really spewy because I had too much time to think about decisions and I was outleveling myself a lot and making a lot of FPS plays. The change was too drastic. So I went back up to 12 and I've found that to be relatively comfortable and I'm picking up on a lot more spots where I can bluff profitably without it involving FPS.
Other than that, I thought I was running fairly decent lately. I have obviously broken the habit of looking at my graph and cashier box due to the fact that I had no idea until yesterday that I was on a massive breakeven swong for 35k hands. That's oddly discouraging and encouraging at the same time. I'll just look at the positive =) Most of it is running hot at 50NL, downswinging at 100NL, and breakeven at 25NL.
I can honestly say that I've only spewed 2 buyins this month which is also encouraging and after reviewing my database pretty much everything else is coolers and beats, by far the majority being coolers (set over set, KK vs AA, flush < flush). So overall I'm starting to like the mindset I'm in of the graph/money doesn't matter as long as I feel like I'm playing well and improving.
Oh and I'm almost finished clearing my $1500 bonus so that will be nice to have. I suspect a bout 1/2 of it my be going to new tires on my car though which I have been putting off for a while.
Saturday, 31 January 2009
Monthly $100K Today
Well I had a good run at the Monthly $100K Gold+ Freeroll today - 6600 entrants. I hovered between 20th and 70th for a good portion of the tourney - I believe the highest I got was 12th. I've read up on what I consider to be some pretty solid MTT strat and I think that helped a lot. Card dead-ness really used to affect me in MTTs and that's why I avoided them, but I think I've got this down now.
I busted out with about 250 left. I had doubled up and won a bunch of domination situations vs short and medium stacks and was sitting with a stack about 2.5x the average - which let me really start to open up and steal more pots against medium stacks and snap off short stacks who I thought were desperate. I was really hoping for a table change due to the LAG sitting 3 seats to my left who covered me slightly and was making life miserable. I'd only been able to take blinds when he was UTG . He was running 44/33 and playing really aggro postflop and getting a lot of folds. The rest of the table was quite nitty except for the dude that is running 10/10 and has a few less chips than me but is open shoving any Ax for some reason with 50BB late in the tourney.
So I raise up KcQc in MP and expect to pick up blinds. I haven't tangled with the LAG yet, the problem has just been that he won't let me get into any pots despite me having position a lot as I'm really not comfortable playing postflop with him with much.
LAG calls on the button. Flop: 2c 7c 6d. Wonderful flop imo. SPR is 4 and I bet 2/3 pot which basically committs me, and I'm fine with this considering I have overcards and a FD. LAG calls. Turn is a harmless looking 9s. I shove since I'm committed and would really like a fold, plus I have a ton of outs and I've seen him float with J high no draw. Villain snap calls with Ts9s and river blanks. I'm out and thinking I should have just gone ahead and overbet-shoved flop with that much equity, but I'm probably just being results oriented.
Maybe I'll start playing some small MTTs or 6max. I think I just need something different to try to get motivated again. If I could do it again, I don't know if pushing so hard for Supernova in December was worth it for a full month of burnout that was January. I still don't really feel like playing - not even to get my $1500 bonus cleared.
I busted out with about 250 left. I had doubled up and won a bunch of domination situations vs short and medium stacks and was sitting with a stack about 2.5x the average - which let me really start to open up and steal more pots against medium stacks and snap off short stacks who I thought were desperate. I was really hoping for a table change due to the LAG sitting 3 seats to my left who covered me slightly and was making life miserable. I'd only been able to take blinds when he was UTG . He was running 44/33 and playing really aggro postflop and getting a lot of folds. The rest of the table was quite nitty except for the dude that is running 10/10 and has a few less chips than me but is open shoving any Ax for some reason with 50BB late in the tourney.
So I raise up KcQc in MP and expect to pick up blinds. I haven't tangled with the LAG yet, the problem has just been that he won't let me get into any pots despite me having position a lot as I'm really not comfortable playing postflop with him with much.
LAG calls on the button. Flop: 2c 7c 6d. Wonderful flop imo. SPR is 4 and I bet 2/3 pot which basically committs me, and I'm fine with this considering I have overcards and a FD. LAG calls. Turn is a harmless looking 9s. I shove since I'm committed and would really like a fold, plus I have a ton of outs and I've seen him float with J high no draw. Villain snap calls with Ts9s and river blanks. I'm out and thinking I should have just gone ahead and overbet-shoved flop with that much equity, but I'm probably just being results oriented.
Maybe I'll start playing some small MTTs or 6max. I think I just need something different to try to get motivated again. If I could do it again, I don't know if pushing so hard for Supernova in December was worth it for a full month of burnout that was January. I still don't really feel like playing - not even to get my $1500 bonus cleared.
Sunday, 25 January 2009
25NL Video: Takin Redline Maney
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=08FTITSQ
Hey, I finally got this video finished. I have a massive toothache and found it a little difficult to concentrate while doing the commentary so if there's anything I missed that looks non-standard or if I'm spewing nonsense just go ahead and point it out.
I run pretty decent for the first 1/2 or so and then spew some of it back so that's fun. This is actually quite a bit more LAGgy than even I usually play as it's only 6 tables and I get a little spewy with less than 12.
I paused the video at some points to go into more detail on my thought process. I did take some notes while playing so that the commentary stays as close as possible to my original live thought process.
Oh and my SN is obviously censored because I'm paranoid that you guys will pwn me if you know who I am
. Here's a quick overview of my HUD so I don't have to jumble it up in the commentary. Preflop stats on top, postflop stats on bottom. VPIP/PFR are the only 2 that change color according to ranges - green = fish, orange/yellow = TAGish, red/purple = TAGish/nit:
Stats and graph for this video are in the last post.
Hey, I finally got this video finished. I have a massive toothache and found it a little difficult to concentrate while doing the commentary so if there's anything I missed that looks non-standard or if I'm spewing nonsense just go ahead and point it out.
I run pretty decent for the first 1/2 or so and then spew some of it back so that's fun. This is actually quite a bit more LAGgy than even I usually play as it's only 6 tables and I get a little spewy with less than 12.
I paused the video at some points to go into more detail on my thought process. I did take some notes while playing so that the commentary stays as close as possible to my original live thought process.
Oh and my SN is obviously censored because I'm paranoid that you guys will pwn me if you know who I am
. Here's a quick overview of my HUD so I don't have to jumble it up in the commentary. Preflop stats on top, postflop stats on bottom. VPIP/PFR are the only 2 that change color according to ranges - green = fish, orange/yellow = TAGish, red/purple = TAGish/nit:Stats and graph for this video are in the last post.
Friday, 23 January 2009
25NL video on the way!
I made a 6 table 25NL video today and just need to dub my comments on to it. I should have it up by the end of the weekend. It was really fun and I pretty much win red line money and breakeven/lose blue line money. My stats are really wacked out due to so few tables and I got a little spewy in some hands. But I think there are some really good spots to think about using aggression.
Here's a preview:
Here's a preview:
Sunday, 18 January 2009
Monkey Time!
I got my Stars Monkey yesterday! A lot of people think the Stars monkeys are cursed because they start running bad as soon as they show up at the door. Mine is not cursed - I put in a good session last night and ran well - I'm assuming because I missed the delivery guy at my door and had to pick him up at the post office myself the next day.
Ive been finding 50NL pretty easy lately after playing so much 100NL. It seems a lot easier to spot the fish and to exploit people at 50NL than before I jumped over it to play 100NL. I guess it helps if Im playing a lot more pots, too.
Ill just keep this short as my keyboard it tilting me.* I hope to get in a bunch of hands and think about my game a bunch this week since Ill be on night shift at work.
*My keyboard is messed up again and typing in Spanish. Please excuse the bad punctuation =)
Ive been finding 50NL pretty easy lately after playing so much 100NL. It seems a lot easier to spot the fish and to exploit people at 50NL than before I jumped over it to play 100NL. I guess it helps if Im playing a lot more pots, too.
Ill just keep this short as my keyboard it tilting me.* I hope to get in a bunch of hands and think about my game a bunch this week since Ill be on night shift at work.
*My keyboard is messed up again and typing in Spanish. Please excuse the bad punctuation =)
Friday, 9 January 2009
uFR - Welcome to Nitdom!
I don't know what the hell is going on in uFR right now. Ultra-weak-tight fit-or-fold has become fashionable apparently.
-Top set vs an uberdonk that donk bets the turn with possible turned nuts when we still hold the 2nd nuts? Fold.
-Top 2 pair - aces up - vs an unknown on a 2 tone board when we get c/r on the flop? Fold.
-Overpair with an SPR of 4 in a 3bet pot? Try for Pot Control? Bet/Fold if we get c/r. Really?
The list goes on.
I mean, COME ON PEOPLE! Get your shit together! Seriously. Just fold everything but KK+ PF, and fold KK if you get 3bet.
In all seriousness, this whole b/f fad has gone a bit too far with people spouting "Baluga Baluga Baluga!" every chance they get. And yet they call themselves TAGs. Sadly, the days of Baluga and the like posting pure gold and refuting this nonsense in uFR are over. There's still a few people that post some really solid stuff but they are few and far between.
And unfortunately, it appears uFR did not take anything away from the "Fold." trolling some ssFR posters were doing a while back. That was the biggest gift anyone could have given uFR and no one really realized it.
The reason why so many people can not handle the move up to ssFR from uFR is that they are still stuck in the weak-tight uFR rut of Baluga-ing away all of their obvious 1 pair hands.
Good players are aggressive. They know how uFR thinks. They know that for 90% of your made hands you are thinking Baluga. And you think that you are better than fit-or-fold? Why? Because you are b/f every time instead of c/f like it's a plan? But really it's just another version of fit-or-fold - at least the way it's being applied. And good players will Baluga you to death.
Sure, weak-tight beats uFR games because uFR is littered with fish jumping into the boat. Moving up, you have to actively look for those fish and you might have to start figuring out how to **GASP** exploit some regs to keep the winrate up.
Here's a simple example:
100BB effective
uFR is 14/11/2.5 "TAG" dealt 66-AA/AQ+/KQ in MP1
CO is 16/12/2.5 realTAG dealt xx
Preflop (1.5BB):
Folded to uFR, uFR raises to 4BB, folds to CO, CO calls 4BB, 3 folds
Flop (9.5BB): KdTs3s
uFR bets 7BB, CO calls 7BB
Turn (23.5BB): 5c
uFR bets 17BB, CO shoves 89BB, uFR folds everything but TT/KK and sometimes AA and AK (if he's feeling spewy) here 100% of the time.
That's uFR's plan - the standard b/f because CO obviously has better than TPTK if CO raises here but uFR wants to get value from draws and hates when his TPTK is being floated - and the hand plays out identically if it's BB instead of CO CRAI on the turn.
Funny thing is that CO can do this profitably with his entire range because uFR is snapping it off with 25% of his PFR range at best and CO has a whopping 75%+ fold equity on the turn regardless of what cards he has here, and sometimes he will show up with a set. uFR, you think you are planning your hand, but when the big bets come out you revert back to 1st level thinking, "Well, that's a big bet... He could have... Hmmm... Big Bet... Well, ok, What do I have?"
As you move up, this is going to be the case more and more. Baluga is an excellent theorem and applies to straightforward players very well. Once you get into ssFR you still apply it to straightforward players. The problem, uFR, is that you are applying it to everyone, even in uFR games. Baluga said it best himself: "when playing against a goood TAG, particularly a 2p2er, most especially me, raising the turn with a draw is a powerful (but risky) play."
And you are going to find a lot of people willing to do this as you move up. You need to stop being weak-tight and figure out a counter-strategy instead of continuing along mindlessly following your weak-tight strategy and forever being stuck in uFR because you can't beat ssFR aggression. This is why there are so many 50NL nitty-weak-tight regs out there.
Don't get me wrong, uFR got me to where I am at right now and is a good foundation to build on and I'm greatful for that. But you have got to break out of that rut once you start to understand just what exactly is going on in this game. And they're not playing back at you contrary to how this post sounds - but you have to remember that semi-bluffing draws and pushing thin edges is not considered "playing back." I'm still working on it myself...
-Top set vs an uberdonk that donk bets the turn with possible turned nuts when we still hold the 2nd nuts? Fold.
-Top 2 pair - aces up - vs an unknown on a 2 tone board when we get c/r on the flop? Fold.
-Overpair with an SPR of 4 in a 3bet pot? Try for Pot Control? Bet/Fold if we get c/r. Really?
The list goes on.
I mean, COME ON PEOPLE! Get your shit together! Seriously. Just fold everything but KK+ PF, and fold KK if you get 3bet.
In all seriousness, this whole b/f fad has gone a bit too far with people spouting "Baluga Baluga Baluga!" every chance they get. And yet they call themselves TAGs. Sadly, the days of Baluga and the like posting pure gold and refuting this nonsense in uFR are over. There's still a few people that post some really solid stuff but they are few and far between.
And unfortunately, it appears uFR did not take anything away from the "Fold." trolling some ssFR posters were doing a while back. That was the biggest gift anyone could have given uFR and no one really realized it.
The reason why so many people can not handle the move up to ssFR from uFR is that they are still stuck in the weak-tight uFR rut of Baluga-ing away all of their obvious 1 pair hands.
Good players are aggressive. They know how uFR thinks. They know that for 90% of your made hands you are thinking Baluga. And you think that you are better than fit-or-fold? Why? Because you are b/f every time instead of c/f like it's a plan? But really it's just another version of fit-or-fold - at least the way it's being applied. And good players will Baluga you to death.
Sure, weak-tight beats uFR games because uFR is littered with fish jumping into the boat. Moving up, you have to actively look for those fish and you might have to start figuring out how to **GASP** exploit some regs to keep the winrate up.
Here's a simple example:
100BB effective
uFR is 14/11/2.5 "TAG" dealt 66-AA/AQ+/KQ in MP1
CO is 16/12/2.5 realTAG dealt xx
Preflop (1.5BB):
Folded to uFR, uFR raises to 4BB, folds to CO, CO calls 4BB, 3 folds
Flop (9.5BB): KdTs3s
uFR bets 7BB, CO calls 7BB
Turn (23.5BB): 5c
uFR bets 17BB, CO shoves 89BB, uFR folds everything but TT/KK and sometimes AA and AK (if he's feeling spewy) here 100% of the time.
That's uFR's plan - the standard b/f because CO obviously has better than TPTK if CO raises here but uFR wants to get value from draws and hates when his TPTK is being floated - and the hand plays out identically if it's BB instead of CO CRAI on the turn.
Funny thing is that CO can do this profitably with his entire range because uFR is snapping it off with 25% of his PFR range at best and CO has a whopping 75%+ fold equity on the turn regardless of what cards he has here, and sometimes he will show up with a set. uFR, you think you are planning your hand, but when the big bets come out you revert back to 1st level thinking, "Well, that's a big bet... He could have... Hmmm... Big Bet... Well, ok, What do I have?"
As you move up, this is going to be the case more and more. Baluga is an excellent theorem and applies to straightforward players very well. Once you get into ssFR you still apply it to straightforward players. The problem, uFR, is that you are applying it to everyone, even in uFR games. Baluga said it best himself: "when playing against a goood TAG, particularly a 2p2er, most especially me, raising the turn with a draw is a powerful (but risky) play."
And you are going to find a lot of people willing to do this as you move up. You need to stop being weak-tight and figure out a counter-strategy instead of continuing along mindlessly following your weak-tight strategy and forever being stuck in uFR because you can't beat ssFR aggression. This is why there are so many 50NL nitty-weak-tight regs out there.
Don't get me wrong, uFR got me to where I am at right now and is a good foundation to build on and I'm greatful for that. But you have got to break out of that rut once you start to understand just what exactly is going on in this game. And they're not playing back at you contrary to how this post sounds - but you have to remember that semi-bluffing draws and pushing thin edges is not considered "playing back." I'm still working on it myself...
Monday, 5 January 2009
Starting to learn NLHE :p
So I started the NLHE Intermediate Course on Stox today. I had really put off watching videos there because of the way they were organized - or lack thereof - and almost all of them are 6max.
So now they come along after being asked the millionth time "you have 600 videos, where do I start?" and put videos into an organized, comprehensive outline with a Begginner's Course and an Intermediate Course. Thank you! I need structure. And now I'm watching those 6max videos and with the expanded outline I know what concepts I am actively looking for to take out of the videos and disregarding the fact that they are 6max based. Just like school! (I am a nerd and enjoyed school btw). It's something to work towards with a begginning and end. And I hope they keep adding more courses, maybe on specific concepts would be nice.
I've been lazy about putting in the hours playing so far this month - only 4 hours @ 5ptBB/100 @ 50NL right now, meh. But I'm really happy with my play and really excited about using Ed Miller's strategeries on how to beat not-so-good TAGs after some very exciting preliminary results, ie. Takin Redline Maney.
Oh and I ordered my PS Monkey like everyone is supposed to. They've got a promo going on and I am winning the 100k FPPs apparently. I just have to come up with a good photo op for my Monkey which I haven't thought of yet. I'm assuming he will also have an interesting TR when he gets here in 6-8 weeks.
So now they come along after being asked the millionth time "you have 600 videos, where do I start?" and put videos into an organized, comprehensive outline with a Begginner's Course and an Intermediate Course. Thank you! I need structure. And now I'm watching those 6max videos and with the expanded outline I know what concepts I am actively looking for to take out of the videos and disregarding the fact that they are 6max based. Just like school! (I am a nerd and enjoyed school btw). It's something to work towards with a begginning and end. And I hope they keep adding more courses, maybe on specific concepts would be nice.
I've been lazy about putting in the hours playing so far this month - only 4 hours @ 5ptBB/100 @ 50NL right now, meh. But I'm really happy with my play and really excited about using Ed Miller's strategeries on how to beat not-so-good TAGs after some very exciting preliminary results, ie. Takin Redline Maney.
Oh and I ordered my PS Monkey like everyone is supposed to. They've got a promo going on and I am winning the 100k FPPs apparently. I just have to come up with a good photo op for my Monkey which I haven't thought of yet. I'm assuming he will also have an interesting TR when he gets here in 6-8 weeks.
Saturday, 3 January 2009
Back to relaxing
I'm back to 18 tabling 50NL. I haven't played much in the past couple of days because I didn't feel like it much at all. I played in the $50k and $20k VIP tourneys today and they tilted me a lot. Finished just in the money in the $20k, meh... I also put in some 6max but I don't have the patience for it - which is kind of oxymoronic since I play full ring - but I can only manage 6-8 tables and I get bored... maybe impatient is a better word... and start pushing hands hard even though I'm comfortably grinding out 10+ptBB/100 at 25NL. idk why that is.
I fired up 50NL FR later this evening and it was filled with fish. I made a ton of thin river valuebets and my reads were nearly 100% accurate over 1k hands that I put in - which is a pretty big confidence booster. I finished up 5 buyins over those 1k hands and called it a day.
I'm thinking I'm going to grind out 50k to 100k hands of 50NL before heading back up to 100NL. I have a lot more to learn and practice before going up to that level again. I have learned and re-learned so much basic theory and it's just a matter of applying it properly regardless of what level you're playing at. I think about the theory behind this game way too much lol.
Right now I'm mostly working on taking actions to manipulate different parts of my opponents' ranges. ie. they'll do this with an overpair if I do this, and they'll do that with a bluff if I check to them - all in the same hand - and try to find the best line given what they'll do with different hands. It's still all pretty complicated to me and I think 50NL is a good place to work on that.
I fired up 50NL FR later this evening and it was filled with fish. I made a ton of thin river valuebets and my reads were nearly 100% accurate over 1k hands that I put in - which is a pretty big confidence booster. I finished up 5 buyins over those 1k hands and called it a day.
I'm thinking I'm going to grind out 50k to 100k hands of 50NL before heading back up to 100NL. I have a lot more to learn and practice before going up to that level again. I have learned and re-learned so much basic theory and it's just a matter of applying it properly regardless of what level you're playing at. I think about the theory behind this game way too much lol.
Right now I'm mostly working on taking actions to manipulate different parts of my opponents' ranges. ie. they'll do this with an overpair if I do this, and they'll do that with a bluff if I check to them - all in the same hand - and try to find the best line given what they'll do with different hands. It's still all pretty complicated to me and I think 50NL is a good place to work on that.
Wednesday, 31 December 2008
Supernova!
Ship the Supernova and the 3.5x multiplier and conceirge. Yay! I put in a massive session yesterday and another today to get it done. Well I guess it's actually the 31st now, but I'm putting it down as the 30th.
Yesterday went very very well for the first 75% of the session and I was on the verge of having my first $1k day. I made it all the way up to $980 for the day 24 tabling 100NL, then had a bit of a downswing and dropped nearly $400 back. Today was a rollercoaster of tilt and exhaustion but I finished the day at +$14 after 9k hands, lol.
I am taking the day off tomorrow, and maybe the weekend too, and meet up with some friends for the evening. It'll feel really good getting back to playing fun, comfortable poker. This last week especially felt like a job with the crazy amount of hours I put in.
One thing I would like to know is how I manage to put in 35 hours 24 tabling since the 24th and manage to not get dealt into any of the milestone hands Stars had going this week. That would have been a real nice boost. I guess that's only 55k hands, but I should have had a relatively good shot at it. Who knows.
Happy New Year everyone!
Thursday, 25 December 2008
Merry Christmas!
Merry Christmas everyone! I hope you're all having a great holiday and, if you live anywhere like I do, trying to stay warm =) I'm finally done work for the year and it's time to put in hardcore hours to get my Supernova in.
I worked the night shift this week and it was actually kind of nice for a change. I did a ton of thinking about my game and my thought process over the past 3 nights while I was working away and made some pretty significant changes to it after running a bunch of math and reading some interesting thoughts by a few different people.
I think what my problem was for the past few weeks has been that at 100NL, the days of stacking top pair or even 2 pair by some random like I did at 25NL are over, which means I have to find a way to exploit and adjust to that. I had been getting pushed around a ton with my 25NL game and it just wasn't working out. But I can't really stop people from trying to push me around because it's going to be a bigger risk than it's worth to do it and they might just not stop anyways, so I just let them take it to the extreme and make mistakes. I find that's the best way to exploit people - find their most likely characteristic and let them go too far with it while having a counterstrategy to fight back at the right times.
And I've come to the realization that CRAI is not the strongest line possible in this game. c/f is.
So the only times I was getting my money in decently were coinflip situations for the most part where it was monster draw vs. top pair or 2 pair - and we all know I am the worst person for flipping - and this resulted in some whacked out variance. I have since begun to get my money in as a 60%+ favorite again and I'm enjoying the results!
I did have the worst suckout I've ever laid out on anyone happen last night though, lol. Villain's a 57/20 superdonk and shoves something like every 6th flop he sees and 3bets/squeezes every 5th hand. Turns out he actually has something this time and I have 3% equity on the flop:
Poker Stars $0.50/$1 No Limit Hold'em - 9 players
The Official DeucesCracked.com Hand History Converter
MP1: $108.50
MP2: $38.50
CO: $36.60
BTN: $70.65
SB: $60.30
BB: $18.15
UTG: $92.80
UTG+1: $98.45
Hero (UTG+2): $101.50
Pre Flop: ($1.50) Hero is UTG+2 with K
K
UTG raises to $4, 1 fold, Hero calls $4, MP1 calls $4, 5 folds
Flop: ($13.50) 3 5
2 (3 players)
UTG bets $12, Hero calls $12, MP1 raises to $104.50 all in, UTG folds, Hero calls $85.50 all in
Turn: ($220.50) 2 (2 players - 2 are all in)
River: ($220.50) K (2 players - 2 are all in)
Hero: Merry Christmas to me!
Final Pot: $220.50
MP1 mucks 4 6
Hero shows K K (a full house, Kings full of Deuces)
Hero wins $217.50
(Rake: $3.00)
I worked the night shift this week and it was actually kind of nice for a change. I did a ton of thinking about my game and my thought process over the past 3 nights while I was working away and made some pretty significant changes to it after running a bunch of math and reading some interesting thoughts by a few different people.
I think what my problem was for the past few weeks has been that at 100NL, the days of stacking top pair or even 2 pair by some random like I did at 25NL are over, which means I have to find a way to exploit and adjust to that. I had been getting pushed around a ton with my 25NL game and it just wasn't working out. But I can't really stop people from trying to push me around because it's going to be a bigger risk than it's worth to do it and they might just not stop anyways, so I just let them take it to the extreme and make mistakes. I find that's the best way to exploit people - find their most likely characteristic and let them go too far with it while having a counterstrategy to fight back at the right times.
And I've come to the realization that CRAI is not the strongest line possible in this game. c/f is.
So the only times I was getting my money in decently were coinflip situations for the most part where it was monster draw vs. top pair or 2 pair - and we all know I am the worst person for flipping - and this resulted in some whacked out variance. I have since begun to get my money in as a 60%+ favorite again and I'm enjoying the results!
I did have the worst suckout I've ever laid out on anyone happen last night though, lol. Villain's a 57/20 superdonk and shoves something like every 6th flop he sees and 3bets/squeezes every 5th hand. Turns out he actually has something this time and I have 3% equity on the flop:
Poker Stars $0.50/$1 No Limit Hold'em - 9 players
The Official DeucesCracked.com Hand History Converter
MP1: $108.50
MP2: $38.50
CO: $36.60
BTN: $70.65
SB: $60.30
BB: $18.15
UTG: $92.80
UTG+1: $98.45
Hero (UTG+2): $101.50
Pre Flop: ($1.50) Hero is UTG+2 with K
KUTG raises to $4, 1 fold, Hero calls $4, MP1 calls $4, 5 folds
Flop: ($13.50) 3
5 2 (3 players)UTG bets $12, Hero calls $12, MP1 raises to $104.50 all in, UTG folds, Hero calls $85.50 all in
Turn: ($220.50) 2
(2 players - 2 are all in)River: ($220.50) K
(2 players - 2 are all in)Hero: Merry Christmas to me!
Final Pot: $220.50
MP1 mucks 4
6Hero shows K
K (a full house, Kings full of Deuces)Hero wins $217.50
(Rake: $3.00)
Wednesday, 17 December 2008
Troughing
I haven't posted in a week. I had a massive cooler/beat induced downswing and ended about $800 below equity. $300 of this was at 100NL and the rest was at 50NL. I've never run this bad in my life, but eventually you run worse than you ever thought possible. I'll probably run worse at some point in the future, but it's amazing how terrible it feels. And don't think it's impossible for it to happen to you. I am totally convinced after reviewing my database for the week that I was playing my A+ game (A+ since it's the best I've ever played, ever) approximately 90% of the time and during 100% of those beats. There is just nothing you can do.
I should have been running pretty decent except that spewing made my equity flatline - which is good to know that I can run breakeven when I feel spewy. Granted I wouldn't feel spewy if it were not for the beats =)
Anyways, I think I hit the bottom of the trough. I'm playing a bit tighter to lower variance and it's working out so far and I've recovered a little.
I almost gave up on Supernova. I'm going to have my work cut out for me after "giving up" and playing 25NL for 2 days on the weekend. I just have to keep reminding myself that if I can get the points in, it's $3k in my pocket, so I can actually stand to lose quite a bit and end up ahead. I'm still up something like $450 for the month. I need to get over losing money that I've won. It makes me feel like every 5+ downswing is a tragedy. But I really shouldn't complain because my entire poker career has been a freeroll.
I'm going to keep at the 100NL and 50NL to hit Supernova. I'll have to pound away some 6 hour sessions when I'm on holidays next week.
I should have been running pretty decent except that spewing made my equity flatline - which is good to know that I can run breakeven when I feel spewy. Granted I wouldn't feel spewy if it were not for the beats =)
Anyways, I think I hit the bottom of the trough. I'm playing a bit tighter to lower variance and it's working out so far and I've recovered a little.
I almost gave up on Supernova. I'm going to have my work cut out for me after "giving up" and playing 25NL for 2 days on the weekend. I just have to keep reminding myself that if I can get the points in, it's $3k in my pocket, so I can actually stand to lose quite a bit and end up ahead. I'm still up something like $450 for the month. I need to get over losing money that I've won. It makes me feel like every 5+ downswing is a tragedy. But I really shouldn't complain because my entire poker career has been a freeroll.
I'm going to keep at the 100NL and 50NL to hit Supernova. I'll have to pound away some 6 hour sessions when I'm on holidays next week.
Wednesday, 10 December 2008
Back under control
I played a longer session of 25NL than usual today to get myself going and finished up 5 buyins. Now that I'm confident again and playing well I'll head back up to 100NL.
I also read a pooh-bah post on Pot Control by AlexB182 that is the absolute nuts. I realized there were a ton of spots where I was using pot control incorrectly and the way he's got it laid out makes the concept easy to understand and apply - and also know exactly when to not apply it. No more thinking "Is this a pot control spot or not?"
This game gets easier with every "aha!" moment. Thank you Alex! You don't find too many "aha!" moments typed out in plain English.
Between that and Splitsuit's article on bet sizing, I don't know how anyone can go wrong. People say 95% of poker is automatic and 5% is tough decisions. But when you have stuff like this down pat, you can even reduce that to below 5% because you have a plan and stick to it for every hand.
No more sick turn cards where you don't know what to do. No more getting c/r where you don't know what to do. No more spewing.
I also read a pooh-bah post on Pot Control by AlexB182 that is the absolute nuts. I realized there were a ton of spots where I was using pot control incorrectly and the way he's got it laid out makes the concept easy to understand and apply - and also know exactly when to not apply it. No more thinking "Is this a pot control spot or not?"
This game gets easier with every "aha!" moment. Thank you Alex! You don't find too many "aha!" moments typed out in plain English.
Between that and Splitsuit's article on bet sizing, I don't know how anyone can go wrong. People say 95% of poker is automatic and 5% is tough decisions. But when you have stuff like this down pat, you can even reduce that to below 5% because you have a plan and stick to it for every hand.
No more sick turn cards where you don't know what to do. No more getting c/r where you don't know what to do. No more spewing.
Tuesday, 9 December 2008
AAAAHhhhhhh
Thank you. Just needed to vent.
23% WtSD. 35% W$SD. 5k hands.
I have been doomswitched.
This might be an interesting spot to talk about doomswitches. I'm at a loss to figure out what to do when you run completely card dead breakeven for 20k hands and get coolered when you finally do catch something every once in a while and get called down by trash the rest of the time because you never have it. It just makes me feel physically ill. Totally helpless.
I mean, there is absolutely not a single thing you can do when you have massive equity preflop/flop and consistently see the worst card in the deck on the turn that makes you take a puke/fold line - or spew.
Sometimes it's the rivered 3rd flush card against a loose-passive. Sometimes it's an A on a ragged board and you know they floated you with A high. It's just so sick.
My instincts/reads have been absolutely killer this month, but all they are doing right now is telling me I'm beat hand after hand. Sometimes I call down anyways out of frustration. But my reads are correct more than 80% of the time.
So the only conclusion then is that there are periods of time where you have no choice at all but to lose money. That's the way the game goes. Just try to lose it as slowly as possible. Don't become a nit, but just try to not spew.
I don't believe taking a break works because future hands are completely independant from past hands and your doomswitch can end at any time. I mean, if you're flipping coins, there's a chance you get heads 40 times in a row, however unlikely. Quitting for the day is not going to change whether or not that coin is going to flip heads another 40 times in a row when you start up again.
There could be something wrong in your game that has doomswitched you, but if you analyze it and find nothing different than when you were winning, then it's just pure variance. I'm a bankroll nit and I hate variance. A site where I get paid my share of equity on every hand that is all-in before the river would be interesting, but it would last about a day before the fish realized just how brutally terrible they are.
I only started playing last year. People say the games are tougher than they used to be. I have no idea. I can't even imagine how rediculously soft the games must have been before. But the doomswitches would have been that much more rediculous, too.
I really need some motivation to keep at the Supernova thing. Doomswitches make me feel like not playing. However much you try to suppress the superstition, you still feel like you are getting ready to donate stacks when you sit down.
23% WtSD. 35% W$SD. 5k hands.
I have been doomswitched.
This might be an interesting spot to talk about doomswitches. I'm at a loss to figure out what to do when you run completely card dead breakeven for 20k hands and get coolered when you finally do catch something every once in a while and get called down by trash the rest of the time because you never have it. It just makes me feel physically ill. Totally helpless.
I mean, there is absolutely not a single thing you can do when you have massive equity preflop/flop and consistently see the worst card in the deck on the turn that makes you take a puke/fold line - or spew.
Sometimes it's the rivered 3rd flush card against a loose-passive. Sometimes it's an A on a ragged board and you know they floated you with A high. It's just so sick.
My instincts/reads have been absolutely killer this month, but all they are doing right now is telling me I'm beat hand after hand. Sometimes I call down anyways out of frustration. But my reads are correct more than 80% of the time.
So the only conclusion then is that there are periods of time where you have no choice at all but to lose money. That's the way the game goes. Just try to lose it as slowly as possible. Don't become a nit, but just try to not spew.
I don't believe taking a break works because future hands are completely independant from past hands and your doomswitch can end at any time. I mean, if you're flipping coins, there's a chance you get heads 40 times in a row, however unlikely. Quitting for the day is not going to change whether or not that coin is going to flip heads another 40 times in a row when you start up again.
There could be something wrong in your game that has doomswitched you, but if you analyze it and find nothing different than when you were winning, then it's just pure variance. I'm a bankroll nit and I hate variance. A site where I get paid my share of equity on every hand that is all-in before the river would be interesting, but it would last about a day before the fish realized just how brutally terrible they are.
I only started playing last year. People say the games are tougher than they used to be. I have no idea. I can't even imagine how rediculously soft the games must have been before. But the doomswitches would have been that much more rediculous, too.
I really need some motivation to keep at the Supernova thing. Doomswitches make me feel like not playing. However much you try to suppress the superstition, you still feel like you are getting ready to donate stacks when you sit down.
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