Starting Afresh - Move Down?

Hi all

Happy August! I have been quiet for a while as I've been having a shocking time at the tables.

As some of you know I started playing poker at the beginning of June. I had a great month and was up over 10bi's and then the rungood stopped.

I hadn't realised how good I'd been running as I'd never played before. My winning line was way above my EV line. And then in July it all changed.

I lost about 7bi's and decided to move down to 2NL. The thing is by then I was running out of time to clear my bonus and with the low volume I play it was only possible to clear the next release by playing more hands. So to add insult to injury I also started playing looser to clear my bonus. I managed to clear it but in the process, after 2 months I have just broken even.

Long story long (sorry) I am now back to square one bankroll-wise. I found 2NL even harder to play but not sure if that was because I was playing badly (loose) and with players who played badly too so was always experiencing suckouts. My bankroll ($100) is still enough for 4NL. And I have registered with a new poker client hoping to clear the decks and go back to playing a TAG winning game.

I've only played around 13k hands as I've played mostly one table at a time. Would your advice be to move down to 2NL permanently until I can beat it or to go back to 4NL and stay there unless I lose so much I am forced to move down?

Thanks all.

Play 2nl and work on your game until you can beat it imo.

You play FR right? I think you had a thread about adding more tables before. I know some others disagreed with me but I still think it would be worth adding a table or two. You must spend ages waiting for hands to finish! Maybe it will help you tighten up as well because you wont get bored waiting for good hands and getting tempted to play shit ones just to get a bit of action.

This time try not to to think about clearing the welcome bonus, it can make you play horribly, as you have seen. Which site did you go for?

micromachine said:

Play 2nl and work on your game until you can beat it imo.

You play FR right? I think you had a thread about adding more tables before. I know some others disagreed with me but I still think it would be worth adding a table or two. You must spend ages waiting for hands to finish! Maybe it will help you tighten up as well because you wont get bored waiting for good hands and getting tempted to play shit ones just to get a bit of action.

This time try not to to think about clearing the welcome bonus, it can make you play horribly, as you have seen. Which site did you go for?

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Thanks mm. Yes, I've learned my lesson about bonus clearing and will not do that again. Seemed like a good idea at the time.

Yes, I play FR. I have dabbled with 2 tables and feel I can handle them now. I also did play much tighter. Stats were around 11/2 for 2 tables FR before the bonus clearing debacle.

I was playing at Party where there are lots of fish so it's good but I've now moved to Titan. Still seem to be some fish there at the Welcome Tables. Someone called my 4bb raise with 69o and beat my KK with a straight...

There are no 2NL welcome tables though (same with Party) so I may just play 4NL until my newbie status on Titan expires (to capitalize on playing with other newbies) and then move back to 2NL. Do you think that's an okay plan?

Yeh it could be a good idea to play 4nl with the noobs

In future I would try to get up to at least 4 FR tables, adding one at a time at 2nl until you feel comfortable with it.

micromachine said:

Yeh it could be a good idea to play 4nl with the noobs

In future I would try to get up to at least 4 FR tables, adding one at a time at 2nl until you feel comfortable with it.

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Great - thanks. I will try to add more tables as I go. I feel quite comfortable with 2 now so 3 is my next challenge.

lawrelye said:

Stats were around 11/2

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You play 11/2 ???

BelgoSuisse said:

You play 11/2 ???

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Sorry - that should have said 11/7 - lol!

lawrelye said:

Sorry - that should have said 11/7 - lol!

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If you're playing 11 vpip, your pfr should be higher, at least 9. 11/7 means that even though you play a rather tight and thus strong range, you call more than 1/3 of the times you enter a pot.

Arjonius said:

If you're playing 11 vpip, your pfr should be higher, at least 9. 11/7 means that even though you play a rather tight and thus strong range, you call more than 1/3 of the times you enter a pot.

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Yes that's true. I call if there is a 3bb (or more) raise before me. Should I be raising or folding in these spots? I am really nervous of raising unless I have QQ+ as I am then usually forced to go all-in.. Equally I find it hard to fold AJ+ or medium pocket pairs and will usually flat and try to cbet or raise/fold the flop. Is this wrong?

lawrelye said:

Yes that's true. I call if there is a 3bb (or more) raise before me. Should I be raising or folding in these spots? I am really nervous of raising unless I have QQ+ as I am then usually forced to go all-in.. Equally I find it hard to fold AJ+ or medium pocket pairs and will usually flat and try to cbet or raise/fold the flop. Is this wrong?

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Yes

jordanbillie said:

Yes

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So what should I be doing?

You should be 3 betting with a much wider range.

lawrelye said:

Yes that's true. I call if there is a 3bb (or more) raise before me. Should I be raising or folding in these spots? I am really nervous of raising unless I have QQ+ as I am then usually forced to go all-in.. Equally I find it hard to fold AJ+ or medium pocket pairs and will usually flat and try to cbet or raise/fold the flop. Is this wrong?

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You should very likely be calling less, which basically translates into raising some hands you call with now and folding some others.

It's not just about the cards, but also about the opponents and their styles. As a simple example, against a maniac who is opening 70% of his hands, your 3bet range should be much wider than against a nit who opens 10%.

And if 3betting over a 3x opening pot commits you, you're playing with too short a stack. Either play with a proper stack or learn to short stack, in which case you'll be shoving wider than QQ anyway.

Arjonius said:

You should very likely be calling less, which basically translates into raising some hands you call with now and folding some others.

It's not just about the cards, but also about the opponents and their styles. As a simple example, against a maniac who is opening 70% of his hands, your 3bet range should be much wider than against a nit who opens 10%.

And if 3betting over a 3x opening pot commits you, you're playing with too short a stack. Either play with a proper stack or learn to short stack, in which case you'll be shoving wider than QQ anyway.

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Thanks Arjonius. Yes, that makes a lot of sense. I was concentrating on just playing the cards as I'm such a novice but it's time for me to start incorporating skills that include reading the players.

No I never play short stacked. Always auto-rebuy to maxium. The reason I become pot committed is when playing LAGs who raise up to 10bb to start with and then when I 3-bet, my raise is much bigger and they just shove after that. In these situations, should we be happy to go all-in most of the time as their range is so wide?

LAGs who play as you described should be very profitable for you. All you have to do is 3bet them with a stronger range than their shoving range. When you lose, it will cost you the effective stack, but when you win, you'll win the same amount. So for instance, if you win 60% of these hands, it's very good for your bankroll.

Arjonius said:

LAGs who play as you described should be very profitable for you. All you have to do is 3bet them with a stronger range than their shoving range. When you lose, it will cost you the effective stack, but when you win, you'll win the same amount. So for instance, if you win 60% of these hands, it's very good for your bankroll.

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Thanks. That's good to know. I'm getting better at judging my sessions by how I played the hand rather than by amount won/lost. My stats are so much better now and although I am still not winning as much as when I started, I realise it's better to lose by playing well than to win by playing badly and delivering bad beats and suckouts to others! Hopefully things will get better the more hands I play.