stormswa
Legend
Silver Level
OK this is going to take all day to write up but well worth it. Joosie and I will be doing a low limit video series in a couple weeks. Joosie will be playing $50NL/ full ring while I play $25NL/6max, our goal in this series is not to show you how much money we win, heck we might both lose. The purpose of this is to show you how a TAG style can be played at lower levels and over the long run will be a winning style. TAG is the most proven style of play and what most successful long term winners play. I have not played this style in about a year, I'm more of a LAG player but I do know the style very well. Joosie has just started getting into LAG so this style will be more familiar with him. Before we start thought there are some things I would like to go over.
I hope you all join Joosie and I while we play and try to improve your own game, please any questions please ask or post in the HA section.
Poker Software
http://www.pokertracker.com/?AfID=25990 : this is pokertracker which in my opinion is a needed piece of software if you are serious about poker. What it will do is pull all your hand histories in a huge database so you can go back and review all your hands.
pokerace hud: Nick does not have a link for them so I didn't put one up. This is another great piece of software but unlike pokertracker it is not needed for this series but Joosie and I will both be using it. Basically it takes all the stats from pokertracker and displays them on the screen next to the players names.
scripts: I use a ton of scripts on full tilt poker, not sure if Joosie uses any or not but I do. There are soo many its real hard to go through each one but if you see one while I'm playing please ask and I will tell you what it is.
Pokeracehud Terms
you will hear joosie and I say these terms over and over and it is good that you know what the heck we are talking about.
vpip or vp$ip : this stands for voluntary put money in pot, this is how often people are putting money in the put or how often they are running hands preflop. You can use this stat over a large sample size to figure out how loose or tight someone is.
pfr: this stands for pre-flop raise, alone this stat really does not mean much but if you combine it with the vpip it means a lot. If someone is running a 24.5vpip and only has a 10pfr then you know when this guy raises he has to have a big hand. What we want as TAG players is our PFR and our VPIP to be very close together.
total aggression or total aggression post flop: this is how aggressive the players are either total or post flop. that's basically it on that stat pretty easy to understand this is how aggressive they are and knowing this helps us know how to play them with our different hand ranges.
went to showdown: I use this stat, not sure if Joosie does. its just like the name states, this is how often the opponent goes to the showdown. This is extremely important when we are trying to find out who are calling stations are.
General Poker Terms
ok here are general terms again that you will hear over and over.
Under The gun (early position) : I grouped these together because they are played the same way. Under the gun is the term used for the player that acts 1st pre-flop. In this position you are going to play your tightest and only open up with very premium hands. The same goes with any early position, in 6max its is the 1st 2 positions to act and in full ring it is 1st 3.
middle position: in this position we can open up our game a little and open hands that we would normally fold in early position like your AJ and QK type of hands.
cutoff, button (late position): OK these are the power positions, these are the positions at the table where we can exploit weakness's we see in our opponents. These will be our stealing positions. Here we can really open up our game and make plays we could not make in earlier positions.
open-raise: this is the term used if you are the 1st one to raise a un-raised pot.
open- limp: this is the term used if you are the 1st one into the pot and you just call the big blind, for the record we will hardly ever be doing that.
inducing a bluff: this is kinda a advanced strategy but we might do it in our videos if given a chance. This is the term used if we are trying to get someone to bluff us. Like if we have a very strong hand and we bet 1/4 of the pot to try to get a guy to come over the top of us.
3-betting: this term I use to describe a bet where I take a opponents bet and I multiply it by 3, so if a guy bets $2 into me pre-flop I might make it $6 to go. This is called 3-betting, this term can also be used if someone bets another guy raises and you re-raise that because you are 3 betting. This can also be used as 4-betting which is just doing all this as a 4th bet.
squeeze play: OK we might not be doing this in our videos too much because it is a very LAG type play but it might come up. This is a move where we have a early position raiser and at least 1 caller behind. We will make a big raise in late position regardless of our cards. It puts tremendous pressure on the opener and we usually will pick up the pot unless one of them has a absolute monster. Its a very high risk play.
odds: odds in poker make our decisions much easier, like if we are drawing to a flush we know we have 9 cards that will improve our hand to the flush but we also have 2 over cards so that in total is 15 outs but we discount them by 2 seeing as the A or K might not be good which gives us 13. so right now we are 2.62 to 1 and as long as opponents bet gives us those odds we can call.
outs: this goes along with odds, it is the cards we believe that will improve our hand.
implied odds: implied odds are how much extra money we can get from our opponent if we hit our hand.
set vs trips: I wanted to add this because everyone messes this up, these are 2 very different things. A set is where you hold a pocket pair and there is one on the board. So say you have 55 and flop is 59K, you have a set of fives. Now if you held A5 and flop was K55 now you have trip fives. The set is more powerful because it is more well hidden.
Types Of Players
LAG: this stands for loose aggressive, their vpip usually is around 18-28 and there Pre-flop raise is about the same. This is a very profitable style of play but is very hard to play. Most players can not master this style of play and usually they just turn into maniacs and spew money.
TAG: this stands for tight aggressive and their vpip is usually 10-18 and again there pre-flop raise is about the same. This is our style and it is the most consistent way to make money.
maniac: this is a LAG player that just cant seem to understand how to play. We only want to go in with strong hands against these guys.
Nit: nits only seem to play the nuts so if they are in a pot with us we have always got to proceed cautiously.
fish/donkey/bad player: here our the cash cows, these guys are the ones we are going to be making the most money from. These are the ones that play way 2 many hands, have no clue what position is.
http://www.pokertracker.com/?AfID=25990
I hope you all join Joosie and I while we play and try to improve your own game, please any questions please ask or post in the HA section.
Poker Software
http://www.pokertracker.com/?AfID=25990 : this is pokertracker which in my opinion is a needed piece of software if you are serious about poker. What it will do is pull all your hand histories in a huge database so you can go back and review all your hands.
pokerace hud: Nick does not have a link for them so I didn't put one up. This is another great piece of software but unlike pokertracker it is not needed for this series but Joosie and I will both be using it. Basically it takes all the stats from pokertracker and displays them on the screen next to the players names.
scripts: I use a ton of scripts on full tilt poker, not sure if Joosie uses any or not but I do. There are soo many its real hard to go through each one but if you see one while I'm playing please ask and I will tell you what it is.
Pokeracehud Terms
you will hear joosie and I say these terms over and over and it is good that you know what the heck we are talking about.
vpip or vp$ip : this stands for voluntary put money in pot, this is how often people are putting money in the put or how often they are running hands preflop. You can use this stat over a large sample size to figure out how loose or tight someone is.
pfr: this stands for pre-flop raise, alone this stat really does not mean much but if you combine it with the vpip it means a lot. If someone is running a 24.5vpip and only has a 10pfr then you know when this guy raises he has to have a big hand. What we want as TAG players is our PFR and our VPIP to be very close together.
total aggression or total aggression post flop: this is how aggressive the players are either total or post flop. that's basically it on that stat pretty easy to understand this is how aggressive they are and knowing this helps us know how to play them with our different hand ranges.
went to showdown: I use this stat, not sure if Joosie does. its just like the name states, this is how often the opponent goes to the showdown. This is extremely important when we are trying to find out who are calling stations are.
General Poker Terms
ok here are general terms again that you will hear over and over.
Under The gun (early position) : I grouped these together because they are played the same way. Under the gun is the term used for the player that acts 1st pre-flop. In this position you are going to play your tightest and only open up with very premium hands. The same goes with any early position, in 6max its is the 1st 2 positions to act and in full ring it is 1st 3.
middle position: in this position we can open up our game a little and open hands that we would normally fold in early position like your AJ and QK type of hands.
cutoff, button (late position): OK these are the power positions, these are the positions at the table where we can exploit weakness's we see in our opponents. These will be our stealing positions. Here we can really open up our game and make plays we could not make in earlier positions.
open-raise: this is the term used if you are the 1st one to raise a un-raised pot.
open- limp: this is the term used if you are the 1st one into the pot and you just call the big blind, for the record we will hardly ever be doing that.
inducing a bluff: this is kinda a advanced strategy but we might do it in our videos if given a chance. This is the term used if we are trying to get someone to bluff us. Like if we have a very strong hand and we bet 1/4 of the pot to try to get a guy to come over the top of us.
3-betting: this term I use to describe a bet where I take a opponents bet and I multiply it by 3, so if a guy bets $2 into me pre-flop I might make it $6 to go. This is called 3-betting, this term can also be used if someone bets another guy raises and you re-raise that because you are 3 betting. This can also be used as 4-betting which is just doing all this as a 4th bet.
squeeze play: OK we might not be doing this in our videos too much because it is a very LAG type play but it might come up. This is a move where we have a early position raiser and at least 1 caller behind. We will make a big raise in late position regardless of our cards. It puts tremendous pressure on the opener and we usually will pick up the pot unless one of them has a absolute monster. Its a very high risk play.
odds: odds in poker make our decisions much easier, like if we are drawing to a flush we know we have 9 cards that will improve our hand to the flush but we also have 2 over cards so that in total is 15 outs but we discount them by 2 seeing as the A or K might not be good which gives us 13. so right now we are 2.62 to 1 and as long as opponents bet gives us those odds we can call.
outs: this goes along with odds, it is the cards we believe that will improve our hand.
implied odds: implied odds are how much extra money we can get from our opponent if we hit our hand.
set vs trips: I wanted to add this because everyone messes this up, these are 2 very different things. A set is where you hold a pocket pair and there is one on the board. So say you have 55 and flop is 59K, you have a set of fives. Now if you held A5 and flop was K55 now you have trip fives. The set is more powerful because it is more well hidden.
Types Of Players
LAG: this stands for loose aggressive, their vpip usually is around 18-28 and there Pre-flop raise is about the same. This is a very profitable style of play but is very hard to play. Most players can not master this style of play and usually they just turn into maniacs and spew money.
TAG: this stands for tight aggressive and their vpip is usually 10-18 and again there pre-flop raise is about the same. This is our style and it is the most consistent way to make money.
maniac: this is a LAG player that just cant seem to understand how to play. We only want to go in with strong hands against these guys.
Nit: nits only seem to play the nuts so if they are in a pot with us we have always got to proceed cautiously.
fish/donkey/bad player: here our the cash cows, these guys are the ones we are going to be making the most money from. These are the ones that play way 2 many hands, have no clue what position is.
http://www.pokertracker.com/?AfID=25990