Moving up the Micros

Hi guys

I have written my final exams so I now have some time to play constantly again. I started in NL5. I have one concern with my game .I have lost 6BI
on one pair hands. I think this is way to much. A lot of the losses are all $1 $2
losses. I am not playing for stacks all the time. It the little losses that are adding up. I am not sure if this is normal or if this is a major leak in my game. Its is something I am going to have to figure out. Seems strange that it is so high because I have been laying down over pairs when being bet into by nits or if the pot is getting to large(big pots big hands small pots small hands).

HI Noname81.

Very nice challenge and impressive graph

I'm in

Keep us updated,
Fran

Thanks for the support. It seems so much easier to play better poker when the results are posted. Not sure why this is but it sure helps my games out. I manage to accumulate enough Bankroll for NL 10. I will be playing my first session after this post. I will keep the graphs coming

MAtt

Day 1 of NL10

So I have started in NL10. Here is my first graph at this limit. I have not noticed a huge difference from NL5. The only difference I have noticed is a few more regular players and a little more aggression around the cut off and button. This seems like a popular place to 3 bet.

DAy 1

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Nice EV line

Also, I agree that it's much easier to find motivation and play your best game when you are discussing and sharing your results and strategies with the forum. Glad you also enjoy it.

glgl,
Fran

Well it was a brutal session. No session review required. I know were I went wrong. I let my emotions decided how I played some of my hands. Usually at this point I delete my database and start fresh. For some reason it makes me feel as if I am putting this donk fest session behind me . This time I am not deleting anything. I m hoping by the time I get to 100 000 hands I will look back and this session will be a little bump on my graph.

Some were in today session I switched from the "crushing the micros strategy" to a loose aggressive strategy which was working but then turned south on me. After I lost a few big pots I got all emotional and started clicking away. I really hope I can live and learn. Not do this all again tomorrow.

Day 2
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So I am not off to a good start. I am playing like a gigantic fish. Some of my money probably went to some of you guys at the tables. A lot of my losses have come from top pair top kicker poker hands. I have made a rule for myself. I will not continue on the turn with only one pair. I know this is not a good ev in the short term but in the long run I think it will help my game. The exception is if the pot is very small I will continue betting(10bb) If anyone is reading this do you think the rule is ridiculous or do you think it a wise move considering my inability to use pot control with one pair hands ?

I am going to restart the graph at 13 000 hands. Im putting it behind me. I will include it when I have more hands played.

Hi Noname81, nice graphs! So ur finding a lil harder at 10NL? Well, it's normal...All you have to do is to play your a-game...there are tons of fishes...play for value, easy poker, always think on the most EV+ moves, don't let your ego-tilt take control...it happened to me and i was stuck at these levels for months (starting again with 5NL close to shoot 10NL soon) thanks to my awful mindset. If it wasn't for this I would be shooting 25NL or 50NL I think...

I will not continue on the turn with only one pair. I know this is not a good ev in the short term but in the long run I think it will help my game.

Hmm....every hand is unique, just try to evaluate the board texture, the villain, if u are IP or OOP etc...I win lots of hands with just TP and folding to any sign of aggression!

Good luck!

I think you hit the nail on the head with the ego getting in the way. I find the nl10 to be a lot more aggressive. There is a lot more 3 betting around the button. Everytime I get 3 bet I feel like Im being pushed around so I get super aggresive and push with only a pair(tptk). I find it funny because I believe I have the skills to be a winning player but I am not using the skills I have learned. I play emotionaly. To someone who has been in the poker world for any period of time has probably hered this story 1000 times

You find more aggression yeah, specially when you steal from LP you get 3bet light very often... I just fold most of the times and call or 4bet light with reasonable hands and for value...most of regulars 3bet light a lot and then play very bad postflop...

I just try to avoid difficult spots and playing this way my graph is positive...no matter how much I get restealed...if u see most of regulars are bad.

Hey Noname81, nice progress so far, don't let the bad sessions keep you down

About deleting your hand history, putting it all behind and all that I think this is a bad thing. Facing your loses (especially when you know it's your own fault) can be hard, especially at the beginning when you're still steaming about it. What I'd advise you to do is to wait a few days and then come back to the game. Basically what I think you need is time to accept that the money is gone, and that you won't get in back short-term. Once that's out of the way, and your emotions have calmed down, you can then use your losses to keep yourself in check. It can be a great motivator to get you off tilt, or at least to stop playing when you feel like you are tilting. When you start to play bad, remember how much you lost when you played under strong emotions and use that to keep yourself in check (or to get yourself to stop playing).

At least that's what I do, and by now I've learned to recognize when I'm steaming and just close the poker client for that day. Took me a while, but learned my lessons. Hope this helps

And about the flushes and straights on paired boards, that was a big leak for me as well. For some reason I'd always find myself shoving the river in those situations, but now I usually just check-call. The main reason behind this is that most of the time, people aren't really calling a shove with less, but they will bluff or value-bet a pair on the river. I don't know how much that makes sense, but it works for me ♠_cool:

Yes agree with the database. What I have done is omitted that part of the graph that I was tilting on. It does still exist. I wanted to start this new graph with my changed mindset. That mindset being laying down one pair hands to large pots or tons of aggression. Also taking a break when steaming is probably the best thing you can do for your win rate but is an extremely hard thing to put into practice. I am posting now and taking a break and the graph will tell you why a break was needed ha ha. All in all I am not losing with my rake back.

NL10 has been a complete night mare for me. I feel I have been so unlucky and with that comes the emotional bets. I am gong to step back into nl5. I dont understand why I am having so many problems in nl10. T Here are a few more regs in nl10 but still a million rec and complete fish players.

Hey Guys

I had a question in regards to win rate with with one pair hands. I think this is a gaping leak in my game and was curious if players have a positive value for one pair hands in the database with a reasonable sample size. Over 50k hands I have lost 40 BI to one pair hands. To be honest 15 of those were caused by tilt.

Originally posted by Noname81
Hey Guys

I had a question in regards to win rate with with one pair hands. I think this is a gaping leak in my game and was curious if players have a positive value for one pair hands in the database with a reasonable sample size. Over 50k hands I have lost 40 BI to one pair hands. To be honest 15 of those were caused by tilt.

Hi, Noname81
Can you post some examples?

"One pair hands" covers a lot of territory.

Is that Top Pair Top Kicker, Top Pair Good Kicker, Top Pair No Kicker or worse, like 2nd pair, 3rd pair etc?

You could be losing with overpairs vs better ones, or overpairs vs trips, sets, straights etc.

Post some hands and let us tear 'em to shreds.

Peace,
--VS

Well this looks familiar. In fact I think I had the same problem, but (thankfully) with fever losses.

I've been grinding NL5 for 2 weeks or so, and had a nice winrate so I decided to try NL10. Lost 10 BI in 3 days, all in equity says I should have lost 1 BI. And although I could blame it all on badbeats and setups I think that's not the case.

Why I realized was that moving up the limits I tried to adjust my game too much instead of just playing like I played NL5. I had this attitude that said players at NL5 are better so I have to play better and I have to keep working on my game and evolve all the time. In reality though, I should have just been playing the way I was always playing.

The trap goes like this. You come to NL10, and naturally you're scared that there are better people at the table. So you're playing a big pot against someone who looks like a good reg, and you have this feeling of my usual play won't be good enough to win here. You try to make a play and put yourself in a spot you're not very comfortable with (because in reality it's not well thought trough or familiar) so suddenly you're under a lot of pressure. There's double the money you're used to in the pot (which is a big factor), you feel like you're outmatched by a better opponent and you're doing something you're not used to doing. Now even though this may not lead to short term mistakes (but usually it does), it will take much more of your energy, making the grind a lot harder. Naturally, being used to your usual grinding routine, which does not evolve hard thinking every 10 hands, you try to compensate your losses by grinding more, and end up playing under huge pressure (because now you're trying to win money you lost back), and with less energy than usual. And this is a huge breeding ground for mistakes and tilt.

At least this is how it worked for me, and a friend who recently went to NL200 from NL50/100 had the exact same problem.

bah, wall of text

short term things that help for me are, I play 2 limits at the same time. Like I will open a NL10 and NL5 zoom table at the same time, so I can directly see what I'm trying to do different at NL10 and stop myself from doing it.
I also took a day off, had a decent night of sleep and some stress relief (sports and killing stuff in videogames), and now I feel much more comfortable at the tables.

anyway hope I'm onto something here and that it helps ♠_biggrin:

Thanks for posting. Playing nl 5 and nl 10 at the same time seems like a good idea. Gradually introduce the next limit.

So I came to the cross roads with poker. I am losing money and cant seem to stop the bleeding. I though maybe it was time to give it up. I did some thinking and decided that I am not packing it in yet. I have hired a coach and have my first session tomorrow. I think this is going to turn my game around. I am tired of wondering if I am playing properly. I have read a bunch of poker books but I don't think this is how I learn hence the nasty graph. I think a more hands on, objective point of view will suit me much better. I my goal is to stitch up the places were there are massive leaks in my game and continue to hunt for other leaks in my game

I think you're on the right track with your conclusions.
volume volume volume! (ofc with studying and discipline)

Also, as bad as it's looks ~20 bi's under ev is still pretty standard short term variance..

I am also in the red in 10NL (a couple of bad beats and bad plays from me as well). I am trying to beat 2NL at the moment and I wish you success in your journey