Easier to play against pro's than donkeys?!?!?!?!

Brodermatt

Brodermatt

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Do you think it would be easier to have a fighting chance against the people that play for higher stakes? I can't beat the micro's due to a lot of lucky/bad/horrible/russian players! And they are everywhere!

Many micro players have less respect for their chips and for some reason they get rewarded for ridiculous plays!
 
Debi

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Having played both I can assure you that it is easier to play against bad players than pros. :)
 
BluffMeAllIn

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Having played both I can assure you that it is easier to play against bad players than pros. :)
^^^^ this.

Also if you can't handle the varience of the micros due to the "donkeys" then probably going to be eaten by sharks at higher stakes. It is the donkeys and fish who enable the micro stakes to possibly be crushed (highest winrate) of any limites there are.

It can be frustrating but learning to deal with the varience is certainly a big aspect of improving the game, make the correct decisions in the long run and increase the br will. Perhaps there are some holes in your game, tilt or just never believing they have anything (bluffing and sneaky plays that would become key in higher limits tend to mean nothing at micros).
 
DrazaFFT

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You just might experienced good swing at higher stake because good player fold easier that fish first few times but after while you'll lose more because they will easily pick what you are doing and exploit that... believe it happened to me...

Stick to the stakes you belong until you see that you are making money for a longer time then go up step by step...
 
Brodermatt

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I just find that there is less respect at the micro tables!
Raises get called no matter how big the raise is. Still winning on the flop, get all my chips in, they call and get lucky with runner runner rubbish!

This happens a lot and it makes it impossible to make any profit!
 
midgetfactory

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I find it hard to play against donkeys, but the funny thing is id say 90% of the players on the sites are donkeys, there is a few who are making money then you have the few who say they are. but truthfully its hard to make a living from online poker
 
Brodermatt

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100% right Midget!

I like to think I'm a good player, make the right decisions more often than not! But clearly it's not working!

I'm thinking just playing in Sunday Million tournaments every week till I eventually make some good money!
 
Debi

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I just find that there is less respect at the micro tables!
Raises get called no matter how big the raise is. Still winning on the flop, get all my chips in, they call and get lucky with runner runner rubbish!

This happens a lot and it makes it impossible to make any profit!

You are going to make money from other player's mistakes - and the bad players make a lot more mistakes than the good players.

You have to think long term not short term. Bad beats are part of the game - how you handle them impacts your success as a player. :)
 
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Really good thread. Have thinked about this, that it would be easier to play versus pros, but your replays got me convinced of that it isnt true :) Need to learn how to take the chips from the donkeys ;)
 
DrazaFFT

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I have made myself to forget bad beats, never ever get mad because of them, only get mad at myself when i play a bad hand...
 
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Raises get called no matter how big the raise is. Still winning on the flop, get all my chips in ...

This is exactly why people are able to win at micro stakes. If you move up in stakes (e.g. play with the pros), you'll find that you rarely get your chips in ahead. If you prefer that, that's your prerogative --- but it isn't the solution to your problem.

Variance happens. Deal with it. If it's true that you are consistently doing what your post states, you will win in the long run. If you keep losing in the long run, though, the issue is your play --- not your "bad luck".

Be well.

-HooDooKoo
 
Brodermatt

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Just to give an example I was playing in a $22 deep stack tournament. Sitting 3rd overall with a chip stack of $26000. There was 23 players left in the tourney, top 9 made cash. The table is fairly nitty although there is one player who has chipped up for several all in occasions. He was "lucky" on multiple occasions! I have AK suited and raise it to 4 BB. Everyone folds but one. The crazy Villain re-raises and I just simply call. Flop comes out and I hit top 2 pair AK. I check, villain shoves all in for about $23000. I thought at first that this was a bluff to try and get me to fold, then i put him on a set, then I thought he would have slow played it more. Then I thought he might of hit his ace, but I know I have him out kicked. I was right.
I call, he rolls over A4! Board is A K 8! Turn 4 RIVER A BLOODY 4! Villain becomes new chip leader, I'm the new short stack.

For some sick reason when the 4 came on the turn, I knew another 4 was going to come on the river! If that's not lucky, and luck doesn't exist in poker, I will quit now and head to slot machines, I might have better luck there!
 
BluffMeAllIn

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Everyone folds but one. The crazy Villain re-raises and I just simply call. Flop comes out and I hit top 2 pair AK. I check, villain shoves all in for about $23000. I thought at first that this was a bluff to try and get me to fold, then i put him on a set, then I thought he would have slow played it more. Then I thought he might of hit his ace, but I know I have him out kicked. I was right.
I call, he rolls over A4! Board is A K 8! Turn 4 RIVER A BLOODY 4! Villain becomes new chip leader, I'm the new short stack.
Just wondering you indicated the villain re-raised pre, to how much?
I'd think he shoved expecting that if you had a strong A you might have 4-bet pre or lead out on the flop. He got lucky with the runner runner obv which sucks but thus is the game and we have to learn to roll with the punches.

Edit: Speaking of which, what were the blinds if you raised to 4bb pre, got reraised and called and had 23k pushed at you post-flop and you called lost but are still in when you started with 26k in the hand? Must have been smallish blinds or one hell of a small 3-bet?
 
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Just to give an example I was playing in a $22 deep stack tournament. Sitting 3rd overall with a chip stack of $26000. There was 23 players left in the tourney, top 9 made cash. The table is fairly nitty although there is one player who has chipped up for several all in occasions. He was "lucky" on multiple occasions! I have AK suited and raise it to 4 BB. Everyone folds but one. The crazy Villain re-raises and I just simply call. Flop comes out and I hit top 2 pair AK. I check, villain shoves all in for about $23000. I thought at first that this was a bluff to try and get me to fold, then i put him on a set, then I thought he would have slow played it more. Then I thought he might of hit his ace, but I know I have him out kicked. I was right.
I call, he rolls over A4! Board is A K 8! Turn 4 RIVER A BLOODY 4! Villain becomes new chip leader, I'm the new short stack.

For some sick reason when the 4 came on the turn, I knew another 4 was going to come on the river! If that's not lucky, and luck doesn't exist in poker, I will quit now and head to slot machines, I might have better luck there!

Sorry about the bad beat. A couple of comments:

Let me reiterate: there is no such thing as luck. Just randomness. Luck is a "quality" that people think they have or don't have, and in that way it's absolute nonsense. Also, you didn't know that the river was going to be a 4. You are not psychic, and you did not have a one-time vision of dancing fours at the table. You were being irrational because you feared the 4, so that's what you were focusing on --- and randomness justified your irrationality in this case. You have forgotten the multitude of times that you feared the river two-outer and it didn't come, because those situations weren't noteworthy since you were a 95% favorite. Since they weren't noteworthy, your brain made no effort to store that information and it just drifted away ...

Randomness is real, and it certainly influences every poker hand. It is equally certain that, in the long run, randomness is essentially neutral to EVERY individual player. In the hand that you posted, randomness "favored" your opponent. hands like this happen to us all. Some of us even manage to win despite suckouts like the one that you shared.

My central point is this: you are fixated on the "luck", not on how you played/are playing. If you consistently get your opponents all-in in situations like the one you specified, then you WILL WIN in the long term. The fact that you've been losing for four years, however, suggests that situation is the exception and not the rule. If you're not using poker tracking software to track hands, then your "recollection" of your "luck" is probably very inaccurate. That is not a shot at you --- it is true of everyone (see confirmation bias).

You should be reviewing your play and, if you do, you'll almost certainly find that you don't get your chips in ahead nearly as often as you think you do. And you'll get reminded of the times that YOU were the lucky one.

In summary, I'm advocating that you change your focus away from luck and to the quality of your play. If the quality of your play is high enough, you will win in the long run. End of story.

Good luck.

-HooDooKoo
 
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D

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I dont think it would be easier playing against higher stakes, but it would be less variance. I think better players are more predictable, but definitely not easier to win against than fish.
 
Brodermatt

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The blinds were only small and intervals went up every 30 minutes. Every one starts with 5k. I believe I raised it to about $650 which the villain re-raised to $1800. Looking back on it now and talking through how it happen, I probably should have folded pre-flop. I should have asked my self the question if it was really worth risking my tourney life ( or so much of it ) for what was already in the pot? Not too sure.

I believe I did everything right and played the hand correctly, it just wasn't meant to be.
 
DrazaFFT

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Are we have two same treads here or im in parallel universe????
Seriously m8 as soon as you let go your luck/no luck theory the better days will come to your poker game...

Poker is all about playing hands that have high percentage to win or if not play underdog hands with proper pot odds so that when you hit you'll win more money than you lost... it is that simple but you cant expect that to happen in 100 hands, even in 1k hands, winning at poker is a marathon not sprint...
 
BluffMeAllIn

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I believe I raised it to about $650 which the villain re-raised to $1800. Looking back on it now and talking through how it happen, I probably should have folded pre-flop
why would you ever consider folder pre with AK to a villian if i recall correctly you indicated was a agro-fish? I'd consider a 4-bet before ever considering a fold, just my thought of course.

As hookoodoo (or is it hoodookoo lol) indicates (and touched on the "luck" focus very well) you were way ahead of the A4 and sucks on the runner runner but we all know it happens (5% of the time you will lose to the river 2 outer).
 
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100% right Midget!

I like to think I'm a good player, make the right decisions more often than not! But clearly it's not working!

I'm thinking just playing in Sunday Million tournaments every week till I eventually make some good money!


Im a winning mtt player and 50NL @ stars. I have done pretty well with them, but I llose motivation and it bores me

I would much rather play in a $55.00 tournament on pokerstars non turbo. or a $109.00
my biggest cashes have come from $100.00 buy in and $60.00.
I also Ran deep in the million,
also knocked out team stars charlotte van brabander on a final table not that it means alot other than a cool experience lol.

you turn up for these games and people are playing real poker.
the lower games you dont really know whats going on half the time,
they might be donk raising with k4o out of position , or calling 3-bets with j8.

I wouldnt advise buying into the sunday million every week unless satellites , it could be months and months before cashing a 4 figure sum assuming you are playing solid
 
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bkniefel

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to answer that question in my eyes, you need to evaluate your play. are you a donkey? (no offense if so) or are you pro?

if you are an amateur player and are looking to grind out many tables, you want people to make bad decisions regardless of your skill level. when they do, you are rewarded. i believe pros just have more money because they have more experience being rewarded..
 
rdm4k

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copy/pasted from a rdm website

chris ferguson, an ex pro of fulltilt turned 0$ into 10k$. Is a pro able to beat micros??

When it comes to bankroll management, maybe we should all just ask What Would Jesus Do? Team Full Tilt Poker member Chris Ferguson recently showed that with the right mixture of responsibility and discipline, it's possible to turn very little money into thousands. In fact, he managed to turn zero dollars into more than $10,000.

Over the past 16 months, Ferguson was on a quest to complete this challenge. Starting with nothing but a Full Tilt Poker account, he played in freerolls until he earned enough to try games with a real-money buy-in. From there, Ferguson built up his bankroll by adhering to this strict set of guidelines:

• He never bought into a cash game or a sit-n-go with more than 5 percent of his total bankroll (there was an exception for the lowest limits: he was allowed to buy into any game with a buy-in of $2.50 or less).
• He didn't buy into a multi-table tournament for more than 2 percent of his total bankroll, but he was allowed to buy into any multi-table tournament that cost $1.
• If at any time during a No-Limit or Pot-Limit cash-game session the money on the table represented more than 10 percent of his total bankroll, he had to leave the game when the blinds reached him.

"I think a lot of players would do well to apply these rules," Ferguson wrote in a FTP pro tip. "One great benefit from this approach to bankroll management is that it ensures you'll be playing in games you can afford. You'll never play for very long in a game that's over your head because, when you're losing, you'll have no choice but to drop down to a smaller game. You can continue to sharpen your game at that lower limit until your bankroll allows you to move up and take another shot. These rules also prevent you from being completely decimated by a bad run of cards."[...]
 
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At at able full of donks you should follow Doyle,s advice and tighten up.. Bluffs are almost impossible and most of the players will not respond to a ssquize play or any other form of poker move.
 
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rrph3rtbkr

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pro will eat u when ur playing with them for first time ...if u have just graduated from donkers to pro table... donkers are easy to read .. but my boy pro ..they are not predictable... but donkers are
 
Brodermatt

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Thanks for the feedback! I'm still learning the game and I have realized that bad beats do happen, its part of poker, it's how I deal with the situation afterwards is what really counts. Tilting is a major factor of being a poor player and I know it's something that happens a lot to me!

For example: I have $200 bankroll. I play $1.50 games and I make the money about 50% of the time. I might go on a losing streak of about 3 games. Instead of taking a break, I buy into a tournament of $3.50. I might win a couple here and there, but then I might lose two in a row. Then I start buying into tournaments due to the fact I want to chase my loses.
Does this form of tilting happen to anyone else, or is it just me??

I would love to get it out of my game, one of the main reasons of always topping up my account!
 
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