Newbie Trying to Learn the Game

(This is a repost of the post I did in the introduction section, but it also had some learning poker elements to it and I thought this board might be slightly more trafficked. Feel free to offer a boot to the shorts if I screwed up.)

Friendly greetings any and all. I'm a poor college student looking to learn the mechanics of poker, how to play it well, and glean from it whatever side lessons I can. I have no interest in making money on it yet (with my record in games of both chance and skill that would be an asinine idea at best) but I do want to see how far I can take my skills and what I can make out of myself.

My initial leaning is toward Texas Hold 'Em for entirely popular opinion reasons and also because it seems to be the most fundamentally intriguing to me (the fact that you only have two cards and the rest is pure probability.) However, I'm wondering what game would be best to dive in to poker as a discipline from a starter's standpoint, what are the concrete fundamentals that I need to gain, develop, and are trainable, and what methods I need to pursue to become a better player in regards to winning?

I'm looking for suggested reading, both in book form as well as articles, and I've begun delving in to the play money sections of Full Tilt as well as Zynga Hold 'Em in Facebook. I'm having trouble finding a starting point though and just need some guidance as to a good, solid place to plant my feet, somewhere I can build on and develop from. Thanks in advance for the insights.

Zach T.

Play money games are soft and not exactly going to teach you how to read opponents correctly... lots of people just shove with any two cards which isnt always true of real money depending on the stakes and whether or not your opponent is tilted... if you just need to learn the basics of what beats what that is a good way to start though... the best advice I can give is follow bankroll management and avoid tilting by not playing when you run bad

Well, I'm not really sure I have the extra money to play with right now. Is there a less-than-ideal but suitable alternative to cash games?

Welcome to the forum Zach

If you want to ease your way into the game,you may consider limit holdem as your mistakes arn't as magnified as in NL Holdem

If you are going to play only freerolls then I suggest you play any game you can get in,since it isn't costing any of your bankroll (or lack there of)

In the long run,learning as many games as possible is best.Then you are prepared for whatever anyone wants to play.

Here is a thread I started on MTT Strategies http://www.cardschat.com/f11/my-mtt-strategies-161649/

There are many great threads here at CC and discussions are ongoing.You can probably spend a lifetime learning here.

When You see "Sticky Threads",these are threads that the Mods ect have determined are of the highest quality.

Enjoy your time here!



Snow

Yeah, freerolls sound like the way to go. Right now I'm tinkering on Full Tilt Poker. Is that a good site, and what about poker stat trackers and such?

Zach,

Welcome to the forum. There is TONS and TONS of info right here on Cardschat. For info to get you started, I suggest the Online Poker Guide on this site. You can find it here:

http://www.cardschat.com/poker/guide/

After that you can start on learning poker strategy here:

http://www.cardschat.com/poker-strategy.php

It is broken down into many different lessons. All of this is really great info.

I suggest you start with freerolls on the different poker sites. If you click on the "private" or "special" tab on the different sites, you will see private freerolls sponsored by different groups or forums. Most of the time they have a website associated with them. That is how I found this place. These freerolls usually are much better to play at then the public freerolls where anyone can join. I find the private freerolls have a much better quality of player (in general, but not always). You can learn a lot by playing these. You can also work on building up a bankroll. I played freerolls until I had enough of a bankroll built up to play the micro tables or the cheapest Sit&Gos. By playing those, I increased my bankroll even further.

When I first started, as a typical beginner, I was playing far too many hands and didn't know anything about position. The first goal I set was to just try to make it to the money in the freerolls. It took me quite awhile to make it to my first "cash", but I learned, and improved my game until I did it. Then I tried to make it to the half way mark into the money. Then I tried to make the final table. As my goals increased, my game improved.

I did have a problem when I first started to play cash games and tourneys. I was worried that I was going to loose my whole bankroll that I had worked so long and so hard at accumulating. What helped me was the FTP Academy. You have different challenges to do. I started working on the challenges and stopped focusing on the money so much, and my game improved even further.

For example, just today I found I was missing one task in one of the challenges, so I entered a SnG to complete that challenge (9 handed non turbo SnG). I ended up winning the game, but I would not have even entered the SnG had it not been for the Academy Challenge.

As my bankroll has increased, the stakes I play at have also increased. I find that I am not so "worried" now when I enter cash games/tourneys. I do find that the higher the stakes, the better quality of play you will find at the tables, so the more you will learn.

Read all you can, and practice, practice, practice! You will find you will slowly get better and better.

Good luck and hope to see you on the felts.

It sounds like you are an extremely smart person, being a beginner in college talking about the mechanics of poker. That was not many peoples goal when they first started. As they were saying before me there is a lot of really good info right on this site to read.

If you are interested, which it sounds like, and have the time there are a few really good books you can get for not too much money. Learning to play at the beginners level David Sklansky has written Small Stakes Hold'em: Winning Big with Expert Play. He is a great author who many people love his book The Theory of Poker. Outside of that Doyle Brunson has an amazing book Super System which many refer to as the bible.

You do not have to start out wanting to go for the big money in poker but after reading some of these books you will realize it can be a great idea.

Agile: Thanks for the tips. I perused some of the FTP Academy videos and found them extremely helpful, dove in to a few of the play-money SNGs and after a half dozen or so actually got in the top three thrice in a row in a nine-handed game. Made me a bit less apprehensive about trying with cash possibly. I loved the idea of the Academy Challenges also, both because it gave something to shoot for and also because I'm a bit of a gamer and love the "achievement" feel similar to those you might get in a console game. Good stuff.

KL: Excellent! I'd read a few references to those books here and there as I perused the net but I wasn't sure if they were really excellent primers or not. I'll check them out and see if the university library has them. Sounds like exactly what I'm looking for. With a bit of book learnin' maybe I can actually play without losing my tuition money. :P

go right now to deucescracked.com signup for a free account and get to watch all their pokertraining videos for free untill oct 4. its a deal you cant beat.

You're on FT spend some time at the academy. There's lots of great videos from the pros that'll help. Don't get caught up in tracking stats untiil you learn the game. You get so lost in the math and how many hands to play you'll miss the big picture. Take baby steps and observe the cash tables. You'll pick up a lot of info. Good luck and hope to take your money soon.

Be prepared for alot of ups and downs - unless you are one of the lucky ones and get it good all the time (LOL). No limit texas holdem was my startimg game also. But since have also started to enjoy some stud and omaha limit high. You may want to have some thing else to play if the holdem becomes tiltish for you. GL on the felts.

You should definitely try the full tilt academy videos. They're very approachable and easy to follow. For basics on Hold 'em (for both tournament and cash games), take a look at Doyle Brunson's Super System.

For beginners, I like the old school books written by Tom McEvoy and T.J. Cloutier. A lot of people feel these books are out of date, but I think that they really hammer home the fundamentals.

Of course there's plenty of great info here and on pocket fives, two plus two.

Best of luck to you!

You can't learn at play money. I'd say play freerolls and attempt to build a bankroll from there, or save up $50, make a deposit and start with 2NL.

GL.

F**K play money dude. If u want some free money to play on poker go onto www.pokerstrategy.com. pass thier quiz, pick a site and they'll send u $50 within a few days. Thier site has some good coaching tips and a good forum. But our forum is better hehe. Jus come bk to us ok.

Thanks for all the tips and comments everyone. Quite helpful. I've got a copy of Small Stakes Hold 'Em on order, and I entered one of the FTP freerolls today. My AQ got borked by an A6 on the river on the first hand I played to the flop and I got punted out at 2117th of 2700. Annoying but quite an enlightening experience. I need to study tournament style play a bit more I think before trying again. It struck me as a real maelstrom.

Also running annoyingly against the 7 post rule. Hopefully I can get past that quickly.

I certainly see the issue with playing the play-money tables. Variance runs rampant because lack of actually value makes people make ignorant, more random plays than they normally would, reducing the value of actual "proper" play. Not that I really have any clue what "proper" play is yet in detail. My play, I think, is still rather sketchy. I keep losing fairly regularly. What I'm worried about is tossing in $50 that I don't really have, and then end up frustrated, annoyed, and no better for the wear on a game that I may or may not grow tired of and quit within the new few months anyway. It's kind of a rough spot to be in.

Anyway, thanks for the tips everyone, this site has been a lot of help.

Oh, also, one more thing. If I AM going to be playing cash, what are the pros and cons to limit and no limit hold 'em, and would be better to play in ring games, or Sit & Goes?

Uka: Fantastic, thanks mate. And don't worry, not going anywhere if I can avoid it. :P

Eh, bum rap? Pokerstrategy.com only lets you cash in the bonus at Bet365, which won't let a US fella sign up apparently. Did I miss something?

Have no idea what Pokerstrategy.com is. I wouldn't play ring games till you have at least $100 in your account. Stick to SNG's, learn the tourney game, then you can get into the ring game.

Making a single mistake in limit will cost you a few bets of a fixed size - a single mistake in no limit can cost you the entire stack of money you have at the table.

If you learn to play limit well, you will develop a very good understanding of pot odds, drawing odds, and position. If you learn to play no limit well, you'll also develop those understandings and understandings of betsizing and isolation.

If you play no limit ring games, you'll develop more of an understanding of postflop play than in playing no limit SnG's. SnG's have the br advantage that your exposure is limited to your buy in.

There are more pros and cons that others may add.

Suggestion - check out these posts if you're going to try limit hold em - fp's discussions are excellent and easy to understand, and many of the posts are specifically about limit.

http://www.cardschat.com/blog/04/30/...gy-blog-posts/

if you can't afford the $50 don't do it. stick with playchips until you learn the game. and i would suggest sit and goes(SNGs). these are the easiest to learn and good strategy will beat cash games or play money games. you won't have to adjust too much from play money to real money. i started with playchips earlier this year and have over $1k real money now. fulltilt has freerolls but also a tourney where you can buyin for playchips and it pays real money. you can read through this thread to find out more.
and one great thing about freerolls is you can't lose any money on them.

Play money: the road to 10,000,000

Selling play chips for real money? Interesting. That might be a bit more productive then taking a stab at freerolls. Are there any particularly good sites and and amounts that I should shoot for if I want to try selling play chips?