[Pov]

The following are some recommendations I wish someone would have given me when I started out. Unfortunately I hadn't started reading 2 + 2 yet.


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i ended up winning $12, so i was happy.

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Don't focus on whether you won or lost. Did you play well?

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using a lot of what i learned in SSH and on these boards, i was able to bluff/push off a lot of people for little/medium pots and draw people into making a marginal hand as profitable as i could.

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You need to be VERY careful trying things like this until you are an experienced player. OUtright bluffing at the low limits is rarely correct. Wait for the opportunity to semi-bluff.

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it was surprisingly tight last night. while people would generally play with crap, there averaged only 3-4 people seeing the flop, which i thought was odd for these stakes . . . kinda boring with not a lot of people seeing the flop.

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When you move up to limits as low as $2/$4 this will actually be pretty much an average game. I know you're just starting out, but start working on your patience now.

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but i'm in the black, so i'm exciting for my winnings.

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I'm glad your first session was a winner. However, as mentioned above, don't get too wrapped up in whether you happened to finish up or down in a particular session. Be careful to separate your results from your quality of play. Sometimes you will play like crap and win and sometimes you will play flawlessly and lose. It's very difficult to grasp this until you have a lot of experience. I'm not saying not to celebrate your win - you should be proud - but the point is to never settle for how you did. Could you have won more on the hands you won? Could you have lost less on the hands you lost? What did you learn about your opponents? Only player who ask themselves these questions on a regular basis will improve and take on the higher limits.

Your next step is to repeat your first performance many dozens of times. You correctly stated that 80 hands doesn't mean much. Neither does 800. Put in a few thousand hands and see if you're trending upward. Even then your results may not be particularly indicative of your skill, but that's when your win rate will start to materialize and you'll start to get a good idea of whether you're actually winning. The more important part is to just keep improving your skills regardless of short term results.