Poker Mastery Pyramid... A path to exellence...

My thoughts on the path to skillsets that make a winning player. Interested in other views....



It may still be hard to view use Ctrl + to "zoom" your screen larger....

Merlin333

humm, where is the pyramid? Looks more like a ladder? That is missing some rungs?

Anyway, do you have a point? What are your expectations with this 'stuff'?

Master?, there are no poker masters. Other than the legend of Stu Ungar, what makes a poker master? Doyle Brunson? He has a hand named after him. It's T2, even he admits its HORRIBLE hole cards in THE.

Granted 'dolly' is a poker legend, but even he only has 10 wsop bracelets, and many were won with fields of 18 players. Does he win a bracelet every 25% of the entries he makes in the WSOP. No. He may not play many wsop tourneys, but, he does play the main event.

How come no 'pro'(loosely used) player, has won the wsop main event in the last 10 years? No 'pro' will win this year, either.

Why aren't there pro lottery players?

"high finishes or is ITM in chosen games against players of comparable skills"

This ^^ makes NO sense. If everyone is equally skilled ("comparable") then there is NO edge, and everyone will eventually lose to the rake. Also choosing such a game would be a mistake (game selection itself should be considered a "skill").

Hahahaha, good points, well thought out commentary.....

Obviously i am already a master

i never do this, but in the immortal words of vanquish.

WAT!

Don't even bother trying to figure out this unintelligible garbage.

It's kind of pitiful that a few guys here have such low respect for themselves and CardsChat, an otherwise good forum, that they can find no better way to contribute to the dialogue here than to post a lot of "expert" poker commentary on others play and write a lot of childish, negative, 7th grade gibberish.

I'm and "old guy", a relative new player and think it's kind of sad that they are too ignorant and self-centered to realize that there a many here, many of whom have written me directly, who can see it just hurts the forum and inhibits some people from joining in what should be an open conversation about everyone's ideas and thoughts about the game.

I've "spoken" to Nick as to whether the content of my posts abridge the rules here - they have not and he has no problem whatsoever with my posts so I'll keep posting what I want, when I want and keep laughing at these few jokers. I hope those of you who have written me directly about some of these pointless comments on my posts here, continue to do the same. Ask yourself "are you going to let these kind of people stop you from talking about what you want? NOT!

Notice how few they are?

Merlin333

Huh what? What are you whining about? But, please allow me to retort...

Really? And when you get them, throw an immature, insecure tantrum? Howsabout, ACTUALLY addressing and answering the questions poised by someone who actually spent the time to read your post?

A very valuable skill in poker is the ability to read people, which I don't think is addressed in your pyramid, btw. So I'll call your bluff on that. You're not an "old guy".

grab a 'chill pill, or doggie downer'(old guy terms) and learn to deal with some criticism with a modicum of respect.

Where is the pyramid?

Why are 'wilderness', 'beginner', 'novice', not the same thing? Let's banter semantics here, as beginner and novice mean the same thing, right? What is wilderness, is that like jungle, or woods/forrest? Is that your pyramid base? Well, that is just plain crap.

Ok, then we have 'expert' and 'master', once again they basically mean the same thing, right?

Correct me if I wrong, btw. I might see where a 'expert' is not a 'master' (leave that as an exercise), but can't see how a 'master' is not already an 'expert', right?

So, again, what do we have here, the 2nd level and capstone for your pyramid? Well that is just plain crap.

Lastly, I have a better kicker, why is your 'pyramid' an image? Couldn't you just post the text?

That being said, I don't totally agree with everything about it & it's deffinately missing some stuff. But overall it's a pretty good example of the road we're all trying to take. Well except maybe pOK35, since he'd probably want to know the name of the road & argue that it's not actually a road, more of a highway. Then he'd probably throw rocks as we drove by.

mparker876 (http://www.cardschat.com/members/mparker876/) Thanks for you take on my post.

The reason it was written was to share my thoughts of the process of learning the game and see what other members thought of the process - what their pat to becoming a good player might be. To POK35 - Only a total cretin would characterize what I've written as a "temper tantrum" - trust me people like you don't even register to the point of giving me a tantrum. As far as answering "question poised" - clearly you have no serious, intelligible questions, read again what you've written,you're just an ignorant yakker who wants to make silly, smart aleck comments - mission accomplished. Your own statements uncover your true intent, other than this - you are not even worth a response.

Clearly there are a few lowlifes in this forum (my guess it's the same guys who sit in the losers lounge whining and calling people donkeys when they get busted), as there are everywhere I guess, who think CardsChat is a place for them to anonymously spew negative, ignorant criticisms and "argue" about nothing. This post, like them all are views, thoughts and an invitation for other players to respond with their own view. Like most other posts it is not given as the final, expert answer but as an invitation for others to join in support, opposition, addition or agreement. This exact same post is on 6 other forums and has been seen by 900+ people when I last looked and not a single,solitary one of them took the tact taken by some here. That tells me something.

You are correct, there are probably as many takes on what I've written as their are poker players but imagine the smallness, the simple mindedness and pure utter lack of even minimal intelligence of a person whose "contribution" to the dialogue here is to do nothing more than make these kind of lowlife arguments - then defend them as fair comment expecting a response.

I wish some of the players who have written me directly about these few people who think they can upset me with their childishness would make some of their comments public and let these simpletons know what others think of this "stuff" - actually I don't. I guess wishing a "flame war" is comparably, which does not mean exactly, as childish. Perhaps if they knew that I am not the only member who thinks them idiotic, they'd post like grownups-lol. It's enough to know that CC is a better forum than the very few members here who act like 7th graders and think it's "cool" to go from post to post making stupid, nasty, little, "put-down" comments instead of trying to participate and add something that might help us all learn more about poker and other players views of the game - ummmm like contribute in a positive way. Isn't that something of the purpose of forums?

You have but to go back and carefully read some of these "comments". You quickly get it that they are calculated to generate conflict (at least in the mind of a fool), simply too childish and stupid to even respond to - that's the truth.

Merlin333

p.s. The pyramid in the background is actually one of the great pyramids of Egypt - Cheops. I know you never heard of it. (Childish remark... I guess I have a little maturing to do too - but at least I know the difference -lol).
The Great Pyramid of Cheops

The pyramid is nice, but the thread takes a sour turn by the nay-sayers. You are spending more time butting heads with idiocy than actually discussing the post's topic.

I understand the pyramid metaphor. The higher steps are built on the lower and there are less people in each group the higher up you go on the 'pyramid'.

The idea of the base seems counter to another post of yours I read recently where you described the 'novice' stage as a wasteland. I see why you called the lowest level of this pyramid wilderness, but it does seem a bit jarring with the other names.

All in all it seems accurate if a bit simplistic.

No offense meant, of course.

None taken bud (Hobbs) ..... Just some thoughts looking for feedback from players with thoughts. You're right about the time wasted with nay sayers - but you know me and what I think of "these guys"..... lol.

PM me about where the other post is - I'm gonna take a look. Needless to say, I'm not above being self-contradictory - this post wouldn't be the first one.

tc
Merlin333

On the fact that the read is spot on. See the further posts.

Can nobody/anybody answer my questions? Where is the pyramid?

Ok, Ok, geeza, I can google, or even cuil?

my read is spot on, and y'all know it.

I don't think you can every truly master poker as there is always room for improvement learning new things. For examples, older pros said they had to adjust to the type of game the online kids were playing when they came accross them in a tournament.

My old music teacher said this of jazz and it applies to poker:

"There are no teachers, only senior students"

Check my thread. I answered your question concerning the 'pyramid'.

I listened to the PokerStars Pokercast yesterday with Ray Zee (one of the original great players in the Johnnie Moss, Stu Ungar, Doyle Brunson era).

During a segment, he was asked about his thoughts on the progression from being a beginning to an expert poker player. I was interested to find that he viewed this progression in four "Stages"

(summarized below):

Stage 1. Beginners Start out too loose
Stage 2. Realizing they are too loose, they become too tight
Stage 3. Advanced - They start to use imagination, bluff, hand reading become LAG
Stage 4. Expert - Then they incorporate the skill/traits in stage the tight stage 2 with the imaginative Skills they learned in stage3

Ray went on to say that all of the great players he knew, and saw from the beginning, went through the same stages - not exactly but pretty much along the same lines".

Merlin333

p.s. Appreciate the feed back but please don't waste time and space responding to the resident fool - thanks.

He didn't say during this broadcast, but the broadcast is in the archives. I'll listen to it and see what else is there. This is what I wanted to find out, I knew others had thought about the process and what each step of the process took.

Merlin333