looking for an honest answer

[tomdemaine]

[ QUOTE ]

You can't lose more than $12 on a hand, or $60 on 5 hands. You feel frustrated, so you are exaggerating. That's not helpful.



[/ QUOTE ]

I'm pretty sure he's talking about NL. Not that it affects much else you've said, but it is possible to spend 2-3 hours building up a stack and then lose it all in one hand set over set or something. I've done it loads of times and I'm a winning player [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[aargh57]

Since I started keeping track I've had 3 or 4 losing weeks out of about 24. The 3 weeks were all when I either was starting out or playing in a card room. Both situations where I didn't play very many hands. Other than that I played an average of about 20 hours a week. Also, I bonus whored most of that time so this helps a great deal to a beginner. I could easily see a 4 tabler that played 25 hours a week having very few losing weeks. Also, OP assumes that the rake is uniform. For the high limits, the rake is less of a factor than it is on the low limits. This is greatly offset by the fact that people are playing 83os to his AA.

[AASooted]

[ QUOTE ]
but the recommendations all insist aggression, aggression, aggression. and if you think about this approach to the game, aggression, since it is coupled with incomplete information, MUST always run afoul of significant losses.

[/ QUOTE ]

If anyone was suggesting you could win by just mindlessly clicking the bet and raise buttons, they were mistaken. Yes, you have incomplete information, but analyzing the information you have can be enough to swing the odds in your favor.

If you have three or four players calling all the way to the river, you absolutely want to put more bets in when you flop four cards to the nut flush. You'll only make your flush one out of three times, but you'll win more that one time than you lost the other two.

On the other hand, you don't want to bet into three or four players who don't know how to fold if you can't beat more than a bluff. In that case, someone is likely to show down a hand that beats you. If you're against one player who tends to fold easily, sometimes you can steal a pot by betting into him. Your opponents' tendencies should also go into your decision-making process.

The key to winning isn't just aggression -- it's controlled aggression. When you think the odds are such that you have an advantage over your opponent, you press that advantage. If you don't think you have an advantage, you don't try to force it.

[ QUOTE ]
one is committing large wagers, relatively, to events that have not just one participant but several, each of whom is motivated by standards having little to do with "the poker truths"...and who continue to play without the least regard for the money they will lose(sic) taking on my kings and aces...except that it is invariably the largest pots one loses, and loses many more times than one wins, to just those 8/2o wielding idiots.

[/ QUOTE ]

The concept of pot equity applies here. If you have a 1 in 3 chance of winning a pot and there are 5 players in the pot, you'll lose big pots twice as often as you win them, but the extra players putting money in when they have a tiny chance to win means you make money in the long run.

It sounds like you've just been sucked out on a lot lately. You have those streaks where that happens. Your flushes don't come in. Your flush hits, but you're beaten by an ugly full house or straight flush. Someone hits an unlikely card to beat you on the river. These things happen in the short term. In the long term, things will even out and you will make money at the game -- if you're making better poker decisions than your opponent.

[pzhon]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I've had only one losing week in 18 months of playing poker. I dream of finding games as soft as those I remember in the microlimits, but I play for much higher stakes because that is much more profitable.

[/ QUOTE ]

Not that I don't belive you, but how do you manage to only have one losing week over 75? No matter how much I want to win, sometimes the cards just don't hit. Like this past week [img]/images/graemlins/mad.gif[/img]

[/ QUOTE ]
I mainly play NL. The win rate in NL is much greater, relative to the variance, than in limit.

On my worst day, I had a downswing of $1100 at NL $100. (I felt $150 of that was due to tilt.) I was down $500 for the day. In total, I was ahead $1700 for the week, which was about 1 standard deviation below expectation.

By the way, I also include bonuses in my results. While my win rate exceeds the bonuses, they may have made the difference between a winning week and a losing week.

[excession]

The rake is about -2PTBB/100 (say $4/hr on a $100 NL table)and that is before you add back bonuses and rakeback.

Sure if you are a marginal winning player (1-2PTBB/100) you will find yourself at a standstill, but, at micro limits rates of up to 15PTBB/100 are achievable for the better players (and even at quite decent SSNL - say $100 tables, rates of up to 8PTBB/100 can be managed consistently (I think AP10 8-tables $100 NL at about 4PTBB/100)

it is argued by probabilists, that warren buffett is a six sigma event, that he is a statistical anomaly. my experience with poker thus far has me nodding my head in accord. maybe this game is about some people being lucky and some people not being lucky. in the past two days, my bank roll lost ~25%, gained 50%, and stands now at a losing 30%. in another post i asked about the play of pocket tens. today alone i have lost 4 times with TT, creating a run of astronomically miniscule and improbable results with this high grade hand. i have tried limping, raising, reraising and whining. i have tied the play to the kinds of players i am facing, rocks to nofoldem holdem. i have done just about all i can think to do..meanwhile, the litany persists, something like flipping heads 80 times in a row. it's argued possible, but it's stunning to say the least. so maybe it's luck. maybe youre lucky and i am not.

certainly not incontrovertible.

i see claims made of 15BB made here. of winning what? 24 times as many weeks as losing? i then look at my record. i have had 10 bad beats this morning. a bad beat being, to my way of understanding it, beaten by 9x as the overcard when you hold the 8s, betting your A from the CO with three limps to you in a loose game; or being rivered by a raiser UTG who reveals a showdown holding of Q9o to make his straight, taking your KKK by storm. and that's just this morning. i appreciate the post which argues that one's EV is more important a criterion by which to judge these things. however, what with my limited experience, some 15k hands, utilizing that approach, i must say, i can EXPECT to win a lot less in the showdowns with my major holdings than i win. however, this is anecdotal--though when the great criterion, BB/hr, is evoked, the amount of money won by these premium hands--as a conglomerate--is so negligible as to question any conclusions to be drawn about them without 10's upon 10's of thousands of instances to draw on for support.

it is insinuated that i lack schooling, and should read some books. i have read both of miller's books (SSH and the other one for beginners),supersystem, killer poker, the illustrated guide to holdem, the complete book of texas hold-em, the psychology of poker, the play of the handsII, as well as a couple of howididitinreallife biographies; i am currently reading weighing the odds in poker, middle limit holdem poker, HE for advanced players, and poker essays III. i also practiced the game on wilson's software for two months before taking to the field. i like to think i know how to prepare for a game of this nature. i am one of the few horseplayers who has made money at that game. it's a very hard game, requiring discipline, assiduity, and hard work.

i have a doctorate in classical literature from stanford university, am a 2300 FIDE chess master, and have, as stated in my first post, lived by the sum of my speculative wits in gambling venues. i know what expectation is, i know what probability is, and i like to think i know when something is anecdotal, and when it is validifiable.

now, by all the information i have encountered, a .05 expectation is deemed superlative, with some outstanding players having upwards of .08 expectation. these figures are produced in NL games, which implies that limit ring games are far less lucrative, and more subject to "chance". given that this is the case, you can understand my uncertainty about the above testaments. i would like to see some math about these testaments, actually, but in order to verify a number, to establish it with some measure of confidence, you need things like win percentage, average mutual/pot per investment, and things like that. maybe you know of another means of establishing confidence, but that's the data i needed to do it in sports handicapping.

please be aware that i am NOT denying your experience. but your experience and mine widely differ, and the sum of the two leaves far greater room for doubt in the curious mind as to the truth of it all. maybe it is all about LUCK, really, maybe it is. and if it is, then all the talk IS anecdotal, and hardly worth the evidence it purports to offer.

(PS. two of the hands i lost were at the 1/2 level, which may account for some of the discrepancy. the 100 dollars had been garnered in the .5/1 limits.)

[SheridanCat]

[ QUOTE ]
maybe this game is about some people being lucky and some people not being lucky.


[/ QUOTE ]

That is certainly not what poker is about. The luck will even out, it's the edges you've gained through superior play that will produce positive results. Pzhon discussed this very well, I think.

[ QUOTE ]

in the past two days, my bank roll lost ~25%, gained 50%, and stands now at a losing 30%.


[/ QUOTE ]

Have you mentioned the size of your bankroll vs. the limits you are playing? I may have missed it. If you're playing a limit corresponding somewhat correctly to your bankroll (let's say 300BB just as a touchpoint), then your 75BB swings are painful but hardly unheard of. That's exactly why it's dangerous to play past your bankroll. If your bankroll is lower than the 300BB touchpoint, then your swing is even smaller and totally within expectations.

[ QUOTE ]

in another post i asked about the play of pocket tens.


[/ QUOTE ]

Focusing on a small sample like this will lead you down the wrong path. This weekend I had a bad run. I lost with AA/KK/KK, a flopped set, etc. It all culminated in about a 75BB downswing when the dust settled. Yeah, I noticed I was getting pretty unlucky, but I just shrugged and moved on. Since then I've turned around a bit.

My point is that I gave a crap about those "bad beats" for about 2 hours and then got on with the business of beating the poor players who had cracked me.

Worrying about 4 hands with TT is pointless. You can play them absolutely perfectly and still get hammered. The short term is a bummer that way.

[ QUOTE ]

maybe youre lucky and i am not.


[/ QUOTE ]

That's fish talk. This type of thinking leads to weak play.

[ QUOTE ]

i see claims made of 15BB made here.


[/ QUOTE ]

Not at any signficant limit and not in the long run. I've sure won 15BBs in an hour or 100 hands or whatever. But it's not sustainable at any game that matters.

[ QUOTE ]

i have had 10 bad beats this morning.


[/ QUOTE ]

The next thing is to get this notion of "bad beats" out of your head. If you played correctly and your opponent played poorly, you won. Who won the pot is irrelevant. If you played incorrectly, then you lost. If you were pushed the pot that is also irrelevant.

[ QUOTE ]

i have read....


[/ QUOTE ]

Some of those books are good, some are average. Perhaps the problem is reading too much too quickly. My suggestion for a Texas Hold'em reading list would be:

Getting Started In Hold'em
Theory Of Poker
Small Stakes Hold'em
Inside The Poker Mind
Hold'em Poker for Advanced Players

Then read the other stuff. You might flip TOP and SSHE, I prefer the theory early, but that's personal preference.

I don't doubt your overall ability to learn and apply your knowledge. Your own introspection leads me to believe that you are a good student who may be simply stuck at the moment. This happens to most students undertaking a new subject.

Poker is a process of learning, applying, receiving feedback and learning more.

Regards,

T

[Quicksilvre]

[ QUOTE ]
See how much people lose here.

[/ QUOTE ]

I've been looking for this very thing and couldn't find it. Thank you.

[KenProspero]

[ QUOTE ]
so my question is: are YOU winning? are YOU winning by crushing the microlimits? is there an edge in your play, significant enough, to warrant committing any sum of money in wager?

[/ QUOTE ]

Looking for an honest answer from poker players??? There ain't no such thing. We're all supposed to lie.

[Quicksilvre]

[ QUOTE ]
today alone i have lost 4 times with TT, creating a run of astronomically miniscule and improbable results with this high grade hand.

[/ QUOTE ]

I suspect you think TT is a stronger hand than it is.

Anyway, it the chances of TT losing four times in a row are far from "astronomically miniscule," as you say. In the multiway pots that are common in low-limit poker, TT will lose any given hand half the time or more. The probability of losing four times in a row, then, is about ~1/16--that's poker. Four hands is not good enough to draw any conclusions (SheridanCat already said that, but it bears repeating).