Probably the best plog in the world

Thanks for your analysis on the R&C games at GGpoker Kyyberi.
I agree that it is kind of a Regfest, but still profitable to play, not really due to the leaderboard money though.

I'm curious, what is your BB/100h at PLO5 on other sites than GGPoker?

Regular tables at GG are more profitable than R&C tables, but also A LOT slower, and also less crowded.

Also wanted to mention, showing the "logic" behind earning chips for the all-in flipout: I flopped a full house in the blinds and donked it. then I chk/raised the turn where the nutflush completed for villain (and he called all-in). He got "bad beat" with getting the money in at 0% equity... (I would not consider that to be a bad beat).

Previously those chips for flipament were clear, there were rules when you got them and when not. Now as far as I know it's done by some non-transparent algorithm, or as GG says "our poker experts are constantly improving our system". In 6card PLO it's really wild west for those, there is no consistency and some of the "beats" are like calling with staight on the river when the board pairs and flushes. But non-transparency has been the trademark for GG for a long time.

I am not sure if R&C is profitable or not without leaderboard and flipaments. This is my graph from this week, 10K hands:

As it doesn't include rake and rake is about ~150, that's breakeven. You can see the drop at 7K hands, without that unlucky session it would be profitable, with breakeven from 7-10K hands would mean 5bb/100 profits. So I am not sure whether I would be breakeven, 5bb/100 or more. At 7K mark my winrate was 10bb/100 and it was looking good. During this 10K hand period I got about 4,5K points for Fish Buffet. Normally that would equal $45 in rake, but as I raked around $175 the PVI is dropping my actual rakeback to 1/4 of what is "promised". So instead of 23% the GG is promising, I get 6%.

On another site, normal tables and plenty of good customers my winrate at PLO5 and PLO10 is around 25bb/100 on a big sample.

And leaderboards are killing normal tables too. Just open the lobby and see how many multitabling tight regs or microstacking chinese players you have there. As I am writing this, at PLO10 pool there are 125 players. 15 multitabling regs, and few of them are playing 9 tables. If on average they played 6 tables, that would mean 72% of the pool are regs. And some of those 1-3 tablers might be decent players too. Let's round it up to 75%, meaning that as there are 5 other players in the table, on average 3,75 of them are regs. That means that on average, there are 4 other regs per table. That last player might be short stacker. 0,5% of the pool are short stackers, so half of the tables have 4 regs and a short stacker. Non-profitable table. Some of the regs are changing tables trying to hunt good customers, so it's constant table hopping if you want to do it too. But that is against the T&C, so you might get banned if you do it.

The best thing GG could do is to tone down the leaderboards, limit max tables to 4 and put that saved leaderboard money to splash pots.

Originally posted by Timmaywin
He got "bad beat" with getting the money in at 0% equity... (I would not consider that to be a bad beat).

Nope it's not bad beat but snap fold on flop (and preflop but anyway)

On the other hand I would kind of feel good for opponent getting such bad beat message. It perhaps make him feel better of his play.

You could go hyperloose vs them if they are that tight. They might adjust though.

@Kyyberi: Yes, when I look at your graph, it does seem so that you are about break-even playing the R&C games, probably in profit land though.
And yes, there are a lot of tight regs playing multiple tables, but it's not as grimm as you describe it.

Also, these tights regs can be exploited as well.
For instance: Some of them are 3betting loose LP (instead of the tight 3bet range you would expect from their stats), others become spewy (with air) oop when you miss a cbet. Thank god for the great system for making notes in the GGpoker software!

Originally posted by ghaleon
On the other hand I would kind of feel good for opponent getting such bad beat message. It perhaps make him feel better of his play.

Yep, that seems to be a legit goal for GGPoker, to make a losing player feel better and keep playing. (and having a shot to win big in the flipout)
The dancing Negreanu in your face (unskippeble) for the big pot winning player doesn't support that cause though...

Not sure where, but someone asked my opinion on what to focus on when moving from HE to PLO. Here are some thoughts:

They are totally different game

Don't think it's HE with 4 cards, as that approach will make you go broke. In HE hand values are more static, meaning that 2 pairs, set, straight etc. is quite often with similar strength, no matter what the board is. In other words, strong hand on the flop are quite often strong hands on the turn, and on the river. In PLO equities shift, which means that strong hands on the flop might be really weak on the turn. It's quite common for HE players to over value 2 pairs or top pair, and valuebet or call with them in spots where it shouldn't be done.

Draws are more powerfull, made hands are more vulnerable

In HE your "monster" draw is just mediocre one in PLO. With 4 cards you can have wraps, which are straight draws with 9+ outs. Quite common theme in a bit pot is that one player has a made hand and other one has a big draw. It's essential to understand how strong draws are.

Preflop is different

In HE preflop is quite easy, as you have very limited starting hands. You can memorize preflop ranges from each position exactly. In PLO you can't. People have tried to make preflop charts and "cheat sheets", but in my opinion it's the wrong way to go. Every system for preflop has weaknesses, and if you just try to memorize stuff you won't learn and understand why and when a hand is good or not. We have a free and easy way to practise starting hands in our PLO section of the forum, if one doesn't have access to solver preflop. The key is to understand what makes a PLO hand stronger and what makes it weaker. And then there is a big difference whether the pot will be HU pot or multiway. The single biggest leak on players is often that they call too much preflop. In reality, if we want to make profits we often need to be VERY tight on preflop calling.

Sizing

Very good tell that someone is HE player is that they use less than pot sizing preflop. In PLO sizing is super easy preflop, as there is only one sizing: pot. Postflop there more room, but I would stick to simple approach in the beginning: On the flop half a pot and 3/4 pot. Half a pot on monotone, paired or super dry (K72r) boards, 3/4 on everything else. On the turn, we ad pot sizing on draw heavy boards. Quite common mistake at smaller stakes is too small sizing. If you are not sure, bigger is always better. More value, more protection and most opponents are calling anyway.

Ok thanks good to know. Do we also bluff less in PLO as people are calling more?

Not sure how much people are bluffing in HE nowadays. Every time I open a stream or coaching with it, people tell that call on the river with A high is super standard. How can you bluff there? ♦

I do bluff "a lot" even at lower stakes, in good spots. I do have some opponents with a not "DO NOT BLUFF!!!!!" though. But overall I think we can bluff even at lower stakes way more than most people think. Just have to be a good spot to do it.

I had one of those "Ghaleon sessions" again. Second in a row. Tables are full of aggro gamblers, who like to get it in with any draw, any hit. Or preflop with any hand they seem to like. Yesterday they cold called 3bets and 4bets, and happened to hit super nuts versus my good hit. Today I got it in in a good shape, but runouts were far from my favor.

But when I look the long term results, it looks decent:

That is about half of the hands I should have in my database, but the rest is scattered between my other computers and one former laptop. But in all the results were quite the same. Stakes are PLO5 and PLO10.

Ah the classic "check-call the river" with good pair from LHE... sometimes backfires at NLHE ♦ Looks like there is hope, looking at your graph.

I also try to adjust to tendencies in NLHE.. as this era people started to 3bet alot pre and others got suspicious of 3bets and playing back, i only 3bet 4% like premiums and call everything pre and then bluff it postflop. Works. I am sure there are also better strategies like Carrolls wide and frequent 3betting but that ends you up in 3bet pots with marginal hands postflop vs suspicious opponents which i dont want.

I have been cautious to post a graph, as every time I post a good graph I get a downswing. Rational mind says "lol", emotional mind says "confirmed".

Next two sessions after posting the graph:

I was like "oh man, I knew it...". Here are couple more sessions after those:

I bit over 10bin under EV, trying to get to breakeven. Makes me think twice before posting good graphs again. :f_mad::f_mad::f_mad:

Losing coach.. would be super epic ♦

The curse is real, played another 1K hand session. EV 2,5bin, results break even.

Bring to my mind the old question:

Would you rather have
- profitable results with negative EV, or
- profitable EV but negative results?

Yeah it's hard to guess the RNG so I better improve the game vs others

Longer the time frame to choose for more I would take that first option of the two

Problem of the EV is there is no stores accepting it. Well I guess there kinda is in some of these spin&go teams where they pay off based on cEV or something like that. Anyway,,,

There is no EVpool for PLO?

Most players would choose the second one for a session over the first one. That is logical choice. But our brains are ***** up, as we usually feel much better if we win but EV is negative than if we lose but EV is profitable.

At the moment I teach in our secondary school about how our brains work, how feelings affect our decision making and how and why our brains are coded to include negative bias. In the end, our brains are designed horribly for poker playing.

Next session, this is how it started...

I will never post winning graphs.

After all that runbad finally a profitable session. Few new players at the tables, and they were like this:

Who needs A blockers...

Wow, almost 2 months without an update. Has been a bit busy in life, but I have also played poker probably more than in few years. Winrate since the last post has been the same ~30bb/100. That has been few really rough sessions, but they were just some bumbs in the road.

Snipped this hand from today.