moving up

[fuzz66]

page 170 and 171 ''holdem poker for advanced players''instead of raising on the flop, you should often call,then go for the raise on 4th street.because that raise will knock people out. the raise on the flop wont''-david sklansky.[playing in loose games.]

[argybargy2002]

Fair enough. I have to admit almost all of my knowledge of the game comes from extensive practice and even more extensive trawling through the posts here. All I am saying is that in the horrible donkfest of a 5-10 game that I play at you will be leaving money at the table by not making people pay on the FLOP with their rubbish cards that they simply won't pay for on the TURN.

I haven't read it but perhaps Sklansky's book is referring to situations where the players have a pretty good idea of how to play. Unless Foxwoods 4-8 is very different to our 5-10, I'd take this advice with a grain of salt.

Or am I wrong with this?

[SeaEagle]

Who cares? The reason fuzz doesn't have a bankroll probably has very little to do with whether he raises his big hands on the flop or the turn - except that it's a warning sign that he might not know how to adjust his game to his opponents.

Fuzz, my advice is to post some hands here. Regardless of where you play, the smaller the stakes, the easier the game. Individual pots tend to get smaller as the stakes go up, so smaller stakes put a premium on maximizing pot sizes with your big hands whereas larger stakes put a premium on winning smaller pots and therefore playing more deceptively. However, you need both sets of skills to get the best win rate no matter where you play.

Don't post when your FH gets beat by quads, that's just bad luck. But if you played for 2 years and only broke even, there must be a lot of hands you play where you wonder if you played them right. Post some.

[Harv72b]

[ QUOTE ]
my reasoning for moving up in limits is that it seems that i win smaller pots against better players and lose bigger pots against weak players.i truly believe if i played against better players during my last break session,although i probably would have had a losing session,i would not have gone broke, maybe even won a little.im i wrong for thinking this?

[/ QUOTE ]

The italicized portion of your post is exactly what will happen any time you are up against opponents who are playing better than you. This will happen more, not less, often when you are playing at higher limits, against opponents who are (presumably) even better. Erego, if you were playing at a higher limit game and had the exact same run of cards, you would have gone busto sooner, not later.

You ran into some very tough luck hands, apparently--boats losing to four of a kinds, an ace high flush losing a straight flush, etc. How many raises did you put in after you were beat in those hands? Were the opponents who put in those extra raises generally passive? Did either of those full house vs. quads hands happen when there were 3 of a kind on the board?

Don't focus on the beats, or on how statistically unlikely they were to occur. Instead, focus on how you could have saved a bet or two when they did occur. Sometimes that's just not possible, and you are destined to lose the maximum number of bets in those pots. Most times, especially in a live game where you should have reasonably good reads on your opponents, it is possible.

Oh, and play with an appropriate bankroll. 200 BBs is not enough to guard against normal variance, even if you have next to no major holes in your game. The 24 hour sessions are also a bad idea.

[KurtSF]

[ QUOTE ]
theres a reason why poor players are sucking out on me with 1 or 2 outers and at the frequency its been happening lately, i cannot blame it on luck.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes, you can. In a game I was beating for 6BB/100 over 20k hands (that's equvalent to over 600 hours in a live game) I went on a downswing of 200BB. I was playing the exact same game against the exact same opponents, I wasn't tilting or changin my style. It happens.

Welcome to variance.

[ QUOTE ]
there has to be other ways i can play against weakies to prevent this. thats why i posted this thread.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes and no. You cannot prevent your boat getting sucked out on. You can fix the obvious leaks in your game and become a winning player.

I'm at work, but I will try to compose a nice long response for you tonight addressing you situation. But let me just say now that most of the posters in this thread are giving you better than you deserve with the combination of ignorance and attitude you came here with. Generally one or the other can be tolerated, but with both its lucky you got anythign but sarcastic smart-arse remaks.

[fuzz66]

thanks for everyones contributions to this thread.with the exception of daver and his belittling comments, ive gotten excellent feedback. this is an awsome forum.

[Hobbs.]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
my reasoning for moving up in limits is that it seems that i win smaller pots against better players and lose bigger pots against weak players.i truly believe if i played against better players during my last break session,although i probably would have had a losing session,i would not have gone broke, maybe even won a little.im i wrong for thinking this?

[/ QUOTE ]

It's your money. Just send Hobbs a PM before you take a shot at the 20 game.

[/ QUOTE ]
[img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[fuzz66]

ignorance, yes, i will admit.i dont see how any of my questions were arrogant.i stated earlier in this thread that i was an intermediate player looking to improve my game.i decided to post here because ive been reading these forums for a while now and i think most of the advice given here is outstanding.im not posting here to dazzle anyone on my poker genius. i want to learn, so, if my questions seem to irratate more knowledgable players here, i apologize.most of the books i study dont address '' bankroll management'' or '' variance'', but im going to find some that do.

[Craggoo]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
my reasoning for moving up in limits is that it seems that i win smaller pots against better players and lose bigger pots against weak players.i truly believe if i played against better players during my last break session,although i probably would have had a losing session,i would not have gone broke, maybe even won a little.im i wrong for thinking this?

[/ QUOTE ]

The italicized portion of your post is exactly what will happen any time you are up against opponents who are playing better than you. This will happen more, not less, often when you are playing at higher limits, against opponents who are (presumably) even better. Erego, if you were playing at a higher limit game and had the exact same run of cards, you would have gone busto sooner, not later.

You ran into some very tough luck hands, apparently--boats losing to four of a kinds, an ace high flush losing a straight flush, etc. How many raises did you put in after you were beat in those hands? Were the opponents who put in those extra raises generally passive? Did either of those full house vs. quads hands happen when there were 3 of a kind on the board?

Don't focus on the beats, or on how statistically unlikely they were to occur. Instead, focus on how you could have saved a bet or two when they did occur. Sometimes that's just not possible, and you are destined to lose the maximum number of bets in those pots. Most times, especially in a live game where you should have reasonably good reads on your opponents, it is possible.

Oh, and play with an appropriate bankroll. 200 BBs is not enough to guard against normal variance, even if you have next to no major holes in your game. The 24 hour sessions are also a bad idea.

[/ QUOTE ]

24 hour sessions are not a bad idea. In fact, i think they're a great idea. The longer you play the more you minimize variance. A while back i put in around 1k hours over the period of 4 months or so. I also put in around 6 sesssions all of which were 24 hours or longer. I came out a loser zero of those times. There would be points in the day where I would lose over and over again to two outters or runner runner flushes/straights. I remember one 24 hour sessoin where this old gentlemen hit a 2 outter against me 3 pots in a row. I couldn't believe his luck. Finally, variance worked itself out. He stopped hitting his 2 outters and eventually lost everything in front of him and in his wallet. My point in this litte story is that variance WILL work itself out. People's incredible luck never lasts forever. At the end of the 4 months i had a horrible streak of luck; I had 14 losing sessions in a row whereas I never had more than 3 in a row in over 4 months. This was playing 3/6 and 4/8 kill btw (mostly 3/6 though). My bankroll was about $2500 (more than double yours in terms of BB). Despite losing that $2500, I was still up about $3000 in that 4 month period.

[jjshabado]

[ QUOTE ]
page 170 and 171 ''holdem poker for advanced players''instead of raising on the flop, you should often call,then go for the raise on 4th street.because that raise will knock people out. the raise on the flop wont''-david sklansky.[playing in loose games.]

[/ QUOTE ]

The 2+2 books make people money in two ways. The first way is in teaching people how to play better, and the second way is that it causes people who don't read carefully and critically to play badly. That quote is for one specific scenario. Big pot, likely better to your right. You're playing with people that are frequently calling 2 bets on the flop but will fold to 2 big bets on the turn. You have a strong, but not monster hand.

I would strongly suggest putting down Hole'Em Poker for Advanced Players and reading Small Stakes Hold'em a bunch of times. Whenever I take the bus to AC to play I bring Small Stakes Hold'em and read it for at least 45-60 minutes because I forget tons of crap thats in there. I've also misunderstood parts of it (and still do misunderstand parts I'm sure), and when I re-read it I get better.