Aggresive play, red line increase

It is good to be aggressive. Aggressive poker is often winning poker. However, you must do it smartly and adapt to different situations. Stupid bluffs will just destroy your bankroll.
I dislike putting myself in one category like TAG,LAG,ABC because good poker player should try to find the best play in every situation and adapt a lot. Our strategy must be dynamic.

The sample size you have is way too small to say anything about your stats. One thing that hit my eye was your very high VPIP.

You said that changing your strategy a bit more towards ABC is not fun and you struggle with it. That means you have a mindset problem. Sometimes poker can be boring. For example, if you are on UTG and opening A9o would be bad, you fold that A9o even if you have ran super cold and folded 100 hands in a row already. Poker requires a lot of discipline.

Players that don't have the discipline to fold hands, want to see many flops and want a lot of action because it is fun, are usually called recreational players. If you want that green line to go up, you must accept that it takes a lot of hard work and discipline and it is sometimes boring. If you cut down your VPIP to below 30 and think it is boring, add another table

This is only the way for me to play and enjoy poker, making bluffs, playing very agressively. So called ABC poker which targeted more on value and showdown winings is very boring for me and I am losing my interest to the game in this case.

Oooh, I hear you, I can fully relate to that one! 100 % understand (actually I was complaining about the same topic in my blog).

BUT: Note that you cannot play like this with calling stations! You must adjust to your opponents. If you face a table full of fishes, aggressive play becomes -EV because you loose what aggressive play is based on: fold equity! So why should you make light 3-bet-bluffs when Villain is calling them with 54s, J8s, J9o and such stuff? At a table with lots of fishes you need value hands! You need to value bet and decrease the number of bluffs a bit. You can still make some aggressive moves once in a while but you should focus on getting value from calling stations and fishes.

A good poker player adjusts and plays profitable poker even though this can means you play ABC-poker. If that´s the way to win, if that´s the profitable way, then so be it.

clearly, the thread starter not interested in advice like "just play standard and win lol". he might be destined to be a recreational, but of course you can still try to play well within an extreme style.

i believe you can profitably get away with a pfr of slightly over 30 in these limits (i have done it myself), but you are WAY out of line.
i like the hyperaggro btn and sb open (autoprofit spot for the limits). probably tighten up on earlier positions and with 3betting, also might want to check your cbetting strategy (can't tell if you are doing anything terrible but it's important to take all the marginal spots if you are playing this aggro)
[edit: i forgot the most important part - adaptation, adaptation, adaptation. low samples are still better than nothing]

Originally posted by Tomaloc
clearly, the thread starter not interested in advice like "just play standard and win .

But if it´s the truth?

There's two ways of playing poker. One is having fun, and the other one is to make money.

You can also play poker with or without looking at your hole cards, for example. So many ways...

you simply can not win by playing half of your hands on a six handed table, nobody can

but while looking at the stats, I think you have got potential, but there has got to be a process

The way to win is: adapt to the players you're facing.
And who says that is Mr. Phillip Dennis Ivey Jr.
I know the sample you posted is so small, but you're clearly on tilt. You're too agressive. No one beats any limit with a red line that one. You're just bluffing to much, in the wrong spots. Sometimes it works, you feel great, but MOST of the times your play is just ridiculous and you lose at showdown. Your blue line is the proof of that.
Playing 42/37 is extremely loose. 5k hands is enough for those stats to converge.
19% 3bet is extremely high and in 5k hands it is already a good indicator of it's true value.

Originally posted by Kyyberi
There's two ways of playing poker. One is having fun, and the other one is to make money.

Agree with this one 100%. That is why poker is way more profitable for disciplined players.

Originally posted by MyFloXyBabY
You can also play poker with or without looking at your hole cards, for example. So many ways...

This made me laugh. ♦ Good one.

I think you need to see the serie of video of w34z3l “the red line rampage”

On the first video you will know why ur perspective is wrong.

You first need to be a winning player... then you can worry about you redline and improve your aggressivity

You dont get fun in winning money playing póker? Maybe you dont like póker

The thought that playing aggressive, and bluffing recreationals, is a losing style, is one of those myths that are objectively not true.

Ofc, playing aggressively on itself, without knowing what we're doing is not going to lead to a profit. But you can definitely make at least the same bb/100 with this style as with any traditional tag style.

So OP, you can continue playing this style, but if you want to make money, you first are going to have to master it. Sadly the way to master it, is by starting to learn the more traditional TAG gameplan.

It's just from my own experience, and surely you have your own demon. I found that when I'm winning 15bb/100 hands, it's not boring, regardless whatever style I'm playing.

I have tried before and still sometimes play this fun and aggressive style in micro 6-max tables. Usually, the result is not so good. Sometimes, especially against specific types of regulars, it works really well, however, I should catch the good cards again and again.

I guess the real reason I like to try my aggro style was mainly because I was, and still is, a losing player. I study and review sessions, but I still lose, so I am hoping changing the style would help me to confuse and possibly punish these so-called regulars. They are still in NL5, so all of them are not good, right? However, these micro regulars are all seems to have been there before. They would fold/fold/fold, and boom! My 200bb stack is gone.

Simply, I reviewed my sessions from DB. When my VPIP/PFR was high, most of them were losing sessions, however, when around the TAG range, I win more.

When you get bored with cash tables, how about opening another table(s) for some low buy-in SNGs, especially in turbo format? At least it works for me.

Just one thing, though. Why your aggression factor is below 3? You could check/raise flop and turn more often. If your VPIP and PFR is over 40%, but aggression factor is below 3, this is not an aggressive style, I think. What you're doing is just increasing the limit. You're making 5NL to 8NL, and play passively on postflop. Try to make aggression factor at least 3.5 or higher, and it is really fun.

Knowing in which spots population folds too much is a key. Whenever opponent misses a bet (having initiative), his range is quite weak especially at micros, low stakes where most players don't balance check range. So you should attack them with bluffs, use overbet bluff on turn or river. When they just call your bets on draw heavy boards, use overbet bluffs on turn/river because they would raise almost all strong hands.

Fold vs agression of regulars, most of them don't bluff enough on river and when raising so fold all bluff catchers.
Fold all bluff catchers already on flop when facing pot size bet, it is very value heavy bet size.

your VPIP is too high meaning you play very loose ranges preflop. Rake is high especially on micros, so it is not possible to play so many hands +EV unless you really play good poker (you wouldn't be playing micros if you do). Your VPIP should be around 24. 3bet is also super high, you 3bet a lot of weak hands. So preflop you should play tight agressive poker,
and postflop attack spots as i explained above with bluffs (when they are weak), and don'T slowplay your value hands, play ABC with value hands.

There is a trade-off, especially on later streets.
If you have the best hand, and it goes to showdown, your blue line increases.
If you bet, and opp folds, your red line increases -- but you've won exactly the same amount.

I suggest OP read The Red Line Myth which is a fantastic discussion lead by one of our coaches -- w34z3l

from the 1st page of the thread
These days having a graph with a break-even/positive red-line is the fashion. Ironically it could be losing you a lot of money.

All the best,
VS

Originally posted by Kyyberi
There's two ways of playing poker. One is having fun, and the other one is to make money.

I don't agree with this, you can play a TAG game and make fun, just need to setup your mind to understand what's gonna hapen
I saw some players LAG that were proffit, but they had played a long time and their experience was the difference. When we are young players, it's essencial play a TAG game to understand all variants and make money.

I find that the more money I make, the more fun it is