NL Freeroll a waste of time?

[floppingnuts]

I played rather successfully on Party Poker for about a month before losing the $200 I had put in. I played best at .50/1 and had some good luck in a short (44 hands) 3/6 session. Most of my losses came from 1/2, 2/4, and a few tournaments. After reading a couple books, checking out these foruns, and purchasing PT, I have decided I need to play a little tigher and more aggressively. Anyway I am going to get some more info from PT for a couple weeks before putting my new knowledge (and money) to the test. In the meantime I'm looking for ways to see if I am getting any better. I'm consistently winning at the play money tables so I suppose that means I can beat the fish. I've tried a couple NL freeroll tournaments with the Party Points I built up but that doesn't seem to be getting me very far. I last there for about a half hour before being drawn out on or staying in too long with a hand that seems good enough to win with. Should I be playing in these games or just wait until my next deposit and perhaps concentrate on the low limit games?

[Vern]

IMHO, They are useless in learing low limit ring games.

If that is you goal, I would suggest you open an account on one of the sites that have extreme micro tables, $200 is low even for $0.50/$1.00 (being only 200BB), but is more than enough for $0.25/$0.50 or $0.10/$0.25 which can be found at sites other than Party Skins. Get comfortable with playing hands, board reading, postion, table/seat selection and learning how to use PT to improve your game.

Once your bankroll is big enough, move up. Typically, 300BB is listed as the minimum bankroll to avoid going bust, but that is really for a seasoned pro. I suggest you move up when you have 20k hands at a level, can consistently beat it for better than 1.5BB/100 hands over the last 20K hands, can handle the swings emotionally and have a 400BB bankroll for the level you will be moving too. When you move to the new level, make the commitment to stay at that level, even if you suffer an initial setback, but have a stop gap like 250BB where you will fallback to the lower level.

In my example, you would start at $0.25/$0.50, Stars and UB both have this level with lots of tables, play for 20k hands, 200 sets of 100 hands, and if you had a win rate of 1.5BB/100Hands or better, you would have made at least $300 and your bankroll would be at least $200+$300=$500, which is more than enough to move to $0.50/$1.00. I suggest you take the $500, move to a Party Skin and play in the extremely loose $0.50/$1.00 games there. You will find them even looser and easier than the lower limit at Stars or UB, but by now you will have the emotional discipline to handle swings and sharper poker skills to recognize a loss due to your bad play and a loss due to luck. Luck only affects the short term.

If you would still have a 400BB bankroll for your current level and can pull out your initial buy in, do so. Bring that money back into your life and Poker can actually become easier mentally since you are playing with winnings now. It adds a great deal of confidence to a player's game.

Use PT to examine your play by position to see if you are playing a good tight aggressive game. Spend time reading in the Micro Limit forum, post hands you have questions on (not bad beat stories) the play and good luck.

Vern

Standard Disclaimer, I am by no means an expert at any of this.

[captZEEbo1]

any poker that's free is pointless (unless it's a homegame with people who value good poker playing and not money). Any ONLINE free poker is just plain silly. I was bored and tried some free limit poker...flop was like AJ8, and I had 87, I decided to cap the whole way for fun, and 7 people were in the pot till the river (still calling bets and raises), and I managed to have the best hand by the end iwth pair of 8s. There's just no point to it.

[floppingnuts]

Thanks for the advice. I think I will try to stick with the low limit games for now and work my way up.

[Jim T]

Read this post:

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=inet&Number=1060198&fpart= &PHPSESSID=

[Zetack]

Empire Poker has four free roll tourney's a day with a 500 prize pool. Winner gets somewhere in the vicinity of 150 dollars. They're fun, the price is right, and if you got lucky they can help your bankroll.

While you're deciding what to do these are a good way to get your poker jones taken care of with the chance to actually win some money.

--Zetack