Introductions - New to the SS forum

[Scuba Chuck]

OK, I’m an NL SNG junkie. I 8 table the $33 and $55 buyins. I’ve played over 7,000 SNGs so far this year. I’ve made enough money to play much higher, but I don’t. Here’s why. I don’t think I know how to play poker. (Good that’s out of the way, as it’s hard to admit).

Well, I prolly know more than I’m admitting to, but I certainly would like to learn more postflop. I’ve been contemplating whether to play limit or NL ring games. And, well, I’m here. So you get to put up with me.

My Goals:
I want to learn to win at 30/60 online:
I want to learn how to play 6 max effectively:
I want to be competent enough to play 40/80 live in Vegas/LA/AC.
I want to be competent enough to play 20/40 live at Canterbury
I want to accomplish all this before my June 2006 Vegas Trip.

My Plan:
Along with a good friend, I plan to work through WLLH (3) & SSHE right away. I’m probably going to start at .50/1 or 1/2. I want to spend as much time studying as I intend to play in the beginning. I intend to learn how to use pokertracker, playerview (gametime). I will be posting hands, and asking questions on other’s posts.

After those two books are exhausted, I intend to move on to King Yao and HEFAP. If any of you have any other suggested reading, I’m very open minded. I have already read Hilger’s book, and I’m rereading it right now was I await our new books from Amazon (and expect a few Hilger related posts here soon). Hilger recommends Middle LHE by Ciaffone and Brier ~ any opinions?

My intent is to move up based on bankroll management. I’ve decided to seed my initial bankroll for this with $600.

My friend and I are going to get together periodically and play HU (hopefully weekly). My instincts tell me that a lot can be learned in this exercise. Any thoughts?

The most important part of the plan:
I intend to only one table for this entire venture. I very much regret my decisions to learn to multi-table, as my motivations were good at the time, I think it hindered my knowledge of the game. I could give a rat’s a$$ about rakeback. I think single-tabling will advance my ability to beat the higher limit games faster. My aim is to learn how to read opponents, learn terminology, how to use position, building pots, taking notes, snapping bluffs, when to bluff, when to fold, when to call vs raise. I’m sure there’s more, but that’s what came to mind at the moment.

Things you can help me with:
1) How do I use the HUSH forum?
2) What is the GENERAL Texas Hold’em Forum for?
3) What limits are considered Mid-High Stakes?
4) Is the B&M cardroom forum a non-strategy forum?
5) Opinions on who are the better posters in this forum?
6) Any opinions on my game plan?

Thanks in advance.

Good luck at the tables.
Scuba Chuck

[hobbsmann]

I'll offer up a few comments:

1) Book wise TOP of a definite read and very applicable to limit poker

2) Your goals seem very lofty, but doable given voracious study and just playing a ton of hands

3) The part about needing to play a ton of hands is really important IMO and I think you might want to reconsider your policy on multi-tabling. While you don't need to 4-table (2 tabling might be best) I feel like a lot of progress that are going to make is going to come from logging a huge number of hands. Of course it will be important to think critically throughout your movement up the limits getting in the hands might become the limiting factor on your learning if you are only playing 1 table.

4) The HUSH forum is very good and limited to shorted handed limit hold’em (6 handed or less). I would strongly recommend browsing it from time to time as concepts there will become important when learning how to play well around the blinds in the middle online limits (3/6-10/20).

Good luck and hopefully others will comment on some of the other things you have written.

[Scuba Chuck]

[ QUOTE ]
2) Your goals seem very lofty, but doable given voracious study and just playing a ton of hands

3) The part about needing to play a ton of hands is really important IMO and I think you might want to reconsider your policy on multi-tabling.


[/ QUOTE ]

Ok, let's talk. How many hands are we talking?

[ArturiusX]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
2) Your goals seem very lofty, but doable given voracious study and just playing a ton of hands

3) The part about needing to play a ton of hands is really important IMO and I think you might want to reconsider your policy on multi-tabling.


[/ QUOTE ]

Ok, let's talk. How many hands are we talking?

[/ QUOTE ]

200 000

[hobbsmann]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
2) Your goals seem very lofty, but doable given voracious study and just playing a ton of hands

3) The part about needing to play a ton of hands is really important IMO and I think you might want to reconsider your policy on multi-tabling.


[/ QUOTE ]

Ok, let's talk. How many hands are we talking?

[/ QUOTE ]

A specific number is very hard to come up with, but at least 100k.

[Scuba Chuck]

[ QUOTE ]
Ok, let's talk. How many hands are we talking?


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A specific number is very hard to come up with, but at least 100k.

[/ QUOTE ]

So you're saying the ability to move from 1/2 to 30/60 is 100,000 hands or more? So I'd need to average ~15,000 hands a month. That's gonna be difficult for me to do as I still intend to put in a minimum of 1k SNGs in. I was thinking more along the lines of 2,000 hands a month. Hmmmm.

[paperboyNC]

If you 4-table limit short-handed, particularly at high-speed tables on stars, you can get close to 500 hands per hour. Play for an hour a day and you have 15k hands per month.

[Scuba Chuck]

[ QUOTE ]
If you 4-table limit short-handed, particularly at high-speed tables on stars, you can get close to 500 hands per hour. Play for an hour a day and you have 15k hands per month.

[/ QUOTE ]

That sounds risky

[Harv72b]

I'll echo what hobbs said--while it's probably best to start out 1-tabling as you get a feel for LHE, you should be able to quickly adjust to 2-tabling and still have enough focus to learn the finer points of the game & take advantage of player-dependant reads. I often find myself bored & playing a side game of solitaire or something when I'm playing 2 tables, and I only 3-table normally.

Your goals are lofty but achievable, but would require a lot more than 2k hands/month to achieve by next summer. As far as the microlimits go (1/2 & below), it's pretty much more of the same as you move up from level to level...the only real difference is that the average player's VPIP drops by a few points. 2/4 isn't really a huge step either, but once you hit 3/6 & above, it generally takes a lot more than 2k hands just to adjust to the new level, let alone to master it. And strictly from a monetary standpoint, it would take you far more hands than that to build your bankroll to the point where you can play 30/60, assuming that you don't intend to keep pouring your SnG winnings into your LHE bankroll.

Personally, I think you'd be far better off to maintain the same final goals, but allot yourself quite a bit more time to achieve them. Put another way, I've been playing LHE seriously for over a year now, and based on my own feelings & some brief experience, think that I'm at best a break-even player at 15/30. I haven't even considered taking a shot at 30/60.

The books you listed, plus TOP, make for excellent reading & will give you all the book learning you need to succeed at LHE. But again, it takes tens of thousands of hands before you'll be able to fully understand (and take advantage of) those lessons--and that assumes that you have an excellent aptitude for the game. If LHE strategy doesn't come intuitively to you, then yes...you're looking at hundreds of thousands of hands.

For your specific questions:
1) I haven't used the HUSH forum (this could be why I suck at 6max). Some brief skimming through it from time to time suggested that it's pretty much the same as the SS forum, but limited to 6max (or fewer) hands.
2) Again, I've only looked over it a few times, but General Hold'Em is intended for overall strategy discussions. It looked like it's typically filled with beginner's questions about downswings, bankroll, and "am I a winning player?", though.
3) The intended use of the forums is 1/2 & below = micro limits, 2/4 through 5/10 = small stakes, and limits above 5/10 = mid/high stakes. But many regulars on this forum play above 5/10, and you'll often see 10/20 & above hands posted here.
4) I don't play B&M, but I have read that one a little more often than the other forums you mentioned. It seems like most of the discussion is centered on trip reports & general B&M questions (i.e., tipping, which establishments are best, what kind of rake to expect, etc).
5) If you understand what the poster is trying to tell you, that's a good poster. If you don't understand, ask--if they then explain it fully, that's a good poster.
6) Already covered. /images/graemlins/smile.gif

Welcome to the forum...hope to see you more often. /images/graemlins/smile.gif

BTW...if this helps at all, I decided to learn Omaha Hi/Lo a couple of months ago. I've done basically what you're doing--set up a seed of $600 on one of my Party skin accounts, and played .50/1 & 1/2 O8 on there. I set aside one day each week in which I play O8 exclusively, and then if I finish up my LHE hands early & still have a hankering to play poker, I'll put in some "overtime" playing Omaha. I've found that this has worked well as far as learning the game & building confidence.

[Jake (The Snake)]

It's good that you seem genuinely interested in learning limit, and are willing to identify your weaknesses.

That being said, I think your goals are essentially impossible to achieve. As for the number of hands it will take to get to 30/60 playing from the micros, someone could probably come up with an exact number given WR, SD, etc but 200k seems low to me, especially for someone new to limit.

I'm not sure the degree to which luck plays a role in NL versus limit, but to give you an idea, the very best posters on this site have gone >50k at breakeven many many times.

Your book-reading plan seems very good.

You will get sick of one-tabling online. Especially at the lower limits. There will just be way too much downtime as the majority of your decisions will be easy.

Questions:

1. HUSH forum works same as here, post hands with 6 players or less. 6 max hands are also generally accepted here but are usually posted when they resemble small stakes games in some way.

2. Personal stories, challenges, events, sometimes theory, it's a weird forum. Just not hands.

3. 15/30 and above I think.

4. Yeah pretty much I believe.

5. This is subjective and rather difficult to deal with. Just try to see what arguments you agree with, the best posters tend to back up what they say logically. If you want specifics, feel free to pm me.

[Scuba Chuck]

[ QUOTE ]
you should be able to quickly adjust to 2-tabling and still have enough focus to learn the finer points of the game & take advantage of player-dependant reads.

[/ QUOTE ]

That's good to know.

[ QUOTE ]
once you hit 3/6 & above, it generally takes a lot more than 2k hands just to adjust to the new level, let alone to master it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Thanks for the extra info, this told me a lot.

[ QUOTE ]
Put another way, I've been playing LHE seriously for over a year now, and based on my own feelings & some brief experience, think that I'm at best a break-even player at 15/30.

[/ QUOTE ]

This question is for my own benefit, I appreciate you giving me some of your history, as it helps a tremendous amount. What was your poker experience prior to learning LHE?

[ QUOTE ]
Welcome to the forum...hope to see you more often.

[/ QUOTE ]

"You will be, you will be."

[Scuba Chuck]

[ QUOTE ]
That being said, I think your goals are essentially impossible to achieve.

[/ QUOTE ]

Thanks, I appreciate brutal honesty. Do you feel the same way about live play?


One last comment. It appears that I should be posting in the micro limits if I'm going to play 1/2, so I apologize for opening up here. Maybe I'll put more money in so I can hang with you guys ... /images/graemlins/cool.gif

[ArturiusX]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Ok, let's talk. How many hands are we talking?


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



A specific number is very hard to come up with, but at least 100k.

[/ QUOTE ]

So you're saying the ability to move from 1/2 to 30/60 is 100,000 hands or more? So I'd need to average ~15,000 hands a month. That's gonna be difficult for me to do as I still intend to put in a minimum of 1k SNGs in. I was thinking more along the lines of 2,000 hands a month. Hmmmm.

[/ QUOTE ]

Its like a sport. Crosstraining is next to impossible. You must focus on one, and put up with the high amount of training and sucking you will undergo.

[Harv72b]

[ QUOTE ]
What was your poker experience prior to learning LHE?

[/ QUOTE ]

Pretty much nil; a few drunken home games.

Point being, it takes a lot of hands before the typical LHE player is really ready to move up (again, once you hit the 3/6 "wall"). I think I probably moved up the limits much more quickly than most of the posters here did. Your experience in NL will help, as you understand the basics of starting hands, pot odds, and hold'em strategy, but there are a lot of differences between the games that will take you time to adjust to--in that regard, you're not going to be a whole lot better off than someone completely new to the game.

[hobbsmann]

[ QUOTE ]

Thanks, I appreciate brutal honesty. Do you feel the same way about live play?

[/ QUOTE ]

I've played 20/40 a couple of times live recently and I've been playing poker seriously for less than a year so I'd say you *could* be playing 30/60 live within year if you worked at it.

[Scuba Chuck]

[ QUOTE ]
Its like a sport. Crosstraining is next to impossible. You must focus on one, and put up with the high amount of training and sucking you will undergo.

[/ QUOTE ]

Well, I don't think my transition is crosstraining, as I am through learning NL SNGs at the moment. It's so second nature, it's like finding the light switch in the dark. But all of my 'day-dream-like' thoughts for the last 3 weeks have been about LHE. So, with regard to training, I'm ready!

[Scuba Chuck]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

Thanks, I appreciate brutal honesty. Do you feel the same way about live play?

[/ QUOTE ]

I've played 20/40 a couple of times live recently and I've been playing poker seriously for less than a year so I'd say you *could* be playing 30/60 live within year if you worked at it.

[/ QUOTE ]

I ask, because I thought I read some place in the not so distant past that someone 4 tabling 5-10 should be able to play 30-60 live. That did come from the B&M forum tho, so maybe I should have taken with a grain of salt.

[hobbsmann]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

Thanks, I appreciate brutal honesty. Do you feel the same way about live play?

[/ QUOTE ]

I've played 20/40 a couple of times live recently and I've been playing poker seriously for less than a year so I'd say you *could* be playing 30/60 live within year if you worked at it.

[/ QUOTE ]

I ask, because I thought I read some place in the not so distant past that someone 4 tabling 5-10 should be able to play 30-60 live. That did come from the B&M forum tho, so maybe I should have taken with a grain of salt.

[/ QUOTE ]

I 4 table 5/10 6 max currently and think 20/40 live can actually be a little easier. I would say you could probably play in a good 30/60 game after you know you are a winner in a decent 6 max game and the 5/10 to 10/20 full games online.

[Scuba Chuck]

[ QUOTE ]
there are a lot of differences between the games that will take you time to adjust to--in that regard, you're not going to be a whole lot better off than someone completely new to the game.


[/ QUOTE ]

Well, I guess it cold be a blessing or a detriment.

[MrEngenic]

[ QUOTE ]
So you're saying the ability to move from 1/2 to 30/60 is 100,000 hands or more? So I'd need to average ~15,000 hands a month. That's gonna be difficult for me to do as I still intend to put in a minimum of 1k SNGs in. I was thinking more along the lines of 2,000 hands a month. Hmmmm.

[/ QUOTE ]

/images/graemlins/grin.gif

[1C5]

Good thread, make me want to dust off all my LH books again. /images/graemlins/cool.gif

Anyone got any views on Poker Academy (or Wilson Turbo) ... could make playing 'tons of hands' a lot quicker.

P.

[Octopus]

I would just point out that there are two separate questions here.

1) How quickly can get good enough to move up? This could be very quickly. The only danger is that it will be quite difficult to tell if you are playing well or just running good. That said, some players have moved through the limits with remarkable speed.

2) How quickly can you build a bankroll for moving up? Playing only one table, this will be a problem. Supposing you are a 2BB/100 winner and are fairly conservative about bankroll size and moving up, it will take you months of playing full time just to reach 5/10.

I think playing one table is probably the right course for someone who wants to move to the upper limits, but building a bankroll that way is slow to say the least. One frequent poster here may have the best answer here: he plays what I consider to be a rediculous number of hands (approaching 100,000 a month) eight tabling, but a couple times a week (?) takes some time to single table at a (much) higher limit. Whatever works.

Anyway, good luck and welcome.

[Octopus]

[ QUOTE ]
Anyone got any views on Poker Academy (or Wilson Turbo) ... could make playing 'tons of hands' a lot quicker.

[/ QUOTE ]

My view is that for someone well familiar with Hold'em (even NL), this will be of very limited value.

[SeaEagle]

[ QUOTE ]
1) How quickly can get good enough to move up? This could be very quickly. The only danger is that it will be quite difficult to tell if you are playing well or just running good. That said, some players have moved through the limits with remarkable speed.

[/ QUOTE ]
Even "remarkable speed" entails ten thousand hands or so at each level. 2000 hands a month isn't going to cut it.

[ QUOTE ]
2) How quickly can you build a bankroll for moving up? Playing only one table, this will be a problem. Supposing you are a 2BB/100 winner and are fairly conservative about bankroll size and moving up, it will take you months of playing full time just to reach 5/10.


[/ QUOTE ]
So let's do some simple math:
Win rate = 2BB/100
Standard Deviation = 0
Bankroll requirements = 300BBs

Starting with $600 and playing at 1/2 you would need to play 15,000 hands to win $600 and be able to move up to 2/4. You'd then need 22,500 hands at 2/4 to have a bankroll for 5/10. Running this progression, you'll need 75K hands to build an 18K BR for 30/60.

Of course, these calculations assume you maintain a 2BB win rate at every level, which you won't. They also assume you won't have any major swings, which you will (and downswings will be more likely than upswings when you're climbing levels).

All in all, I would think 150K is probably an aggressive number for someone who has a ton of natural talent, is working their butt off studying poker when they're not at the table, and doesn't have any substantial amount of bad luck. But for the vast majority of poker players, no number of hands is sufficient since they simply don't have the talent and/or drive to get good enough to play winning 30/60 online.

[Greg J]

We don't bite in ML. /images/graemlins/smile.gif Posting some in ML will probably help you adjust to some basic concepts of LHE, while this (SS) is obviously more substantively advanced. It's good to frequent both IMO.

At our best in ML we discuss more complex and nuanced hands, just at limits 1/2 and below. But there is more noise there -- a lot of holding the newb's hand through pumping valuable draws with an equity edge, or not open limping 77 in LP (stuff guys here in SS take for granted).

So yeah, ML is a good forum (but I'm biased), but as far a high quality content goes, SS is better no question (though we do have our moments in ML too!).

[brettbrettr]

Starting at .5/1 sounds crazy for someone with your roll and experience. Start at 2/4. Play 2 tables, lots, post lots of hands, reply to lots of hands. When you're getting it, get a coach or someone to sweat you for an hour or two, he'll find more leaks.

[Scuba Chuck]

[ QUOTE ]
Starting at .5/1 sounds crazy for someone with your roll and experience. Start at 2/4. Play 2 tables, lots, post lots of hands, reply to lots of hands. When you're getting it, get a coach or someone to sweat you for an hour or two, he'll find more leaks.

[/ QUOTE ]

Thanks, I came to this conclusion finally today.

And thanks to many of you for your opinions. They've helped me out a lot, including those of you who PM'd me instead of posting here.

/images/graemlins/grin.gif Took me a while to figure out what ML is /images/graemlins/grin.gif

One other thing. I was given a different list of books to read. From first glance, this list looks excellent, and the thought process behind it was quality. I figured I'd share.

WLLH (this was given the ok as a starting point)
SSHE
King Yao
Inside the Poker Mind
Poker Essays 1,2,3
How good is your limit hold'em
Real Poker II

Furthermore, the same poster who gave me this list of books, also did a good job of learning a little about me, and suggested the following study timetable to start out with. Focus on limit for 3 hours a day. 2 hours of study, and one hour of play. (which isn't too different than what I was intending anyway).

When I was learning SNGs, I had many posters/lurkers send me PMs thanking me because they were able to learn through my presence on the boards (because I'm real good at making mistakes, posting, and learning from them). So I'm going to share as much as I can as I "cross-train."

Good luck at the tables.
Scuba Chuck

I am actually a big fan of Turbo Hold Em. Although I am a solid, experienced player, the program is an excellent way to practice between cash game sessions. The play evaluation feature and Sidekick Sid option are particularly useful.

[bnorthro]

SSHE is an excellent book. After reading it through 3 or 4 times, i picked up King Yao's book....and I was a little dissapointed. A lot of the stuff in his book was like "yeah, i know that already," which I guess is a good thing. I think the shorthanded section would be valuable if you'd never heard about shorthanded play, and hadn't read anything on this forum about it. However, you can learn a lot more from the HUSH forum than whats in that book. Just my 2 cents.

[mtdoak]

First off, welcome to the forum. Second, it sounds as if you have a good enough bankroll to start much higher, but you are very wise to start low. You gotta learn to beat up the slow fat kids before you tangle with the big boys, which looks like that is your long term goal. Take it slow, however. Its going to be tempting to move up quick. I don't know if you have a rakeback deal setup yet, but get one if you don't. Its going to be your lifesaver some months. Its going to take alot of hands to get where you need to be, become a regular hear. There's some of the best advice dispensed in the poker world happens right here in this forum.