PLO - cash games, theory and general banter (oh and 20BI swings)

Originally posted by Kyyberi
Problem here is your betsizing. If your opponent has a flush draw or a set, you give him the odds to call. So therefore your opponent doesn't make a mistake. And if he doesn't make a mistake, you don't win any money in the long run.

Yes, I think someone pointed that out in the HH Discussion forum, my sizing was to set up a river shove but I should have simply increased my FE on the turn straight away rather than giving villain the odds to call. Likely a poor example to show what I meant.

Game Development

Shuller_A1t's Zoom Challenge
So I was watching the videos from Shullers twitch stream (for those that aren't aware of him he crushes 200PLO+) where he is playing 5PLO/10PLOz and took some notes on his tendencies for 3-betting IP and OOP. Some things to note and things I will take in to my session today are:
- 3-bet IP vs EP opens often had good board coverage and suitedness, tending to flat with PP QQ+ and 3-bet double suited hands with good playability.
- Flatting AAxx OOP when you cannot get a great proportion of your stack in preflop.
- CO and BTN opening super wide, this of course requires a good postflop game but it is definitely somewhere I can look to open wider.
- Being much more selective with boards I c-bet, he had premium hands with no re-draws on many a flop and hence would check the board sometimes in order to pot control.
- Folding of TT-QQ with poor side cards, this is something I have not been doing and I think it will be effective my win rate, playing QQ23ss in MP will just not be profitable so I need to select PP's with better connectivity.

Anyways, these are a few notes I took from the video's, hopefully it helps with my session today. I was also curious about his hud, obviously there are just numbers in order to save space on his HUD but I tried to figure out some of the bottom row stats on his videos and just couldn't think what they could be.

Links are here if you want to watch the videos. It is in Russian but Chrome will translate it for you no problem.
[Link 1]
[Link 2]

Game Development
Doing a couple of sweat sessions with some friends whom's game I respect. Playing regular tables a bit more. and going for Gold star by the end of the month. Only need to get 100VPPs/Day so shouldn't be too difficult.

Poker Progress
Came out of the red today and 'grinded' 8 Buy-Ins to be 4BI up for the day. Was relatively happy with my play - the downswing was relatively standard, for example:

I held: A♠:9♠:8♥:7♣:

(FLOP) 9♠:3♠:X:spade:, (TURN) X, (River) 3♣: and I pot, pot, leaving like 1/2 pot on river and first to act and villain stacks off with :9x::3x:.

Disheartening but some people just run like God vs you sometimes and you can't do anything about it.

Session Results:
Hands Played: 3004
Profit: +$19.38

General Ramblings

Wanting to get a new chair for my flat, got to have a good grind station set up. I'm stuck between going cheap or getting a decent one.

Option 1: Ebay's Finest

Option 2: Ikea Markus

But this has to be the perfect grind setup, amazing.

General Ramblings
Isildur1 vs. Withcolor - I watched this match along with commentary from the Twitch stream of Jnandez last night, Isildur seamed to run like God but steamrolled Withcolor with what seemed to be a tonne of pot bet river bluffs. Great match and Isildur was $1,000,000 up on him.

Poker Progress

Finally shot taking at 10PLO again after our last shot did not last very long due to my idiotic play in 5PLO and the 20BI downswing. Played quite well, if I was going to rate my game i'd definitely go for B+ which I felt showed in my red line, I was taking down a lot of pots, donking when appropriate and not barrelling on cards that just smash villains ranges. Something I have wanting to improve on. I also reduced the frequency at which I call out of position, this was something I noticed had a huge impact on my winnings (mainly non showdown) so it is something which is showing dividends already.

I played well but got relatively coolered in the larger pots, FH vs Quads etc and a monster draw vs my top set not holding. I just wish people ran things twice 100%. So annoying when you are flipping and they don't run it twice (embracing variance)

Good win of the session:

Big loss of the session, NF blocker:

A poor call from villain pays off:

Short Term Goals:

[*] Reading Mastering Pot Limit Omaha: Not so good, Ipad charger broke so haven't had the charger for a week. I'll get one ordered or just read the book on my laptop.

Is that call on the last hand so bad? Let's assume the opponent knows you have a set, and he knows that you are going to call for the last 24bb on the river. Is his turn call -EV or +EV?

Originally posted by Kyyberi
Is that call on the last hand so bad? Let's assume the opponent knows you have a set, and he knows that you are going to call for the last 24bb on the river. Is his turn call -EV or +EV?

Yes in regards to how much I have behind. I make it, he requires 2.5:1 on a call, he gets ~2:1 on a call. Need to make 31bb on the river in order for it to be a break-even call. His call is ultimately -EV but it is close to being neutral if I have less than sets in my range. But when you consider my raise, I have wraps, sets and or 2P with FD I don't think I have any range in this check raise which isn't for value. I'm not saying I call the NFD 100% but in terms of raising it I think it is raised a very small percentage compared to the rest. So it is definitely a poor call on turn imo.

if my thinking about this is incorrect then please share, I am always up for some extra education.

Game Development

Leak Busting
So I decided to consider some leaks I have in my game, in respect to calling out of position. In particular top pair OOP, calling flop bets with this accounted for 20% of my Non-Showdown losses. This is of course something I can work on. Surprisingly this 20% of losses was only over 0.22% of all hands played however, when these losses are so tremendous relative to my overall non showdown winnings I can definitely tighten up in these spots and save money. If anyone is interested in how to see this in PT4 just ask on here or send me a message.

Poker Progress
Again playing 10PLO now, I chose to stay clear of zoom today and focus on more regular tables, 6 to be exact. 6 is about the limit at which I am comfortable with on my laptop purely because of screen space, the 15" monitor is widescreen but when you overlap 12 tables there is quite a bit of lag which I don't like and considering I use hotkeys combined with applying them on the table the mouse is over it can result in mis-clicks which just tilt you.

Session Results:
Hands Played: 350
Profit: +$16.62

I am finding at 10PLO players are folding way too much and do not bluff, ever. I mean there are a few spots but I am confident in my bluff catching but if I was bluffed I will never know unfortunately. Non-Showdown winnings at this stake are proving quite fruitful but we will see if it is sustainable.

General Ramblings
So I was scrolling through various Poker forums last night, mainly 2+2 as it is simply where I find the most content. Seeing some rake analysis on PLO compared to NLHE and how the structure is totally unfair for regular players especially in the zoom pools. It was a very interesting read and one which focused on micro through small stakes showing the rake in bb/100 hands for 25PLO-100PLO as well as their respective NLHE counterparts. The focus was on the top 100 players by volume played which is not necesarilly true of the representation of the game but does show how the rake is rediculous and not sustainable considering the evolution of the game and how the skill edge for players will shorten year on year just as NLHE did/has/is doing.

The link is here: Rake analysis between PLO & NLHE incl. Zoom

Seeing the stats definitely had me like this:

It is making me consider purely playing regular tables, this would require an investment in a larger monitor however so I am not sure if the investment for me is fully worth it at this moment in time. I am also considering multi-siting in the future or just seeing what the traffic is like on other sites. I know the traffic is a fraction of 'Stars but during peak hours I could choose to play on some 'fishier' sites. This is not because stars does not have fish but if elsewhere gives 30% rakeback instantly and rakes tables less then it is a consideration to be taken in to account when, after all, this is a financial focus at the end of the day.

Get the best chair out there! Besides the brain, a poker player should protect his back and sitting posture! Don't go cheap on this:f_thumbsup:

Those swings man:f_ugly:

Poker Progress
Running relatively stale for September, playing well just not winning the important hands or I am chopping them. Glad to see my play is correct however especially when I am playing my highest stake yet. 10PLO is going well at the regular tables.

I was almost sick at this hand however:

Poker Progress
So we have surpassed the $500 barrier for Bankroll. I am now in a relatively comfortable position to play 10PLO, I will still be disciplined enough to drop down if I should need to. Had a good session after this afternoon and the EV gap closed up, got a bit of run good and finished the session well. Currently I am 6 tabling 10PLO with some deep ante tables in there (just 2PLO ante so $5 BI) when the games are relatively nitty. I prefer to play loose games with large average pots, it allows me to maximise the expectation of my better postflop play, I think. Really pleased to have passed this mark, granted it has not been rapid but BRM requirements and time available to play have effected this, hey well I am happy to be here, just a long grind till 25PLO.

The days results:

Cheers to breaking the $500 barrier.

Poker Progress
Spending FPP's

Currently I am a silverstar on Pokerstars, I narrowly missed out on Goldstar due to the zoom issue at microstakes thanks to a bug in either the PT4 update or Pokerstars updates. It was something I know others were effected by so I can't wallow in self pity . Currently I tend to use my fpp's for cash bonuses, I am beginning to think this is a valuable waste EV wise.

[*] I get $25 for 2250fpp's. This is 90 FPPs per $1,
[*] If I play the Sunday Storm Satelites I can get a return of $11 from a 235 FPP investment, this is 21.36 FPP per $.
[*] In order to be breakeven in the long run I need to be ITM in the satelites 23.7% of the time (21.36/90), personally I think I can get somewhere around a 30% ITM in what is seen as a soft field. With a 30% ITM I would expect to get $31.59 for the same price as the $25 cash reward. It therefore makes sense to me to take a risk on the money earned and play these satelites from now on.

On my current play I tend to earn the one reward in a month so I will be playing approximately 10 satelites a month, I do of course expect variance in this but as long as I am happy with my play I know the true result will be clearly shown over time, anyways I will give them a shot at the end of this month.

235FPP satellites are the best way to spend points for Gold level and lower. Even with just simple hand charts for 2 first blind levels and 500 chip stacks as starting point you should be able to get +33% ITM. Of course the variance is a bitch, but you can hit a rungood too. Just remember that unless you play tournaments you only get aroun 98-99% of T$ in dollars.

Value for one FPP point:

Bronze $10 bonus: 0,010
Silver $25 bonus: 0,0111
Gold $75 bonus: 0,0120
Platinum $200 bonus: 0,0129
Supernova $600 bonus: 0,0150
Supernova $1600 bonus: 0,0160

235FPP Storm 6max hyperturbo satellite: 0,0157 (T$)
70FPP 6max hyperturbo satellite: 0,0157 (T$)
Sunday Storm ticket: 0,0157
The Big $55 ticket: 0,0157
$215 ticket: 0,0159

Cheers for that @Kyyberi, I would play the 70 6-max ones but they don't seem to run as often as the Sunday Storm Satelites. If they run I would rather get the greater volume in, considering the format of the hyper-turbo's the volume would not affect time taken too much.

I often wait until I have a lot of points and play those hypers when having fun, relaxing or when drinking beer. ♦ Nice gambling and with those preflop hand charts and some understanding there aren't any big mistakes in them even when having beer.

Keep it up! Definitely gonna follow your blog:f_cool:

I was just wondering how PLO players work on their games, since i was searching through the internet tonight to find out more about plo and there is not much strategy content out there, even here on psgy we dont have many videos.

In nlhe it is easy to find everything u got to know about the game or you can use some gto solvers so i am curious how do u work on your game