The road to NL. How'd you get there?

[angelo alba]

Did you all follow the prescribed route of playing HE at low limit till you could bust $6-12, graduated to $15-30 and busted those and then, and only then become NL and/or tournament players?

Or were you transplanted Brits used to pot limit? Or was it more dramatic than that?

Enquiring minds (that like to psych and bluff, etc.) want to know!

Thanks in Advance.

[Bozeman]

I played online 1-table tourneys, bought Cloutier and McEvoy, and then moved slowly up in tourneys. In San Jose, they only have spread limit, so most of my NL experience is online, and almost all tourneys.

Craig

[Greg (FossilMan)]

I started with super-low-limit games with my frat brothers in college, continued at those stakes with buddies in grad school and law school. I then moved up to 3-6 games at the charity casinos in Chicagoland, and stayed at 3-6 when I first moved to San Diego. While in Chicago, I played a few cheap NL HE tourneys, and played quite a few more in SD.

Finally, one day, instead of taking my $100 buyin to the 3-6 table, I took it over to the 3,5 blind PLH game at the old Oceanside Card Club. About the third time I played that game, I won $2500, and it was eternal love.

While in SD I moved up to 10-20 and occasionally 20-40, and started playing bigger tournaments ($100, then $300, up to $1000 once). When I came out here to Connecticut, I was playing all the tourneys and games up to 20-40. Since winning more money, I've moved up to 30 games, then 40, 50, 75, and nowadays 150 (played 300-600 HOSE one time only).

The games are very different at each level. In tourneys you clearly see the overall improvement of the average player as you move up. While the same holds true of cash games, it is somehow different. In the biggest games I still see players regularly making truly terrible mistakes. The big difference is the type and character of those mistakes. As a rough generalization, in low limit they play too many hands and play them too passively. In high limit games they play too many hands and play them too aggressively. The other big difference is the number of strong and weak players. Low limit games feature from 0-3 strong players, and the rest are long-term losers. High stakes games tend to have 1-2 long-term losers, and sometimes more, but the rest are all pretty good to excellent players.

Later, Greg Raymer (FossilMan)

[qwerty]

Or were you transplanted Brits used to pot limit?

Do you know that there are people using this forum who do not live in the states ? /forums/images/icons/shocked.gif Yes, Yes, the internet is somthing global !!!! /forums/images/icons/grin.gif

Qwerty

I have almost always played NL. I started out playing with friends at the Toronto Chess Club in the mid 70's playing for relatively small stakes. I'd bring my allowance every Friday night, lose it in the first hour and watch for the rest of the night. Eventually I became one of better players there but the games slowly withered away. A few years ago charity casinos operated in Toronto and I played some limit poker there but quickly got bored (NL or PL is so much more fun IMO). Moved to Europe last year, discovered PL tourneys and a cash game here and YAHOO I play every weekend now when I'm in town.

My advice (in case you're looking for advice) is to NOT think of limit poker as a stepping stone to NL or PL games, they are much different animals. If you want to end up playing big bet poker then just start out playing for very small stakes at which you can afford to lose every time to play. As you feel you're getting the hang of things then slowly move up.

[Mark W]

[Trefo]

Online tourneys, many hrs playing limit at the Taj, reading the books and eventually just jumping in.

[AlanBostick]

I haven't gotten there. I'm pretty much a mediocre journeyman NL player, don't play it often enough, have a lot to learn about it.

I've played a bunch of tournaments, of course, and have done all right; and I've put something like two hundred hours into live games, where I'm somewhat ahead, mirabile dictu.

When I decided I wanted to learn how to play, I organized a home game, put some time into it. After a while, I got a handle on the basics, and started occasionally showing up in the $300-buyin NLHE game on Sunday nights at Artichoke Joe's. I've played once in the $1000-buyin game at Lucky Chances, booked a win, and got out, knowing myself to be outclassed.

I'm fortunate in that there are games locally that I can afford to play.

I don't recommend online games as places to learn. Two big problems: (1) the level of play is so atrociously terrible that merely bad play will be long-term profitable, and if you take that bad play you've learned to win with into a real game, you will get killed; and (2) big-bet poker is very psychological, and online poker almost completely lacks the psychological dimension.

Hey qwerty, sorry for my parochialism ! Well, one more faux pas for the record. Thanks to all for responding.

Say guys (and gals) is that it? With hundreds of forumites, you'all just graduated from 30-60 to NL?

Peace.

[qwerty]

No probleme....

I just play poker with my friends, baby baby limits, and nobody (appart from me) has even heard about limit....

qwerty

[Greg (FossilMan)]

A 30-60 game is bigger than many (most?) NL games.

It depends a lot upon how tight people are preflop, and how aggressive they are postflop, not just the size of the blinds. However, in my experience, with blinds of say 5&5, only a very small percentage of players will finish a session up or down more than $2000. I'm pretty sure more of the players in the 30-60 game will finish outside that range.

But, I've never measured such things, and could be wrong.

Later, Greg Raymer (FossilMan)