Games played: 166
Result: $11.12
Other: 500 ICM spots done (in the Pokerstrategy.com ICM trainer)
Graph in spoiler (Graphs is off by 1$ - reason being a 1$ ticket used to buy in to 1 sng)
Spoiler
Volume was decent overall - sessions thursday + saturday was both among the longest ones during the challenge - Sunday on the contrary was the shortest.
Was a bit swingy during the course of the week - Did OKish in the 0.50$ games and well in the 1$ games (lol @ samplesize though).
This week i'll do another smaller sessions with fewer tables to have max focus in the 1$ games - Gonna do a bunch of off-table work aswell - focusing on tha ICM trainer + reviewing spots from sessions
While i do agree, that we need to change our approach in ante game vs. non ante games, im not sure, the difference is that big between the 0.5$ games and the 1$ games.
Structures in spoiler.
Spoiler
From lvl 7 and onwards, the structure is the same - this is basicly push/fold territory.
lvl 1-6 has antes in the 1$ games. I'll consider for first 6 lvl as 2 stages:
Stage 1 is lvl 1-3 (10/20 ante 3, 15/30 ante 4 and 25/50 ante 5)
This stage is "deepstacked" and given the pot has doubled in size we should widen our range (especially from late position + blinds). If we keep ranges intact, we'll give up a lot of EV in bb's by not attacking/defending wide enough. On the other hand, we need to be able to realise our EV playing postflop - especially from the blinds (being OOP) this can be hard. Finally the EV we'll be missing out of is less significant, when we look at it from af chip perspective.
All in all i'll argue, that we can still make money playing (relatively) tight in this stage.
Stage 2 is lvl 4-6 (40/80 ante 10, 60/120 ante 15 and 80/160 ante 20)
In this stage blinds are a bit smaller, which is countered by the antes. Instead of double pot size, we're looking at an increase of ~50%.
We need to play our ranges accordingly, but again: with wider ranges, we're looking into more difficult spots postflop.
Overall i'll rather underadjust a bit than overadjust (the latter would bring more close spost postflop, which im afraid has the potential to take away the EV gain of playing the wider ranges preflop).
The more games I play (and the more study i'll do off table), the better i'll be at realising my EV postflop. For starters i'll underadjust a bit to make sure, im not loosing EV by trying to gain EV (I hope this makes sense)
Given the fact i've played quite a few games (45 mans) with a corresponding structure, I'm rather confident, that my preflop game doesnt suffer too much EV in this structure.
While i do agree, that we need to change our approach in ante game vs. non ante games, im not sure, the difference is that big between the 0.5$ games and the 1$ games.
Structures in spoiler.
Spoiler
From lvl 7 and onwards, the structure is the same - this is basicly push/fold territory.
lvl 1-6 has antes in the 1$ games. I'll consider for first 6 lvl as 2 stages:
Stage 1 is lvl 1-3 (10/20 ante 3, 15/30 ante 4 and 25/50 ante 5)
This stage is "deepstacked" and given the pot has doubled in size we should widen our range (especially from late position + blinds). If we keep ranges intact, we'll give up a lot of EV in bb's by not attacking/defending wide enough. On the other hand, we need to be able to realise our EV playing postflop - especially from the blinds (being OOP) this can be hard. Finally the EV we'll be missing out of is less significant, when we look at it from af chip perspective.
All in all i'll argue, that we can still make money playing (relatively) tight in this stage.
Stage 2 is lvl 4-6 (40/80 ante 10, 60/120 ante 15 and 80/160 ante 20)
In this stage blinds are a bit smaller, which is countered by the antes. Instead of double pot size, we're looking at an increase of ~50%.
We need to play our ranges accordingly, but again: with wider ranges, we're looking into more difficult spots postflop.
Overall i'll rather underadjust a bit than overadjust (the latter would bring more close spost postflop, which im afraid has the potential to take away the EV gain of playing the wider ranges preflop).
The more games I play (and the more study i'll do off table), the better i'll be at realising my EV postflop. For starters i'll underadjust a bit to make sure, im not loosing EV by trying to gain EV (I hope this makes sense)
Given the fact i've played quite a few games (45 mans) with a corresponding structure, I'm rather confident, that my preflop game doesnt suffer too much EV in this structure.
/AlcopopDK
I agree with you about the stage 1 but not for stage 2.
I think in stage 2 we are basically in a push/fold Phase unless you double up in the first blinds levels.
Take in account that 160/80/20 with 7 players has a pot of 380. Which means the real blind without ante is 250/125.
So if you have 1600 chips you might believe you have 10 bb but the true is that you have 6,4 bb.
You can see that the antes will make a huge impact in your push/fold ranges.
I was pushing almost nash ranges with antes at 1 and 2$ (9-man) but im down 70-80 buy-in in 2k sits.
I think that probably these ranges are too wide, since in microlimits they often call more loose so we need to tighten these nash ranges in order to adapt well. Also villains push less that they should do so we need to call more tight than nash .
I will buy ICMizer, it give you the default nash push range but you can change the villains call range and than recalculate it in order to adapt well.
It will be very helpfully if ghaleon,maniac or other sit and go player of the community can give us some estimative default ranges for the new structure with antes.
So - what have I been up to, while not updating this blog?
First of all - One of the strengths I highlighted starting this blog was that the money involved is insignificant to me. I've always considered my poker game as "just another videogame" making me indifferent about the money involved.
Unfortunately I failed on this part - i got borred - and frustrated with the game (and the pennies involved)
This lead me to explore the live poker in my city. Theres at poker club hosting ~60$ tournaments twice a week (and a very spewy nl100$ game).
My life roll leaves plenty of room to play these games (and even bigger if that was the point - but its not...).
Friday the 27th of may i entered the ~60$ tournament (it had ~30 entries). I mincashed as 5th (doubling my money)
This gave me the taste of the live scene - I entered the tournament again on 3rd of may - but busted this one with 2 tbls left.
Both fridays I brought a few shots for the cashgame - while i was burned out the first friday out, i entered the cashgame this past friday - and oh boy is that a great game
The game is like a time pocket putting us back to the poker boom. Its a nl100$ game that plays rather big ($1 / 1$ blinds with a 200bb max buyin). Even the "good" regs couldnt hold their own in the nl10 games online, and the marks are basicly there, untill they loose their 1-4 buyins....
A lot of straddling, a lot of limping, and a std raise is everywhere between 4 and 10 bbs - ppl are there to gamble it up!
A got in the game an hour or two "too late" for the droolers, but even then its a great game.
Managed to win ~100bb within 3 hours this past friday. Its definately possible to keep a high winrate - but the swings can get big (depending on the beforementioned droolers).
While i buy into the torunament with my liferoll, ive have a designated roll for the cashgames (~2500bb). I have no doubt, that im a winner in both the tournament and the cashgame - problem is i have to leave the house early in the night to take part in the game (while the online grind is more flexible)
I'll definately keep you guys updated, when I leave the house for poker
but but but - what about the online pokerz??
I have the day tomorrow off - after playing way bigger games for the last couple of weeks, i couldnt be bothered with the 0.5 and 1$ grind. That lead me to registering a tournament schedule tonight (~15 tournaments with bigger 11 and sunday storm being the highest buyins). Plan was to redeposit any loss from the night in order to keep the bankroll challenge intact.
That wasnt necessary though - I ran deep in the big 11 (~92nd) and in a 4.4 bounty builder deepstacked (18th). Kinda dissapointed, that i couldnt keep the run good aliv, but busted both in rather std. spots (88 v. 1010 and 1010 v. JJ).
This gave me a 15.61$ win for the session - im gonna add this to the challenge bankroll (207.83$ for a new peak!)
I just got my love/hate relationship with tournaments confirmed - omg theres nothing like running deep in big11 - but then again the bustout is just soo disappointing...
Still super busy @work - but im looking forward to comitting to the SNGs in the challenge in the upcoming week!
b4 I wrap this up, im gonna leave you with a "AlcopopDK grinding soundtrack classic":
First of all - the following post will include some numbers, that will make yesterdays "tilt" from loosing ~$10 sound rather silly.
But then again - Every time i sit down i play to win - stakes doesn't matter...
I went to the local cardroom and played the friday special: ~$45 buyin - 20 players - 25.000 starting stack - lvl 1 = 25=50.
Hand 1 lvl 1. limp - raise 4 bb - i make it 24bb holding AQo - 4 callers. Board runs out A1039Qddd and i beat A3 for at ~15k pot
Hand 3 - open 4 bb - i call K10 - we go 4way again to a 9JQ flop - I bet - Villain call // turn Q I bet - Villain call // river 5 I bet - Villain call ---- I win another ~10k pt from same opponent (He's holding KQs).
Overall the game is VERY splashy for lvls 1-2-3-4. Every1 wants to see flops.
Long story short - i win the tournament for ~$290
Random Chipporn:
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After the tourney win - I insta reg for the very loose cashgame (0.75 / 0.75 - 200 bb deep)!
I loose ~60bb in a 2 hour session - but not without a win in a ~800bb pot and a loss in a ~1000bb pot (Sick shit...) details will follow tommorow.
Overall i win ~$245 - but i'm still haunted by the 1000bb hand in the cashgame - how entitled can u be? :f_frown::f_frown: