I would really like to see a coaches opinion on all the ideas presented here, This thread has got really interesting and has really made me think about my game 
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i see alot of talk about the preflop chart . and how you cant win playing that way. it seems to me speaking from my game , that if u are not winning its your play after the flop that needs help,,,,,,seems to be where my problems are.
It's not that you can't win with the charts. But you need to adapt to other players as well so some people will be exploiting you.
i dont understand what they are doing preflop to exploit u. maybe by folding not much else they can do to exploit u.. i would like to hear your thoughts on this
Exploitation goes like this:
Hero is in EP
MSS says you have 8 possible raising hands in EP.
QQ+, TT-JJ, AJs, AQ+
Except for QQ+, the chart says, "You RAISE with these hands once, but FOLD if are reraised after that".
So the fact that you are in EP, and have raised tells a savvy player that you will fold GUARANTEED 5/8 of the time. to a 3Bet.
You can work around this but it is costly.
First method:
If you think someone is doing that to you, 4Bet shove a couple of the weaker hands -- JJ, TT come to mind. I have done this, got called and faced both trash and AA -- so it goes.
Second method:
Just don't play the weaker hands. Tighten up then whack 'em when you can.
Third method:
Find another table.
That is preflop exploitation.
A "by the book" MSS player will abandon his hand by the river in all but a few cases. The chart also tells players to bet/raise overpairs all the way down.
I lost a fair number of chips that way, until I learned that even fish can have good hands too.
It is really too bad that there are no English MSS coaching sessions.
There are some German ones, and I think I might just watch one, to see how it is done.
my winrate at NL2 MSS is typically -7BB/100
In all fairness, I have been making some costly systematic mistakes, and according to holdem manager, I am losing much more than my EV says I should be losing, so I am getting sucked out on a lot.
However even if I adjust for hands where I just plain blew it, the result is still negative.
I'm trying out a hotkey program for Party Poker to improve my ability to play stacked tables, and I am doing this at NL2 MSS. There have been a few mistakes caused by not being familiar with the software too.
I'm going to keep on with MSS for a month or so.
In terms of BB I lost less at NL25 MSS, but the $ amount lost was greater.
So I'll stay with the lower limits.
The basic MSS is a starting guide for beginners. It provides the beginner
poker player a solid foundation to build on. If you blindly
follow the charts you will have a very small win rate.
The way to make money $ at poker is to adjust to your opponents.
MSS & variance (swings in bankroll, suckouts etc)
MSS is high variance, you are going all in constantly.
5K+ hands losing streaks are common, so is running under EV
get used to it!
Postflop play
TPTK = Top pair top kicker.
OP = overpair
The post flop chart has you going to showdown with overpairs+.
Alot of players at the lower limits will go to showdown with TPTK, so going to showdown with overpairs to the board will be +EV over the long run.
I use the postflop stats:
WTSD (How often someone goes to showdown when the flop was seen. IE their cards are shown at the end of the hand.)
W$SD (won money % when hands go to showdown)
A bad player will go to showdown alot with bad hands, so a high WTSD and low W$SD would indicate a bad player.
A good player will go to showdown with good hands so a low WTSD and high W$SD would indicate a good player.
Using these stats i'm happy to go to showdown with TPTK (on a dry board) or OP if the stats indicate my opponent is a bad player. If the stats indicate that my opponent is good player and he plays back at me I will fold all TPTK hands and be more careful with OP.
MSS & exploitation
At the lower limits you will not get exploited that much, so
don't worry about it. At higher limits good players will try to
exploit you.
The only way you can counter 3bet exploitation is by
using stats. This is explained in the GOLD MSS articles.
Basically, if villain has high 3bets stats, you can widen your 4bet range etc.
I have made my own charts for typical 2/3 bet ranges calculated 50% & 55% equity ranges against them. I then use this as a guide to adjust my
3/4 bet range.
This software is useful for doing just that:
http://www.bigbetsoftware.com/holdemviewer
When I reach gold status I will use the Gold MSS charts etc.
All this is covered in the GOLD MSS articles in much more
detail.
The gold MSS articles cover:
Who is MSS for?
Differences between mid stack and short stack strategy
Differences between mid stack and big stack strategy
Getting Started
Open-raising
Limping
Calling
Raise sizes
Standard ORC
Extended ORC
3-bets in MSS
Reacting to 3-bets
4-bet strategy
Flop
Turn
River play
Originally posted by VorpalF2F
I'm trying out a hotkey program for Party Poker to improve my ability to play stacked tables, and I am doing this at NL2 MSS. There have been a few mistakes caused by not being familiar with the software too.
If you multitable this software might be useful:
http://www.stackandtile.com/sat/
i have played alot of mss , from what i have seen people seem to play back at u when u are raising alot . there are 4 different kinds of players , nits , nuts calling stations ,, and the trappers ,, look out for the nits and trappers ,,, easy game,, and remember the nuts and calling stations make hands 2
Well these are quite old, but it's my graph building $20 into $50 to allow myself to play NL5 MSS
Spoiler
I play 24 tables, and use TableNinja to aid me. You will constantly run under EV and over, and few downswings, and upswings. The variance is huge, but at least it is not PLO. 
This video:
http://www.pokerstrategy.com/video/1175/
makes a few points that bear on this discussion.
Has good examples of varying from the standard.
Examples are some looser steals, a squeeze play and folding QQ.
It is actually a SSS video, but I'm reasonably sure that the principles transfer to MSS as well.
I would love to see such session reviews for MSS.
Originally posted by VorpalF2F
This video:
http://www.pokerstrategy.com/video/1175/makes a few points that bear on this discussion.
Has good examples of varying from the standard.
Examples are some looser steals, a squeeze play and folding QQ.
.
I will watch this when I hit gold status, hopefully this month. Thanks for the link.
VorpalF2F, what do you think of the gold MSS articles? I desperately want gold status so I can read them!
Originally posted by chimpboy
The basic MSS is a starting guide for beginners. It provides the beginner
poker player a solid foundation to build on. If you blindly
follow the charts you will have a very small win rate.
The way to make money $ at poker is to adjust to your opponents.MSS & variance (swings in bankroll, suckouts etc)
MSS is high variance, you are going all in constantly.
5K+ hands losing streaks are common, so is running under EV
get used to it!Postflop play
TPTK = Top pair top kicker.
OP = overpairThe post flop chart has you going to showdown with overpairs+.
Alot of players at the lower limits will go to showdown with TPTK, so going to showdown with overpairs to the board will be +EV over the long run.I use the postflop stats:
WTSD (How often someone goes to showdown when the flop was seen. IE their cards are shown at the end of the hand.)
W$SD (won money % when hands go to showdown)
A bad player will go to showdown alot with bad hands, so a high WTSD and low W$SD would indicate a bad player.
A good player will go to showdown with good hands so a low WTSD and high W$SD would indicate a good player.
Using these stats i'm happy to go to showdown with TPTK (on a dry board) or OP if the stats indicate my opponent is a bad player. If the stats indicate that my opponent is good player and he plays back at me I will fold all TPTK hands and be more careful with OP.
MSS & exploitation
At the lower limits you will not get exploited that much, so
don't worry about it. At higher limits good players will try to
exploit you.The only way you can counter 3bet exploitation is by
using stats. This is explained in the GOLD MSS articles.
Basically, if villain has high 3bets stats, you can widen your 4bet range etc.I have made my own charts for typical 2/3 bet ranges calculated 50% & 55% equity ranges against them. I then use this as a guide to adjust my
3/4 bet range.This software is useful for doing just that:
http://www.bigbetsoftware.com/holdemviewerWhen I reach gold status I will use the Gold MSS charts etc.
All this is covered in the GOLD MSS articles in much more
detail.The gold MSS articles cover:
Who is MSS for?
Differences between mid stack and short stack strategy
Differences between mid stack and big stack strategy
Getting StartedOpen-raising
Limping
Calling
Raise sizes
Standard ORC
Extended ORC3-bets in MSS
Reacting to 3-bets
4-bet strategyFlop
Turn
River play
nice post chimpboy! very helpfull!
I had a look at Holdem Manager, and although I cannot distinguish the MSS sessions from the BSS ones in HEM, I know that I have been playing only MSS for the past week.
I discovered that a disproportionate part of my losses were from big medium pocket pairs. 77-TT,
Of most of the hands I lost, according to the strategy, I played them incorrectly, in many cases, I should have folded them without ever enterring the pot.
Mind you, I WON several hands open raising medium pocket pairs in MP, and I may continue to look for opportunities to do this, since against the right opponents, and especially if your vpip drops below 5.
The next biggest loser is pocket Aces.
That shocked me. I won 7 times w/ Aces, for a total of 27 Big blinds.
I LOST with pocket aces only 5 times, however that total is 348 BB
Wow. Variance? Since July 31, I have not taken AA to showdown and won.
Can I learn to fold them? We'll see.
This does point out a problem with MSS. You rely on the big wins to make up the the much greater number of times you must fold.
I did figure out tough, that if I had won exactly half of the AA hands, and if I had folded the medium pairs preflop that I should have according to the strategy, I would be down only slightly.
The next category I looked at was "Non-suited Aces".
In this case, most of my losing hands are those that I open raised then folded to a 3Bet according to the strategy. Mind you I lost even MORE when I did not fold them. Again, almost all of my wins were from the entire table folding to my raise. I watched this category carefully today, and played very carefully postflop, playing check/fold unless I actually hit a flop, or unless I was up against a player I was pretty sure would be able to fold.
Interestingly, suited aces had a fairly low loss rate.
Only 5 full-stack or greater losses, but a v large number of small wins.
Only 1 win at showdown, vs 5 losses. Interestingly, in none of my suited ace hands -- win or lose -- did I make a flush.
My "Hand at showdown" results were amazing too.
I lost money with straights and sets.
Out of six straights, I only won two.
Of my 8 sets it was 4 & 4, but I lost more that I made.
KK & QQ both nicely positive, but JJ same as AA -- no showdown wins, lots of blind collection.
The conclusion from all of this is that:
If I tighten up pre, and give up a bit sooner post flop eventually I should be able to at least break even.
They have to stop sucking out my Aces sometime, don't they?
Sounds just like alot of run bad to me. You can't really fold aces on many flops to many opponents because it becomes too exploitable in the long run IMO.
Hi
I play MSS at NL2. My winrate is 5-6 bb/100.
I plan to play MSS at NL5 and higher limits.
This is my graph at NL2 MSS
