I think this was a genius fold.

[blankoblanco]

Raising 3xbb all the time w/ a big hand becomes too predictable.

um, only if you're dumb enough to not be raising the same amount with a whole slew of other hands. if opening for a raise on the godforsaken button shorthanded is too big an indicator of strength, you're doing something terribly wrong

 

[Dorkus Malorkus]

Nothing wrong limping in w/ QQ on the button for variance.

...care to explain this? i'm rather baffled, you see.

 

[ABorges]

I think it's more likely he has a 9... in which case you have him beat. No one leads with a pot sized bet with trips on the flop in micro stakes, everyone insta-checks hoping to check-raise! Like everyone said, the limp is horrendous, you should have raised the flop and you probably should have called the turn; every street was badly played. You have the read on him anyway, so maybe I'm wrong, I dunno. Am I missing something when everyone says it's a regular fold here?

I've read your other thread about losing a lot lately playing micro stakes. Maybe it's not because of variance, maybe it's just you're not applying your knowledge correctly when you're playing. You should be humble enough to admit it's a possibility... you could find a way to improve is to review your hand histories and see if you really played well, or even better giving a sample of it to someone around here to analyze it for you; make sure it's a good player though. Good luck with your game, don't give up like you said you would, just gain experience and you'll be winning in no time, maybe you'll find poker a profitable hobby.

 

[vanquish]

...care to explain this? i'm rather baffled, you see.

basically what hes saying is that limping QQ leads to range imbalance, which, at level 18, evolves into variance, one of the best pokemon in the game

 

[skoldpadda]

...care to explain this? i'm rather baffled, you see.

BR variance ldo

 

[switch0723]

^^ :rofl: :rofl: archive post

Edit: Bah skold ruined my arrows

 

[pantin007]

basically what hes saying is that limping QQ leads to range imbalance, which, at level 18, evolves into variance, one of the best pokemon in the game

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: i lol'd
van deserves medal

 

[ph_il]

Geez...where do I begin? Please dont take this the wrong way because I am trying to help you and improve your game, but this hand is just craptastic.

: sings :
Come along and ride on this craptastic voyage...

Full Tilt Poker Game #5787802186: $2 + $0.25 Sit & Go (44058050), Table 1 - 100/200 - No Limit Hold'em - 6:59:17 ET - 2008/03/26
Seat 1: fmiles (2,575)
...Ok, lets take a look at your stack-size compared to the blinds.
You're sitting on just a little over 12 BBs/M of about 8, so you're nearing the danger/short stack zone. You definitely want raise here and buy this pot since it'll increase your stack by over 10%. The last thing you want to do is limp in, find yourself in an odd situation, and then be forced to fold. Raise here, steal the blinds, shove to a re-raise unless you have a monster read and put your opponent on a better hand.
Seat 3: Chipaholic23 (485), is sitting out
Seat 4: tizakdayo (1,965)
Seat 6: 123tommysean (4,250)
Seat 8: IniquitousGnome (4,225)
Chipaholic23 posts the small blind of 100
tizakdayo posts the big blind of 200
The button is in seat #1
*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to fmiles [Qh Qc]
...Very strong starting hand. 4 handed = raise!!!
123tommysean folds
IniquitousGnome folds
fmiles calls 200
...No, dont do this. Raise here. Blinds are too high and your stack is too low to just limp in.
Chipaholic23 folds
tizakdayo checks
*** FLOP *** [8c 9h 8d]
tizakdayo bets 500
fmiles has 15 seconds left to act
fmiles calls 500
...Why did you call here? Because you have an over-pair and possibly the best hand? Then wouldnt a shove here be more profitable? I dont like this play at all because you dont know where you are and you're not really doing anything that'll win you the pot. What do you put your opponent on that would warrant just a call here?
*** TURN *** [8c 9h 8d] 7♦
tizakdayo bets 1,265, and is all in
fmiles folds
...So, now I ask: Why did you fold here? Your play so far is not making a whole lot of sense. What can you possibly put your opponent on now that would warrant a fold being a genus play? Trips? Then shouldnt you have folded on the flop? 10J for a straight? Then shouldnt you have pushed on the flop? This is obv a standard fold and not a genius fold by any means. Dont kid yourself.
Uncalled bet of 1,265 returned to tizakdayo
tizakdayo mucks
fmiles has returned
tizakdayo wins the pot (1,500)

Above.

What, would you have called that all-in?
...No, but then I wouldnt have even let it get that far.

She was an aggressive but solid player on the big blind, so I don't think she had an overpair. She had me beat, and I'd bet my whole bankroll for that.
...So, you dont raise because she is an 'aggresive, solid player in the BB'? She could be the worst player in the world and would have you beat in this situation because you allowed it. Its not her solid BB skills that beat you, it was your foolish PF mistake to not raise.

I knew her too well to do that.
...Oh yeah, Hellmuth. You must've had a monster read on her hand in the BB. This must be the reason why you limped in, am I right?

Above.

I don't feel bad at all about this hand. I was beat. It was a great Sit & Go, I had a good table image and played pretty well.
...You were beat after the flop came out. You probably had it won PF. Why didnt you take advantage of that? And what table image is this you're going for? You like to limp big pairs?

Too bad I ended up placing 4th. I had two unsuccessful big hands at the last stages, both in which I was mathematically a clear favorite.
...LOL. If you play your hands out like this, its no wonder you lost. Im not saying that you were guaranteed to win with QQ in this hand, but you stand a far better chance to by raising than by limping in. Yes, you probably were a mathematical favorite, but you failed to use that to your advantage.

But that's just poker.
...Dont forget its also making foolish, silly, and easily avoidable mistakes that probably cost you the game. I think they deserve credit as well.

Above.

Like I said, Im just giving constructive criticism. There are so many things wrong with the way you played your hand. While there is not right or wrong way to play a hand, its all situational, you can minimize your mistakes and avoid sticky situations like mentioned above. GL in your future games.

 

[ph_il]

THIS IS A $2 TOURNAMENT - STOP GIVING SO MUCH CREDIT

Are you implying that people who play $2 tournaments are bad players just because of the low buy-in?

 

[marble]

...care to explain this? i'm rather baffled, you see.

....meaning variance in your play. maybe once every ten hands you can trap with your big pocket pair by limping in. and get someone to either bluff at you or commit all their chips w/ top pair (ie. 94o).

and to those that raises w/ QQ ALL the time on the button...good for you. prolly the type to ALWAYS reraise w/ AA also. absolutely nothing wrong with that.

 

[viking999]

I take great exception to the assumption that QQ is beat here.

Most players won't bet pot for 1/3 of their stack with an 8 on that flop. The idiot's reason is "Yay! I have trips. Let me slowplay it as much as possible." The good player's reason is "I have no reason to think I'm up against any sort of a draw or made hand, because I've seen no aggression." The justification for betting is usually to charge a draw or to play a reverse psychology trick versus a made hand. He has no reason to put you on a draw or a made hand, so it makes sense to check it.

Other than that we're worried about what? JT? That's the only sizable draw on the flop that got there. Otherwise, he could have made a daring semi-bluff with T6 or 56. I think the far more likely set of hands is 9x, T7, 76, or jack squat. I don't see folding QQ getting better than 2:1 pot odds as being the right play here. I think perceiving QQ as being worse than 33% chance to win is pure MUB mentality. Extra paranoia caused by slowplaying a big hand.

 

[5miles]

Don't get cocky about a fold if you don't know how to play poker.

Ok, I won't next time.

No one understood the irony with the word ”genius” in the topic. But I don't care, it appears my image on these forums as a community member and as a player is much worse than I had thought.

 

[5miles]

This all comes down to the fact that I feel really frustrated about poker now. I've been recovering from a big losing streak and just as I'm going to start studying and improving my game, I'm depressed about it again. At this point I've withdrawn the money from my poker accounts and have quit the game.

The hands I post here are the worst I played. That's why I put them here. I don't think these are strong plays and I don't think I did anything well in those hands. Any of them.

 

[KenFischer]

....meaning variance in your play. maybe once every ten hands you can trap with your big pocket pair by limping in. and get someone to either bluff at you or commit all their chips w/ top pair (ie. 94o).

and to those that raises w/ QQ ALL the time on the button...good for you. prolly the type to ALWAYS reraise w/ AA also. absolutely nothing wrong with that.

Hmm... perhaps you are just confused - variance does not equal deception.

Variance is what happens when you misplay hands and lose money to people that shouldn't have been in the hand with you. Open-limping in late position with QQ is definitely a way to add variance to your game. Good players try to avoid doing this.

Deception is what you get when your opponent assumes you have something other than what you really have. Open-raising with a variety of hands (no matter what the strength) is a good way to add deception to your game. Good players strive for this.

 

[5miles]

I've read your other thread about losing a lot lately playing micro stakes. Maybe it's not because of variance, maybe it's just you're not applying your knowledge correctly when you're playing. You should be humble enough to admit it's a possibility... you could find a way to improve is to review your hand histories and see if you really played well, or even better giving a sample of it to someone around here to analyze it for you; make sure it's a good player though. Good luck with your game, don't give up like you said you would, just gain experience and you'll be winning in no time, maybe you'll find poker a profitable hobby.

Thanks for the reply, it appears you're treating me as an adult.

The problem is that I'm not this bad player. I haven't been able to apply my knowledge and skills lately. Maybe it's because of the losing streak or something else, but I just somehow don't know how to play poker anymore.

This hand clearly shows the problem: https://www.cardschat.com/forum/tournament-hand-analysis-51/kqs-button-108849/

Last year when I was playing the $0.10/$0.25 cash tables, I would've NEVER made that kind of play. It's just mindnumbing that I managed to play that horribly. Why didn't I bet the flop? Why did I call on the flop and turn? What kind of value am I thinking to get out of hands like that?

If I sit at a poker table now it feels the same as pulling my toenails off. I can't play poker, I can't concentrate. No matter how long a break I take, I come back and suck even worse.

That's why I quit.

 

[marble]

Hmm... perhaps you are just confused - variance does not equal deception.

Variance is what happens when you misplay hands and lose money to people that shouldn't have been in the hand with you. Open-limping in late position with QQ is definitely a way to add variance to your game. Good players try to avoid doing this.

Deception is what you get when your opponent assumes you have something other than what you really have. Open-raising with a variety of hands (no matter what the strength) is a good way to add deception to your game. Good players strive for this.

advance member.....beginner thinking. i like you already

 

[KenFischer]

advance member.....beginner thinking. i like you already

I'm not quite sure how I should take that...

 

[viking999]

Hmm... perhaps you are just confused - variance does not equal deception.

Variance is what happens when you misplay hands and lose money to people that shouldn't have been in the hand with you. Open-limping in late position with QQ is definitely a way to add variance to your game. Good players try to avoid doing this.

Deception is what you get when your opponent assumes you have something other than what you really have. Open-raising with a variety of hands (no matter what the strength) is a good way to add deception to your game. Good players strive for this.

I agree that variance does not equal deception, but I don't agree with your definition of variance.

Variance is a measure of how much your individual hand results deviate from your mean hand result (your win rate per hand).

Variance can be bad or it can be good. Misplaying a hand can actually make it much lower variance than normal. Folding every single hand is the lowest variance way of playing, yet I think everyone would consider folding AA preflop a horrible play. It is possible that limping with QQ is a lower variance play than raising with it. It all depends on how you play the QQ after limping. If you fold it to any bet after limping, that's a pretty low variance way of playing QQ, albeit a retarded way.

Some very profitable plays are very high variance. For example, your opponent shoves all-in for $1 million into a $3 pot in a $1/$2 game. He accidentally flips over his hand, and he has AKo. Everyone else folds and it's to you to close out the action. You have 22, and you have $1 million in front of you. Calling will win you $60,000 on average, but you risk a cool million. Your average win rate per hand is less than a buck at these stakes, and so you will definitely hit some monster variance if you call, but it also averages out to more money than you could make in several years at your standard win rate.

I would also argue that higher variance players can make more money than lower variance players. Actually, variance is the wrong word here, because variance is statistical and so you cannot control it directly. Perhaps "risk" is a better word here. The long run most profitable (in dollars) perspective in poker is the risk-neutral one. If you are risk-seeking, you will accept negative value because you want to gamble. If you are risk-averse, you will forfeit higher value plays that put more money at risk or don't have enough of an edge for your taste. I don't personally have statistics to back this up, but I think most poker players (and people in general) fall into the risk-averse category. If you are risk-neutral, you play purely from the perspective of maximizing your EV (in dollars) when making decisions.

 

[KenFischer]

Admittedly my lack of smileys do hide it, but I have to admit that I was pretty much just mocking here

Thanks for following it up with a real definition. Class, when you study for your exam, use Viking's notes - not mine

 

[marble]

variance in your standard play, varying your play, changing your play, mixing up your play, deception in your play.......this is off the topic. antonym for variance is (sameness), so i used that word. yes i should of used a different word because variance is used somewhere else in poker, but i'm not so edukated.

at any rate, i feel bad for 5miles so i will help him out. i usually don't. maybe i'll get one or two people here that can use it, and the rest....stick with your ABC, it works also.

let me first begin by saying that it's also good to raise standard and take the blinds, you're going to add 10% to your stack without a problem. he's prolly going to put you on button steal mode, but he still has to put the rest of his chips in there, knowing he'll be called no matter what, so he still needs some sort of hand. if you both have more chips, then a raise is more appropriate.

ANOTHER way of playing it is by limping in w/ a big pair, especially on this spot which allows for more mistakes from the bb. i don't do this often but this is one of those 10% times i will. the sb is sitting out so he's out of the picture, but helps your cause. had you raise standard, it will be for about 1/3 of the bb's stack. he prolly knows he won't get you to fold that way so an all in reraise bluff would be dumb, so he will fold and off to the next hand. i've notice a lot of short stack get anxious later in the tournie, because those blinds eats up their chips, this is good for you when the flop comes.

so you limped, BB's first mistake would come from moving all in here preflop thinking you're weak and just limping because sb is sitting out. most peeps on the button will raise in this spot no matter what they are holding to steal the blinds. all the chips are gong in the middle anyways if they're holding some sort of hand, BUT you just gave them a much WIDER range in moving all in because you showed so much weakness.

the big benefit in limping in here is the opportunity for the villain to bluff. yes you could be outdrawn, if you're scared of that then stick to the standard raise. 889 board is a good flop for the bb to bluff at or bet if holding the 9. as stated by previous posters, a pot size bet will not always mean that the villain flopped trips. seems more like a scared bet.....scared of an overcard on the turn bet, thus all in on turn 7. i obviously could be wrong, but w/ QQ, i think it's time to put all your chips in there.

my mind veered off while writing this, but i really hope it helps you 5miles. DON'T think that you have to play a particular way to win in poker. look at me for example........i play different and still not much of a winning player =)

-m

 

[Arielstorm]

My question is, why did you just limp with that hand? A good lay down considering you made the mistake of limping. That hand you should have done some major pushing. If she was a solid player she would have laid down the 8/9 or possible 9/10 that she could have had. A few blinds gained is better than losing a few blinds.

 

[5miles]

my mind veered off while writing this, but i really hope it helps you 5miles. DON'T think that you have to play a particular way to win in poker. look at me for example........i play different and still not much of a winning player =)

It always helps.

About ways of playing... My biggest problem is that I've somehow lost the overall picture of the poker game I used to play. I don't know what I do at tables and I don't know why I do it. I'm now a weak player who thinks too much about the strength of my hands and not risking too much chips in anything, and on the other hand I do stupid reraises and pull off bad bluffs. For instance, I always seem to be so scared of a flushy board, a possible set, trips etc. that I don't have the courage to bet.

I used to have a playing style, and I liked that style because I had so many winning nights in multiple tables, but I've forgotten about all of it. I've played poker for 6 months pretty much everyday. Sometimes I played a little over my limits but I kept building bankroll steadily. If you play everyday and manage to break even or win a little, I don't think that's bad at all.

Right before I took a break from FullTilt to spend time in other things (early this year), I had €250 on my account. It's good considering I only risked a little over $100 in poker in the first place. I let the FullTilt account to rest for two months and with my winnings I bought shoes for my grandma's funeral.

I can't pull that off again. I'm stuck in a bad game, because I didn't take notes about my mistakes and I can't go back in time and look how I played certain hands and positions at those cash tables last year. Looking at these recent hands, they're horrible. That's not me playing.

 

[Steveg1976]

It always helps.

About ways of playing... My biggest problem is that I've somehow lost the overall picture of the poker game I used to play. I don't know what I do at tables and I don't know why I do it. I'm now a weak player who thinks too much about the strength of my hands and not risking too much chips in anything, and on the other hand I do stupid reraises and pull off bad bluffs. For instance, I always seem to be so scared of a flushy board, a possible set, trips etc. that I don't have the courage to bet.

I used to have a playing style, and I liked that style because I had so many winning nights in multiple tables, but I've forgotten about all of it. I've played poker for 6 months pretty much everyday. Sometimes I played a little over my limits but I kept building bankroll steadily. If you play everyday and manage to break even or win a little, I don't think that's bad at all.

Right before I took a break from FullTilt to spend time in other things (early this year), I had €250 on my account. It's good considering I only risked a little over $100 in poker in the first place. I let the FullTilt account to rest for two months and with my winnings I bought shoes for my grandma's funeral.

I can't pull that off again. I'm stuck in a bad game, because I didn't take notes about my mistakes and I can't go back in time and look how I played certain hands and positions at those cash tables last year. Looking at these recent hands, they're horrible. That's not me playing.

The same thing recently happened to me. I was playing well got my little roll up a bit and BAM!! I turned into an agrodonkspewtard. I was chasing, bluffing at the wrong times, just playing as wrong as can be. The worst part is I knew it and couldn't change it. For me I just stopped playing for money for like 3 weeks. Re-read some poker books, read cardschat, watched poker after dark but didn't play for real money. If felt like I wanted to play I just spewed play money. Now I am starting to get back on track, so there is hope.