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oh yeah, and what you said about having too much investing in a hand by the time the turn or river comes out, happens to me at least a couple of times a game.
sign of a amatuer i guess, lol.
i always get to the turn with nothing but a long shot at a straight or flush, but convince myself that i have nothing to lose, and end up chucking in half my stack.
sean, while I agree with you that while having more players in a pot CAN be enjoyable, there is extreme risk and playing that style. It's hard enough just trying to read one hand, but when multiple hands come into the equation you are looking through a blizzard with sunglasses on. The chances of busting, being trapped or just plain losing increase with each player in the pot. The goal of every great player is to isolate a hand with one player and attack. The easiest way to achieve this is to raise preflop, the reason why ALL pros suggest this line of attack. That being said, I can't get anyone out of a pot preflop in my home game either. I play a .25/.50 cash game and regularly have pots with five players calling a three dollar raise. This is because we KNOW each other too well. It's times like this that reading ability can be the difference between walking home busted and walking home rich.Quote:
Originally Posted by sean michael
Some added advice I have for you is this. If you find yourself playing every hand or too many hands, you should walk away from the table for a second. Get a nice drink (not too stiff) and take the time to enjoy it. Think about your approach and how you can change it to work for you. Slowly make your way back to the table and calm down. Slowplay the next three or so hands you get and when you finally win a big pot, change up your style to aggressive.
After the next big pot you win, change it up again and keep changing, throwing your opponents off balance. When I am down in a rut at the table, this simple strategy has worked wonders for me over the years.
"Poker is hours of boredom and moments of sheer terror"
- the professor Howard Lederer
oh yea ps GOOD LUCK!
wanting to gamble isn't a sign of an amateur, its the sign of the gambler, and some of the biggest pros out there are huge gamblers.Quote:
Originally Posted by sean michael
Tune in Monday when I go over pot odds and what makes for a good and bad gamble.
yeah i feel what your saying,
but that said, i dont really play to win, i mean i always try as hard as i can, and im really competetive, but when i lose a can still enjoy the night etc.
to me that more important, all our games have some really close high stakes hand, which makes it interesting.
also, as you said when you play with the same group of people all the time, you get to know their tactics/tells/betting trends etc. its always interesting when you think you have someone figured out and they come out with somethink totally unexpected, such as a huge bluff.
another point/question. when i play my main tactic when i have a strong hand is to slow play initially, wait for someone else to move, and then follow there bets. or if this doesnt happen, to then make my own moves.
i do this because i assume its a safer tactic then bluffing etc, the problem is i seem to be more predictable now that people have picked out my betting trends.
anyway, question is, what tactics would you employ when bluffing, eg. cards down, amount in the pot etc.
because usually when i do bluff, i seem to under bet to late and end up getting tangled up in an unwanted show down, or betting to much, too early and picking up a relatively small pot.
Ok, you aren't that big of an amateur. Your 1st question shows that you have graduated past rank amateur and have reached the second stage. I was on that stage for a while myself, thinking I could slowplay all my big hands successfully and waiting to spring that giant trap. The problem is these occurrences are extremely rare, and when they do happen, chances are fastplaying would have produced the same results, maybe even better. I'll get to the bluffing in a second, but lets tackle that question first.Quote:
Originally Posted by sean michael
The KGB slowplay is a great move. I don't want to down the play totally, but that play has a time and situation to be used, but it is unfortunately overused. I, myself, don't recommend slowplaying that often. There are two major reasons why.
1. You risk letting a weaker hand or a draw hand catch you. There is nothing worse than flopping the nut straight, checking it down and have a back door flush take all your money on the end. Listen, its like this. By slowplaying, you gain no information on a hand, you also give no indications of strength. I can't tell you how many times I've slowplayed a hand, then had to lay it down because of a play made later on in the hand, only to find out I had the winning hand. Why did I lay it down? Because earlier in the hand I picked up no information, made it appear to my opponent that I was weak, and when I finally bet on the river, the bet made no sense. He sees this as a bluff (like he should) and comes over the top all in. Now i'm lost in the forrest. I can't risk my entire stack, knowing he could have caught up to me on the river.
2. You don't make as much money. You can check and check and check and not make a dime. Used to slowplay a set on the flop all the time. Now I barely do. And ya know what? I make tons more money and get sucked out less. Also the first bet people put into a pot many times is construed as a bluff and is subject to reraises. This is exactly what you want correct? REMEMBER :maximize wins.
The bluff is a beautiful thing when employed properly. Too bad most people use it up like a cheap whore. When I play a cash game I employ a bluff at most maybe once an hour. At times I have gone entire nights without bluffing and was the massive chip leader at the table. You want to pull off the bluff right? Well make the play make sense. (see example below) As far as the correct amount to bet? Ask yourself, What would I bet if I had the flush right now? A bluff bet should be a happy medium between betting too strongly and betting too little. (I prefer like half the pot) You essentially want to place a bet that looks like a value bet. A value bet is a bet that looks like it is crying for a call. The only problem is a bad player will do just that, not caring what you have.
I'm not saying 100% of the time you should employ this type of bluff but it works wonders especially against great players. Other types of bluffs to try are the blow off, a huge immediate all-in raise usually done preflop or on the flop against an aggressive player who likes to continuation bet on the flop.
The other type of bluff is what Doyle Brunsen calls the post oak bluff(don't know how he got the name) This is a very small bet into a huge pot designed to look like you are trying to make a little more money on a made hand. This is very very hard to use and almost never works, but when it does, it more than makes up for all your failures.
I don't like to give up ALL my secrets but this is a bluff play I use occasionally that works well. For this play to work, the flop must contain a pair, preferably low. (aces on board is a bad time to try this)
Lets say after a small raise prefop you call with ace jack off.
Flop (9H 9S KC)
Your opponent bets the pot representing a king.
You ponder the move and smooth call.
Turn 4H
Your smooth call slows down your opponent and he bets the same as previous showing a little weakness.
You have two choices now the 2nd being more risky. You can raise now about the size of the pot and hope to take it down now or risk another card coming off and try the move on the river.
You smooth call again.
River 3H
now your in business. A card that could a backdoor flush has fallen on the river. You have planted the seed in your opponent that you either have a 9 or a king. He sees this and checks. You bet big on the river (a little more than the pot) He contemplates and folds his king suspecting you had slowplayed the 9. You turn over your ace jack and he throws up. You have just pulled off a successful bluff because the play made sense.
As far as picking up a small pot early because you bet too much, don't sweat it! part of hold 'em is those monotonous seemingly meaningless little hands with small pots. Phil Ivey is considered the greatest player on earth because he is constantly going after those little unwanted pots. Would you rather win several small pots taking the blinds with aces, or lose a monster pot because you slowplayed those aces and got cracked?
"Aces either win you several small pots or lose you monster ones."
-Doyle "Texas Dolly" Brunson
When to slowplay...
1. When you have the stone cold nuts. Your hand on the flop is either unbeatable or very unlikely to be beaten. If you flop four aces you can bet right out, but serously your opponent has to have something to call right? Not likely with a flop like that.
2. You know your opponent to be aggressive and checking will surely induce a bet.
3. You suspect that a player may be slowplaying you. This is the quagmire. If you bet they call and you get no info. You check and they check. These hands always lead to a disaster on the river. The reason I suggest slowplaying, is because you can save some money if you make a correct read and they DO have a monster. Sometimes this is the only way of avoiding a "cooler " hand.
good topic beatuifulrock... im a poker enthusiast myself
slowplaying is indeed way over used by bad players
you can get sucked out on but also you risk a card coming that scares your opponent in not putting anymore money in the pot, even though he really liked his hand on the flop and woldve gone all the way with it
also a good point^^^^
As well as scaring YOUR opponent, the cards that come can make the board a mess and scare you, making it hard for you to throw more money in the pot as well as making it easier for your opponent to bluff you later in the hand.
I can't reiterate enough the dangers of slowplaying, but like I said there is a time and place.
what stakes do you play at rock?
i play $0.50 - $1 NL and sometimes dabble in the $1-$2 if the game is juicy..
I play several different stakes, 1-2 at the casino and at a bar I go to. My home game right now is a .25-.50 cash game which is a really good level if you dont wanna burn more than $150 bucks and want to actually PLAY the game. Online I have played as little as .01-.02 no limit and as high as $2-$4 in both no limit and pl omaha. This is also a great level if you have over a grand online. The problem is at the bar and the casino, the buy in is capped at $100 which means at 50 big blinds you really don't have much room to play. It's pretty much shove in and pray poker, and I don't like that. If I really want to gamble I'll buy a powerball ticket. I don't wanna lose $100 on 1 hand with ace king.Quote:
Originally Posted by mic-cord-strangler
Today's tip- Always wait until it is your turn before you look at your cards. Many amateurs can't wait to see what they are dealt and immediately look at their cards the second they are dealt. This is a bad move. What you should be doing is taking the time as the cards are dealt to study your opponents and their reactions to the cards. Also it is a good idea to not give any necessary info away on your hand until it is your turn to play. Many will look at their cards and look either disinterested/very interested, giving away your intentions to previous bettors. The best time to look down at your cards is when it is your turn. While this may seem a very benign action, it WILL help your game in the long run.
problem with that is that other players, that may not have looked at you earlier are now all looking at you.
i just dont look at my cards straight away , and then once everyone else has, i have a look. if you check them when its your term dont you think there is a greater chance of giving something away to your opponents? cause they will all be looking at you?
I really don't think so, unless you are that bad at concealing your hand. Do you react to your cards? I don't. All I'm saying is you may affect a previous action in the hand by looking too early. When its my turn, I want them grilling me. I want them to try their best to read me. Because I plan to misdirect them the whole way. Remember there are (52 x 51)/2 = 1326 different hands you can start with. If you give away the strength of your hand simply by looking at your cards, well then you probably shouldn't be playing. Be aware of the tells of others as well as your own tells. Let's say you look at your cards early and see a hand like pocket kings. You inadvertently begin playing with your chips as the play comes around the table to you. An opponent sees this and instead of raising flat calls to wait for your action. You just lost money. You may not have meant it, but you did because of impatience.
"looking at your cards early is truly the sign of an amateur"
- The Real Deal - A book by poker pro Phil Gordon
i mean i dont think i react to my cards, but any tell is unconcious anyway.
but i get your point about wanting everyones attention when you try to mislead them.
ahhh False!, Any and all tells are not unconscious! Many pros and players alike such as myself give off what are called false tells. That is we have read Caro's book of tells, know what it looks like when they do or don't have a hand, and "act" the opposite way. This is a very cleaver deception especially when "set up" by previous hand. At the stage of the game you are at right now Sean, I highly highly recommend this book to you especially if you have interest in becoming a better player. It completely turned my live cash and tournament play around.Quote:
Originally Posted by sean michael
what the book called?
Caro's Book of Tells
by Mike "the mad genius" Caro
old book there have been several reprints. newer reprints even have internet tells.
ok thanks, i'll check it out.
Some thoughts on pot odds....
Pot odds are tough to explain, but a friend of mine said it best. He said that if the percentage to win the hand is greater than the percentage of money you contribute to a pot to make a call, you are making a correct mathematical call. While the percentage can be low, if you continue to make the same correct mathematical call throughout the course of your career the money in the pots you win will far outweigh the money you lose in pots you don't win.
Heres a simple example
the blinds are 1/2 you are in the bb, and someone goes all in for 4 total and the play folds around to you. you have A2. It costs you 2 to win a pot of 7. thats his bet 4 + your big blind 2 + small blind 1 =7 and to make the call it costs you 2. 7/2= 3.5 to 1 odds
this means if you are less than a 73%-27% underdog the call is a good one
with any ace it is pretty easy to call getting more than 2-1 odds.
you call
he shows KK
you are a 70%-%30 underdog about 3.3 to 1
If you infinitely ran ace 2 against kk for those pot odds, ace 2 would make money.
As far as tournaments go, If i am in the small blind and at least 2 people limp in front of me, there is no hand I can fold for a call of the blind. If 2 people call, I am getting 7 to 1 odds to call the blind. These are great odds even for 72.
As far as the big blind goes If someone minimum raises my blind I like to make them pay by calling with any hand to suck out as I am getting at least 3 to 1 odds to make the call.
Pot odds can be used in many situations but the most helpful times to use them is when you are trying to decide whether to call in the blinds or to make a call on a draw. There are times when you should ignore pot odds, and times when you can't.
One caveat about pot odds... Your shortstacked friends will hate you.
I won my first Hold 'em NL tournament yesterday (buy in 5.5$)
check the last play :) (i'm Abarai_dogg)
http://img107.imageshack.us/img107/3...iercoupne6.jpg
Congrats hellspawn ^^^^thats a cooler hand heads up, not too many gettin away from that. How much did ya win?
36$ I think, it was that 5.5$ shit
2 table tournaments are a good thing to play because they simulate the end of a major tournament and don't take too long. You need to know how to get all the chips and this is a good way of doing so. I would suggest before going up to the next level (you said $10 in the other thread) build your stack up to $200 as you don't wanna spend more than 5% of your bankroll on any one tournament. Doing so leads to concessions like well I can play this 1 twenty dollar tournament and it won't hurt me that badly, and thinking like that makes you go broke. Protect your money!
cool, thanx for the advice
I do it like this :
enter the bet only if i have good cards on the first table and then give it all in the final table.
For all you heads out there that don't wanna pay for a poker tournament, but wanna win real money, I have this for you.....
Absolute Poker has daily freerolls around the clock with a fixed prize pool of $50 paying over the top 18 places. They also have a REBUY FREEROLL in which entry is free buy you may buy rebuys for 1 dollar. While rebuying in such a tournament with 4000 people is stupid, people do it anyway, building the pot to over $300 spread across 63 spots.
This freeroll takes place at 15:15 eastern standard time you can sign up any time after 14:15 but the registration closes after 4000 enter. Good luck!
thanx for the info I'll try to register tomorrow :)
I do it that way sometimes too. While this play (going all in 1st hand or early) diminishes your chances of cashing, it greatly increases your chances of winning the entire tournament if you double or triple up early. In a $$$$ sit n go such as this however there isn't that much to get by anyway. I probably would save that play for the bigger tournaments because if you do go broke early you don't have to waste 4 hours only to go broke on the bubble, you can join another tourny or go outside a play basketball or something...heh hehQuote:
Originally Posted by Hellspawn
oh yeah and hellspawn, absolute has a feature where you can find me by typing in my user name "beautifulrok".( no c) If you tell me your name on there I'll look for you tomorrow. I start in 5 minutes, see you and good luck!
yeah!
placed 98th in a freeroll tourney on paradisepoker out of like 2500.
anyone have strategy how to play at the $0.02/$0.04 with 10 cents +)
Maybe I can get it up to $2 today
lol...maybe ill start playing for some cash online
but i would rather do not on my bankcard maybe on a pay as u go card type shit haha
heh heh, pray I guess?Quote:
Originally Posted by Prolifical ENG
hey proof if you don't wanna spend money just yet, but wanna make real money let me know, I've done it tons of times on absolute.Quote:
Originally Posted by 100pr00f
Who here plays Fulltiltpoker?
i do freerolls mostly name beautifulrock. I'm in the horse tourny at 5est
about to head out to a game in about an hour, $120-$140 pot, 6/7 players and winner takes all.
should be interesting, i'll let you lads know what happens when i get back...i need the money so i need to win this one.
ok, just got home from the game, its about 3am and i am fairly drunk so the synopsis will be brief.
basically i won the first hand of the game, comforatbly, gained a generous chip lead. however the next hand went all in on pocket pairs (the highest pair on the board pre river) and my opponent rivered a straight. i had a chip advantage over him, so i wasnt out, but my chip stack was pitiful. i played the rest of the game making the most of my free hands, and basically gettinng rags on the majority of hands. i wasnt the first player out, but generally played poorly.
the game went for about 4.30 hours, and heads up at the end went for about 1.30 hours, with the two remaining players splitting the pot on three occassion.
anyway im annoyed that i didnt win, maybe next time i wont be so agressive.
heads up was 1.5 hours? That's crazy! Musta been epic. Wish I was there.
sean remember my credo on tourmaments:A TOURNAMENT IS A MARATHON, NOT A SPRINT. IT DOESNT MATTER HOW MANY HANDS YOU PLAY IT MATTERS HOW LONG YOU LAST, SO DONT BE AFRAID TO PLAY TIGHT.
especially early....
just flopped a royal playing omaha hi/lo one of the perfect times to slowplay.
hand Ah Qh 5h 6s
opponents hand Kd 2d Tc 4h
flop Kh Jh Th
turn Kc
river 9c
all the money went in on the turn
Quote:
Originally Posted by beautifulrock
yeah, i won a large hand early, and thought i had my opponent read, which i did, until the river. when he rivered a straight and took my chips.
heads up was epic, three times when both players were all in with fairly equal chip stacks, they both had the same hand. they must have split the pot a total of 4 or 5 times that night.
Todays Omaha Lesson
Playing the proper starting hand:
In Omaha playing the proper starting hand is almost as important as winning the hand itself. The real object of Omaha is to make the nuts or close to it. Still I see players playing any four random starting hands. Since the mean winning hand in Omaha is the nut flush, You should be looking to make a hand as good as a straight. Playing low suited cards to try and catch a flush is a no-no as is playing low pairs to try and catch a boat. I just assume avoid the mess caused by playing bottom set and dump any pair lower than 66. These are the premium starting hands in Omaha.
The Two best-
AAKK - double suited
AAJT - double suited
although AAKK is a slightly higher percentage than AAJT, most pros would agree that AAJT is the better hand due to the amount of nut straights it makes.
Other great starting hands
four running cards
QJT9 and JT98 are the best of these, the purpose of which is to make the nut straight.
Double Suited cards
while this is a good drawing hand you want your flush draws to be as high as possible.
pair + connectors
KKQJ, QQJT, JJT9
hands like these are very playable, especially if double suited
two gap connectors
KQ98 , JT76
these hands make the best straight draw possible if the two middle cards come. This is called the Maine to Spain draw. Lets say you have KQ98 and the flop comes JT3. You have an A,9,8,7 to make the nut straight and a K,Q for the 2nd nut straight. This is nearly half the deck to make a straight and two streets to catch.
The biggest piece of advice I can give while deciding on a starting hand is avoid hands with a dangler and hands in that make two good starting hands in hold 'em but don't work together in Omaha.
examples of bad starting hands
KQJ2 - deuce dangler
AK33 - ace king is nothing in omaha, so are treys
TT54 - only a set of tens will help you here
9983 - you have 99 and 98 but the three is a bad dangler
These hands are more or less a waste of money. In omaha you want four cards that mesh well together.
The misconception of preflop play in omaha.
I see people all the time at a 9 handed Omaha table raise preflop. This is an incorrect move. Omaha is not Hold 'em. Lyle Berman says there is NO HAND WORTH PUTTING THE 1ST RAISE IN PREFLOP. That's not to say you can't re-raise to isolate with a hand like aces preflop. In a game like pot limit omaha, the 1st raise is never enough to push anybody out and therefore you are pricing multiple opponents to call. If multiple opponents call you are no longer a favorite to win the hand. The pot will always get big enough in PL, and since you are chasing the nuts, its always better to see cheap flops.
Let me show you a shocking example of why aces are nothing in Omaha
Your hand As Ad 3h 2d
opponents hand Js Ts 9d 8d
guess who's ahead preflop? NOT YOU. Your opponent is a 52% to 48% favorite. Aces pretty much shrink after that don't they? In a game where people are chasing straights, flushes, and fullhouses aces only help you make a boat, and if the board doesn't pair, you can't make a boat.
In Summation save the preflop raising for when you get to 5 of 4 people left. Your chances of winning are much better then.