Online poker make you a better live player??

I've been noticing lately then every once and a while when i venture of to play at home game(usually a tournament) i dominate and play very well after playing more online than live.

I used to play more live poker when there was a 1/2$ cash game going on at my friends house every sat....this turned into more than just sat. and people were losing money(more than they could afford) so that stopped.

but now i play hardly ever live and seem to do very well when i do...anybody else notice this either???

Yeah I noticed this also, none of my mates play on-line, we used to play £20 freezeouts and I actually think they have stopped inviting me as I was winning almost every other time.

i think online def makes you better. theres no better way to get a ton of experience seeing a ton of hands. yes there are differences, but many aspects of the game translate from online to live.

I was actually just getting ready to start a thread about this when I saw this one.

I've noticed this a lot lately. I've been running very well in our local home cash games and a small 25-30 player tourney I go to each month (won it for the 3rd time in 6 months last night!). I really think that all the hands I see online is making a huge difference when I play live.

Live players generally have poor fundamentals. The online guys have a much sounder fundamental game. I play a 1/2 live game that is probably the quality of a decent 25NL online table.

Also agree that seeing loads of hands online just gets your experience up way faster than live.

Schatzdog said:

I play a 1/2 live game that is probably the quality of a decent 25NL online table.

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Not sure where you play, but 1/2 live games I have seen have the quality of 1cent/2cent on line.

Of course playing online makes you a better poker player, as many of the online phenoms have shown, names like Eric Lynch, etc., and even Eric Lindgren and Chris Ferguson were originally online players.

aliengenius said:

Not sure where you play, but 1/2 live games I have seen have the quality of 1cent/2cent on line.

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Australians are just naturally better players, y'know

OzExorcist said:

Australians are just naturally better players, y'know

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Naturally

aliengenius said:

Not sure where you play, but 1/2 live games I have seen have the quality of 1cent/2cent on line.

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Are you serious?

I actually went up to a charity poker event at a church. I was planning on playing $1/$2 (which would be a lot for me, although I could manage a loss there) but the table was full and I ended up not being able to get a seat all night. But I watched some of the play at the $10/$20 and $5/$10 tables and the play didn't impress me at all. I felt that if I had a steady paycheck and a few thousand bucks to spare, that I would have been one of the better players there. Unfortunately, I'm just a poor college students with an entire net worth (including savings and money for books) of a little over 3k. Guess I'll just keep grinding it out online and in my live games I play with friends ($.25/$.50, and pretty good quality) and keep working summers and hopefully someday I'll have enough to play some higher stakes games. I'm just not going to sit down with several hundred dollars because I know I could not handle losing it and thus would play scared.



Back to the original question, I agree. I used to just play live, we'd play 2-3 times a week, and then all of a sudden I could never find a game. I started playing online, could never win, worked at it, came to this site, started to win, and now I notice a huge difference in the quality of my live play. I think just seeing all the hands helps because you've pretty much played most situations when you play as many hands as you do online. I'm able to more easily recognize betting patterns. The one place I'd say my play takes a hit from playing online is staying focused and observant. It's easy online to pay attention to something else because the pot size, all the stacks, and the action to you is all very accessible. In a live game you cannot afford to ask for a pot count and give someone a chance to get a read, and you should know approximately each stack size, along with all possible draws, your ranges for each opponent, their image (no PT or PA HUD live) as well as your own hand and outs. I've been working at it but that's been the toughest part about adapting to live play.

Just my 2 cents.

I have a live tourny game 3 times a week in my little town here. Same 9-12 players every week. This is what I have found. Out of the 12 players only 3 of us play online. Myself I have been playin for cash online for almost 3 years. ( I felt it improved my live game for about the first year) The other 2 players only play for play chips online and I have found it has improved there game as well but are pretty loose with the types of hands they are willing to play and this I believe to be because when there is nothing at stake (play chips) they tend to play alot more hands.

Where I believe it has not helped my game is no matter what kind of live play your playing if there isnt enough at stake for someone to care whether they win or lose it is very hard to beat them even if you change up your game daily hourly or minutely. In which case this has been where I believe it has hurt my online play as I have to change my game up so much during the live play I loose total site of quality play.

For what it is worth to anyone Im working on that now, deciding whether its even worth continuing on with my 3 live games weekly.

Long winded I know but my 2 cents.

32SpittFire said:

no matter what kind of live play your playing if there isnt enough at stake for someone to care whether they win or lose it is very hard to beat them

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This is false. If this were the answer, many more people would be able to beat the pros. All they have to do is not care if they win or lose.

Playing online definitely makes you a better player. The more experience with different hands and different situations will always improve your play. As wth anything though, it makes you better when you take the time to study leaks in your game or, once offline, sit back and think about a few hands that you lost and perhaps why you lost them (beyond the obvious suckouts). Was there a hand where you checked when you should have raised, etc....

I also like online in that I encounter many different player styles - super tight, super aggressive, stop-and-go players, etc... You can't get that playing the same guys/gals at your weekly home game.

Only caution about online is I found myself getting lazy about calculating the pot size in my head. It is always right in front of me online. WHen I went back to playing live tourneys, I had to mentally adjust myself to get back to being able to do this naturally in a live game.

gamedemon said:

Playing online definitely makes you a better player. The more experience with different hands and different situations will always improve your play. As wth anything though, it makes you better when you take the time to study leaks in your game or, once offline, sit back and think about a few hands that you lost and perhaps why you lost them (beyond the obvious suckouts). Was there a hand where you checked when you should have raised, etc....

I also like online in that I encounter many different player styles - super tight, super aggressive, stop-and-go players, etc... You can't get that playing the same guys/gals at your weekly home game.

Only caution about online is I found myself getting lazy about calculating the pot size in my head. It is always right in front of me online. WHen I went back to playing live tourneys, I had to mentally adjust myself to get back to being able to do this naturally in a live game.

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Actually, this got me thinking, maybe the bigger problem is lack of logging hands and our natural memory forgetting details. How many of us remember anything other than the bad beat you took at a live session? Meanwhile online I can go back and see where I lost my money, whether my wins were flukes and literally examine every hand, calculating odds of winning, looking at bets, patterns, etc. How many people do this after a live game?

i think my play online has helped my live game, just because i can practice what i have learned so much more often than just live games with friends cuz online poker is available with ppl playin 24/7.

For me on line play has improved my live play for all the reason already mentioned...I also have played with several very good players in live games and had my head handed to me...

def true .you see millions of hands,playing styles,etc. practice make you perfect..simple

I have wondered about this as well. I think my play has improved by playing online. However, if you want to be a better live player I think an online player has to focus on their body language and reactions to how a hand unfolds online. Online I tend to move forward and probably look for focused when I'm dealt a hand like AA or KK....if I do that in a live game I might as well stick the cards to my forhead like indian poker...food for thought

imo it's easy to crush live mid-stakes even if you're just a winning 50max player

Playing online has helped me big time during live play just because it seems there are so many more bad beats. This passes over to your live games and when you need to be aggressive you know when to kick it into high gear so the guy who is on a str8 draw or flush draw you make them pay dearly to see the next cards at hand. I always feel alot better knowing I took a bad beat and played the hand aggressive making it tougher decision on them then slow playing a hand and getting beat because I didnt bet enough to force them out the pot. I cant tell you how many times I have got busted by people chasing str8s and flushes while I was slow rolling trips. Man does it suck too knowing you should of put them in a all in decision after the flop when the to clubs popped. Like I said I agree 100 % online play is great practice and you see thousands of hands if you play every night like me in the average week. Remember if you cant spot the sucker at the table more then likely you are the sucker!!! Have fun on the felt and wish me luck this week at the borgata Atlantic City!!!!

vanquish said:

imo it's easy to crush live mid-stakes even if you're just a winning 50max player

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How do you define mid stakes live? What is considered mid stakes?