52K HAND MEGA TUNE UP (REALLY LONG instructional content)

[droolie]

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I have played higher levels. I usually clear bonuses at non-party sites at 1/2 or 2/4 that aren't in this DB. I cleard the last two stars bonuses and the pacific crap at 3/6. I won everywhere I went I just don't like the added stress. I have cashed out over 4K this year so I don't feel too bad about the $$ I'm making in this part time hobby.... I am a nit too.

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Arggg... the pain... the pain.

You should play 2/4 until you lose 800$ (200BB downswing). If after two months, you haven't hit one yet, send me the portion of your roll you wouldn't have won had you played lower.

Krishan

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LOL!

You wanna stake me?

Congrats on your upcoming nuptials. Maybe once you're married and have two kids in diapers you can understand why I play primarily for relaxation and amusement. The $$ is nice but is not my primary objective.

I guess you could say I am a gamer not a gambler. I like playing for fun and profit and I'll take the sure thing and an enjoyable experience over maximizing profits most times. Losing big pots at higher limits really eats me up in an unhealthy manner right now. I can finish a session up $50 but still lose sleep over the $100 pot I lost to a runner runner suckout. Sleep is worth much more than money to me right now with my 6 mo. old ruling the roost. When I lose 20BB pots at .50/1 in the same way I can giggle about it because the $$ is insignificant.

When I cleared the last stars bonus at 3/6 I took down a couple $150 pots and wound up winning twice as much as the bonus I was trying to clear and yet I was miserable the whole time. What can I say I'm a tightass. I have the BR to be playing 5/10 right now (on top of the 4K+ I've already cashed out this year) but I need more time to be immune to chip shock I feel at higher limits.

Never fear though I am slowly drifting away from .50/1 into 2/4 full and I plan on giving 1/2 6-max another shot, it just takes me a lot longer to get comfortable with higher limits than most. I understand variance and the concept of making more per hour despite a lower winrate but the actual experience is just too stresful. I just can't convince myself yet that the money is just chips in my 300 bet BR at higher limits. It's real money that could have been withdrawn to play bills, renovate my house and save up for my kids college. Yeah I have issues. Whatever, I'll get there someday and when I do I'll be as prepared as possible.

[krishanleong]

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I have played higher levels. I usually clear bonuses at non-party sites at 1/2 or 2/4 that aren't in this DB. I cleard the last two stars bonuses and the pacific crap at 3/6. I won everywhere I went I just don't like the added stress. I have cashed out over 4K this year so I don't feel too bad about the $$ I'm making in this part time hobby.... I am a nit too.

[/ QUOTE ]

Arggg... the pain... the pain.

You should play 2/4 until you lose 800$ (200BB downswing). If after two months, you haven't hit one yet, send me the portion of your roll you wouldn't have won had you played lower.

Krishan

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LOL!

You wanna stake me?

Congrats on your upcoming nuptials. Maybe once you're married and have two kids in diapers you can understand why I play primarily for relaxation and amusement. The $$ is nice but is not my primary objective.

I guess you could say I am a gamer not a gambler. I like playing for fun and profit and I'll take the sure thing and an enjoyable experience over maximizing profits most times. Losing big pots at higher limits really eats me up in an unhealthy manner right now. I can finish a session up $50 but still lose sleep over the $100 pot I lost to a runner runner suckout. Sleep is worth much more than money to me right now with my 6 mo. old ruling the roost. When I lose 20BB pots at .50/1 in the same way I can giggle about it because the $$ is insignificant.

When I cleared the last stars bonus at 3/6 I took down a couple $150 pots and wound up winning twice as much as the bonus I was trying to clear and yet I was miserable the whole time. What can I say I'm a tightass. I have the BR to be playing 5/10 right now (on top of the 4K+ I've already cashed out this year) but I need more time to be immune to chip shock I feel at higher limits.

Never fear though I am slowly drifting away from .50/1 into 2/4 full and I plan on giving 1/2 6-max another shot, it just takes me a lot longer to get comfortable with higher limits than most. I understand variance and the concept of making more per hour despite a lower winrate but the actual experience is just too stresful. I just can't convince myself yet that the money is just chips in my 300 bet BR at higher limits. It's real money that could have been withdrawn to play bills, renovate my house and save up for my kids college. Yeah I have issues. Whatever, I'll get there someday and when I do I'll be as prepared as possible.

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I understand being risk averse. I play with a 2000 BB bankroll. But you've ground out way more than you need to have and your game is more than ready for 2/4. I understand that money means something to you. And I know the value of a good nights sleep (not as well as you I'm sure). And I know emotional control and tilt are terrible things to combat. But you are ready. And once you have move to 2/4 permanently, you'll have more money with which to rennovate the house, spends on the kids, etc...

Krishan

[grjr]

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I guess you could say I am a gamer not a gambler. I like playing for fun and profit and I'll take the sure thing and an enjoyable experience over maximizing profits most times. Losing big pots at higher limits really eats me up in an unhealthy manner right now. I can finish a session up $50 but still lose sleep over the $100 pot I lost to a runner runner suckout. Sleep is worth much more than money to me right now with my 6 mo. old ruling the roost. When I lose 20BB pots at .50/1 in the same way I can giggle about it because the $$ is insignificant.

When I cleared the last stars bonus at 3/6 I took down a couple $150 pots and wound up winning twice as much as the bonus I was trying to clear and yet I was miserable the whole time. What can I say I'm a tightass. I have the BR to be playing 5/10 right now (on top of the 4K+ I've already cashed out this year) but I need more time to be immune to chip shock I feel at higher limits.


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You are my long lost twin-brother! (My son is 6yo though).

[walshamatic]

Hi droolie,

What is the typical VPIP at the tables you try to play at..a range perhaps...can it get to high of to low to be successful at? I am break even right now at about 8000 hands. Trying to figure out the right mix.

[droolie]

The higher the better. I would kill to play at tables where all my opponents played every hand. It never happens though. I usually like to see 5 or more players seeing almost every flop. If the action folds to the button or blinds twice in an orbit it's usually time to click off the auto-post blinds button, finish your free hands and leave.

The thing about tables with lots of high VP$IP is that your good hands will get cracked with a higher frequncy than at low VP$IP tables. This can ve emotionally draining but don't let it bother you. The pots you do win will be much bigger and will more than account for the few times your AA gets cracked by some fool playing garbage. Just remember top pair is not a very good hand when 8 players are seeing the flop. You will often be forced to fold those AA when the action gets heavy as str8's flushes and trips take down a large % of the pots. Going too far because you "deserve" to win with your big hand, despite overwhelming evidence you are beaten, is a formula for failure. Don't fold them lightly but just know top pair often is not the winner.

[walshamatic]

Thank a lot....you give very good advice!

[imported_bezdi]

I just want to say that this thread has literally saved my game.

Story goes I built a decent bankroll and ventured into 2/4 limit territory, then all of a sudden I could not beat game for weeks and weeks while my winrate for those sessions were like +.05bb/100 or -.05bb/100 for the longest time. Started doubting myself and even reread all the 2+2 poker books, but it was just not working.

Day in and day out, it became really frustrating.

Eureka, there was this guy on 2+2 with a decent winrate (+5) and a long PT stats post. Maybe it'll fix a lot of my leaks. So what I did was compared my VP$IP VP$SB FSB to Steal FBB to Steal Att. Steal Won $ WSF BB/100 WSD% W$SD PFR numbers to Droolie's numbers.

I went to showdown 25% and won 59% which meant I folded a lot of winners.

Every day now, I keep the aggregated session stats in an excel spread sheet to get them closer to Droolies' numbers and it is working. From trying to match up to his numbers, I found multiple leaks.

- not showing down enough
- not folding big blind to steals enough
- not stealing enough
- preflop raise was too low

Winrate is no longer +.05bb/100 but a decent +3bb/100, everyone who is having stagnant sessions should try their best to emulate these numbers or give it a shot at least.

Droolie, can't wait to see your stats for higher limit games, and thanks for share such a great post.

[DeathDonkey]

I just want to say that anyone attempting to improve their game by manipulating PT numbers and stats to some predetermined "good" values may or may not be successful, but certainly doesn't have a good enough understanding of poker theory. I'm glad your successful bezdi, but for people in general trying to improve their game, working towards some imaginary stats which are "optimal" is going to be a huge crutch more than anything.

-DeathDonkey

[imported_bezdi]

DeathMonkey,

It is not like it is possible to be a complete clone and have success.

What I felt that was really important in improving the poker play was finding the multiple leaks as mentioned in the previous post. Just by comparing my own numbers to a successful player's numbers, I got a sense of what they were doing right, while I was not doing any or enough which resulted in giving away money to other players on the table.

[droolie]

bezdi- I'm really glad this thread helped your game. I was quite surpised to see this got bumped.

I would echo the sentiments of DD's that it's really not about getting stats like mine. I firmly believe that low limit hold 'em can be beaten a variety of different ways.

Let me provide an example from my development. My stats were created despite the conventional wisdom that really-to-super-aggressive play was the correct way to play. People were continually showing stat posts with pf aggros 3+ on every street. If you look back at my first post in this thread I linked to a thread that showed my awesome winrate despite relative passivity. After the feedback I recieved from that thread I tried to get my pf numbers up to get more in line with what the popular wisdom thought it should be. The more aggressive I got the worse I played and my winrate plummeted. Finally I just resigned my self to the fact that I play my style and whatever numbers that style produces so be it. This does not mean I won't learn or refuse to try new things. It just means I pay very little attention to my stats and much more attention to making good decisions and being able to justify what I am doing at all times. Whenever I find myself confused or questioning what I should do I write it down for future use on these forums. You should do the same thing. A good session for me is when I have very few of those moments of confusion regardless of the winrate.

Since I'm uncomfortable with you guys trying to get my numbers here are some of the reasons my numbers look the way they do. If you want to emmulate me emmulate the thought process not the result...

- I always take implied odds into account before folding any hand that has outs. If I'm closing the action and the pot is multiway I know there will be lot more money going into the pot on the turn and river. I'm talking about made hands or draws that contain at least backdoor str8's and flushes usually here. You will clean up when your monsters come in. I also take reverse implied odds into account as well. If I am stuck in between a donk bet and a LP pfr raiser I adjust accordingly.

- I rarely fold if it's HU and the pot is big if I think there is any chance that I have the best hand. If the pot is HUGE (20BB's plus) I'm usually seeing a showdown with anything reasonable (TP or better) no matter what the board looks like.

- I rarely take lines that lead me into getting tricked into folding the best hand. I call down a lot when in doubt. I don't often raise the turn with a hand that might be best if I have to fold to a reraise. (Even a two outer has two outs...) I'll save that bet to show the hand down.

- I push the little edges pf but don't get married to the hand. I don't mind raising a lot pf and giving up on the flop if the flop misses me and it's multiway. I think of pf raising as doubling down in BJ. When I have an edge over what the average hand the field is likely playing I want more money in the pot so I raise. After the flop everything changes and I adjust.

-I think I play overcards better than most micro players. I realize that overcards frequently leave you drawing to top pair. In a multiway pot (4+ players on the flop) this is a very weak draw if someone already has two pair or a set. I fold my overcards despite being the pfr on the flop and turn much more frequently than most at this level.

- I pay attention to what the betting of my opponents means. One guy betting and raising could be a bluff. Two (or more) guys betting and raising, one of them usually has it. Players don't bluff as much as we think they do. Sometimes a bluff just doesn't make sense. The more I play the better I understand this. Work on hand reading. It is the absolute best thing you can do. Try to guess the hole cards of the player going to SD even when you are out of a hand. If you are wrong try to figure out what clues you missed and try to do better the next time. You will be surprised how predictable most players are when you really pay attention. Read all the hand reading threads on 2+2 and pay close attention to the thought process of the people who got it right.

- I check TPNK and MPGK from EP in mutliway pots a lot even if I was the pfr. I like being able to C/R or possibly muck if the action gets too heavy.

-I play my good hands fast and pump the crap out of all my draws. I rarely go for overcalls and get huge pots with my monsters. You can get a very nice winrate from just doing this BTW. Nut peddling works when the average pot is big and one or two maniacs will play back at you.

- I played a lot of 2+2 tables. The single best exercise you can do is play against tough players who will show you their hands at the end and tell you what you did wrong. It's worth blowing 50BB's a session to learn what can be learned there. (Later at night when we're all drunk and we average 20BB pots this isn't true but early when guys are playing tight and aggro it is.)