Is ABC poker the best strategy at micros - Pt 2

OK, here is some follow up - After reviewing my hands, I was coached to play less hands, so have been playing: All pairs, AKs, AKo and AQs and AQo only.

So I play less hands, and when I do, it's with much stronger hole cards. And I have to say, there is a small improvement in that I seem to have stopped the slow drip of losses. However, I am still as vulnerable, as I am losing still about 5 big hands for each one won.

I have to say, I am still not convinced, I see many, many players PFR around 50 upwards, and these guys are making a lot of money.

I still say, I don't beleive hands would play like this on bigger stakes tables.

I would love to see a proper mathmatical study. My current strategy is:

1) Only open with big hands
2) Only continue post flop if favourite
3) Build pot and get villain to commit chips as underdog
4) Los hand about 80% of the time.

Don't take this as complaining of a bad beat, it isn't. I am genuinely interested to know how to work this out. I don't think this is mathematically optimal.

As I only enter hands with good hole cards, if I miss the flop, I can bale and save funds, but I am still getting huge clear outs.

I have many hands to show this playing 15/11. I can wait for 2 hours and play 10 hands, 3 will be folded to me, 2 I will win small amount, 5 I will lose, usually all in.

I am playing according to strict rules, and I think the hands I lose I am playing better, but still losing as I don't believe this method has the edge. Not at Micro stakes.

I will say, that I am continuing with my strategy, but it's hard as the losses are constant, and the wins are small.


Here is a typical example.

PokerStars - $0.10 NL - Holdem - 7 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

Hero (BB): 84.2 BB
UTG: 108.3 BB (VPIP: 13.79, PFR: 10.34, 3Bet Preflop: 0.00, Hands: 29)
UTG+1: 40 BB (VPIP: 14.29, PFR: 14.29, 3Bet Preflop: 0.00, Hands: 21)
MP: 41.4 BB (VPIP: 0.00, PFR: 0.00, 3Bet Preflop: -, Hands: 1)
CO: 156.8 BB (VPIP: 26.32, PFR: 21.05, 3Bet Preflop: 0.00, Hands: 19)
BTN: 173.5 BB (VPIP: 32.26, PFR: 25.81, 3Bet Preflop: 6.25, Hands: 31)
SB: 97.5 BB (VPIP: 0.00, PFR: 0.00, 3Bet Preflop: 0.00, Hands: 8)

SB posts SB 0.5 BB, Hero posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 1.5 BB) Hero has Q♦ Q♠

fold, fold, MP raises to 3 BB, fold, fold, fold, Hero raises to 9 BB, MP calls 6 BB

Flop: (18.5 BB, 2 players) 6♠ 3♥ J♥
Hero bets 18 BB, MP calls 18 BB

Turn: (54.5 BB, 2 players) T♠
Hero bets 15 BB, MP calls 14.4 BB and is all-in

River: (83.3 BB, 2 players) A♥

Hero shows Q♦ Q♠ (One Pair, Queens) (Pre 68%, Flop 84%, Turn 75%)
MP shows K♠ Q♣ (Straight, Ace High) (Pre 32%, Flop 16%, Turn 25%)
MP wins 79.6 BB

Stop doing that,you can never make profit playing like that,because it's very easy for your opponents play with you.you don't make steals,don't use your position,don't blef,don't use opponents style against them, you just don't play poker l guess.Of course all l said is just my opinion,and l just want to give an advice,because l think every spend cent is in vain with your strategy.

I'm sorry, I should have added, I am playing from the button and stealing from the blinds with a fairly open range. Anyhow, my play has stopped me leaking bad hand, but it's not really about my play.

I am trying to see if there is any mathmatical analysis that shows the optimal play.

Interesting.

Well first of all this doesnt sound like abc,it sounds like NIT... You are easy to read... Where are suited connectors? Str8s make loads of moneyz...
This play maybe ok if you 16-24 table fr... But ppl will read you like a open book


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Are you writing a program for bot? Just kidding

Can you post your stats? How big of a sample size do you have?

1) Only open big hands.
This is fine imo. However you have to realise you can open slightly wider from late position, like AJ ATs+ KQs, 78s+. You will often pick up the blinds, if you don't no big deal you still have a decent hand to continue post flop.

2) Only continue post flop if favourite
It seems that you have bad post flop play if you are only continuing if the flop is good for you. That means that you are showing aggression only like 50% or less(I assume not betting low pocket pairs with 2 overcards or 1 overcard, AK/AQ you hit ~1/3 of the time). When you play like a nit preflop, you have to show aggression post flop. Poker is a game of incomplete information. They don't know that the flop missed you, you could easily have JJ-AA since your range is so tight. You have to represent strength, you have outs to hit with overcards if they call anyways.

3) Build pot and get villain to commit chips as underdog
This is the plan. But it is linked to #2. If you are never ever showing aggression unless you have a strong hand, it becomes extremely easy to play against you. This is why you are only winning small pots and losing big ones most of the time. Even a minutely observant player can see you only bet like 6 hands out of 100 and unless they are absolutely horribad, they won't put money in unless they are beating you or have good implied odds.

4) Los hand about 80% of the time.
If you mean preflop, this is normal in full ring.
If you are nitting up in 6 max, change to full ring, nitting in 6max is much harder to profit even against bad players because of how often you pay blinds.
If you mean when you get the money in you lose 80% of the time, it ties in with #2 and #3. Despite what you think, even at microstakes, not every player is a dunderhead who has no brain and will not adapt to someone who only bets when you are strong. At 2NL and 5NL it has higher chance of working but at 10NL there would be fewer such players willing to pay you off.

''I have to say, I am still not convinced, I see many, many players PFR around 50 upwards, and these guys are making a lot of money.''
These guys are most likely on a heater and have probably lost hundreds/thousands of dollars lifetime online depending on how long they have played. If you want to be one of those go ahead. You can see professionals who are winning players playing very loose but they have put in a lot of work and/or are extremely talented to get there. They have a very deep understanding of the game and are able to play in such a way. You will just lose more if you try to imitate them while you can't even beat the basic stakes which you can beat with just very basic poker. And it looks to me like you don't have a very good grasp of the basics. If everyone could just imitate the pros and beat high stakes so easily, we'd all be printing money.

Edit: hit submit instead of preview.

This might look like a flame and I'm putting you down but I am just telling you things from my perspective and pointing out what seems to be flaws in your thinking. Your coach is beating much higher stakes than me so he is obviously a much better player but it seems to me like he isn't really teaching you well. It seems to me you severely overestimate your ability and/or underestimate the game and/or other players. I suggest you start over from 2NL/5NL and see if you can beat these stakes first.

This is not ABC poker at all. This is N-I-T. Sorry op.

I'm a low stakes player, so I don't know what the higher stakes plays like, but this strategy seems horrible!! Your original post doesn't include any other important variables in your play such as adjusting for position, c-betting, or using information you have on your opponents.

I don't know who is coaching you, but it really sounds like it's time for a new coach unless this was just meant to be a short training strategy.

Thanks to all for the answers. My apologies for not framing my original post correctly, it's not about my play or my sample, I am referring to general play.

Let me see if I can put the point over in a completely different way.

When playing poker, we face choices:

Freflop: Fold, Call, Small Raise, Big Raise.
If not folded then proceed to after flop action.

Flop: Fold, Check/Call, Small Raise. Big Raise.
If not folded, then proceed to after turn action:

Turn: Fold, Check/Call, Small Raise. Big Raise.
If not folded, then proceed to after river action:

River: Fold, Check/Call, Small Raise. Big Raise.
Either win or lose or tie.

So, the decision tree for playing a hand will always be the same. Now, here is where I want to examine the playing theory.

Higher level games: (ie higher level of understanding)

The above decision tree also has some rules applied. Pot odds and value calculations are used, such that if it's not profitable to make a call, then the hand is folded. Therefore, outcomes are predictable and it's easy to see how some hands are lost through variance, but as long as the game is played according to the rules, then over time you should expect plays to be profitable. There is a mathmatical model that shows to be true in the long run.

If we were to plot the decision tree for each possible starting hand type, we would be able to statistically show that the conventionally accepted stronger hands are more profitable. We don't need to look at anyone's hand history, the theory holds mathmatically valid. If we analysed millions of hands at this level, we would expect the analysis to show that in reality, the long term value of hands matched the theoretical model. We all accept this as general poker theory.

OK, now the big question:

Lower level games (ie micro stakes and lower skill level/level of understanding)

Now we have the same decision tree as above, however we remove the rule that states your plays are based on odds, expectations and values. Put simply, people call when they shouldn't and so you run the risk of getting suckered more.

Now, we see many more hands that reach the end of the decision tree, because now they are not being folded as they are not subject to the rules stating that hands that are not mathmatically profitable to call should be folded.

We don't have a mathmatical model now. We have a statistical one that can only be demonstrated by data mining a hand history. The more hands analysed, the more accurate the results.

By data mining a large sample set (and I mean LARGE), you would come up with some interesting statistics. From that you would be abkle to derive what hands play best and in what way - or, which opening hands, and which decision tree, was the most profitable.

For example, this method may show that, over a billion hands, J10s was the most valuable starting hand with the highest frequency win rate, and Q10 was the hand with the biggest pot wins. (These are examples only).

Based on these results, your strategy would be to play the decision trees of the hands that do best at this level.

We can't determine that mathematically because the hands aren't played according to mathmatical rules.

In my experiences, there are players that we all label as lucky fish, maniacs, river rats, and so on, because we lose good hands to what seems to be bad play. But...

What if these guys are actually just naturally playing the most profitable decision trees ?

Until some maths whiz does a study, then we can't really know.

(For those that doubt the theory, look into data mining used by financial institutions. Here they specialise in running queries against huge data sets to find trends that conventional maths won't spot. It's a sound concept).

Thanks for listening....

In reply to your original post:

I can't believe you still don't get it, the villain in the QQ hand WILL LOSE MONEY IN THE LONG RUN and if you keep getting your money in good like that you will make money in the long run.

And wtf to playing "All pairs, AKs, AKo and AQs and AQo only"? What happened to playing hands according to your position? That looks like a good range for UTG and UTG+1 (except possibly the lower PP's and AQo) but in late position you should be opening with a whole lot more than that.

Well nice wall of post but..
You cant get maths and make a winning formula... In poker there are a lot of variables....
You play with different people not with yourself... Every hand is different,yes you can follow some guideness but you dont know if villian plays j2 on 22a board while you hold ak...
Basicly you look for guide when to play and how with range of hands...
Preflop there are guides which hands and in which position to play,but when hand starts there are vast options avaible... Look off board,table image,villian image,how many players in pot etc etc

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Don't read too much into what I said about my opening hands, of course I play more, my post isn't about that. My mistake for opening as I did, I am happy with my play, please don't take this as an analysis of my own playing style, I am sorry for bringing it in to the post.

I know conventional wisdom states that QQ will win in the long run according to general poker theory, which I outline as my scenario 1. This is good, proven theory and the basis of all poker teaching, but it assumes you play in a system where the rules are the same for everybody. (ie you play when statistically favourite, and fold when you aren't)

However, if we don't play by the same rules, instead we have a system where hands are played without the application of the rules that state to fold when it's not profitable statistically. Now there isn't a mathmatical model to follow, now we have to examine a data set to spot a trend. If we data mine over a large enough sample, (10 million hands ? 100 million ?), we may see that WITHOUT the rule of playing according to odds, the best hands are not the same as the best hands that play WITH the rule of playing according to the odds.

In other industries it's shown to thow up some interesting results, so it's not unreasonable to suggest it might do the same in poker.

We have two possible outcomes - either the claim is true, therefore we have some new ways to play opening hands, or the claim is not true and the hands will all have the same expected value over a long enough sample.

It's an interesting thought.

The original question isn't a very good one. It basically assumes there's a strategy that's best at the micros *for everyone*, and just asks if ABC is it.

It probably also assumes that best means most profitable, which in turn assumes that making money is every players sole motivation. But it's not. To varying degrees, many players have other motivations, such as fun, competition, entertainment, etc. Consider this. How many players have hourly win rates that are far less than they'd make from a minimum wage part-time job, with no realistic chance of ever making more? Choosing to play poker for less per hour than working indicates that making money isn't the sole motive.

There is no blanket best strategy, period. It depends on the player, his ability, how he prioritizes his short and long-term goals at aby specific moment, etc.

I do believe that ABC is the best way for players who are at or still near the start of their poker learning curves to advance along those curves until they've built solid enough foundations to begin shaping their games to fit themselves more individually. Bust best for every micro player? No, and neither is any other style.

Microstakes players play very face up and have a lot of tendencies you can exploit. And like you said, these guys are not folding in spots where they are losing money. And apparently that makes them winning players. Because they will call all in with random hands, AA suddenly don't win 80% of the time anymore?

Great I should tell my friends who play facebook poker to go play mid/high stakes. They are gonna crush it so bad.

Bad players playing random hands just means that the hand range equities are different from that of optimal hand ranges and it should be to your favor not the other way round. Against 100% vpip hands like K8o Q9o are easily profitable hands while they usually put you in losing/marginal spots against good players. So yes, bad players skew the equities and your expected value in the long run but its in your favor.

Yes the play becomes more unpredictable but you just have to trust in the math to do the job in the long run.

@enesem

I like your approach. You are turning to math to find answers to your 'problems' and to create "an ultimate winning strategy". As someone else already said, you want an algorithm and you actually gave one in your first post. In game theory, Poker can be defined as "asynchronous, non cooperative, constant-sum, dynamic game of mixed strategies" which basically means that...there is a lot of psychology involved in it Thats why 'Poker theoreticians" are very often not great players -> they dont "feel" the psychologycal part of the game.

Anyway, I understand your approach because math was the first thing I wanted to master when I started playing poker (which was not quite long time ago), and if you are really into Game Theory etc, I have recently found a paper which seems like a nice read: "Game theory and AI: a unified approach to poker games". You can give it a try.

That's the very thing...

Thank you.

Well belive it or not there were maths whiz that had done this and they put out the outcome so that others do not bother with it.
It is all about math.

Poker is not like financial institutions.
A bad player is a bad player. And there are ways to combat them otherwise I would not be a winning player at micros. The one that hit on the river are actually the most profitable ones. Imagine that they call 3 streets of value and they do not hit that often. Simple math. I get value from the often enough to make profit.
A poker bot could be made but there is a problem. Why would someone bother to make something that cannot be used. There are AIs to play against them like there are AIs to play chess.
But bots? Poker sites spend a lot on security. Software bots can be blocked and accounts banned. Easy.

Swingro -

We are not talking about poker bots.

The question is this: Are there some ways to play profitably at micros that would not be profitable at higher stakes ?

Abc is safest,on higher stakes there is also bluffing,3b bluffing,you dont need that @ micros..
Push good hands,fold bad ones

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Geez... rule #1 in poker keep things simple.

My favourite tool in the game POSITION! if you can read the game and learn peoples tendencies..

You guys crunching away with the calculator........ by the time you've pressed equals in your head and formed a number... I've taken your money.



Also I second what micro says

I think this strategy works very well in Brovada zone poker. Playing like a NIT in zone works very well for me. You only play big hands because nobody has a read on you because you switch tables every hand.

You mean profitable moves that do not work higher? No there are not. This is because we play a much more simple poker and we do not bother with subcategories of players.
We say at micros that there several types of players (NIT, TAG, LAG,SLAG, LAP and Maniacs). But these are only the basic types. We do not bother because we actually do not get to play enough hands against them to see what they really are(There are a lot of types of Nits, TAGS, LAGS)We target mostly LAPs, SLAGs and Maniacs because they are the most profitable and the tables are full of them. All we need is table selection to find them, avoid the regs and avoid a nit when he is giving action. When we are getting to higher stakes than 50NL ( I have never been there but I saw training videos) we need to go past the basic types and find some more weapons to profit because absolute fish are rare. You know you play against regullars and avoiding them it is not a solution anymore.
You still play the same against the fish, play the same against the nits, but we need a bigger arsenal against regullars.

Ps. Maybe this is what you did not get. You play the same in the same situations. Against certain types of players you play the same. There are a lot more types of players at higher stakes than at 2 and 5NL. At 100NL if you find the type of players that you found at 5NL you play the same. You will still make profit from nits and fish. But probably you will not find them that often.

Enesem, you are interesting. You seem like a very smart person and seem to be putting in a great effort to master the game of poker but it seems like you just don't get "it". This really makes me wonder if poker is truly a game that can be mastered by anyone that is willing to give it enough time/effort like I thought.

You either have it or not. You don't gain it

enesem I think you'll want to check this out if you haven't.

http://www.fulltiltpoker.com/blog/exclusive-wcgrider-six-figure-hand-analysis-hu-vs-isildur1/

WCGRider breaks down a 6 figure pot between himself and Isildur1. WCGRider apparently did a lot of math work and just suddenly started crushing nosebleeds out of the blue(he was a reg at high stakes before I believe but not crushing the game). Its a very beneficial read.

Whoa nice article.. Thats just how isildur1 plays,overaggressivewill3barrellany2cards... I get impression his parents are ultra rich and he started spewing chips on high stakes from beggining.... I must search his history how he started,but thats how it looks for me....
Anyhow this is highstakes and you dont want any of these in microstakes.... You dont need too much of maths,slowplaying,4betting and bluffing in micros...
Fish with 84o will call it either way... So @ the end i still think pure ABC is more than enough for micros...

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Isildur1 isn't just spewing. Well sometimes he tilts for sure but he is an extremely extremely talented player, not just in NLHE either(well he does have the roll to do reverse game selection and just jump in against the best players, but the speed at which he become good enough to battle the players at the highest stakes is ridiculous). He went busto at nosebleeds the first time he appeared on FTP and grinded back up I believe.

I disagree you don't need to learn all the math and 3b/4b spots at micros. You could probably still be a winner at micros but thats all you are ever gonna be if you don't even bother to learn these very standard spots. Even at micros you will see alot of 3bets unless you table select like hell to just play the fish.

As for the 6 figure hand, I figured it would be very informative for OP(and everyone else) to get a peek at the thought process of one of the best NLHE cash game players in the world playing against a very tough opponent.

Yes article is very informative...
I am just talkin as abc works well in micros,no fancy moves,you get good hand and you play it aggressive,you get crap and let it go...
Q was is abc best strategy for micros,and i am sure it is... I saw many nits @ micros and i am wondering if its profitable,any decent player will be bluffing them,and get away if they put pressure,
In higher stakes position is a must,while in micros most ppl will be playing any spot with decent cards


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Yes, absolutely. The first example that comes to mind is from Blackrain's book. Open-raising big with AA and KK is profitable because many opponents don't notice and/or don't react. They call a 5x or even larger opener with the same range they call 3x, which means you win more. This obviously wouldn't work against better opponents who would both notice and adapt their play accordingly.

Better opponents means it is not the same situation.
It is not the same play if the opponents are not the same.

We play this way at micros against the bad players that are willing to call big raises.
At a table full of nits at micros I do not think you will open 5-6BBs.

Fish are fish at any lvl. Those stats do not lie. If he is playing 70/10 he will call you no matter what even if it is 100NL.

No argument. This is just an extrapolation from what I said

All nits are not the same. Some tighten up their already tight ranges even more vs larger bets. Some do not. They also have different degrees of elasticity.

[/quote]Fish are fish at any lvl. Those stats do not lie. If he is playing 70/10 he will call you no matter what even if it is 100NL.[/quote]
You're making a gross generalization and supporting it with a selective anecdotal example. A fish is a poor player relative to his opponents. I suspect a fair number of people who are fish at NL100 would be winning players if they dropped down far enough.

Maybe I was not clear.
He asked if the same play works at higher lvls as it works at micros. It is the same play only if the opponents have the same stats. If the players I bet 60%of the pot when I miss the flop against a 70/10 player at microstakes. This is what I would do if I would find a players like this at higher lvl.

What you talk about are different players than you can find at micros.

And when I talk about fish I do not talk about TAGfish or bad LAGs that you find at 100NL. I talk about maniacs and Loose Passive players. I do not think they will beat the micros. A player with VPIP/PFR 70/10 that plays 6max at 1000NL will not beat 2NL 6-max with 70/10 stats.

Let's assume this is so. Is it more likely that such a player dropping down this far would continue to lose at the same rate, or that he's lose less? In bb/100, not $ of course.

I belive he will loose less. Actually I am sure of it. Of course against such a guy there is only one kind of poker. ISO/C-bet/(pot control or value). Same at the micros , same at higher stakes. There is not other way, the only profitable way against them.
Higher the lvl, more sharks that will not make a single wrong move against him. The first that takes his money wins. Lots of tables at 6-max with 5 players fishing from the same barrel
I saw TAGs at, 2,5,10NL doing stupid things against such fish from time to time. I do stupid things against them sometimes when I multitable. And he meets some of his fish friends that loose money one to the other. So, some of his money come back at a low rate at micros. He is still a looser but his pockets does not heart that much.

Ah micros are pain in the ass... So what ever you play its not good @ 2nl...
When i saw shove with 26s i was stunned...
I think if you gather top pros and put them in 2nl with 40$ that they would prolly go bust...
Raises doesnt mean anything,isolation doesnt work etc etc...

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