My degenerate tendancies....anyone have similar?
 

I've been making a living playing poker full time for 1.5 years and am mostly playing 2/4NL-5/10NL now.

For some reason I still am willing to pay people off on the river sometimes largely to feed my own curiosity. I "know" I am behind, but still call for a few hundred dollars. I avg a few hundred dollars an hour so it doesn't seem like a lot of money to me, but when I look back on it It is TONS.

It is a really odd feeling. Like my logic just completely shuts down and I make entirely emotional decisions. Afterwards it is like I get thrown back to earth.

It doesn't happen anywhere near enough to make me a fish but I bet it would add 1-2PTBB/100 if I could control this.

I've thought "JUST DONT DO IT" but somehow occasionally when the situation comes up it still happens. It feels beyond rational thought

thoughts?/sympathies?

Re: My degenerate tendancies....anyone have similar?
 

[ QUOTE ]
I avg a few hundred dollars an hour

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Is this even humanly possible at these limits? Golly I think perhaps it's time I learn NLH

Re: My degenerate tendancies....anyone have similar?
 

I easily get rid of these tendencies

Think, raise or fold.

If you are really really really close to raising, then call. Otherwise fold.

If you start saying that word that rhymes with call, then you are destined to lose, or win less than you should.

Most times when i make a crying call on the river, the chippies to towards my opponents. Thinking in terms of raising or folding, makes sure i dont pay off my opponents, while keeping my aggroness up!

Re: My degenerate tendancies....anyone have similar?
 

Sometimes when my friends watch me play I shake my head and say something like "wow, running flush again" and I end up paying off a bet in limit and see the flush. My friends just ask me why I didn't fold if I was so sure.

It doesn't just happen when people watch, a lot of times I pay off when I'm 85%+ sure I'm beat, just to make sure my read is good. Gotta stop doing that, the above post was a good one and I'll start thinking along those lines.

Re: My degenerate tendancies....anyone have similar?
 

nothing constructive to add, but yep, I do this too

Re: My degenerate tendancies....anyone have similar?
 

Sounds a lot like me, good thing I play minbet which means you never have to fold the river as long as your hand contains at least one picture.

Re: My degenerate tendancies....anyone have similar?
 

its the short term vs long term problem.

in the short term, its only one call, and you know if your read was right, meh, at least you were spot on, whereas if you fold, you'll never know.

this situation can repeat itself many times, especially when you know there is a chance he is bluffing.

i try to conquer it by saying to myself 'i am now good enough to make these folds, fold and move on'. but still, when you've been grinding for 3 hours and are fairly breakeven, i find it easier to make these calls becuase i just want to win some bucks - utility of winning $ is greater then of losing $ when been grinding for ages.

Re: My degenerate tendancies....anyone have similar?
 

i have trouble folding medium strength hands against uber donks

YEAH, BUT..................
 

What about the times you make the call and win? We tend to forget about that side of it since we think we are so smart. Paying off on the end can be winning poker too, although some times we feel like an idiot when we do that.
Things are not so obvious as we think, so if you are making a few hundred dollars an hour, I don't read this is a problem. It is just the cost of doing business.

Re: YEAH, BUT..................
 

[ QUOTE ]
What about the times you make the call and win? We tend to forget about that side of it since we think we are so smart. Paying off on the end can be winning poker too, although some times we feel like an idiot when we do that.
Things are not so obvious as we think, so if you are making a few hundred dollars an hour, I don't read this is a problem. It is just the cost of doing business.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not talking about this at all....I'm talking about calling out of curiosity and wanting to gamble not pot odds.

Re: My degenerate tendancies....anyone have similar?
 

[ QUOTE ]
I've been making a living playing poker full time for 1.5 years and am mostly playing 2/4NL-5/10NL now.

For some reason I still am willing to pay people off on the river sometimes largely to feed my own curiosity. I "know" I am behind, but still call for a few hundred dollars. I avg a few hundred dollars an hour so it doesn't seem like a lot of money to me, but when I look back on it It is TONS.

It is a really odd feeling. Like my logic just completely shuts down and I make entirely emotional decisions. Afterwards it is like I get thrown back to earth.

It doesn't happen anywhere near enough to make me a fish but I bet it would add 1-2PTBB/100 if I could control this.

I've thought "JUST DONT DO IT" but somehow occasionally when the situation comes up it still happens. It feels beyond rational thought

thoughts?/sympathies?

[/ QUOTE ]

if i was avging a few hundred an hour playing nl 2/4 - 5/10 in long run, id be a billionaire and i wouldnt be posting about my degenerate tendencies on 2p2 [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Re: My degenerate tendancies....anyone have similar?
 

Figure out why you are playing. It's not 100% 'for the money'.

Therefore, as it stands, you get exactly what you want from poker.

Re: My degenerate tendancies....anyone have similar?
 

perfect example, this is horror play from me.

2-4nl. utg limps. i have KK. i make it $24. button calls, utg calls.

flop 4 5 J

utg check, i check, button bets $20, utf folds, i raise to $80, he calls. now he has a set, at very worst flush draw, but i know he is pretty rocky.

turn 7, not a heart

i check, he has $240 back, he bets $113. now i KNOW he has a set, he has a set, without a doubt, at worst 45. i think until almost time is dead and raise for his last 130 bucks. he insta calls. i knew he had a set as i had repped an overpair, so he only bets 1/2 pot with a set. so [censored] annoying when i do that [censored].

i have no excuse. if it came up what he had i know i would of folded, just one of those times when you know if he does have the set at least you read it right, but there's no point in that if i cant find the fold button.

Re: YEAH, BUT..................
 

keep a note on ur computer to remind urself, it will add to ur hourly rate significantly, or u can give me ur sn if u want so i know who to push against [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Re: My degenerate tendancies....anyone have similar?
 

1. Poker is a game of incomplete information. That includes after the hand, not just during it. Accept that.

2. Folding in this situation on the river is a skill. In order to develop and then master a skill you must practice it. So, to that end, play as if the whole point of the game is to fold the river when you know you're beat. It's a good way to work on developing skills.

Good luck.

Re: My degenerate tendancies....anyone have similar?
 

sounds like you haven't learned to completely trust your read or you just aren't disciplined enough to make the tough laydowns. i don't think there's a magic bullet for this, you just have to start forcing yourself to make these folds. you can say you KNOW what he has and you just want to gamble/whatever, but making these calls is a leak and an aspect of your game you should actively work on improving. most people don't even know their leaks, you've got step 1 out of the way.

Re: My degenerate tendancies....anyone have similar?
 

As stated, you're already on your way.

You've identified a poker venial sin, and now you've confessed it. You can take comfort in the fact that you're not alone in committing this act.

Now I think you need to examine what the offense is, as you already have admitted its consequences.

In these situations, you decide to act against reason. Why? I'd say it stems from the human desire to be disobedient.

I really don't think that this spot is akin to degenerate gambling - though, like most of us, I'm sure you're guilty of that too.

The "feed my own curiosity" statement is closer to the mark, in my opinion. In fact, I'd say that's just way to justify acting in opposition to reason.

Well, what to do then? We can't exactly avoid these situations, can we? I'd like to think that as we grow as players, these situations will appear less frequently because our study and experience lead to in-game analysis that is more precise.

Even then, though, if we struggle with this issue some shadow of it likely still will be there; so for then and now:

Prepare yourself in advance for "the feeling." Believe me, I know what you're talking about. It's like time slows down a little and the room gets smaller. Then, you say to yourself, "I know this is wrong, but I'm going to do it anyway." And then you do.

By looking back at the times I've had "the feeling" (and how bad I feel afterwards), I've been able to recognize it as it creeps up on me. "Wait," I tell myself. "What's going on?" I realize that I'm in a bad spot and force myself to reevaluate the entire situation.

Then, I just go back to basics. And usually when I go through the action, consider my opponent, his range, his opinion of me, etc ... I fold.

Re: My degenerate tendancies....anyone have similar?
 

ski, very good description of a problem I also have, but much less now than in the past. Very well written.

Re: My degenerate tendancies....anyone have similar?
 

It's possible that your willingness to pay for information when you are behind might be part of your overall success if that information is valueable. For example, if you "know" he has a set. Then you get the the river with 2-pair, but now you're not sure because his line doesn't make sense. So you call to see what he did and why he did it. Now, in some later, similar hands with the same or similar villains, you can make better decisions than if you "folded" that first hand and had to play without experience in all those later hands.

I suspect that periodically paying for information when you're curious about a hand is not so much a leak as an investment in your decision-making process for future hands.