To all you 2/4 players - how many hands of 2/4 have you played, and...

[detruncate]

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No reason to not play 3/6, you'll want to learn the lessons presented there sooner or later. And if you have the bankroll for it, why not sooner?

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Speaking only for myself, I feel that I should learn SH play at the 1/2 6m tables before moving to 3/6.

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I've been thinking the same thing. Seems like I lose most of my 'mistake money' in ill-conceived HU play.

[Munga30]

I have about 17K hands at 2-4 with good results. I still wonder whether I'm just running well. On the plus side, I have spent and continue to spend a lot of time here (and elsewhere) reading, thinking, and occasionally posting. So I just made what some might consider a slightly underrolled move to 3/6 with a little more than 250 BB in tow. If I fall to 180 (and I'm on my way there so far), I'll drop back down.

[goodguy_1]

I've played about 155K hands in $2-4 LHE Full and 11OK $3-6 LHE Full hands.I've also played a ton of 6MAX/5MAX/ in both games.I'm ready now to move up.I want to play $15-30 LHE but I need to take out the $5-10 6MAX games first and aclimate to even higher swinginess and maintain my edge.I make more in $100 NLHE 6MAX's then I do at $3-6 LHE Full but I think moving towards $15-30 Full is the best long-term move so I'm grinding LHE again.

$3-6 LHE is not at all like $2-4.It is much tougher game seriously.Proof of that is many players choose not to play $3-6 because they make more in $2-4.People that say the 2 games are comparable are wrong.$3-6 is a game where you need solid blind play,solid short-handed play and solid hand-reading skills.In $2-4 the players are so poor you can get away with being mediocre at those 3 skills and still make 1.00-2.00 bb/100 ..at $3-6 you will break even or lose if you havent worked on these parts of youre game.

All the games at Party over last 6 months have gotten progressively tighter in general.You used to be able to find 4-7 $2-4 games w/$40+ pot averages now these game are hard to find and when you do find them they dont sustain action often...anyway even with less easy games you should be able to make 2.00 bb/100-3.50 bb/100 at this limit after a very large sample

My first 2 attempts I failed moving up to $3-6 last year.My first 500 hours were a horror show I ran really really poorly but I also had work to do on my game.I was very depressed about it also. [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img] I now have around 1800 hours/~110K hands.Making the jump and staying there is well worth it because it will allow you to really start to make serious money and you can move up to better games.Both Party's $2-4 and $15-30 are better games then $3-6 or $5-10 Full.$5-10 by far the tightest of the small/mid games.Every single player in $5-10 Full seems to be playing for rakeback.The whole table is 17-20VIP/10PFR/2.50TA on ave.

I made almost 3.23 bb/100 at $2-4.My $3-6 earn was horrid for my first 30K hands then took off to the upside.My $3-6 earn is ~2.85 bb/100 currently.$3-6 is good game because it introduces you to a swingier game..yes dollar amounts arent huge ~$300/$400 or so but as you play more you'll adapt to the swings and play better.I'm a very aggressive player but ironicly never been big on huge intra-session swings.This is a major deficiency for any serious player -this fear of swings.Read Ray Zee's excellent post in this month's 2+2 Magazine..in it he says the best players are uneffected by large swings and this is so true.IF you want to play better,higher you must filter out the monetary value of your swings and just think of them as betting units.Matter of fact that whole Ray Zee article was very simplistic but to me it's the best 2+2 Magazine article I've read.

IF you need to move up slowly as I have so be it- know yourself.Beat a limit steadily on a large sample of hours/hands ie 100K hands before you move up.Some great young players will whip right thru limits..they are in general not the norm but there are many out there..god bless em.
Me I'm very methodical but it's put me in good shape.I've beat every level I've played at Party at PLO,NLHE and LHE Full/6MAX and now have a solid footing to move higher and make some really serious money-or at least as long as these online games stay good [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

The important thing to realize is that as you move up and experince higher dollar swings there are core components of your game that you must improve on to profit at this new higher level.The better players quickly figure out what these skills are and fix whatver defiency they may have.As you move up you have to be more adaptive and recognize where the skill-gap is between you and the field.
If you arent yet ready to adapt and open up your mind to how your game may be leaky head back to limits you can beat consistently.IF you stay at the higher limit and dont work on your game your variance will be very high and playing will be very painfull.

sorry for being so long-winded this is a topic that hits close to home for me.

[QTip]

Thanks for the long-winded post....things for me to consider.

I'll tell you what I sometimes think on this.

I'm always in a terrible game (good thing for me terrible). However, sometimes I think this hinders my development. Because I only play with horrible players. The 3/6 games I've been in can be played just like the .50/1 games I've played.

[DMBFan23]

great food for thought. certainly a lot of things to think about here. I'll probably re-evaluate at 10K, and see if I feel comfortable enough to mix 3/6 in on a part time basis.

[Lurker4]

good topic. I have about 20K hands at 2/4, and after playing 1/2 6m for a bit will be taking a shot at 3/6. I haven't moved up yet mostly b/c of reason 2 and maybe a bit b/c of 6. My winrate isn't what I think I am capable of at 2/4 (I've gone through two 100ish BB downswings through first 20K hands) and I still have sessions where I drop 40-50BBs and start doubting whether I can beat the game. Part of it is probably the money as coming from 1/2, the same swings feel bigger since the money is twice as much. I think I am capable of beating 3/6 though, so I will be playing some soon while making my main game 2/4.

[pyroponic]

I basically skipped $2/4 (played like 200k hands of 1/2), and am 7-8 tabling $3/6 now.

Things to look for:

1. Players are much tigher, and more aggressive

2. 30+ VPIP tables are not plentiful unless it's a weekened night, I consider a VPIP table of at least 25 to be fairly juicy, most 1/2 and 2/4 players would probably think otherwise

3. HIgher ratio of TAGs and rocks to fish/maniacs, although I find the rocks pretty easy to beat

4. Swings (especially when playing 6+ tables) can be brutal and takes aome getting used to, you need to still play at the top of your game after losing $500-$1000

5. Don't overplay overcards and turn check-raises and raises should be respected more

[GrunchCan]

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Why?

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Why do I think I need to work on my SH game?

2 reasons, I guess. First & foremost, my SH game sucks. Its really bad. Second, I think it would indirectly help my ring game by making me better with standard lines, hand reading, etc.

[housenuts]

to me it's all about bankroll. my bankroll allows me to play 3/6 so that's what i'm going to play. playing 2/4 just doesn't seem exciting and sometimes i find myself calling raises or making otherwise wrong plays because it's only $2 or $4.

as for my win rate:

2/4 & 2/4 KILL games - 7,887 hands - 2.17BB/100
3/6 & 3/6 KILL games - 7,085 hands - 0.96BB/100

and i'll add 5/10 just for fun - 1,218 hands - (-0.28BB)/100

i really liked the kill games at UB. alot of the time they would have 45% table VP$IP. and it was only once in a while that you'd be playing at double the stakes. which also added some excitement to the daily grind.

so it looks like 2/4 is more profitable for me. that's the first time i've compared. hmm.. more than double the BB/100
i wonder if that's statistically significant, i'd like a bigger sample size but i think i will play some more 2/4

maybe 2 tables of 2/4 and 2 tables of 3/6. does anyone recommend playing 2 different limits at once?

[BigEndian]

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does anyone recommend playing 2 different limits at once?

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I do not recommend it between 2/4 and 3/6. The blind structure is different and the above mentioned factors make it a bad idea imo when MTing more than 2 tables (if you can't pay attention to specifics when only playing 2-tables, there are other problems).

- Jim