I'd rather have a losing session than this? (probably not)

[DcifrThs]

this should make you feel a bit better...and realize that you really won alot...

when i go to visit my mom in fl we go on a casino boat and play for the 6 alotted hours.

i play 10/20 (from now on 20/40), and she plays the 2/4/8 game.

after all 6 hours i won a grand total of 2 dollars. it was my first experience w/ something like this as i usually win or lost at the VERY least 1 bb. my mom ended up winning 800 at 2/4/8 and i had $2 to show for my time and "skill" whereas her play ever hand scenario turned out amazingly well.

after a week of thinking about it (YES...A WHOLE WEEK) i realized that i won a great deal of money for the rake. $3 per hand, 40 hands per hour, of which i was in about 7.5/40 hands. i won lets say 30% of the hands i played 2.25 hands where i should have won more than i did and that comes to 6.75 dollars per hour so i paid 6.75*6=40.5 in rake and "won" two dollars so i REALLY won 42.5 dollars which put me above my bb limit. SWEEEEEEEEEEEEET!! [keep in mind this is a biased way to calculate rake paid]

-Barron

[BarronVangorToth]

It is always ... frustrating ... when the people who know nothing about poker do better than you, especially when you know you know more.

Similar to your mom-in-FL story, my grandmother and her friends have a fairly regular game that they play of "poker" (and I use quotes since they play every poker game imaginable, half the deck is wild, etc etc) and my grandma invited me to play with them in their "big" monthly game, which meant a few tables of 5/10--

--that's 5-cents, 10-cents, in case you were wondering.

I lost OVER 8 big bets on the session -- 85 cents -- even though I thought I was playing fairly well against her 80- and 90-year-old friends.

Sometimes ... the change of scenery isn't profitable. Sometimes, it is. But I WILL get those bets back next time, grandma, I swear.


Barron Vangor Toth
www.BarronVangorToth.com

[SmileyEH]

[ QUOTE ]
my grandma invited me to play with them in their "big" monthly game, which meant a few tables of 5/10--

[/ QUOTE ]

Damn, I thought you were going to be playing for prescription drugs.

-SmileyEH

[fnord_too]

Your reaction to this experience is something you should work on. How are you going to feel when you play well but still go on a 200BB skid over 15k hands?

You should strive to feel the same regardless of outcome. Your post session reflection should be on the play of hands, not results. Also, you cannot say a worse player would have lost money with the cards you had. He may in fact have made a ton by playing incorrectly and getting lucky. All you can do is make good decisions. Over time, the results will reflect the quality of your decisions. You probaly played between 1000 and 2000 hands in that 3-4 hour stretch, the results over that many hands are going to be dominated by chance.

I try to avoid any emotional reacation to my results, good or bad. My experience is that feeling good, bad, or even blah hurts objectivity, and objectivity is vital. (blah more saps the energy needed for objective review, and tends to push one more to the loose passive side I think.)

[dfscott]

[ QUOTE ]
Your reaction to this experience is something you should work on. How are you going to feel when you play well but still go on a 200BB skid over 15k hands?

[/ QUOTE ]

I think I can honestly say that I wouldn't be able to handle a 200BB slide over 15K hands. Maybe it's my personality and the need for at least some glimmer of hope, but 15K hands would be about 4 months of poker for me, so that would be a long time to hang in there without any positive results.

Since this post, I've played about 1000 more hands and lost about 130BB. Am I reeling? Yes. Have I considered quitting? Yes. Will I? Not yet. Four bad sessions does not a career make. I will get back on the horse tonight. I'm also taking labor day weekend off from poker, so I'm hoping that will help as well.

[Position]

I'm totally curious how you manage 10K hands in 2 days! My record is more like 3K -- and that's 4+ tabling.

Wow.

[fnord_too]

Over in the HU Shorthanded forum, loosing streaks get talked about a lot. There is a fellow over there who is a 2.5/100 winner over 150kish hands (maybe more). He has had a 300 and 380BB loosing streak in his run. It gets hard sometimes to know whether the problem lies with oneself or short term luck. It is very important to have a good idea about why you are losing. The above example shows though that even very good players can have extended losing streaks.

One thing I cannot reccomend highly enough if you don't already have it is pokertracker. This is a very useful tool on two fronts:
1. It lets you look at your vital playing statistics like how often you voluntarily put money into the pot, what your aggression level is, how often you win at showdown, etc. It is great for finding leaks in your game.

2. It gives you a good line on your opponents. Even at the higher limits (on Party) the pool of opponents is so large that you are often sitting down with a table full of players you have never seen before. However, it is very very helpful if you have a line on even one or two of your opponents. This is useful for game selection as well as how you play hands. If you multi-table, it is almost impossible to get good notes on players. Maniacs stand out, but, at least for me, the others just sort of blur together.

Oh, another thing you may want to do if you are on a losing streak and it is bothering you is just to play one table for a while. You will increase your EV / 100 and you will decrease variability.

Again, if you play poker you will have losing streaks. Learning to deal with them is very important.

[dfscott]

Thanks for all the advice -- I appreciate the help and encouragement. I stumbled upon another thread in the SS forum, and I'm glad that at least I'm not in that bad a shape. I feel sorry for the guy, but it made me feel a lot better about my situation.

I do have poker tracker, and I use it religiously. I'm a stats junkie, so not only do I use PT, but I also keep a ledger-style spreadsheet of my bankroll, progress and win rate. One thing that has been key for me is my win rate as well as the standard error that's associated with it (I can't remember who posted the formula for it, but I owe them a big thanks.)

Given those stats, I can say with 99% certainty that my current win rate is somewhere between 1.1BB/100 and 8.5BB/100. A big spread to be sure, but at least both numbers are positive. I have a 95% chance that it lies between 2.4BB/100 and 7.3BB/100. Of course, this figures in some lower limits and goes back over several months -- I might have picked up some bad habits. The bad thing about statistics like this is that since you're always learning, changing, and moving around in limits, by the time you've got enough data to be statistically significant, it's started to get obsolete.

As far as notes, I'm using a modified version bison's auto-rate plan and it seems to be working quite well, although you really have to take the ratings with a grain of salt when you haven't seen many hands (I'm sure that lately, I'd look like a rock.)

The good news is that I'm already out of the shell-shocked phase and back to just somewhat disappointed and approaching "defiantly determined." I'll drop back in limits again tonight and give the tables another shot.

Thanks again for the feedback.

[PhilipJ]

[ QUOTE ]

Sometimes ... the change of scenery isn't profitable. Sometimes, it is. But I WILL get those bets back next time, grandma, I swear.


Barron Vangor Toth
www.BarronVangorToth.com

[/ QUOTE ]

You know who's to put on tilt next time, grandma. [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

[dfscott]

Sorry to drag this old thread up again, but I've just started reading Zen and the Art of Poker. I wish I'd read it earlier, because Poker Rule #6 applies to this perfectly:

[ QUOTE ]

No one sets out for a trip to the casino [...] with the idea of breaking even as a goal. Rather, we set out with high hopes, excitement, expectancy -- the promise of big dreams. But then something odd happens when we get there -- we break even. Our reaction is a feeling of annoyance, of letdown.


Breaking even happens. It is one of the possible outcomes. We must not see it as a nuisance or an unwelcome event. A distaste for breaking even can lead us into the valley of pressing and overplaying and other wrongful activity. Become comfortable with breaking even. Teach yourself how to sit quietly and patiently at the even mark.


You sit simply, as a warrior, and out of that, a sense of individual dignity arises - Chogyam Trungpa, Shambhala: The Sacred Path of the Warrior


[/ QUOTE ]