My way out of the Micros AND Poker Studies

The latest book I´m reading is No-Limit Hold'em for Advanced Players by Matthew Janda. After reading more than half of it, I will try to go chapter by chapter and try to apply the concepts and discuss the topics.

The first four chapters are very general and were not new to me. The first thing I want to tackle is my Preflop Play. The book provides you with some Opening Ranges (except for SB). So I think this is a good starting point to play against unknown players. Something I miss a little bit is the Defending Ranges - what should be my 3bet-Calling Range and my 4bet Range. So if someone knows some great sources regarding this topic, I would be more than thankful

Hi illwhisky,
I wonder why there are no pre-flop ranges for SB?

It will be interesting to see how an old-school grinder fares in the modern world

Best of luck :gl:,
VS

Thank you VorpalF2F.

To be honest, I don´t know why there is no Opening Range for SB. But instead, there is a 3bet-Range against BU open.

And how I´m doing in the modern world? We will see - just come back from time to time and take a look in my weekly reports

Originally posted by illwhisky
Thank you VorpalF2F.

To be honest, I don´t know why there is no Opening Range for SB. But instead, there is a 3bet-Range against BU open.

And how I´m doing in the modern world? We will see - just come back from time to time and take a look in my weekly reports
OK -- now I understand.
There is a school of thought that advocates 3Bet/Fold in the SB
I've never read any articles that explained why -- or how to play SB vs other positions

Hi illwhisky,

good luck with your challenge. I'll be following your progress. There are at least 5 of us right now with blogs trying to get through micros ♦

Except of this book: No-Limit Hold'em for Advanced Players by Matthew Janda, can you recommend any others?
I do have these which I can definetely recommend:
The Poker Mindset by Ian Taylor and Matthew Hilger
The Mental game of Poker by jared Tendler with Barry Carter

Have a nice weekend!

Originally posted by VorpalF2F

Originally posted by illwhisky
Thank you VorpalF2F.

To be honest, I don´t know why there is no Opening Range for SB. But instead, there is a 3bet-Range against BU open.

And how I´m doing in the modern world? We will see - just come back from time to time and take a look in my weekly reports:f_cool:

OK -- now I understand.
There is a school of thought that advocates 3Bet/Fold in the SB
I've never read any articles that explained why -- or how to play SB vs other positions

I also heard about that approach, but don´t think that Matthew is also one of them - at least he didn´t mention it... But I think a default Opening Range looks like the one from UTG or MP as there is already 0,5 BB invested.

Originally posted by Pokrovec
Hi illwhisky,

good luck with your challenge. I'll be following your progress. There are at least 5 of us right now with blogs trying to get through micros ♦

Except for this book: No-Limit Hold'em for Advanced Players by Matthew Janda, can you recommend any others?
I do have these which I can definitely recommend:
The Poker Mindset by Ian Taylor and Matthew Hilger
The Mental Game of Poker by Jared Tendler with Barry Carter

Have a nice weekend!

Hey Pokrovec,

great to have you onboard - I also recognized your Blog and will follow it.

The best book I have read so far is Mattew Janda's first book: Applications of No-Limit Hold'em. I read it in 2014 and it was like an eye-opener for me. Because of that reading now his second book is a direct consequence of it.

Another great read was Harrington on Online Cash Games, which I read in 2010 or 2011. This book is especially interesting for Microstakes players who are using a HUD. I think a lot of the writings are still up to date, as this book focuses more on exploiting Villain.

Today I tried to do some maths, also with a little help from Matthew Janda's first book. And one thing I recognized is, that I am raising too low - especially for the recommended Open Raising Charts and building the pot. Many of Matthew Janda's calculations are based on 3,5bb open raise and 2,5bb raises from the BU. Before today's session were 2,5bb from all positions, except on BU where I raised 2bb. As my last session went quite well, I will adapt for the higher raises for a while (2000 hands) and compare them with the rest of my database. I suggest that Villains are more likely to fold preflop and to give them bad pot odds with their marginal hands - as before I offered them better pot odds and their loose calling was justified by that low raises.

What are your thoughts on raising sizes?

Originally posted by illwhisky
What are your thoughts on raising sizes?

If you're up against people with high 3Bet rates in the blinds, then opening smaller on the button makes sense.
The downside is that opening 2BB on the button gives BB the correct pot odds to call very, very wide.

If opponents in the blind defend too widely, then tighten up a bit (or a lot ) and open raise bigger.

Originally posted by VorpalF2F

Originally posted by illwhisky
What are your thoughts on raising sizes?

If you're up against people with high 3Bet rates in the blinds, then opening smaller on the button makes sense.
The downside is that opening 2BB on the button gives BB the correct pot odds to call very, very wide.

If opponents in the blind defend too widely, then tighten up a bit (or a lot ) and open raise bigger.

Thank you for your feedback, which makes sense to me

As I´m one of the "old school" I assume, that most players on NL2 - especially on zoom - don´t think about bet sizings and call/raise with whatever they like to play. That's the reason why I want to make the above-mentioned experiment. And if I´m right with my assumption, I guess I would steal with 2bb/2,5bb as I did before and bet/raise my "default" range with 2,5bb/3,5bb. And by writing this, I don´t think that the majority at NL2 will notice this and would exploit me by 3betting more often.

As I have to report my progress for the Get Rich or Die Tryin' - The Bankroll Challenge every Monday, I will do this here as well, but with a little more background. I like the way Pokrovec in his Blog is doing this, so I will follow his example

Week 1
Format: NL2 SH zoom
Hands played: 750
Profit: -8,46 $

Overall statistics
Hands played: 750
Profit: -8,46 $
BR: 60,83 $

As I started on Saturday with this Blog and with the challenge I didn´t play a lot of hands - especially that I played on Saturday with my friends a couple of SNGs on PokerStars. And it seems that I´m a terrible SNG-player or that my friends had the luck on their site Without the SNGs, it would be a profit of 3,20 $ but with them, it's a small loss. But I think it was worth it because I had a great evening with my friends. And playing some home games on PokerStars is a great opportunity to play Poker with your friends during the pandemic.

Originally posted by illwhisky
Week 1
Format: NL2 SH zoom
Hands played: 750
Profit: -8,46 $

The graph shows a profit of €3.20, yet your post shows a loss of $8.64, yet both show 750 hands -- is this two different sessions?

Originally posted by VorpalF2F

Originally posted by illwhisky
Week 1
Format: NL2 SH zoom
Hands played: 750
Profit: -8,46 $

The graph shows a profit of €3.20, yet your post shows a loss of $8.64, yet both show 750 hands -- is this two different sessions?

yes, different sessions. In my regular NL2 games I won a little bit, but with the home games versus my friends, I lost more. Maybe it is not shown in the graph because it doesn´t show SNG. I´m not a PT4 expert , but maybe it's a licence problem, as I only have the Small Stakes license.

Ah -- I see.
I'm no PT4 expert either, but I don't think that you can combine a cash graph with a SNG graph.
Small Stakes should be fine though -- unless the home game was over the limit (and I can't remember what the limit is)

Cheers,
VS

I made some research...it is possible to combine them, but it shows only the winnings per day. Maybe this is interesting (or looks interesting) in long term, but not for two days.

In the last few days, I have played more than studying. For me playing poker after work is some kind of relaxing. But after some losing session, I decided to implement a stop-loss-limit of 3 buyins. And after hitting the stop-loss-limit I want to focus on analyzing my plays. For this reason, I asked for help in this post Improve game by analyzing. If you have suggestions, just let me know here or in the post.

Besides that, I´m still studying how to design good opening ranges and defending ranges. During the weekend I have more time to study, so let's see how far I get

To have a better overview, I will add a little learning backlog in my initial post.

Originally posted by illwhisky
The latest book I´m reading is No-Limit Hold'em for Advanced Players by Matthew Janda. After reading more than half of it, I will try to go chapter by chapter and try to apply the concepts and discuss the topics.

have you read applications first ?

Originally posted by illwhisky
I And after hitting the stop-loss-limit I want to focus on analyzing my plays. For this reason, I asked for help in this post Improve game by analyzing. If you have suggestions, just let me know here or in the post.

get a solver. GTO+ is very affordable.

Originally posted by Pokamon

Originally posted by illwhisky
The latest book I´m reading is No-Limit Hold'em for Advanced Players by Matthew Janda. After reading more than half of it, I will try to go chapter by chapter and try to apply the concepts and discuss the topics.

have you read applications first ?

Yes, I did, but it is some years ago. By designing my new ranges, I reread parts of Applications.

Originally posted by Pokamon

Originally posted by illwhisky
I And after hitting the stop-loss-limit I want to focus on analyzing my plays. For this reason, I asked for help in this post Improve game by analyzing. If you have suggestions, just let me know here or in the post.

get a solver. GTO+ is very affordable.

Maybe I will do so. But first I´m looking for a routine to review my sessions and to find leaks. I already have CREV and Flopzilla, and with both, I think the most use cases should be covered. Do you have any review routines?

Its time to report my progress....and sadly I lost again:f_frown:

Week 2
Format: NL2 SH zoom
Hands played: 8561
Profit: -28,10$

Overall statistics
Hands played: 9311
Profit: -36,58 $
BR: 32,78 $

And again our home games on PokerStars, where we are playing SNGs are destroying my bankroll. Maybe I should have a separate bankroll for these games, as these are for fun...