Sick hand, thought I would take 5 mins so I don't end up on super tilt. Me and villain had been raising, re-raising, triple barrel bluffing, check raising each other all session (pointless reg wars but fun lol) then this happened:
Reading Jared Tendler's Mental Game of Poker and thought I would post this phrase as I really like the way he takes something negative and posts it in a positive light.
"Every time you go through a period of running bad, it’s an opportunity to prove just how much you have learned. Only when skill consistently shows up under extreme emotional pressure can you prove what has been learned to the level of Unconscious Competence. Everything else is still in the process of being learned"
Goes to show that when running bad if you just keep playing your normal game and making the correct decision one at a time and then things will eventually start to even out and go your way again.
Variance can be one big head f$*k if you let. Previous to this little heater today I had broke even for roughly 30 hours at 10NL so about 15-17.5k hands.
Another big positive is that I only need 685 points for priority so that will be worth another £175 for me at the end of the month plus maybe another £50 at least from the weekly cash bonus.
So if all goes well in the next few days and I continue to add to my roll rather than drop any I may be in a position to move up to 20NL.
My roll is now £350, plus £175 priority rakeback, plus £50 weekly cash bonus adds up to £575.
I am going to have a good think about whether or not I should move to 20NL after such a short time at 10NL but I think as long as I have 30 buy-ins so £600 I will take a £200 10 buy-in shot.
I will not be too bothered about playing all my volume at 20NL but it will just be nice to be able to game select from two stakes 10NL & 20NL.
When you keep loosing sessions and breaking even all the time it is very easy to convince yourself that you are a loosing player at whatever stake you are playing but just one good session can turns things right round and have a big impact on your winrate.
Over my last 40 hours so 20k hands, I broke even for the first 15k hands and had a negative to breakeven winrate. Now after todays session that brings my winrate up to 5bb/100 over my last 20k hands.
However I do know not to look to much into this as 20k is a very small sample and things can so easily turn around again.
So moral of the story is when things are not going your way just keep on plugging away, making the correct decisions and if you continue to do that and you are a good enough player to beat the stake things will turn round.
Going to leave this post again as I really like it:
"Every time you go through a period of running bad, it’s an opportunity to prove just how much you have learned. Only when skill consistently shows up under extreme emotional pressure can you prove what has been learned to the level of Unconscious Competence. Everything else is still in the process of being learned"
98 gets there and I block a combo of that, also the flush gets there.
I think villain would of check raised flop with set or flush draw so when he raises turn it so looks like QJ or 76 to me.
Villain is a decent reg so I thought depending on what come on the river I could possibly bet big and push him of a two pair type hand.
Thoughts please on whether I am just spewing chips here or is it a decent attempt at a bluff but just didn't pay off this time ?
Worst case scenario it enhances my spewwy image and helps me get payed of more when I do hit my big hands. (I have noticed that players tend to call me down a lot lighter than when they started playing with me)
Should I be 3-betting this hand pre vs a BTN open ? Do I just flat the flop with top pair and a flush draw ?
When I check raise flop and get min 3-bet should I just be flatting in this spot or do you prefer a shove to really put the pressure on ? (folding is never an option given the price where getting, what about if we are 3-bet shoved though ? can we call ?)
Not sure why you're raising the JTs on the flop. Ok, I get that we have a decent amount of equity but for me, the hand plays well as a call/call/decide or call/turn checks through/bet river.
The J9s should probably be a fold pre flop facing the 15.5bb 3bet. I notice that we're playing a little deeper but given the likely strength of Lisa's range and the high rake environment, I don't think we're going to be showing much if any profit by calling here.
With the T9s, I think folding the turn is easily the best option. We face a sizeable raise and we only have two outs to the nuts, given the K won't give us the nuts and four of our outs bring in potential flushes.
All of the above being said, I doubt any of them are big mistakes in isolation. The problem is though, that if we're frequently defending vs aggression in games that by and large play very passively, we're going to find ourselves taking the worst of it far more often than we might imagine.
Maybe people play more aggressively vs you because you have an aggressive image, I obviously can't know the answer to that but I have played enough £10nl on here to be confident in my read that by and large, the games are chock full of loose passive pre flop players that mostly convert to being weak/stubborn post flop with just the occasional nutjobs to keep us on our toes.
Here is the thing about Sky that is never talked about but is quite true if you're playing in decent games. You can get away with playing a quite weak and defensive style post flop without it having a detrimental effect on your ability to get value. Old school strategies of keeping pots small until you have a strong holding and then trying to bloat pots still work incredibly well vs bad players.
That style isn't going to prepare you well for playing higher stakes than £20nl and £30nl when it is hard to find tables that have an equal distribution of decent regs and very weak players but there is nothing stopping you using the most effective style to beat one limit whilst studying different strategies in preparation for tougher games.
My style of play on Sky is very different to how I operate when I occasionally play fast fold poker on other sites. It's not hard at all to switch between various different gears as long as we prepare ourselves in advance for the type of sessions we are expecting.
At the moment to me, it looks like your game is geared up for playing against more aggressive opponents. You're ready and willing to fight fire with fire, which is no bad thing when you're up against players who are fighting tooth and nail to get you to fold your equity share but if you're misreading players intentions when getting raised too often in games that mostly play passively, you will too often find yourself taking the worst of it and encounter the turbulent variance that you have talked about lately.
@The_Don90 Hi Mate that J9s hand was another player posting their hand on my wall to prove they had J9s as I thought they had something else and we where chatting about it in the chat box.
JTs after reading the hand again I agree that this is a check/call flop however if I did not hit top pair then I would still consider check raising against a rec and check/call against fun player. In game I think that I just wanted to start building the pot sooner rather than later. This hand is against a rec by the way, regardless of against a rec or a reg do you think this hand should still be played the same ? Check/call flop, check turn, lead river ? What if I hit flush on turn ? Do you try and go for the check raise, check call to keep in villains bluffs or lead ? I am not a fan of leading to be honest.
The games are chock full of loose passive pre flop players that mostly convert to being weak/stubborn post flop with just the occasional nutjobs to keep us on our toes. Agree that is what 90% of the recs are like but like you said the regs do tend to play very agrro against me.
Here is the thing about Sky that is never talked about but is quite true if you're playing in decent games. You can get away with playing a quite weak and defensive style post flop without it having a detrimental effect on your ability to get value. Old school strategies of keeping pots small until you have a strong holding and then trying to bloat pots still work incredibly well vs bad players. Completely agree here when playing against recs this is by far the best strategy as majority of them cannot fold and do not think past what is in their own hands. I don't know if you are familiar with BlackRain79 but he calls this strategy weak tight and it is the strategy that he used and has one of the highest winrates recorded at the micros.
At the moment to me, it looks like your game is geared up for playing against more aggressive opponents. You're ready and willing to fight fire with fire, which is no bad thing when you're up against players who are fighting tooth and nail to get you to fold your equity share but if you're misreading players intentions when getting raised too often in games that mostly play passively, you will too often find yourself taking the worst of it and encounter the turbulent variance that you have talked about lately. This is something that I need to work on, adjusting my plays depending on villain. I agree that the weak tight style is best for dealing with recs/fun players but when facing regs stepping up the aggression is good. Like you said due to my agrro image players are not believing me when I have big hands. I am still able to get away with flopping a set against good regs, overbet flop, overbet turn, shove river and get called by 1st/2nd pair, however I am balancing that play with my strong draws so sometimes I am shoving air and loosing full stacks but I do tend to do it more with sets and big hands than draws making it a profitable play in the long run I would imagine even though I have no data to back this up.
@The_Don90 Do you think that with a £600 roll I am best of playing one more full month at 10NL where I know I can beat for the experience and to build a more comfortable roll or should I start mixing in 20NL tables also due to the rake increase and also having more decent tables to choose from ?
@ALAN_18 I don't have time now to respond to your longer reply to me but to answer your question about your roll, I think £600 is plenty to take shots at £20nl.
I know you have been expressing some concerns about downswings and your style certainly increases your short term variance but even so, £600 should be plenty to take a shot.
Even if you drop 10 buyins, which seems unlikely, you will still have 40 buyins left to rebuild in what are the softest 10nl games you are likely to find anywhere on the internet.
I completely agree with the wise words of @The--Don - both in hand/game analysis and also in regards to moving up to 20nl.
I'm pretty sure I have a higher win rate an 20nl than I do at 10nl for two reasons. Firstly, the difference in rake is hugely significant and secondly, I tend to play like a bit of a tit when the money at stake feels less significant
Just make sure you table select well (especially at the start of your 20nl adventures) and I'd also suggest dropping your table count at the beginning so you can give it maximum focus. Poker is far less stressful 2 tabling with an 8bb/100 winrate than 6 tabling at 2bb/100 just because you feel compelled to get in a certain number of hands per hour.
If you are wanting to move up to 20nl and have a smallish roll, why don't you just add one table of nl20 and carry on playing nl10? You don't have to tie yourself to one level. This makes it easier to table select too.
I don't play 100bb cash but do play some spins and for me its all about table selection. I just try and pick the good games and will jump around the stakes. As the last few posters have said pick the good games within your roll. It could be you make more in a lower buy in game so make sure you are making good notes on players so you can identify good tables. If you are playing on a harder table because you want to challenge yourself against the best (this goes back to some of the stuff Alan Carr was saying) then make sure you are doing it with open eyes and not because you are now a 20nl player so you must play those tables.
Comments
"Every time you go through a period of running bad, it’s an opportunity to prove just how much you have learned. Only when skill consistently shows up under extreme emotional pressure can you prove what has been learned to the level of Unconscious Competence. Everything else is still in the process of being learned"
Quote Jared Tendler
Goes to show that when running bad if you just keep playing your normal game and making the correct decision one at a time and then things will eventually start to even out and go your way again.
Variance can be one big head f$*k if you let. Previous to this little heater today I had broke even for roughly 30 hours at 10NL so about 15-17.5k hands.
Another big positive is that I only need 685 points for priority so that will be worth another £175 for me at the end of the month plus maybe another £50 at least from the weekly cash bonus.
So if all goes well in the next few days and I continue to add to my roll rather than drop any I may be in a position to move up to 20NL.
My roll is now £350, plus £175 priority rakeback, plus £50 weekly cash bonus adds up to £575.
I am going to have a good think about whether or not I should move to 20NL after such a short time at 10NL but I think as long as I have 30 buy-ins so £600 I will take a £200 10 buy-in shot.
I will not be too bothered about playing all my volume at 20NL but it will just be nice to be able to game select from two stakes 10NL & 20NL.
Over my last 40 hours so 20k hands, I broke even for the first 15k hands and had a negative to breakeven winrate. Now after todays session that brings my winrate up to 5bb/100 over my last 20k hands.
However I do know not to look to much into this as 20k is a very small sample and things can so easily turn around again.
So moral of the story is when things are not going your way just keep on plugging away, making the correct decisions and if you continue to do that and you are a good enough player to beat the stake things will turn round.
"Every time you go through a period of running bad, it’s an opportunity to prove just how much you have learned. Only when skill consistently shows up under extreme emotional pressure can you prove what has been learned to the level of Unconscious Competence. Everything else is still in the process of being learned"
Quote Jared Tendler
I think villain would of check raised flop with set or flush draw so when he raises turn it so looks like QJ or 76 to me.
Villain is a decent reg so I thought depending on what come on the river I could possibly bet big and push him of a two pair type hand.
Thoughts please on whether I am just spewing chips here or is it a decent attempt at a bluff but just didn't pay off this time ?
Worst case scenario it enhances my spewwy image and helps me get payed of more when I do hit my big hands. (I have noticed that players tend to call me down a lot lighter than when they started playing with me)
When I check raise flop and get min 3-bet should I just be flatting in this spot or do you prefer a shove to really put the pressure on ? (folding is never an option given the price where getting, what about if we are 3-bet shoved though ? can we call ?)
The J9s should probably be a fold pre flop facing the 15.5bb 3bet. I notice that we're playing a little deeper but given the likely strength of Lisa's range and the high rake environment, I don't think we're going to be showing much if any profit by calling here.
With the T9s, I think folding the turn is easily the best option. We face a sizeable raise and we only have two outs to the nuts, given the K won't give us the nuts and four of our outs bring in potential flushes.
All of the above being said, I doubt any of them are big mistakes in isolation. The problem is though, that if we're frequently defending vs aggression in games that by and large play very passively, we're going to find ourselves taking the worst of it far more often than we might imagine.
Maybe people play more aggressively vs you because you have an aggressive image, I obviously can't know the answer to that but I have played enough £10nl on here to be confident in my read that by and large, the games are chock full of loose passive pre flop players that mostly convert to being weak/stubborn post flop with just the occasional nutjobs to keep us on our toes.
Here is the thing about Sky that is never talked about but is quite true if you're playing in decent games. You can get away with playing a quite weak and defensive style post flop without it having a detrimental effect on your ability to get value. Old school strategies of keeping pots small until you have a strong holding and then trying to bloat pots still work incredibly well vs bad players.
That style isn't going to prepare you well for playing higher stakes than £20nl and £30nl when it is hard to find tables that have an equal distribution of decent regs and very weak players but there is nothing stopping you using the most effective style to beat one limit whilst studying different strategies in preparation for tougher games.
My style of play on Sky is very different to how I operate when I occasionally play fast fold poker on other sites. It's not hard at all to switch between various different gears as long as we prepare ourselves in advance for the type of sessions we are expecting.
At the moment to me, it looks like your game is geared up for playing against more aggressive opponents. You're ready and willing to fight fire with fire, which is no bad thing when you're up against players who are fighting tooth and nail to get you to fold your equity share but if you're misreading players intentions when getting raised too often in games that mostly play passively, you will too often find yourself taking the worst of it and encounter the turbulent variance that you have talked about lately.
JTs after reading the hand again I agree that this is a check/call flop however if I did not hit top pair then I would still consider check raising against a rec and check/call against fun player. In game I think that I just wanted to start building the pot sooner rather than later. This hand is against a rec by the way, regardless of against a rec or a reg do you think this hand should still be played the same ? Check/call flop, check turn, lead river ? What if I hit flush on turn ? Do you try and go for the check raise, check call to keep in villains bluffs or lead ? I am not a fan of leading to be honest.
The games are chock full of loose passive pre flop players that mostly convert to being weak/stubborn post flop with just the occasional nutjobs to keep us on our toes. Agree that is what 90% of the recs are like but like you said the regs do tend to play very agrro against me.
Here is the thing about Sky that is never talked about but is quite true if you're playing in decent games. You can get away with playing a quite weak and defensive style post flop without it having a detrimental effect on your ability to get value. Old school strategies of keeping pots small until you have a strong holding and then trying to bloat pots still work incredibly well vs bad players. Completely agree here when playing against recs this is by far the best strategy as majority of them cannot fold and do not think past what is in their own hands. I don't know if you are familiar with BlackRain79 but he calls this strategy weak tight and it is the strategy that he used and has one of the highest winrates recorded at the micros.
At the moment to me, it looks like your game is geared up for playing against more aggressive opponents. You're ready and willing to fight fire with fire, which is no bad thing when you're up against players who are fighting tooth and nail to get you to fold your equity share but if you're misreading players intentions when getting raised too often in games that mostly play passively, you will too often find yourself taking the worst of it and encounter the turbulent variance that you have talked about lately. This is something that I need to work on, adjusting my plays depending on villain. I agree that the weak tight style is best for dealing with recs/fun players but when facing regs stepping up the aggression is good. Like you said due to my agrro image players are not believing me when I have big hands. I am still able to get away with flopping a set against good regs, overbet flop, overbet turn, shove river and get called by 1st/2nd pair, however I am balancing that play with my strong draws so sometimes I am shoving air and loosing full stacks but I do tend to do it more with sets and big hands than draws making it a profitable play in the long run I would imagine even though I have no data to back this up.
I know you have been expressing some concerns about downswings and your style certainly increases your short term variance but even so, £600 should be plenty to take a shot.
Even if you drop 10 buyins, which seems unlikely, you will still have 40 buyins left to rebuild in what are the softest 10nl games you are likely to find anywhere on the internet.
I'm pretty sure I have a higher win rate an 20nl than I do at 10nl for two reasons. Firstly, the difference in rake is hugely significant and secondly, I tend to play like a bit of a tit when the money at stake feels less significant
Just make sure you table select well (especially at the start of your 20nl adventures) and I'd also suggest dropping your table count at the beginning so you can give it maximum focus. Poker is far less stressful 2 tabling with an 8bb/100 winrate than 6 tabling at 2bb/100 just because you feel compelled to get in a certain number of hands per hour.
If you are wanting to move up to 20nl and have a smallish roll, why don't you just add one table of nl20 and carry on playing nl10? You don't have to tie yourself to one level. This makes it easier to table select too.
As the last few posters have said pick the good games within your roll. It could be you make more in a lower buy in game so make sure you are making good notes on players so you can identify good tables. If you are playing on a harder table because you want to challenge yourself against the best (this goes back to some of the stuff Alan Carr was saying) then make sure you are doing it with open eyes and not because you are now a 20nl player so you must play those tables.