Rolled On The River

So, I play, and I make decisions. What are my decisions based on?

With so many different aspects of the game to look at, it’s hard to crunch everything down into a correct decision of ‘raise, call, or fold’, but, that is what we have to do in order to get to the next stage, so what is the most important factor to consider? It may seem stupidly obvious, but the biggest question you should be asking yourself (or so I’m told) is… ‘what does the other guy have?’.

I’ve been working on ranging with skelm a little, thinking about what a certain course of action is most likely taken by a player if he has certain cards. This is such a powerful tool, which almost guarantees a profit once it’s down, and Skelm has got it down.

When the cards are dealt out, a player could have anything in the deck except your two cards, you have to use the information of every move they make from then on to determine a range of what cards they could be holding. If you hold AQs, the flop comes 284 rainbow, and he bets into you, the information in your head, should be blotting out certain card combinations, and you should be ‘putting him on’ something. How you play future streets is up to you, using a combination of probability and previous hand information on the player, you can not so much determine what he has, but what he doesn’t have. Was he set mining? Does he have a good pocket pair? Is he continuation betting for fold equity? All questions you should be asking yourself, but as long as what you decide to do gives you the best chance of making/saving as much money as possible, it is the right decision.

I guess how I would play this particular situation, would be dependent on stats of the player, and I would probably react to a continuation bet aggressively, if I was called on a reraise, depending on the turn, the choice of betting further would be in the minority, as the range I have him on is going to be thinning down to a decent hand, one I’m likely not beating, therefore one that unlikely profitable to continue betting into.

I’m losing money.

I was told by Skelm that I’m to expect this to happen, but I kidded myself into thinking I’m a prodigy of some sorts. Was my ego too big? Was I not applying my learning correctly? Well, I guess both. The good thing is, in poker, there is a solution to losing, but it requires you to look at the big picture, and how poker is something you never thought it could be: A team sport.

Reviewing hands with another person has to be simply the most effective learning tool out there, if you can find someone of equal or better skill level willing to run through your biggest losses using teamviewer and HEM (these people are out there on the 2+2 forums, usually wanting you to look at and discuss their hands in exchange), you will put yourself in a much better psychological frame of mind to handle losses. The knowledge you gain from having personalised training is invaluable, and with all the statistics available to you through HEM, any shortcomings in your game can be filtered out and analysed. The level of scrutiny is all up to you, as you can even go as far as posting them on the 2+2 forums and having the members there bicker about every aspect of the hand.

Still, dealing with the fact that I’m running at a negative does make me question lots of things, but not my decision to stick with the game. I’ve taken a day’s break from study, so I’ll make tomorrow’s post with a learning review.

I’m a slave, and I am a master
No restraints and, unchecked collectors
I exist through my need, to self oblige
She is something in me, that I despise – Slipknot, Vermillion

I’ve decided to write a learning review, and use the blog as something I can look back on and go over what I’ve learned. An entertainment outlet and an education tool, what a diverse skillset this little page has! I just watched Ed Miller’s: Stages of a TAG, which was interesting, it gives a gauge of where you you are in the big scheme of things as a Tight Aggressive player based on the concepts of TAG play that you understand. Was also good that it was a video that was pretty light in the sense that it goes for an hour, but you dont have to sit and think about every point, I was playing a couple of tables in the background while watching it. I would reccommend this to anyone out there trying to pick up a profitable game, it’s basically proffessional poker in a nutshell, complete with a ‘at this stage you can quit your job’! Well, not exactly, but it’s pretty difinitive.

I had a little training session with Skelm last night, which was a bit unorthodox since he was in the latter stages of a prop bet, attempting to beat someone’s hand count. Using team viewer, I got him to spill his thought process on the hands he was playing, between the video lag, and Skelm going ‘yeah so this continuation bet, I’m…. uhhh…. yeah for fold equity…… um.. one sec…. what was I talking about?’ my learning was fairly limited, but I still picked his brain for a few notes on how the statistics HUD works (which he won’t let me use until he deems me worthy), like holding the final crystal of my lightsaber out of my reach until I can dispatch 20 combat droids blindfolded with a plastic spoon. So I guess, I’ll go over what I’ve learned.

Learning review – HUD Statistics:

First Stat: VPIP – Voluntarily put money into the pot. This statistic shows when a player has made a conscious choice to put money into the pot. Numbers <10 would indicate a tight style of play, where other than BB checks, the player would only see a pot if called on that percentage. Also the primary stat to look at when stealing from this player. >15 would show an aggressive player, in which I can more confidently call weaker hands against him.

Second Stat: PFR – Pre-Flop Raise: This indicates the percentage of times the player has raised pre-flop, showing often he goes in hard with his hands pre-flop, it can never be more than VPIP as raising pre-flop IS voluntarily putting money into the pot.

The following stats are more technical, and their relevance is still too lost on me to fully understand how to apply them properly in a game, also I need to increase my hands played, and hands played against specific opponents to a great amount for these statistics to be able to have any significant weight relevant to how I’m going to play my hand.

Third Stat: Three-bet. – The percentage the player has made a 3bet.

Fourth Stat: Fold to Three-bet. – The percentage the player has folded to a 3bet.

Fifth Stat: Aggression factor. – The calculated aggression factor of the player.

Ever had something in your mind just click? This will seem obvious to any regular profitable poker player, but give me the luxury of happiness that having something dawn on me without outsider help brings. Years ago, people in the street were confronted by a naked screaming middle aged man, though traumatic as it may have been, they were witnessing an epiphany, one that did not affect them, as Fb = pgyA = pgV doesn’t exactly put food on the table, but an epiphany of eventual significance.

Although fully robed, I too came about sudden logical insight in the way poker and money work around each other, and though this may have been said a thousand times by a thousand people through a thousand different mediums, humour me in allowing me to write what I have ‘discovered’.

Poker is a game of skill and luck, after calculating all probabilities and psychology that is relevant to the hand, the correct decision is to be made, and the process is to be repeated for each betting round. Once the correct decision is made, luck, which is incalcuable, is added to the equation. As the sample size of the hands increases, and if the amount of skill added to the equation remains at a constant maximum, eventually luck will be negligible. Because of this, adding tables is profitable to the point in which your skill level decreases, as more tables = more hands, more hands negate luck. And profits will only be affected when skill is reduced, as luck stays the same variable per hand.

Hmm, I’ll ponder on that for a while.

I have been going over some reading material recently, particularly my books, I’ve decided I’m going to read them all twice, once to get to know the topic, and a second time to write my own notes and thoughts on everything. I’m not normally one for reading books, especially more than once, but the knowledge contained within is a viable stepping stone for me, and to miss the opportunity to absorb all the information would prove a great failure in time managment.

The forums at www.twopluswtwo.com are also a great resource, I was browsing and decided to look at hands in my stake (5NL), and the stakes directly above and below me. Quite interesting to see multiple views on the same hand, but that just adds an extra dimension to my knowledge, as it requires me to filter out faulty arguments and advice. As with every forum community, you get douchebags, sarcastic fools, and people just out looking for a bite, but in the poker world, it seems as this is a game in itself, intellectually dominating people by giving false advice, and having others join in on the feast, until (if at all), the carnivorous beasts are tranquilised by being called out on their misinformation. Nasty Stuff.

“The universe is hostile so impersonal, devour to survive so it is, so it’s always been” Vicarious – Tool

Padawan

As I am pummelled with a plethora of information so early on in my journey, I begin to wonder what the fruits of this conditioning will be, and if my days of physical labour are numbered. As I’m playing, I try to keep my conscious thought to a maximum, learning poker should not be underestimated, as every move you make has to have a point to it, putting money into a pot should be for the reason of getting money out, none other. Whether that return is immediate or not should be considered also, as bets are made on the calculations done in your head, and with the information you have, as the situation changes, whether the money you put into the pot is really yours any more changes with each action.

I gave in to temptation earlier, as I can be quite spiteful and vindictive, I try to hold my tongue lest it make a fool of me. But, after making, what I believed was a good call, and a good fold, another player commented on my play (without seeing my cards, therefore speaking with a serious lack of information of what was going on in my head at the time), by calling me a ’stupid fish’. At first, I was delighted, as I had never been given any attention in the little chat window, oh goody, someone noticed me! I held my tongue, and by a twist of fate, I was dealt pocket aces the next hand. I put in a modest raise which my new friend decided was good enough for him to ship it all in, I of course, called, he shows pocket 9’s . As his stack of chips slid over to my side of the table, he went on a tirade of colourful language and insults, to which I replied: ‘Damn fish, calling on aces huh?’, we shortly had one spare seat on the table.

I have been watching stoxpoker.com videos regularly, and for anyone starting out, I highly reccommend Ed ‘notepokerauthority’ Miller’s: Poker made simple series. These videos are easy enough to understand for a retard like me, and it fits well into all the other types of training I am currently undertaking. I started out with ‘The art of folding’, which is a vital video for anyone just starting out. I’m currently focusing my studies on the maths side of the game, I have a fairly simple grasp of hand odds, pot odds and the like, on-the-fly maths are a definite weakness of mine, so I’m starting to cover the wall behind my monitor with useful charts, ratios, percentages, and pre-flop ranges from different positions and under different circumstances.

None of this is what I really expected poker would be like, I expected more people in each pot, more bluffing, less reason behind everything, I’m glad that it’s a winnable game, structured in a way that favours intellect over luck, and perception over aggression.

I like it.

Padawan.

Poker, not so long ago was a mystery…

I know it had something to do with  smoke filled rooms and cheesy western shootouts, but like many, I’ve had my view of it changed dramatically. Armed only with my limited knowlegde of the hand rankings, I decided to commit myself to learning, and perhaps, mastering this game of skill. Inspiration came from an old school buddy who readers  know as Skelm, a poker proffessional I had known since I was about 15. I must have put him under the illusion that there was intelligence present somewhere in my big head, as he decided to go out on a limb and offer  to teach me the ways of the game with the ultimate goal of  being a poker proffessional myself.

The first step was basic knowledge of hold’em, I was shown how the cards were dealt, how the blinds work, the betting structure, and other crude tools to forge myself a seat in a game. Then, a myriad of books, online texts, videos, sites, and forums were bestowed upon me, with clear instuction to choose a game and stick with it, as even the slightest variation causes drastic changes in the way everything is played, and the way everything should be perceived. My chosen poison: No Limit Full ring Hold’em.

For a living, I work as a Linesman, I work on powerlines across the state of NSW in Australia, this made it pretty easy to add poker study into my daily regime, as we usually drive for 2-4 hours each day, and my workmate who shares the truck with me prefers to drive. So breezing through books on company time just works, the books that were reccommended to me to begin my training are: David Sklansky’s Theory of Poker and The Poker Mindset by Ian Taylor and Matthew Hilger.

Once I got home, I was instructed to watch at least one stoxpoker.com video a day, and check the forums on 2+2 relevant to the micros. All of this was required in addition to playing for a while each night. As I was assisted in signing up for a rakebreak account, Skelm asked me if I could think of a fitting screenname for myself…

That night, the padawan was born. (dramatic much?)