BluffTHIS!
08-19-2005, 06:10 PM
I received a PM from a poster lamenting the "deterioration" of this forum and inviting me to join in intermediate/advanced plo discussion on google groups. I wrote out a response only to discover that this user does not accepts PMs but only sends them. This is Stpd.as.Fk. However I decided to share my response with the rest of you.
I realize that many of you are probably frustrated with a lot of the plo threads that are just the same newb type of questions/situations over and over, and would like to see discussion of plo played at the highest levels. But now I am going to be honest with you. To my knowledge, there are only a couple regular posters who regularly play in 1K or above games, myself and Big Dave, and maybe occasionally, Acesover8s and Rolf. I only play plo and no limit and the pool of players at higher levels of plo is much smaller compared to that in nl. So I am just unwilling to make replies to even certain newb posts regarding what I consider advanced plays and ways of thinking because for one thing they won't be of use at lower levels, and also because I am unwilling to educate all the lurkers who do play high but never contribute.
I will tell you that from a very detailed reading of C&R's PL&NL Poker you can learn a lot of these things if you think deeply about small parts of it at a time. However there is a class of plays, each of which doesn't come up that often, but which as a whole can add significantly to your long term results. I learned these from hard experience and lots of thinking about hands I played and watched, and like I said, I am not willing to share when so many others won't either.
I realize this is especially frustrating because party, where the majority of plo action takes place, has basically burned out all the games between 400 and 2K and also greatly diminished the 100/200 action, making it extremely difficult to slowly build your roll and climb the ladder in only plo.
My advice to you regarding building a roll and working up if that is your goal, is to learn nl well and work up from that since there are lots of tables available on all sites at each level. Then when you have a roll, go play high plo, maybe only buying in real short until you feel comfortable, although a real short stack can never protect a hand and can't be the type of favorite allin that many better holdem hands can be.
I don't claim to be the best all-around plo player by any means, but I am good and win lots of money regularly at it, and it just doesn't pay for me to share certain things regarding higher play. I don't feel this way about nl because there are more correct playing approaches there and because lots of donkeys just won't take your advice anyway. Plus I feel that I still have a lot more to learn about nl than plo. Therefore, I would not care to post about plo in other venues.
However, I will give you a suggestion for each of you to help improve your play at any level. Every week, pick out the hands in your hand histories in which you played big pots, whether you won or lost. Also, log on and just watch the next level or two higher than you normally play and see if you can see some big pots played, then copy those hand histories. Then when you have a bunch of both those you played as well as observed, take the hand of each player that played til showdown, and ask yourself if that player could have played it better, either to win more or lose less money. Key points to factor in are pots odds, outs and the possibility of other players in the hand drawing with another player for a split. If you do this, especially in conjunction with rereading Ciaffone & Reuben's PL&NL Poker, then I guarantee you it will advance your play.
Also I would strongly encourage all of you who are new to these forums to use the goldmine that can be found in the archives. Although the plo forum itself is relatively newer compared to other forums, there are still tons of threads to be read on the archive server. Click on the link "Older Archives" on left, then at the top of that page you will see "Recent Archives", and then click on "here". There are also digests of early years when the plo forum did not exist but you can open a month under a subject and then use your browser's search function to search for "plo" or omaha. So spend some time in the archives as well as reading current and more recent threads here, and you will be able to learn even more.
I realize that many of you are probably frustrated with a lot of the plo threads that are just the same newb type of questions/situations over and over, and would like to see discussion of plo played at the highest levels. But now I am going to be honest with you. To my knowledge, there are only a couple regular posters who regularly play in 1K or above games, myself and Big Dave, and maybe occasionally, Acesover8s and Rolf. I only play plo and no limit and the pool of players at higher levels of plo is much smaller compared to that in nl. So I am just unwilling to make replies to even certain newb posts regarding what I consider advanced plays and ways of thinking because for one thing they won't be of use at lower levels, and also because I am unwilling to educate all the lurkers who do play high but never contribute.
I will tell you that from a very detailed reading of C&R's PL&NL Poker you can learn a lot of these things if you think deeply about small parts of it at a time. However there is a class of plays, each of which doesn't come up that often, but which as a whole can add significantly to your long term results. I learned these from hard experience and lots of thinking about hands I played and watched, and like I said, I am not willing to share when so many others won't either.
I realize this is especially frustrating because party, where the majority of plo action takes place, has basically burned out all the games between 400 and 2K and also greatly diminished the 100/200 action, making it extremely difficult to slowly build your roll and climb the ladder in only plo.
My advice to you regarding building a roll and working up if that is your goal, is to learn nl well and work up from that since there are lots of tables available on all sites at each level. Then when you have a roll, go play high plo, maybe only buying in real short until you feel comfortable, although a real short stack can never protect a hand and can't be the type of favorite allin that many better holdem hands can be.
I don't claim to be the best all-around plo player by any means, but I am good and win lots of money regularly at it, and it just doesn't pay for me to share certain things regarding higher play. I don't feel this way about nl because there are more correct playing approaches there and because lots of donkeys just won't take your advice anyway. Plus I feel that I still have a lot more to learn about nl than plo. Therefore, I would not care to post about plo in other venues.
However, I will give you a suggestion for each of you to help improve your play at any level. Every week, pick out the hands in your hand histories in which you played big pots, whether you won or lost. Also, log on and just watch the next level or two higher than you normally play and see if you can see some big pots played, then copy those hand histories. Then when you have a bunch of both those you played as well as observed, take the hand of each player that played til showdown, and ask yourself if that player could have played it better, either to win more or lose less money. Key points to factor in are pots odds, outs and the possibility of other players in the hand drawing with another player for a split. If you do this, especially in conjunction with rereading Ciaffone & Reuben's PL&NL Poker, then I guarantee you it will advance your play.
Also I would strongly encourage all of you who are new to these forums to use the goldmine that can be found in the archives. Although the plo forum itself is relatively newer compared to other forums, there are still tons of threads to be read on the archive server. Click on the link "Older Archives" on left, then at the top of that page you will see "Recent Archives", and then click on "here". There are also digests of early years when the plo forum did not exist but you can open a month under a subject and then use your browser's search function to search for "plo" or omaha. So spend some time in the archives as well as reading current and more recent threads here, and you will be able to learn even more.