Tilter's Annonymous. All tilters welcome.

[Guruman]

So I’ve suffered some remarkably demoralizing downswings over the last few months. Of course, you can’t suffer downswings if you catch a big run of great hands and I’ve caught the opposite of that. Lots of expensive second best hands, lots of river cards that make my hands but make the other guy’s hand a little better. Lots of good starting hands in position that whiff on the flop in big pots and get bet into in protected pot situations, etc. Those things cause downswings and I’m cool with that. I’m also freakin good at it, but whatever.

These downswings that I’m experiencing are compounded by various forms of tilt and generally poor decision-making. I’m going to attempt to list the multitudinous ways that I abuse my br, the various routines I have in place to attempt to mitigate these tilts, and then humbly ask for advice in resolving these insidious termites in my game. I’ll also try to list leaks that I believe that I have, and to keep them separate from the tilts.

I gotta say, I kinda feel like an alcoholic at an AA meeting asking for Jesus here, but well, my game has to be sick right now and it probably needs a little Jesus. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

So…

Hi, my name is René and I’m a tilter. [I’ll assume the “hi René” response [img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img]]

I guess I first started tilting when I realized that if I bet with nothing sometimes people would fold. Then it got worse when I found out that if I had been doing that for a while and ran into a hand then people would think I still had nothing and give me all kinds of action. It went downhill from there though, because when my timing was off I’d start winning small pots and losing big ones.

I realized I had a problem, so I found Tommy Angelo and did some research on what tilt is and what I can do about it. What Tommy taught me was that I’ll always be a tilter, but if I can manage to have an A game that can beat the other guy and if I stay closer to my A game for longer periods of time than the other guy, then I”ll win his money.

Tommy also taught me that there are many many forms of tilt because there are many many aspects of every session and every hand, so consequently there are many different opportunities to do things that I know better than to do.

Tilt is a crazy thing sometimes because it really doesn’t feel like tilt when you’re in the throes of it.

It feels like rational behavior.

It feels like normal logical thinking poker.

Its not though, and when you step back to review sessions and action and results the tilt stares back at you. It’s marked into your sessions and roles like a scar. The remains of a self-inflicted wound burned into the flesh of your bankroll.

And there it is: the vivid image of you clawing and tearing at your own roll. Ripping into it with eyes shut and mouth open. Justifying, complaining, thrashing, crashing, making excuses, and crushing your eyelids even further shut.

I’ve done that.

I’d like to stop.

Here are the specific things that I do to my poor br on a far too frequent basis:

1) Playing in games that are too tough.

-I suffer from a particularly onerous catch 22 when it comes to game and seat selection as they relate to mid-hand actions: I have to feel like I can pull off an appropriate bluff or make an appropriate laydown in order to feel like I’ve got enough of an edge to sit in a game. If I can’t make good postflop moves then I can’t sit, but if I can’t sit I can’t figure out if I can play well vs the opposition postflop. I’ve learned that preflop is a poor indicator of whether or not I can beat someone. There are two sides to winning poker: One side is to be better at guessing your opponent’s range of hands and then manipulating the action based on the read. The other side is to find games with brain-dead gambooooolers and just valuebet. When there are no maniac gamboolers, I’m forced to go the other way if I want to play, and too often I’ll look up and find myself in a game that I’ll have to play very very well in if I want to walk with a [theoretical] profit.

2) Watching my $$ at the table.

- Downswings of the magnitude that I’ve been experiencing do funny things to one’s expectation of results. During my first crushing downswing I attempted to use a tilt-blocker type coverup on my br when I bought in to each table. A problem started arising though, in that I’d keep accidentally getting all in with good hands because I had already taken my usual run of river suckouts, expensive secondbest hands, and postflop whiffs. I started buying in for double and the problem mitigated somewhat. I’d still be crushed when I’d pull the tiltblocker off and count up the 40bb or so loss at each table. What I was finding was that I was being too loose and too aggro when I didn’t know about the money. So I took it off and tightend back up, but now I watch my roll too closely again.

3) Demolition tilt

- This is usually a matter of losing a lot early in a session and just saying “F it I’m gonna wait for a big hand and get all in” I lose a lot these days and so I lose early a lot and the demo tilt comes along to clean things the rest of the way out.

4) Ego

- Generally the feeling that I have a distinct edge on someone. I’m sure I lose all kinds of money this way.

5) Pushing back when they’ve already dug in.

- I’ve got poor showdown radar sometimes, and I’ll tend to push back in spots where an opponent is already committed to turning his cards up at the end. This is mostly a leak and a deficiency in my A game, but it also registers as tilt in spots where I should know better.

6) Compounded tilt

- I’d call this generally the non-recognition of tilt as the tilt is occurring. I’ll push do something dumb and think, “ah, well he had that hand that time but he’ll tend not to in that spot so I’m ok” Then I’ll keep playing as though I didn’t do something stupid. This undoubtedly leads to further stupidity

7) Weaktight tilt

- I raise a lot pf, which has the eventual consequence of widening my opposition’s hand ranges. Sometimes I end up folding to further action when I could show down.

8) Loose passive tilt

- Sometimes I show down when I should be pushing back or folding. this tends to be out of confusion, and while this one is a leak in my A game, it can also register as tilt in spots where I know better.

9) Acting too fast tilt.

- this one should be much higher on the list because I know its one of the most frequent. Far far too often I’ll think to myself “checkraise turn, lead river” and then do that without looking at the damn river card. I’ll find myself in a situation where I have to call a river raise in a spot where I should have checked to price myself down cheaper. I almost never really make the mistake of checking too fast, its usually betting or raising too fast. I do this far far too much.

10) Ignoring pf tilt.

- this one’s like dieting or exercise to me. When we ignore the pf action and just go by the board, initiative, and postflop action we’re leaving out a very big part of the hand range equation. Its not hard to look at pf, but for some reason it can be a chore in spots, and when I don’t think about it but I should I’m tilting and losing money. I do this some, but not as much as I used to.

11) Ignoring protected pot tilt

- when a pot is multiway the actions have to be much more straightforward and the resulting actions have to take that into account. When I don’t but I know I should then I’m tilting and am likely to be doing something stupid.

12) Confusion tilt.

- If I don’t know where I’m at with a player or how I think I can beat him but I’m still stubbornly sitting there I’m tilting and losing money. This is similar to the first tilt I mentioned, which is sitting in games that are too tough, but the distinction is that I don’t know if this is a too tough spot or not. What I do know is that I don’t know what the hell I’m trying to accomplish, so I should sit back and re-evaluate before continuing any stupidity.

13) laziness tilt

- Lots of this in lots of spots. table selection, session review, thinking about pf, thinking about hand ranges, thinking away from the table, thinking while at the table, note taking, watching after folding, etc. I know better so therefore I should do better. These are all aspects of my A game, and when I fail to exercise them then I’m tilting and leaving money on the table.

14) distracted tilt

- barking dog, nagging wife, 2+2, hunger, thirst, etc. Outside of the dog I don’t suffer from this one much, but the rest of it can show up in spots if I don’t pay attention to those things before sitting down.

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k, I’m sure there’s more but that’s all I can come up with off the top of my head.

For the record, here are some common tilts that I think I do a good job of avoiding:

-surfing the interwebs tilt
-too many tables tilt
-tv tilt
-drunken tilt
-deadline tilt
-long session tilt

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so now I need your help, your support, and your suggestions. These tilts have combined with ugly cards and a sub-optimal A game to devastate my roll. When I play poker I like to win, and I haven’t won in a while. These are reasons why and I need some Jesus.

Thanks!