Is this the best way to begin to learn Hold'em? New Players Log

[helpmeout]

Pacific is a good place to start I have to agree.

My progress has gone like this.

Spent 2 weeks playing free money games and learning.

A month playing at pacific and learning, read WLLHE and HEPFAP. $50 --> $300 5c/10c -> 50c/$1 (smashed the games 5BB/HR over about 150 hours)

After a week, maybe only 10 hours or so got my ass handed to me in 50c/$1 (100BB ouch)

Played a bit at pokerstars 5c/10c and 1c/2c NL also more SNGs and MTT and Pacific. Not much luck, played pretty poorly and lost the plot a bit.

Purchased a 21" monitor for potential multitabling but I think it is actually better for finding which games to play in. Eg open 4 tables and watch, join the best game.

Currently reading SSHE(reread WLLHE and half of HEPFAP), waiting on MLHE and going to purchase a few more books soon. I am playing primarily at 5c/10c at pokerstars and am analyzing every hand. Pokertracker works at pokerstars and the games are much tougher, it is good cheap practice. (I already have loose game experience vs bad players at pacific)

My goal is to play short sessions and try to perfect my game. I want to be able to play 4 hours and not make the usual dumb errors I usually do.

After a few months experience and a bit of reading I pretty much know what I should and shouldn't do in low limits so I can pickup most my errors.

The problem is in a game situation you make dumb decisions all the time and not realise after how many mistakes you really make and how much they cost you.

If I am unsure then I post the hand and hopefully get some good feedback.

Over the next month or 2 I plan to mainly read and reread books as well as posts and some articles that are around the place (at cardplayer.com mainly). Play a few short sessions and hopefully get closer to perfecting my game.

I eventually want to get to 50c/$1 party games but I am in no hurry, I still have too much to learn.

[derick]

2200 Hand Update: I lose at playing and make money at bonuses.

Finished the bonus at Paradise. I earned $100 bonus and lost about $25 so I'm up $75 from Paradise. I took the money from Paradise. To take advantage of their new 50% deposit matching bonus I made a deposit on Ultimate Bet. It seems really clunky to get the hand histories into PokerTracker from Ultimate Bet. I played at the lowest stakes I could work off the bonus at 25/.50 Limit. I lost at Ultimate bet. I'm not sure why... Maybe having a VP$IP > 60% had something to do with it. I played only HEPFAP class 5 hands or better, but I think I stayed too long with them. I really need to improve my post flop game.

I put my tail between my legs and ran to Pacific. Home of the oceans of fish. I entered a $2+.20 No Limit SNG and came in 4th earning a few bucks (I think $6)


HELP!

I think I’m getting into big trouble since I’m trying to follow the SSH style of play but not applying it correctly. Before I think I was winning by playing very tight and only seeing the flop with Pairs over 77 and AA, AK, AQ. Now I’m seeing way more hands and not knowing what to do with them. Often I’m thumbing through SSh while at the keyboard and trying to find the appropriate section.

Did anyone else find their game went south after reading SSH?

I think I have been trying to change too many things in my game at once so it’s hard to know what to work on.

I went from playing weak very tight to trying to play tight aggressive. So I find I’m seeing the flop a lot more but I don’t have experience to know how to handle the postflop decisions that come up.


For example from page 96 in SSH I don’t understand this play,

One player limps, the next player raises

Starting with Qh, 7h, our hero calls. Everyone folds to the blinds who both call. The limper calls.

On a flop of Jc, 7s, 5h it is checked to the preflop raiser who calls.

Why is re-raising the best option? (I would have folded)
Are you trying the free card play?
I count about 6.5 outs…

Can someone explain why re-raising is the best option?

[helpmeout]

Slow down with SSH its not an easy book to take in straight away.

Stick with playing weak-tightish until you are 100% sure why you want to do something.

Raise or bet when you know why you should not because you think it is what SSH tells you to. When you enter a pot with a hand think about what could happen and what you want to happen. Not just oh I have A7s and in HEPFAP it says I can call here etc.

You have to start thinking about the game more not just blindly read a few books. I'd also suggest moving down to lower limits and don't worry about chasing bonuses. Play less poker and analyze more.

As far as the Q7s hand in SSH it really isn't useful for beginners. Firstly if there is a raise in front of you preflop then you fold. You also have no reads which is a big factor.

The whole idea of raising is because only the preflop raiser bets(likely to just have overcards), your raise suggests that you have a good hand which might knockout hands slightly better than yours such as J3 or A7. You also want to knockout potential overcards and gutshot straights so your hand may win unimproved.

The pot size is the main factor here, you may be ahead so you try to win the pot by protecting your hand.

[Mangatang]

Excellent post.

[derick]

2300 Hand Update: Played a couple more sessions of .50/1 at Party. Installed the Pokertracker Beta patch to get hand histories. Won a slight amount about ten BB. Made a few errors that I spotted right away. I think my bad play is losing me about 2-4 BB/100 but the terrible play of my opponents is more than making up for that.

I finished re-rereading the post flop and turn sections in SSH. My objective in the next few days will be to concentrate just on post flop and turn play so I’m going to read the SSH sections on that again. I still have yet to read Theory of Poker and Middle Limit Holdem for the first time. Should I take a break from SSH and read those two or just concentrate on SSH??

I think I’ll get an account on Empire so I can use pokertracker and get a sign in bonus. I’ve heard that I have to uninstall and clean the registry of Party’s client before I can use Empire - Is that correct? I’m off to find the best Empire bonus and affiliate scheme.

A big thank you again to all those who have helped me on this forum. You guys are wonderful!

[derick]

Thanks very much for your help!

[helpmeout]

MLH is a pretty decent book, its mainly just question and answer stuff and will help you think more about your game and each hand.

The advice is slightly weak-tight but I think a combination of both MLH and SSH is good. Without totally understanding SSH your style might be a bit LAG, MLH should tighten it up a bit.

Just make sure you slow down a bit, it works a lot when you check through your hand histories for mistakes. You start becoming much more accountable.

I tried to be a bit fancy with an AKo hand yesterday where a player raised my preflop raise, I capped of course but when an Ace hit the flop I checked, hoping for a checkraise. Of course all 7 people in the hand checked it through. Anyway I bet the turn and got rivered by a runner runner flush.

Now this play probably cost me 10+BB because a bet on the flop probably would have made the runner runner flush guy fold. A few dumb plays like this every couple of sessions could be costing you a lot.

[kalooki45]

Read your post with great interest, Red Rain!
It seems so logical the way you've laid it out--can you recommend a book that would cover all those situations in an orderly fashion?
All ears here!
Thanks [img]/images/graemlins/heart.gif[/img]

[derick]

2400 Hand Update:

Played more on Party last night.

So far I'm down about $9.95/2400 hands playing .5/1.
I've also spent a bunch on books and Pokertracker. These seem reasonable expenses because I've picked up $200 in bonus from Party and Paradise.

Theory of Poker arrived! It looks like some good background. I play to study it after I digest SSH.

Reread the chapter in SSH about overcards. I'm amazed at how much I forget between readings of the material. My retention is like reading a vector calculus textbook. I'm considering picking up ITH because someone said Ed Miller said, ITH and SSH is better than SSH alone.


Just applied for the 15% RELSEP04 bonus on Party. I don't have the bankroll to get the full $100 but every little bit counts. Now I have to wait 8 hours before I can withdraw and reload for the October bonus.

Pokertracker has been sucking up hand histories. It uses 100% CPU after a while...

Tonights plan is to let Pokertacker get some hand histories on 4 games and then join them after I go get some exercise.

Last night I set up the Pokertracker icons to match bisonbison's system. I'm not sure how to use the icons since they don't show up during the Game Time screen runnings.


I'm trying to figure out how to get pokertracker to self populate the Game Time screen without having to sit down and play a hand.

[Ed Miller]

Reread the chapter in SSH about overcards. I'm amazed at how much I forget between readings of the material. My retention is like reading a vector calculus textbook.

SSH isn't an easy book, and poker isn't an easy game. Don't let yourself get frazzled just because you are having some trouble. It will take a LONG time... like months and months... until you even begin to "get" it. I'm a smart guy, and it took me months and months before things even remotely started to come together for me. That's because there's simply a LOT to get. It sounds like you are doing fine.

Don't worry about your results, don't worry about whether your game is worse this week than it was last week, and don't worry about whether reading book X will hurt you or not. Your goal is to be a good player six months or a year from now, not next week (at least that SHOULD be your goal if it isn't.. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] ).

Keep reading, keep playing, keep thinking, and keep posting. You'll get there. And have fun. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]