How I Will Master Poker

[mrmonkey]

I'm curious, how many other people who think play money has value even win at cash games? Doubt there's one.

I am an advocate of play chips and I'm a moderate winner at cash games, both NLHE and PLO at about 4BB/100 (8bb/100) over about a million hands from 2nl-25nl. High stakes PLO play chip games in particularly taught me a lot about the game before I ever put a cent of real money into the blinds.

I'll also state that when I first started my primary focus in poker was to just have fun and become more skilled. I also made a promise to myself to never deposit a cent of money into the game that didn't get its start from freerolls or other promotions. One thing this and I think my play chip background helps me do is to keep the money and my play objective. When I look at my bankroll it's basically all play money to me because the only thing I have invested into it is my time... therefore as long as a play is +ev I have no issue bluff shoving 300BB into a pot and as long as I stay within BRM I never play with scared money. Sklansky bucks FTW.

I also think that people deriding play chips and saying "deposit deposit deposit" as a level may be shortchanging the game. I believe play chips can be an excellent gateway for people who would never in their life consider gambling with real money on the internet as something they might do... but if they spend enough time on Zynga or whatever they probably delude themselves into thinking they can make it in real money games too without any adjustments. This is why if Zynga somehow transitions into real money play... my god, it will be like the early days of party poker all over again.

I think perhaps that something that dakota was alluding to in this thread though is > it can become more harm than good. One will likely need to 'unlearn' alot of bad habits from playing in alot of unrealisitc situations, vs. alot of ridiculous play.

My counter argument to this is that people should be making adjustments in their game all the time to different kinds of table dynamics. If you go into play chips with the mindset that adjustments need to be made at 100playchipNL vs. 10,000playchipNL, you should be able to also adjust from 10,000playchipNL to 2NL. Additionally, 10,000playchipNL rarely had the same kind of spewy play you'd see at the lower levels of playchip play, and quite truthfully played pretty similarly to many 2nl/5nl tables I've been at... ie, lots of passive limpers.

 

[ifoldquads]

Hey all, just a quick update. I've finished the initial read-through of the books I purchased, and I'm now going to spend some time doing some additional note-taking, as well as then making a more detailed and thorough study syllabus. I'm in the midst of getting real-world professional licenses, and the holidays are around the corner, so things will be quiet on this front until probably after the new year. More to come.

Good luck at the tables!

 

[dj11]

Hey all, just a quick update. I've finished the initial read-through of the books I purchased, and I'm now going to spend some time doing some additional note-taking, as well as then making a more detailed and thorough study syllabus. I'm in the midst of getting real-world professional licenses, and the holidays are around the corner, so things will be quiet on this front until probably after the new year. More to come.

Good luck at the tables!

Great that you have returned. I think most of us will agree that the first read thru of all your reading material is just that....the FIRST read thru. I have re-read most of my books many times, each time learning something I glossed over previously. They occupy the reading drawer in the loo. So I get refreshment ideas daily....

 

[bz54321]

Hey all, just a quick update. I've finished the initial read-through of the books I purchased, and I'm now going to spend some time doing some additional note-taking, as well as then making a more detailed and thorough study syllabus. I'm in the midst of getting real-world professional licenses, and the holidays are around the corner, so things will be quiet on this front until probably after the new year. More to come.

Good luck at the tables!

If you are looking for real games to play try using meetup to find some local home games.

I think play money cash games are a little funny but freerole tournys are fun and can help you get started with a tiny online bank. With this tiny bank you will pretty much be limited to the smallest limit games and that's what you want to play limit so it should work out if you can hit a tourny.

 

[Iselo]

Well, thank you for that opinion. While I still think that with the right mindset and a series of specific goals one can still learn selected things playing in such an environment, given the general strongly expressed denouncement of even seeing a hand in play money, I simply will discontinue playing at Pokerstars.

In which case, I am simply only going to be able to approach the game 100% from a theoretical standpoint. I don't see the point in organizing a home game, because given who I'd be able to gather together, the level of play will be no better than a play money table.

In which case, how do you suggest I best go about obtaining hands to analyze? I may simply have to pose myself examples. For example, say I will assume I always have KQ-suited on the button, then use a real deck of cards and place a flop, then theorize what happens with that flop if there are X number of opponents and Y was their actions pre-flop and Z their actions post-flop.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

I'm pretty new to poker myself. I started off reading a couple of books to learn the theory of the game but when I started to actually play (real money, micro stakes) I realized I hadn't fully understood the concepts and ideas that were presented in the books (even though I thought I did while reading) until I was in those specific situations myself.

Anyways, I'm still very much a beginner and what really helpes me alot (except playing) is watching videos of other peoples play. I recently got a membership at Cardrunners. It's a poker training site where you can watch videos "class room style" aswell as pros playing while analyzing their own game. I love it and I'm sure you could find similar stuff on youtube if you don't want to pay for the membership.

GL!