Building a bankroll at the micros

Hey everybody,

I just signed up for this forum, because I was looking for a online community for some good poker advice

I have been playing poker at PS for a few months now, mostly at the $.2/.5NL tables, hoping to build a bankroll.

My brother, who has been playing poker for a much longer period than me (and has some awesome graphs regarding poker profit), has given me some solid advice. That, and reading some poker strategy books, resulted in some basic poker knowledge (position, betting, range, equity, pot odds, aggressiveness, etc.).

At the moment, I have played about 85k hands at PS and I have not really had any success. First, I went through the learning phase and lost some money (obviously). After having played 40k hands I started to see some results. At a sudden moment, I had built a bankroll of $200 at the $.2/.5NL tables (which meant a profit of approximately $75, but mainly due to receiving some cash bonuses).

However, the last couple of weeks I just kept losing, primarily because of the fact that I go on tilt pretty fast (after two bad beats I am going on tilt and I won't be playing my A-game anymore). This resulted in a loss of 25-30 buy-ins. Last week I barely played, because I know that when I play again, I start with a goal that I absolutely have to rewin my losses. A bad mindset, I know.

So what I would like to ask is, does anyone have some advice on grinding the micros (especially on C-betting and aggressiveness)?

Thanks in advance!

Greetings,

Robbel

I can quickly tell you one thing (unless you meant to write .02/.05 nl). You are playing way above your bankroll.

200 bucks is fine for 5nl but id still drop to 2nl if i were you

Yeah I meant the 0.02/0.05 blinds. When I play 0.01/0.02, I just call way too much, since the losses are so small that I do not care.

Not sure what your balance is right now, but don't drop to 2nl if you still have $200, $200 is plenty for 5 and not far off shot-taking at 10nl lol

I'm playing 10nl atm with 24bi's, just know when you should move down and make sure you do, which is nothing to worry about for you atm as you shouldnt move down to 2nl until you ge to about $70 imo. This is all provided you have a $200 roll, which i'm not 100% sure of.

My advice would be to have a look at controlling tilt before you go any further, read the poker mindset and try to get a trial for deucescracked if you haven't already, tommy angelo has a really good series there called the eightfold path to poker enlightenment, I used to tilt like crazy and the only reason i've only made 1 deposit is because of disciplined brm, but after reading that book and listening to the series my whole mindset changed and I am now very relaxed while playing, even when the cards don't go my way.

The thing thats brought my micro game on loads has been to seriously up the amount of tables, i'm guessing people will rubbish this but its working for me so I'll put it out there incase it works for you. Your on stars, which is perfect, now get yourself tableninja, set it up to play with a stack of tables, and just keep adding them, not sure how exp you are with multi-tabling already, but for me, playing 16-24 tables of FR is exactly what I need to avoid FPS, boredom and tilt.

FPS - No chance of that happening with a stack of 24 tables, I look at my cards, look at the stats of the people already involved/soon to be possibly involved and make a decision, thats it, and when i say i look at the stats......i don't look at a billion different stats of the guy who's just opened, i just look at his vpip/pfr and make a snap decision about what i'm doing with my hand.

I think a huge leak for people at the micros is to level themselves looking at hundreds of different stats and making moves based on decisions made from a small sample of hands on a villain. The micros is about getting max value out of your good hands and losing as little as possible from the rest, people play very faceup so don't kid yourself that the CO opener who has a pfr of 23 and has now just came over the top of your 3bet from the blinds is playing some meta-game where he knows he opens wide and he knows you know this so you'll be 3betting light and he can 4bet and make you fold, so you just stick it in there with your TT b/c he's a bit aggro so he does this with any ace and loads of small pairs/sc's/junk, only to see him turn over the KK that he practically announced to the table with his 4bet. Like, just assume that all the villains are brain-dead and if they have a hand they'll let you know about it, if it looks like somebodies got it, they generally have in my experience.

Boredom - Again, no chance

Tilt - The beauty of playing this many tables stacked, is that you rarely see the outcome of a hand until you finish your session and have a look at your winners & losers, this for me practically eleminated my tilt overnight, by the time i'm raging that the fish hit his 2 outer i've closed all my tables and finished for the night anyways so no worries about spewing off the rest of my roll.

People might say your missing out on thin value b/c your not spotting as many habits, or don't have enough time to make a good decision about whether or not to make that thin valuebet on the river for an extra 20bbs off the fish, but i can show you hands where i've bet rivers with nowhere near nut hands and been paid off, all while playing 900 odd hands an hour.

This has got waaaaaaay TLDR, but as a last point, imo the most important thing for a micro player is to learn about valuebetting, micro fish's biggest leaks are that they like to call, so to make money you just make them call when they have the worst of it, ez game, learn about when there is value in betting that river card, even if its just brought an overcard to your pair and you'd normally check it back, this is where there is money to be made from fish, making like a less than half pot bet on the river and being paid by a worse hand is the best feeling ever imo and all those extra 20-30bb's really add up.

Anyways, i'm at work so have basically just been babbling here, hopefully its makes some sort of sense, and isnt too long.

Just:

Steal loads
Cbet loads
Barrel loads
Valuebet loads
Make loads of good folds
Profit
Ez game

This may be a big problem for you atm. Calling to much is a problem that a lot of players have at the micros. If you want to consistently win and win well then you have to start caring about those small losses as they all add up and can severely affect your WR.

its better if you go forward with good bankroll manager

while 200 is a lot(you're actually rolled for 10nl at 200), why would you stay at 5nl if you obviously have some leaks? Best way imo is to drop stakes to minimize your losses while you work on your game...

lol facepalm

But if he changes his game when he drops to 2nl like he claims, dropping down makes no sense since it just introduces new leaks.

i'm slowly builing a bankroll on carbon... It is tuff sometimes for me.. I miss fulltilt.... Anyone else feeling this way

Don't tilt off your money a bad beat is a bad beat , AA gets cracked all the time just learn to deal with it the best you can and don't tilt. It's hard enough to win money dont be giving it back on tilt.

THIS seems to be the biggest leak in your game. Sort your head out, quit if you feel yourself tilting, etc. You've got to be consistent.

As for having the goal of getting back your losses, how about having the goal of playing your A game and quitting once you suspect you are not playing your A game. The results should follow. Poker is long term.

Thanks for bringing nothing to this thread.

What stakes are you playing?

I will manage bankrolls for $10 per hour, pm me for more info

what services would you offer for that?

You know I was referring to op when I talked about dropping stakes right? If you did then im no sure how I was trolling/not bringing anything to the thread unless youre just mad that I didnt quote your entire response.

Wv good point but I think that if he has that leak at 2nl then he prob has it at 5nl

someone plz link oz exorcist's poast about brm...on phone, cant link it

Thanks for the many replies guys! Some really useful information, I have done some reading as well (from Mike Caro, Tommy Angelo, David Sklansky).

Orangepeeleo, thanks dude, your post has been very helpful. Well, I do multi-table, but 6 tables max...

This and last week I won about 70 bucks at the 0.02/0.05 tables. Not due to one exceptional day, but about approximately $6-8 per day. I noticed that I tilted less, but maybe that is more because of the fact that I am winning. My bankroll is now $170.

A question what I would like to ask is, how do you guys value bet on these stakes (since many people simply won't fold)?

Another thing is the preflop raise ratio. I tend to raise too much preflop, because I lose several big pots when I C-bet on the flop and the turn, but don't hit anything (when I am the preflop raiser). What should the ratio VPIP/PFR be approximately?

the entire point of a value bet is to make it with the best hand and to hope to get called. if you think they will not fold, definitely do not bluff. in fact, i would suggest not bluffing much as a general strategy, perhaps once a day or so ... at most
the vpip/pfr stats should be pretty close to each other. whether you play 11/9 or 19/16 does not matter much (if you know how to play those stats), what is important is to not have them more than... say 30% apart. and again, this is still just an estimate, do not take it as scripture

what you should consider is c-betting less often and barreling less often if you are seeing resistance and have not hit anything.

Yeah, careful to not overdo it on the turn cbet if you've got close to f'all in terms of draws/equity. Might be time to give up and wait until you've actually got something that wants to be called.

Try to learn that if u feel u are on tilt u should go for a walk instead of playing.

You will always have a "tomorrow" to continue playing.

Ok, I worked on my tilt (among others thanks to Tommy Angelo's 'Elements of Poker') and I must say I am playing much better. In a couple of weeks I grinded my way from $100 to $312 dollar, with two cash bonuses of $50 each within reach.

How much buy-ins are normal to take a shot at a higher blind level?

22

this is all about personal comfort. most people here would tell you that you need something between 20 and 50 BI to move up. basically, the higher stakes you plan to move up to, the more buy-ins i would recommend having. 20BI may be okay to play 5 or 10nl, but you may want at least 30 for 100nl, and a lot of people would suggest much higher numbers.

what you want to do is set a stop-loss for the shot, say move back down if you lose 3 or 4 or 6 buy-ins. personally, a few months ago i took a shot at 50 nl with just about 24BI, intending to stop if i lost a 4-5 BI quickly. thankfully, that actually went well from the start.

Do you use HEM? If so check out the Leak Buster application. There is a great video on 3betting leaks in there. Also, with a 85k sample size you're sure to find some other leaks that you are currently unaware of. Hope this helps.

Ok, the shot at 0.05/0.10 has not been very successful... I lost almost $60 in two hours. I got totally outbet (is that even a word? excuse me for my English since it's not my mother tongue). So I am going back to 0.02/0.05.

@ Swiggler

What's HEM? I guess that pretty much answers your question

Hold'Em Manager - http://www.holdemmanager.com/buy/1/hold-em-manager

I think there is a free trial available if you don't want to jump in and buy it straight away.

Jep, Hold'em Manager, I used to have the trial version, now I have the small stakes version. Where can I find this Leak Buster application?

The Leak Buster app is embedded in the Holdem Manager program along with other apps like Table Ninja, SNG wiz, etc. You can see it in the left side bar when you have Holdem Manager open.