The Dutch Unite - Varune

Hey Erik thanks for stopping by already

1. Lets see if we can be more specific and try to break things down more when it comes to the tilt issues you have. " i just spew away some stacks after losing some pots etc" is the same as telling a strategy coach "i played some hand s and lost some money, what did I do wrong?" Think about what spots that usually tilts you; bad beats, making mistakes, when regs put pressure on you, bad variance etc etc. How does it feel, what is your reaction emotionally and how can you tell you are tilting? Anything that comes to mind basically

True true,
A 'big' factor probably is variance, where i keep running into the (Semi-)nuts with my hands. And if that goes on to long, i'd spew a bit harder making bigger mistakes.
Same with a reg constantly putting pressure, i tend to just 'disbelieve' and start to play back and begin with making minor mistakes becoming bigger and bigger imo.
The minor tilt, where i make small mistakes in small pots i just whipe off as: 'won't happen again'. But noticing i should stop often comes after confirmation of a big pot lost, which was definitely tilt induced. And then i stop, or try to win it back and spew some more

2. How big of a part of this issue do you think is ego and/or fancy play syndrome? Do you consider yourself an "authority" or "solid reg" at the stakes your playing? Is that in any way putting extra pressure to win?

Well i do consider myself as one of the better regs, atleast on NL50, don't know about NL100, cuz i haven't played it for a while now. If i feel my profits are going 'to slow', i try to 'force' winnings, which mainly comes down to making bigger pots with marginal hands. This sometimes works, but i guess it's -ev longterm, as the other regs, just keep playing the same. And as the pots get bigger their ranges get stronger, and mine just get weaker.

3. Why do you think that you don't study the game as hard as you could? When we know something works and is good for us and we still aren't doing it, there is usually an emotion or thought pattern there holding us back. Does anything come to mind or any theories on this?

Laziness basicly. And the fact that how i play is ok'ish, as i do make some profits, but without getting my game up to a next level. It's going to be very hard for me to move up.

Originally posted by Varune
I think if some dutch people would read this, i will have to be very honest. Thus i say i'm a tag with a big taste of maniac habits. Sometimes i take very VERY strange lines with VERY strange hands, that generally are spewish longterm.
But overall i have a good understanding of the dynamics and fundamentals of the game imo. But i don't use the theory that much. I have a good idea what to do, but the 'exact' idea lacks focus. Overall poker IS sort of a guessing game of guestimates, but that 'guessing'-part is too big in my game imo.

You are correct. Poker is a massive guessing game. Who guesses best is debatable. I think its common for players to not use fundamental theory enough. Using it will allow you to play more consistently, which is seems like you aren't? I personally think that understanding math fundamentals - writing them down to look at while you play, will help you.

Originally posted by Varune
Since a few months i try to tableselect a bit harder. Atleast when i start a session, but when the session progresses my tables get tougher, i don't take action to find new tables.

Its fine to play tough tables if you prefer the enjoyment of playing tough tables, but expect more variance and a lower win rate.

Originally posted by Varune
:spade:One thing is definitely Tilt. Quite a few times i just spew away some stacks after losing some pots etc. On the other hand i find my profits going 'too slow', when i'm not up a certain amount after, say 1k hands, which makes me tilt aswell i guess. As i also tend to think in $, as it's my income and thus important $.

Everyone has this problem and solutions to the problem can be different person to person. A few things that may fix it:
1) Having good bankroll management.
2) Understanding how variant poker can be.
3) Remembering that earning money isn't as important as enjoying yourself.
4) Don't be reliant solely on poker for work and entertainment. (Get out of the box)
5) Remove your pride and need to prove to others that you are better than them by outplaying them.
If you can go into more detail on how you feel when you tilt - I can suggest more. I.e. Do you feel angry, depressed etc?

Originally posted by Varune
Leveling myself way to hard in regbattles, 3/4/5betwars mainly.

Ignore leveling. Regs multitabling do not have the time to think about different thought levels. Especially pre flop. Some regs are 4betting purely nuts. Other regs are 4betting way too much. Pick your regs better to exploit - look at their average tendencies mostly. Meta game pre flop can become all consuming and overall a waste of your precious time imo.

Originally posted by Varune
:spade:Lack of discipline, i never really 'work on my game'. As i've always played through a 'trial and error' approach. Of course i've watched the occasionally video, but not as often as i should. Or do reviews etc.

The problem with trial and error is that in poker you can get short term rewarded for bad plays. The human mind can't think long term imo, so your trial and error becomes a flawed process. You have to understand fundamentals. Tilt etc is all because you don't have it all straight in your head. You might know it without actually knowing it and reafirming it in your mind, if you know what i mean?

Originally posted by Varune
Crushing reg @ NL200 Would be a nice start
Crushing is a myth. If you win at 1.5bb/100 long term, you've done well.

Show us some stats !

Hey,

Just wanted to say, you sound a lot like me. I typically table select but then after that I just stop and grind it out until I'm done and almost never switch my tables out. I also learned to play through trial and error, kind of figured out what spots are good and so on and just guesstimated from there. And I also sometimes will force too much action with too many marginal hands because I'm down for the session and I want to hurry up and get even :f_biggrin:.

Until recently I put in like 0 work in to my game besides the occasional talks over a few hands on skype but never in detail. I didn't even know basic math for some spots. The truth is until you actually decide that you want it bad and you want it bad enough to put in the work required you will never get better imo.

Also as far as the whole money/tilt situation goes. I can also relate to this on a very personal level. Last year I had a month where I was up 15k+ on the tables and hit the bbj for like 92k, I was staked but I got a lot of it. Anyway my spending habbits quickly increased and I bought a car for 42k, most of it is payed off by now but anyway a month or two after I decided to take a shot at 10knl and lost 45k. Also after that I had taken a few costly trips, spent more here, spent money there, helped my mom out with some bills etc etc. But the -45k hit was quite devastating cus now I had to win it back and I wanted to hurry up and do it so I definitely didn't play as well plus the fact that I had to pay off stuff and my spending habbits didn't change much didn't help. And in my mind I expected to win x amount every month or every y hands and if I wasn't I began tilting etc. Anyway the truth is, it doesn't work like that and you have to be smart with your money and work hard to get what you want.

at Erik: I think I have got a lot better at controlling tilt issues lately but obv they still happen. But I think one of my factors that contribute to tilt is, what you pointed out, the fact that sometimes I feel like I'm getting owned by regs that I think I'm better than and perhaps it's an ego thing but I get very annoyed and try to own them back/play back too much/start to level myself etc. Also this prob happens the most when I play against friends I know. And it tilts me cus I know I'm better than them and they even tell me man wtf you doing I'm a nit but to me it feels like they are constantly fucking with me.

I just did my first coaching on the dutch forums, and imo it was a great succes. For me to play very focussed and i think i could bring over my thoughts good aswell. Only the timebank was a minor issue this time ♦
For my own game it has a +EV side aswell, because i have to explain things, i automatically have to think longer about spots, which i usually didn't do, because of automatism and 'general ideas' of it being a good move.

I personally think that understanding math fundamentals - writing them down to look at while you play, will help you.

This'll definitely help my game and will plan to do this in the 'minor dutch bootcamp'.

Its fine to play tough tables if you prefer the enjoyment of playing tough tables, but expect more variance and a lower win rate.

I dont enjoy it really, i enjoy winning pots. Even simple pots as when a fish pushes allin and i'm behind him with AA.

You have to understand fundamentals. Tilt etc is all because you don't have it all straight in your head. You might know it without actually knowing it and reafirming it in your mind, if you know what i mean?

I think i know what you're trying to say. That my brain gets 'rewarded' for a bad play, but because the outcome was good, i might think its good.

And is "Crushing" 1.5bb nowadays?

@ Serverm07,

That are a bit bigger sums of money than i play with
And i totally find myself in the bit about playing with friends. That being sort of the same with leveling wars with regs. How did you control your tilt?

Some stats over 53k hands(Database crashed few months ago):
VP:26 PFR:22.5 3bet: 8.31 Fv3bet: 60% 4bet: 14.7% WTSD: 27.6 W$SD:53.4 AF: 2.6 AGG%: 34.5

How i interpret these stats myself, i'm a bit on the loose side and going to showdown to often i guess.
What worried me (and suprised me) was this graph:

It's a graph of just my 4bets, i asked some guys on skype how theirs looked like and theirs went up. So this must be a massive leak or massive variance.

same with this Allin graph which looks bad to me.

Honestly, I haven't figured it out yet tbh. You just have to realize that they can't see your hand and I just try to make the best decision and try not to win every pot vs them.

GL, hope we will improve a lot! ♦

Just gonna post my graph here. It has ALOT of dents, which represents my 'tilt' very good. so many spots where i lose 3+ stacks in a very short time.
If i could get only those tiltspots out of my game, my winrate would be three times higher :/

And my stats:

I personally think my aggression is on the lowside. If i swap to stats of just this year, which are ~50k hands, my aggression is even lower.
And i see i call too much 3bets imo.

Any thoughts?

Hey there Varune,

I see that you have some problems with discipline and I would like to help you solve them :).

But in order to do that, I would need some more information from you. Could you tell me (in a detailed way) what would be a good amount of studying (per day/week for you)? Also, what would that studying look like? Think best case scenario. Also take some time to think if there are some studying techniques that you really enjoy (private coachings, sweat sessions, database analysis, equity drills, hand reviews, watching videos, etc...).

Once we know that, we can help you gradually form solid studying habits ;).

Looking forward to your answers,

-Primož

Hi Varune!
I dont think that you 3bet to much, nor do I think your 4bet% is out of line. Your graph can be mainly varrience, however, there is a chance that you level yourself againt the wrong villains or sth. Maybe you have a very (or messy?) 3bet range and go out of line with hands like small sc in 4bet+ spots?

Originally posted by Schnitzelfisch
Hey there Varune,

I see that you have some problems with discipline and I would like to help you solve them :).

But in order to do that, I would need some more information from you. Could you tell me (in a detailed way) what would be a good amount of studying (per day/week for you)? Also, what would that studying look like? Think best case scenario. Also take some time to think if there are some studying techniques that you really enjoy (private coachings, sweat sessions, database analysis, equity drills, hand reviews, watching videos, etc...).

Once we know that, we can help you gradually form solid studying habits ;).

Looking forward to your answers,

-Primož

Well, i don't study at all recently. Most hands i 'review' the second after they were played and think: 'DAMN i should've played that another way'. Furthermore i don't really watch videos because i already have the feeling i understand most things. On the other hand, i just watched a video earlier this evening and had 'aha' moments. Those 'aha' triggers do keep me motivated to watch more videos so that i learn more.
I also think this 'lack of discipline' has evolved through the way i went/go through school/college, i do everything with '2fingers up my nose' (it's a dutch saying, don't know or it's an english one ♦, Basicly everything is below my potential so i don't have to do alot of effort).
It's the same with poker really, and there's also where the 'trial and error' approach comes from i guess, as it's by far the laziest way to learn i guess.

And thus saying i 'enjoy' studying is a bit weird :P. I've never had any private coachings, as i think these aren't needed <NL100. And the rest i only did very few imo. Of course i've did quite some handreviews as a handjudge, but judging if someone going allin pre with AA is good/bad isn't really helping my own game ♦
I quite like watching videos, IF they're well presentated. So i expect to learn quite a bit coming weeks with the new vids coming out.

I already found 1 thing that'll probably improve my game:
Play with headphones on, so i isolate myself from outside distractions.
Same with Skype, shutting this down would help me quite a bit.

Hi Varune!
I dont think that you 3bet to much, nor do I think your 4bet% is out of line. Your graph can be mainly varrience, however, there is a chance that you level yourself againt the wrong villains or sth. Maybe you have a very (or messy?) 3bet range and go out of line with hands like small sc in 4bet+ spots?

My 3bet range is quite a mess yeah recently, just watched some videos earlier from 'gap the mind' about 3bet ranges. And this was quite an eye opener, how shitty my 3bet ranges were. Or how my 3bet ranges lacked boundaries really.

I dont really think i go out of line that much with sc's or other hands in 4bet spots. I generally think i 4bet too light vs certain opponents. As they do 3bet alot, but play back supertight

Well this looks like its gonna be an epic thread.

Originally posted by pleno1
Well this looks like its gonna be an epic thread.

²

Hey again!

I can see a bit of a conflict in your thoughts. On one hand, you are saying that everything is below your potential, so you don't have to put in much effort. Of course it makes sense that you will learn way faster if you are smart :). Also you say that you don't have that much to learn from the videos as you already know most of the things.

On the other hand, you say that good videos can give you "ahha!" moments, and also you probably understand that in order to reach NL200, you will most likely have to improve your game. And you also mentioned that you might have some leaks in your basics. So this might me a bit contradictory ;).

In any case, even if you are a good player, you can always aspire to be even better and crush even more, right? Why stop at NL200? Why not use up your whole potential? If you for example aimed to reach nosebleeds, it would be way easier to understand why you should study more.

But of course this really depends on each person's goals and expectations. I assume that you are here because you want to improve though, and I think that the coachings/videos from the bootcamp can help you improve your knowledge quite a bit :).

A good thing to do now might be to take advantage of these new learning materials and study them daily. I suppose that you shouldn't have much problems with motivating yourself to watch the bootcamp videos? You needn't watch them all at once, but I would make sure that you at least watch 15min. of a video a day, to make it a habit to study.

Another thing that I'm wondering about is your "trial and error" technique. This generally isn't that bad of an idea (we DO learn from our mistakes, even though ofc. we need a big sample size). What interests me is:

Do you find yourself repeating similar mistakes over and over again? As you mentioned that you "review your hands right away", does this work for you or not?

Looking forward to hearing from you soon,

-Primož

Originally posted by pleno1
Well this looks like its gonna be an epic thread.

I look forward taking all your money from the tables, but that'll take some time. ♠_cool:

On the other hand, you say that good videos can give you "ahha!" moments, and also you probably understand that in order to reach NL200, you will most likely have to improve your game. And you also mentioned that you might have some leaks in your basics. So this might me a bit contradictory.

Yeah it's that with most videos i get bored, as i already think i know it all, but i only know it for, lets say 66%. Making it perfect(100%) is what's lacking. As i've mentioned earlier, i get okey results with the '66% attitude. So that is a quite a flaw in my general reasoning imo, also in reallife.
The "ahha" moments are like totally new insights in the game for me and that's where i think i learn alot. As getting from 0 to 66% is more than 66-> 100. But overall 66->100 should be more productive.

Why stop at NL200?

I thought i made a realistic goal in the near future : But making SMART goals at poker is a bit weird, and it's just better to 'go with the flow' and study hard and see where we'll end

The new videos/coachings will probably motivate me alot more, as i think the pokerschool has done alot of effort to put in a very good structure and very good subjects.

About the trial and error approach, when i started poker i 24tabled nl25 6max. So i had ALOT of volume, so i saw alot of spots etc. BUT the mistakes i made back then were alot less costfull as now. As the general field has become tougher and smaller mistakes cost more.
Even though i know this, i do see myself making the same mistakes every time. I.e. Stacking of light preflop or overvalueing my foldequity postflop.

As you mentioned that you "review your hands right away", does this work for you or not?

Well yes and no. Right after the and it's not that hard to say: 'OMFG IM SUCH A RETARD', but it doesn't get imprinted so i keep doing it over and over.

Hey again,

here's what you can do that will solve some of your problems:

1. every time you do a stupid thing WRITE IT DOWN (on a piece of paper/in a document).
2. post those things/leaks here, in this blog
3. figure out ways to fix those leaks. discuss them with other players/review theory. work on those last 37%
4. focus on actually fixing one leak every session, until you don't make mistakes any more, then move on to the next leak.

What do you think, can you give it a shot?

-Primož

I don't have any pen or paper laying around here. But i will use notepad instead ♦

Originally posted by Varune
Just gonna post my graph here. It has ALOT of dents, which represents my 'tilt' very good. so many spots where i lose 3+ stacks in a very short time.
If i could get only those tiltspots out of my game, my winrate would be three times higher :/

Spoiler

And my stats:

Spoiler

I personally think my aggression is on the lowside. If i swap to stats of just this year, which are ~50k hands, my aggression is even lower.
And i see i call too much 3bets imo.

Any thoughts?

Stats look really, really good btw.

One problem is indeed perhaps calling too many 3bets. How does your strategy change when you are deeper vs shallower.

Could you filter your stats and see how often you call/4bet/fold to 3bets

- 100bb deep
- 120bb deep
- 200bb deep

Thanks!

Isn't my Turncbet lowish? I feel i check to much imo. Valuehands and bluffs.

I used 100-120bb 120-199 and 200+ filters.

100-120: 36k hands.
Fv3Bets: 55.3%
4bet: 17%
Call3b: ~28%

120-199: 39k hands.
Fv3bets: 58%
4bet: 16.4%
Call3bet: 26%

200+: 29K hands
Fv3bets: 52%
4bet: 14%
Call3bet: 34%

I just found out something way more disturbing i think: I tend to only lose in 20bb+ pots the past time.

Vs smaller pots 20-bb pots. (2-20bb to discount the blind bleeding/stealing)

And i'm bleeding MASSIVE on TPWK no draw, 10k hands at a -144bb/100 rate. This can't be good
Whereas i also think i have a weak winrate at TP Q+ kicker? 889 hands at a 438bb/100 winrate.