Game Selection (Day 15 Course Discussion)

[Coinuss]

In low stack MMTs, there are many players who don't take the game seriously. Game selection is an additional factor when I'm looking for the type of game for the evening. I like HU, and sometimes I lose multiple HU rematch to one person, and then I think it was a bad game selection. I like the quiz format you do in this course. Thank Collin and Katie

 

[tealurker]

Unfortunately, I got only 6 fully correct in the exam.
I would have one question about the second and sixth quiz question.

Question 2 with 87s: Why wouldn't you c-bet on your inside straight ánd flush draw here? If I remember right, the course taught me to generally bet on draws. We have no showdown value and 12 outs (~48% equity). Is it purely because the flop is coordinated?

Question 6 with 65s: Isn't shoving here super risky, since the villain called both our flop and turn bet already? We have no equity and it seems the fold equity is quite small. Maybe it is because I'm practicing with micro-stakes games, I feel like 8/10 players would call our shove there.

On the other three questions I made minor errors, due to just not paying enough attention, or forgetting to add the pot to an opponent's stack in calculating implied odds (stupid, I know). I feel like I learned already so much from this course, but not yet make a profit exactly because of this. Not paying enough attention and letting emotional responses influence my decisions.

Thanks a lot for this amazing course!

 

[nwhitney118]

Ha I got 9 but wonder if I can claim a tenth point: for the bonus question I answered variance. Is that a fair alternative answer?

 

[king11682]

A great poker player can lose money in the games and a weak poker player can win money in the long term at the tables. The cause of this phenomenon is table selection.The winning game is fundamentally a matter of going into games against weaker opponents and letting your skill edge do the rest. As your skills improve, you can upload and expand the games that you are winning comfortably.

 

[Collin Moshman]

Ha I got 9 but wonder if I can claim a tenth point: for the bonus question I answered variance. Is that a fair alternative answer?

Great work getting 9 right!

For the bonus question, alas no credit there

The reason is because we specify "long-term," and variance will only cause this to happen over the short-term.

 

[Collin Moshman]

Unfortunately, I got only 6 fully correct in the exam.
I would have one question about the second and sixth quiz question.

Question 2 with 87s: Why wouldn't you c-bet on your inside straight ánd flush draw here? If I remember right, the course taught me to generally bet on draws. We have no showdown value and 12 outs (~48% equity). Is it purely because the flop is coordinated?

Question 6 with 65s: Isn't shoving here super risky, since the villain called both our flop and turn bet already? We have no equity and it seems the fold equity is quite small. Maybe it is because I'm practicing with micro-stakes games, I feel like 8/10 players would call our shove there.

On the other three questions I made minor errors, due to just not paying enough attention, or forgetting to add the pot to an opponent's stack in calculating implied odds (stupid, I know). I feel like I learned already so much from this course, but not yet make a profit exactly because of this. Not paying enough attention and letting emotional responses influence my decisions.

Thanks a lot for this amazing course!

Thanks so much Tealurker! Great job completing the first half of the course, and it sounds like you have a solid understanding of the material so don't worry about missing a few questions

With 87s, we didn't have a gutshot there I think? The reason to check is because the flop is very coordinated and it's multi-way. But you're right that not having showdown value is an important factor in these spots and this hand is probably closer than we should have made it for a test question!

For 65s, you definitely will not get called 80% here. Loose players will call small bets a lot. But you'll get credit for larger bets where you're credibly repping a strong hand over multiple streets in all but the craziest games.

 

[tealurker]

Thanks so much Tealurker! Great job completing the first half of the course, and it sounds like you have a solid understanding of the material so don't worry about missing a few questions

With 87s, we didn't have a gutshot there I think? The reason to check is because the flop is very coordinated and it's multi-way. But you're right that not having showdown value is an important factor in these spots and this hand is probably closer than we should have made it for a test question!

For 65s, you definitely will not get called 80% here. Loose players will call small bets a lot. But you'll get credit for larger bets where you're credibly repping a strong hand over multiple streets in all but the craziest games.

Thank you for the detailed response Collin. Good to get some encouragement. You might be threatening your own potential profits by educating the poker community with such dedication.

Regarding the 87s, unless my brain is malfunctioning at the moment, I think we even have an inside straight flush draw! But I guess the suggested play is still viable. (hand starts at ~9:15 in the video)

 

[fundiver199]

Regarding the 87s, unless my brain is malfunctioning at the moment, I think we even have an inside straight flush draw! But I guess the suggested play is still viable. (hand starts at ~9:15 in the video)

The question was: "if we have 8h7h on AsJcTc, should we C-bet into two opponents." Heros actual hand was 8c7c. 8h7h is a very bad draw on this board, because it could already be dead to someone with KQ, and 9c could give someone a flush. So even when we make our hand, sometimes we are just setting ourselfes up to getting owned by someone with an even better hand (reverse implied odds). When we also expect little fold equity against two opponents, the best play is to check back and basically give up, if we dont improve on the turn and face some kind of bet.

 

[Collin Moshman]

Thank you for the detailed response Collin. Good to get some encouragement. You might be threatening your own potential profits by educating the poker community with such dedication.

Regarding the 87s, unless my brain is malfunctioning at the moment, I think we even have an inside straight flush draw! But I guess the suggested play is still viable. (hand starts at ~9:15 in the video)

I really appreciate these nice words Tealurker, and will throw my potential future profits into the wind for the sake of the CardsChat community

Re 87s, like Fundiver points out below, the question was a hypothetical where we have 8h7h instead so no flush draw. But -- you are completely right that in either case we do have a gutshot straight draw to the low end of the straight. Somehow I missed that and you are 100% correct!

The question was: "if we have 8h7h on AsJcTc, should we C-bet into two opponents." Heros actual hand was 8c7c. 8h7h is a very bad draw on this board, because it could already be dead to someone with KQ, and 9c could give someone a flush. So even when we make our hand, sometimes we are just setting ourselfes up to getting owned by someone with an even better hand (reverse implied odds). When we also expect little fold equity against two opponents, the best play is to check back and basically give up, if we dont improve on the turn and face some kind of bet.

Thanks for this explanation, very well said!

 

[Good Man]

Good day!
Wow, it's hot. Wow.
This lesson was long and at the same time very useful. I watched for almost 1.5 hours, because I paused before answering questions, thought, and reviewed some places several times. Here I got answers to all the questions I asked in the 13th lesson!
And in the end, my rating even made me happy, 9 correct answers!
The only place where I made a mistake is the moment with a pair of 4. In similar situations, if my stack allowed me to see the flop, I would call. But here the formula is well described and shows the calculation of all the actions that I will follow and not make mistakes in the future!:congrats::congrats::congrats::congrats::congrats:
The puppy patrol was fun, and you're good at distracting people during class.




Life is a game , play beautiful

 

[Collin Moshman]

Good day!
Wow, it's hot. Wow.
This lesson was long and at the same time very useful. I watched for almost 1.5 hours, because I paused before answering questions, thought, and reviewed some places several times. Here I got answers to all the questions I asked in the 13th lesson!
And in the end, my rating even made me happy, 9 correct answers!
The only place where I made a mistake is the moment with a pair of 4. In similar situations, if my stack allowed me to see the flop, I would call. But here the formula is well described and shows the calculation of all the actions that I will follow and not make mistakes in the future!:congrats::congrats::congrats::congrats::congrats:
The puppy patrol was fun, and you're good at distracting people during class.




Life is a game , play beautiful

Haha thanks Good Man, and congrats on the 9 correct answers!

 

[TeUnit]

I think table selection in sngs can vary from very easy to do to very difficult. If you look at a site like Betonline you can see the players names in the lobby and you can see any color coding you may have done, but if you look at a site like Merge they hide the players identity in the lobby. And a site like ignition where the players don't even have names makes it even more difficult. However, you get to pick where you play.

Even on sites where you don't get to see who is registered you probably can tell if you are up against a bunch of regs when the game starts(especially if you have good notes and are using sharkscope).

Another trick, on sites where they allow you to have "buddies" make the bad and good players your buddy and look and see what games they are regged for and act accordingly.

And if you are lucky enough to play on a site that lets you pick where you sit at the table make sure to try to sit with the non stealers on your right and the non defenders on your left.

Thanks Katie and Collin. Good content so far.

This lesson (game selection) seems a little tough to apply when we are playing SNG's or tournaments. We cannot generally "select" who is at our table. We can pick stakes, but that is about it. I am not trying to win a million at low and micro stake games, so for me it is training for the larger stakes. My goal is to keep moving up in stakes, which means game selection is a bit of a mute point. Would you agree?

Regarding much of the content in the mid-term quiz, it seemed that a large percentage of the examples had us as the large stack. I feel that this is a little un-realistic, as while i try as I might, I am not generally the large stack at the table. So, it is a lot different playing for our tournament life than when we are playing for a mere bump in the road if we lose. I believe that when we are playing cash, it matters not. The long run is the long run and as long as we are +EV, we can rationalize our play. However, in a tournament we MUST make some adjustments and we are not looking for marginal plays to put our tournament life on the line. Do you agree with this?

 

[Collin Moshman]

I think table selection in sngs can vary from very easy to do to very difficult. If you look at a site like Betonline you can see the players names in the lobby and you can see any color coding you may have done, but if you look at a site like Merge they hide the players identity in the lobby. And a site like Ignition where the players don't even have names makes it even more difficult. However, you get to pick where you play.

Even on sites where you don't get to see who is registered you probably can tell if you are up against a bunch of regs when the game starts(especially if you have good notes and are using sharkscope).

Another trick, on sites where they allow you to have "buddies" make the bad and good players your buddy and look and see what games they are regged for and act accordingly.

And if you are lucky enough to play on a site that lets you pick where you sit at the table make sure to try to sit with the non stealers on your right and the non defenders on your left.

Excellent breakdown. For sure, if worst comes to worst, then you can just make a decision based on how the games are going. If anonymous ones start off loading with lots of regs, then stop playing. But it's much easier when you get to see all the names and color-coding.

I like the buddy trick a lot

 

[Phyrrura]

Very nice avaliation

Well, I didn't expect for that much of review of concepts. The way they articulate every concept into the table, all based on the new one given: the importance of table selection!

Amazing!!

 

[Katie Dozier]

Well, I didn't expect for that much of review of concepts. The way they articulate every concept into the table, all based on the new one given: the importance of table selection!

Amazing!!

So glad to hear that you’re enjoying it

 

[carmenzu]

Katie Dozier, Collin Moshman and CC for giving us an excellent book
I keep the games I can afford to play (bankroll ) on my poker room favorites list.
Getting the list of games is ideal, because most of the players are regulars and we get to know them (a little) and if we don't have HUD then the notes help us.

 

[Phyrrura]

This is massive!

I found it great that you exploited every single concept that have been taught until this point, and it was amazing to see how them work together.

And in the end, you just drop the bomb... table selection, this is it, you surely will escape a lot of trouble by selection which villains you want to play against.

 

[imnoobpoker]

Passed the exam! Thank you so much for all the efforts and help.

 

[xOneCoolHandx]

Quiz Questions

Great content. I got 9.66 right (I thought 22 would be a fold) but got the bonus question correct and the Paw Patrol Character question correct so I am going to give myself full credit.

 

[Collin Moshman]

Great content. I got 9.66 right (I thought 22 would be a fold) but got the bonus question correct and the Paw Patrol Character question correct so I am going to give myself full credit.

Thanks xOne, and congrats on completing the midterm with such high marks!


I'm going to tell our 4 year old about you getting the Paw Patrol character right, she's going to be very pleased

 

[henriquemaduro]

Just a great last bonus question. I don't win a lot of money at poker, but after I started to select better tables and softwares, I stoped to lose money. For me its important to select the software not because of bots or any of those things people curse some, but I realized that some softwares there are weaker players.

 

[Marcos1315]

Great content!!
I got all but question 6 right.

Maybe it's because I only play freerolls, but I didn't trust the hero to have a big fold equity.


I was thinking and did some calculations:
If the hero makes the same bet (2 625) 100 times (spending 262 500), the pot would be 5 571. So the hero needs to steal the pot more than 47.12% of the time to make a profit (I divided 262 500 by 5 571).

I was a little skeptical about this fold equity, but looking at the combos I think villain would have, I think it makes a lot of sense.

 

[barbados]

As we say in our proverb: "The further into the forest - the more firewood." The lecture turned out to be very lengthy and informative. There is something to ponder. I noticed one feature - in two weeks of courses, I began to lose more often than to win. I'm probably a bad student...

 

[Vallet]

I reread the book a year later. The exam is conducted in a video course after chapter 15. Just when half of the book is read. But I still could not answer all the questions without errors.:icon_stud

 

[mariussica88]

Finished Day 15...15 to go

Quiz time This is the lesson that I enjoy the most.

Answered all questions, I attached a photo with my answers. Disappointed of myself, at some questions I haven't paid attention to the table stacks. After finishing the course I will rewatch it all over again.