Hey Waiboy it pains me to watch the agony you go through at this masochistic game, hit me up on skype (dakrynveii) and I'll sweat you some time.
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Gentlemen.
Many thanks for your responses, sympathy and feedback!
@ Terrorblade: Thanks heaps for the offer! I will definitely take you up on it, but I'll wait till I'm back at $.50/$1 because I think the value of your input will be diluted at No Fold'em Hold'em in Hell. Hopefully it won't take too long to get back.
First, on the plus side, my first session in Hell wasn't too bad.
Initially there was horror in seeing three of the reg TAGish types I kept banging my head against in Purgatory when my first table popped up. Once I'd sorted out the table selection things went weird good. Lots of poor calldowns on terrible boards against the nuts - and for once I was the beneficiary rather than the benefactor! 
I always thought there was sod all difference between limits this low, but on a sample size of one hour long session, I take it back. Players suck in here - YAY! So, hopefully a bit of determined, motivated grinding should see me get rolled again for another tilt at $.50/$1 in reasonably short order... especially if I can run okay for a week or two.
Re the new site selection.. not what I'd call promising responses here. 
I may muck around with Pacific seeing as I already have an account there (sans second starting capital due to some bizzare support delays and incorrect information - I'm a little bitter, but I'm not gonna hold a grudge over something that was essentially going to be free money). If the traffic is limited then I'll just play available, appropriate level tables and multi-table with Mansion.
If it doesn't work out and I can't clear any (or much) of the bonus, I won't be too worried. It doesn't sound like I will have missed out on too much anyway at a site I probably won't continue with post bonus and at least it's a change of scenery.
@897: Thanks for the suggestion of the bonus site... I actually already have it bookmarked. :f_biggrin:It's just there's nothing like good first hand reports to get to the good oil on traffic and playability.
@ CoreySteel: Thanks for the feedback re Everest. I may go the .pdf route - for some reason I've resisted it based on some sort of misguided motivation to play/maintain status/earn the information kinda mindset.. I think printing them all out makes too much sense though. 
In summary, despite feeling like I've just skulled a bottle of Hydrochloric acid (ie all empty on the inside - ba-dom-cha!) I'm still in the game. Lets see how the next phase goes.
out.
Originally posted by CoreySteel
Go off Mansion... ASAP
Mansion vs. Titan Rakeback
Cool analysis CS.. pretty much confirms my calcs.. my problem is I'm approx 100k MCP off getting the $1k bonus so, as much as it pains me, I can't really abandon Mansion just yet. Hopefully I hit a heater, rape $1/$2 and get outta there by October (or more likely slow grind until Xmas).
Just when you think nothing can go right, this happens:
Add to this I cashed at the first NL MTT I've played in ages - it was a bit of a donkathon v about 10k other fish, but I'll take it. Oh.. and of course I also actually found fish in Hell on Mansion AND took their cash.
Oh the excitement!
There may have been other eval hands that I commented on that weren't quite so awesome.. but for the moment I'm pretending they don't exist... I work out where I went wrong after my heart rate drops back.
out.
Whats with the evaluation pic? Is it that a judge agreed with you and you made a spot on judgement ;P?
gratz!
BTW TB thanks for the session yesterday!
I think I got some really good things out of it like betting for value more, loosening up starting hands v loose/weak players and considering the type of player in the blinds before folding pre flop or isolating palyers .
But despite this...
...even the best of intentions or focus can't help me out of my freefall. I feel like I played a really solid session today. I know I missed maybe two value bets v weak players but on semi scary boards - but v their range I had to bet them. Add that to another nasty little run while TB watched - including a flopped nut straight losing to a flopped set improving to a full house.
Okay, so not the worst beat, but I hate that "I have the NUTS" feeling on the flop, where in the back of the mind you know you've still a hand vulnerable to redraws v a very narrow range of hands. And then you get to see that happen. Meh. 
So after a really positive start, I'm now running at -2.85BB/100 through the first 3.3k hands this month in Hell. Which is nice because I've just gone -180BB through the last 1.5k hands. All this playing with (mostly) the best table selection I can muster. 
Of course, table selection is a little easier because...
of my diversion; I have opened a bwin account. So far (three days) it's been reasonably postive (not counting the obvious win rate stuff).
The software is okay once you used to it, they have 5 max shorthanded tables and the play is relatively fast paced.. so I'm getting way more hands an hour in than at iPoker. There are (so far) usually only 2 tables (4 at most) during the week at SH $.25/$.50 and occassionally none or few at SH $.50/$1, SH $1/$2 (although why I even note this I'm not sure :f_p:).
But the players, so far, are a mixture of super loose/tight and super loose/aggressive. There is the odd LAG here and there and I have sighted a TAG but maybe only two or three so far (and to date not at all the same table!!). So the fishes are there and terrible, and so far much frickn' luckier than me. If I ever have a top pair that doesn't lose to a rivered two pair Ts and 5s I'm sure I may even break even!
One interesting aspect about the play at bwin is that it is no CAP FL. This has only caught me out once so far where I 4-bet pre flop with TT, expecting it to CAP and got 5-bet. I suspect that the 4 -bet range pre flop may have to drop back to something like KK+, possibly QQ+, except where reads suggest otherwise.
It looks like the rake may be fairly similar to iPoker which is a downer, and I haven't really calc'd out the VIP program or whether I'll actually clear any of the bonus, but TBH I don't really care too much about any of that. This is just a holiday for me while I try my seemingly endless (and more and more likely futile) attempt to play a solid FL game.
Still the attempt continues and so...
I've started a new blog! The idea is to have a dedicated blog to the study of FL. I'm hoping that it provides some motivation and inspiration for me. I'm hoping so because the last 6 - 8 weeks have, in most respects, sucked.
So, whilst it may end up being a bit of a flop.. who knows.. here's my latest attempt to help improve my (deparately in need of a serious overhaul) skill and understanding of Fixed Limit Hold'em:
Poker Trek 3: The Search for Value
If it works as it could, this new blog should be a fairly interesting read for all FL tragics. If it doesn't work then, well, lets just hope it works in some way, shape or form.
out.
Well, I have just finished reading this insanely short blog and I must say, I would
nominate it for an EMMY.
I don't feel bad for not using all the shark and fish smileys because you have made up for all of us who don't.
One thing I must say to you is that you are one determined poker player.
Clearly there is something that has been missing from your game which on top of the variance/downswings
which you can definately say you have been through alot.. You know the fact that you have had soemthing harming
your results and throughout all this time, you have been on a constant hunt to sort it out.
So in short (which is something I never am no matter how often I lie and say I am gonna be)
From reading your blog I can guarantee you that once you do click in, and get your play together, you will
go so far with this game, because if someone can combine the kind of dedication you have with the ability
to mop up a card table, then look out fish.
What ever became of your study goals?
Did you ever finish that river article?
How is it going with the book? It is a great read, (SSH) So far I am through the intros, and into the gambling concepts.
I think it really helps to think about just sitting back and making an easy profit from the poor players mistakes
as opposed to trying to go in and kick ass and take names.. Really puts it in perspective when to just
call down with a likelyhood to pickup small change here and there and when to realize (SWEET I GOT THE NUTS AND HES BETTING)
and not the vulnerable nuts that the river turns into rags, I mean like nut flush on an unpaired board with two folks capping the turn
and the river and you hit on the turn.
I wouldn't be embarassed about getting things wrong in the evaluation section. Its much better to take a stab at it and mess it up
then to just wait for someone else to come along. I always found in the SNG section the farther from the truth my post was,
the more I learned form the judge.
Anyhow I should stop writing.
And of course here is my traditional last at least paragraph that always follows such a sentence.....
A suggestion for the articles, something that has helped me....
Try writing out the main points of the article, or typing out or whatever.. see how far off base you are..
what I mean is do not read the article then try and write it out right away, but just open up a new
.txt file, and pick an article you feel you know the content of, and wihtout looking at it just start typing.
You do not need the intro and all that jazz, but just the MAIN situations and things to remember.....
If you try to do this once a day with only one article untill you have it absorbed, it should not take you long.
When you read the real article I Think you will surprise yourself with how much you understood, and were able
to put down by yourself....
Anyhow just a suggestion.
Sorry again for such a long rant in your blog but after all that reading I had to write something.....
Hey Waiboy. It sucks to read you're struggling. I can't even remember your last upswing...
I feel like doing the same as Terrorblade did. Although I'm still a big fish myself, it can't do much wrong, can it? It will improve my own play as well 
Send me a pm and we'll go from there. I think you live in australia or new zealand so we can only play if you're up for it in the morning, simply cause I only have time during evenings :). I hope that's not a problem. And if it is we'll arrange something...
Originally posted by DarthBobo
I feel like doing the same as Terrorblade did. Although I'm still a big fish myself, it can't do much wrong, can it? It will improve my own play as well
Send me a pm and we'll go from there. I think you live in australia or new zealand so we can only play if you're up for it in the morning, simply cause I only have time during evenings :). I hope that's not a problem. And if it is we'll arrange something...
Thanks DB, awesome offer, much appreciated! Sweat sessions rock, so I'm sure you'll get some benefit from it - even if it's just working through the thought process of how a hand gets played. I've got a few thoughts on how to maximise benefits from these sessions I'll be posting in my theory blog in the next few days. See what you think and we can go from there.
In any case, add me on skype: Waiboy4Life - just note your PS.com handle in the intro note.
As for time difference, I have a few mornings available during the week - my work hours are all over the place. And NZ and Australia are joined by a bridge so the time zones are pretty similar between the two. Drop me a note and we'll sort something out! ♠_cool:
I just had a session where I hit hands and wasn't sucked out on, and I cracked somebody elses AA.
Wow.. possibly the longest absence from blogging since commencement...
So, I'm still alive, still tripping through hell (with a little FR in purgatory for good measure) and with a pretty good attitude at the moment.
I think the reasons for my blogging hiatus are twofold:
i. At $.25/$.50 I'm stuck back in the grinding trap to clear MCPs for status reasons. It is important for me to maintain pro status in order to have some chance of ever clearing the $1k bonus. If I stay at PRO status on Mansion I'll clear the $1k definitely by the end of November. I've invested too much time to drift on this... and I would like to maybe move back to Titan which looks like being a better VIP system for me. Being unable to utilise the double MCP happy hour sessions available on Mansion due to time zones is unfortunate as it would make a significant difference to my points accumulation. I'm attempting to limit my poker time so the grind means I don't have as much time to blog.
ii. I've been REALLY considering variance recently. I've always understood the concept, known what it means and had a healthy respect for it. I think though that I've always underestimated its impact. My preference is to blame a lot of my performance on bad/poor play and attribute some to variance.
Now, I'm not for one second suggesting that I'm not a substandard player. My play is anything but optimal, lets be clear. However, when I'm consistantly playing better hands in position compared to my opponents (assisted by vigoruous table selection) as I am at micro stakes, variance must have had a significant impact on the outcomes. Getting annoyed at the results is counter productive. My monthly hand sample size in insignificant (usually 10 - 15k).
Given this contemplation of variance, the whinging/raving posts just seem more pointless... barring the odd excessively sarcastic ones like my last!
A couple of random thoughts:
Aussie Ian: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. I actually almost feel sorry for you after the Ashes went north as well. Just taking the opportunity whilst it presents itself.. Aussie Rob/Dingo Deans will get your boys firing soon.. you can see it building.
FreakishLy HandsomE (stolen from TerrorBlade, won't be returned soon!): As a FLHE player I'm really enjoying the increasing number of FL blogs in this section of the boards. It definitely seems like there is much more activity from members on the Chosen Game than there was even 9 months ago... this is of course as it should be. There has been some cool discussion and a lot of support of folks making their way through the limits and its all jolly good stuff.
Poker Trek 3: The Search For a Blog Entry: Okay, so I admit my strategy blog isn't exactly off to a spectacular start. One might say it's not off to a start at all. 
The grindathon in Hell has been a major hampering factor... once I get back to Purgatory (maybe even this month if the heaters stay on) I'll be able to comfortably make PRO status on Mansion without requiring a couple of hours grinding each day. That will open up some time for applied study and hopefully something pretty valuable. Stay tuned folks...
8979687: PS.com Iron Man Blog reader award goes to you.. I can't recommend any good pyschologists (if I knew any I'd be there now obv) to get over the traumatic experience you've been through... good luck with the nightmares.
I like the suggestion re: restating the main aspects of the articles. It is something I have in the past intended to do and procrastinated about it. This was one of the goals of the strategy blog - to restate the main points without recourse to the article. Then to seek out examples and apply the theory to reinforce the concepts further.
And of course I've not finished the river article. Did you learn nothing at all from my blog?! 
One more thing fella... learn to embrace the angst. It's a tough lesson, but essential. You simply can't look at results over any short term period. If you aren't working on your game, that's a problem - one I struggle with in any sort of applied manner. Where I suspect your frustration (and anyones for that matter) is you do work on your game, apply your understanding and learning, and still lose. This is because of the irrationality of considering short term results. The same applies for folks that storm the limits, reach $2/$4 and then start to experience some negative variance. It takes a serious amount of work + hands to get some sort of reliable, reasonable result.
I really hope that the venting on the boards is just that, as you seem to have the right approach to learing and beating this game. ♠_evil:- except red with gold lightening bolts down the side...
Alright. Enough.
out.
Lets rip into it, shall we?
$.25/$.50 FL SH
And related stats:
$.50/$1 FL SH
FL FR $.25/$.50 - $1/$2.
Sorry for the intrusion of the summary in my $.25/$.50 SH stats.. you're not missing a whole lot there, rest assured.
What is the tale of the tape then?
Well, obv there was the descent into Hell due to that shocking run at $.50/$1. 99% of those 1.3k hands were played in the first 4 days of the month. I'm not sure how I ran at -9.15BB/100 over the period.. must be some tilt in there, but I don't think I could ever tilt with that kind of dedication over that long a period.
So, that leads to a period of mucking around, moving some of my roll to bwin just for the sheer "this isn't an iPoker platform"ness of it all.
Having said that, the platform is just so ridiculously fishy I'm kinda disappointed I'm not in more of a position to take advantage of the awesome $1k bonus available.. I'm sure at a decent limit with a bit of application I could have taken a decent chunk of that moolah. Still, plenty more bonus whoring opportunities for me should I ever extricate myself from the firey pits of Hell.
Anyway, in the immortal words of Steve Hansen, one of the All Blacks assistant coaches, I'm gonna flush this month down the dunny and move on.
September Goals
A little more simple for me this month methinks compared to previous efforts.
GTFO of playing $.25/$.50 FLSH as soon as possible (preferrably by moving up limits). 
Retain Pro status on Mansion and make my 20k (adjusted) MCPs. Approx 60k MCPs to go for my $1k bonus - so two to three months at current limits/rate.
Accept variance into my poker life.
Once I've managed to up just one limit - into the sweet, rareified air of Purgatory, start posting in my strategy blog.
Abadi, abadi, abadi.. That's all folks!
out.
Oh, and Hallo Spaceboy.
Hey Waiboy I'm looking forward to the month where you go on an insane heater. You deserve it
So how's bwin? Are there many tables available for the limits you play? Any more interesting facts for us FL players?
Originally posted by DarthBobo
Hey Waiboy I'm looking forward to the month where you go on an insane heater. You deserve it
So how's bwin? Are there many tables available for the limits you play? Any more interesting facts for us FL players?There are few 0.25/0.50 tables. Higher you get, less table there are (read: none).
Originally posted by CoreySteel
Originally posted by DarthBobo
Hey Waiboy I'm looking forward to the month where you go on an insane heater. You deserve it
So how's bwin? Are there many tables available for the limits you play? Any more interesting facts for us FL players?There are few 0.25/0.50 tables. Higher you get, less table there are (read: none).
Hmm.. not entirely true. In off peak times there can be no or one table.. usually it is a $.25/$.50 table but up to $1/$2 is not unusual (and at a 50-60% players to flop on a 5max game). BTW these are all 5max tables.. I've not seen a FR table at FLHE at these limits at all.
During peak times there are usually 2-4 tables of each limit $.25/$.50 - $1/$2. I'm not sure about the higher/lower limits as I filter them out. Needless to say though, what is there is usually pretty juicy. If you were worried about traffic you could always do what I have done from time to time and play multiple platforms simultaneously.
Just checked and right now (10:25 NZT, 22:26 iPoker time (I think GMT!)) there are four $.25/$.50, three $.50/$1 and four $1/$2 5max tables. Two tables are 46% players to flop, rest are 57% - 75%. Also one $2/$4 and three $3/$6 tables (at 55%-78%).
@Termi8r: No, aside from giving a bit of stick to the AussI my heart just hasn't been in it. Waikato have sucked so far in the Air NZ Cup and I'm never pleased when the ABs are playing poorly. Still, a big test coming up in the mighty 'Tron next week. Should be an interesting game whether the Tri Nations is (HA) alive or not.
I'm plagarising myself here.. I posted this in opal99's blog to go out in sympathy with some angsting he's going through (messages of support, sympathy and virtual flowers can be posted here). I figure its a nice state of play for me to come back to next time I'm chucking a wobbly in order that I may check its veracity at that future time.
Originally posted by Waiboy
...I've threatened giving up a couple of times, but I'm still playing. So I guess all I can do is give you my perspective on why I'm still playing, even when it seems pointless and I'm staring into months of bs.i. I know I can beat the limits I'm playing. I know I can beat the limits at least two above the one I'm playing.
ii. I have accepted variance into my life.
iii. I have accepted that working on my game will not necessarily immediately be rewarded with positive results.
iv. I figure over the medium term I can get a sustainable income stream from poker (at what level is another matter) that will in some way compensate the amount of time I commit to it.
v. I still enjoy this frickin' game. Sometimes I don't know why, although I suspect it has a lot to do with addiction (in a (mostly) non destructive way).
vi. I can see and understand the a substantial proportion of the errors my opponents make, and an ever increasing proportion of the errors that I make.
vii. If things start to get out of perspective, I now know that taking some time out will heal the damage.
viii. I have accepted that using bonus targets as motivation to increase volume must be kept separate from the emotion that results from negative variance/errors or leaks in play. If I start to resent having to grind despite poor results then my game will be affected (ie tilt) therefore if I begin to notice any overlap between these two emotive forces, then I recognise it for what it is and attempt to deal with it.
Dunno if any of this helps but I've gone through a fair bit of introspection (poker wise) over the last two months and I guess the above is some of the result of it. Ofc I'm currently grinding my way upward at the moment so maybe that positively impacts on my ability to rationalise the negative side of things. Having said this I consider that my mindset is much more mature than it was and this little treatise is a relatively accurate reflection of that - so the next major ugly patch of results hopefully will not lead to the same level of frustration. Certainly I don't have the same desire to whinge as I once did...
Wonder how long this will hold true?!
BTW... heater arrived.. back playing $.50/$1 SH per PS.com recommended 500BB BRM.
FWIW since 1 July 2009 I have run as follows:
1.33BB/100 through 13.4k hands at $.25/$.50 SH
-2.30BB/100 through 11.8k hands at $.50/$1 SH (lifetime now at 0.48BB/100 through 70k hands).... egad...
0.29BB/100 through 4k hands at $.25/$.50 - $.50/$1 FR
out.
Getting net on the 17th! Hurrah!
I have a very promising (in my opinion) study plan drawn up that is a hell of a lot more promising than our old idea. Hopefully you are still up for it. The downside to this study plan is that its ultimate aim is to take an almost ruthlessly mathmatical approach to the game ensuring that we will be spending our time on the most challenging concepts.
Congrats on moving back up to .50/1.00!