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#81
10-24-2006, 02:03 PM
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here is how to do it
take every poker psychology book you own and throw them away. you can buy them again when they matter.
you should buy "small stakes hold 'em" and read it. most likely your results are poor because you do not understand proper limit hold 'em strategy, not that you do not understand people. many correct strategies are counter-intuitive, especially when the pots become large. before every action you take you should think about your hand and try to figure out what you would like to accomplish with your hand. preflop, do you want to play against many people or just a few? are there already a few in and you want to play with just a few and hate playing against many? then you muck or maybe just call, never raise. do you want to play a big pot or a small pot with your hand? can you improve your position by raising? you are playing live, so you can actually look over at the people after you and decide if they are going to fold or not if you raise. postflop, now you think about your hand and think about what your opponents could have based on the preflop action. you look at the size of the pot and decide how you should play your hand. who will bet if you check? who is likely to raise? this and preflop are probably where you are losing a lot of money. you have a flush draw, and the pot is pretty big, so you don't raise a bet because you want to keep people in if you hit your flush, right? well, no not right. it depends. sometimes you want to thin the field so you can win the pot if you happen to make a pair. very counter-intuitive, but true. sometimes you want to just call. sometimes you want to call and then raise when it comes back to you. sometimes sometimes sometimes. it depends. do you even know what it depends upon? i doubt it. that's why you read small stakes hold 'em, because it tells you what to think about and why and what it depends on. these are the places you are likely making poor decisions and you can make better decisions by reading a book, posting and practicing. the absolute last thing you should be thinking about is anything psychological. that stuff is gravy on top of your strategy decisions. just ignore everything psychological until your game is really tight because it just gives you too much to think about and makes it harder to learn the best strategy. you have enough to think about without trying to get a world poker tour read on the guy who smiled when he bet. just ignore it and think about your hand strategically for now. later on, when you can automatically make the right decision 90% of the time, then you can use your spare processing power to try to figure out what the smile is likely to mean. the smile is unimportant anyway, since most of the tme even when you become a good people-reader, you will be forced to ignore it anyway because the pot is so big. at the end of every hand, ask yourself if you played it properly. when your top pair is beaten by a rivered gutshot, ask yourself if there was a way you could have gotten that gutshot to fold if you played the hand differently. probably at this point in your thinking you just think the guy sucks and gave you a bad beat. you bet the whole way and he called with a gutshot! a lot of the time though, it is your fault you lost. now you think about it... okay, betting didn't get him out. the pot was big so he was not really making a big mistake drawing to the gutshot. then the light will go on, what if i tried to check raise someone else so that the gutshot-drawer had to call two bets? then he might have folded. ohhhhhhhhhhhhhh, i messed up. ok. and you are on your way to zooming up through the limits. you should practice important things when you are not in the hand. practice playing every hand responsibly, so that you do not give away you are going to raise or fold or anything when you are going to. 83o? who cares if you look disinterested? you should. do you bet in a messy way? then when you bet, make sure it is nice and neat and controlled. every time. whether it's putting your big blind in or capping the river. you aren't in the hand so play a game that is try to guess what everyone has. don't get full of yourself and talk out loud. don't talk out loud ever. just sit there and guess. and look. and guess some more, and look. and, what will eventually happen is you will review your own play after the hand, and notice mistakes. and then that guy you thought played well, you will look at the hands he turns over, and notice mistakes because if the person really played perfectly, he probably wouldn't be playing 4/8. and then you will look around and notice that every single person you are playing with makes mistakes on every street. and then you will wonder if there are any good players at all in the casino. and you win a bunch of money and move up to the bigger games. and get crushed, of course, until you learn how to play in them. get crushed, but don't cry about luck or bad beats. you think hard about why you got crushed. was it really bad luck? the first time it happens, you will say yes. but you will rebuild at the lower limit game you can beat and then you will try again. and get crushed. and then, because you have been analyzing your play for so long, you notice new mistakes. you don't bluff enough or you fold too much or whatever. new, different mistakes. but the important thing is you have a habitual self-awareness that will allow you to (eventually) recognize and (hopefully) eliminate those new weaknesses. don't make excuses, ever. if you lost, you played bad. if you win, guess what, you played bad too. you will always make mistakes. always miss a bet here and there. you don't have to get down on yourself for it, you just try to work out all the kinks, every last one. and that is just the beginning. 
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#82
10-24-2006, 02:32 PM
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Re: here is how to do it
[ QUOTE ]
take every poker psychology book you own and throw them away. you can buy them again when they matter. you should buy "small stakes hold 'em" and read it. most likely your results are poor because you do not understand proper limit hold 'em strategy, not that you do not understand people. many correct strategies are counter-intuitive, especially when the pots become large. before every action you take you should think about your hand and try to figure out what you would like to accomplish with your hand. preflop, do you want to play against many people or just a few? are there already a few in and you want to play with just a few and hate playing against many? then you muck or maybe just call, never raise. do you want to play a big pot or a small pot with your hand? can you improve your position by raising? you are playing live, so you can actually look over at the people after you and decide if they are going to fold or not if you raise. postflop, now you think about your hand and think about what your opponents could have based on the preflop action. you look at the size of the pot and decide how you should play your hand. who will bet if you check? who is likely to raise? this and preflop are probably where you are losing a lot of money. you have a flush draw, and the pot is pretty big, so you don't raise a bet because you want to keep people in if you hit your flush, right? well, no not right. it depends. sometimes you want to thin the field so you can win the pot if you happen to make a pair. very counter-intuitive, but true. sometimes you want to just call. sometimes you want to call and then raise when it comes back to you. sometimes sometimes sometimes. it depends. do you even know what it depends upon? i doubt it. that's why you read small stakes hold 'em, because it tells you what to think about and why and what it depends on. these are the places you are likely making poor decisions and you can make better decisions by reading a book, posting and practicing. the absolute last thing you should be thinking about is anything psychological. that stuff is gravy on top of your strategy decisions. just ignore everything psychological until your game is really tight because it just gives you too much to think about and makes it harder to learn the best strategy. you have enough to think about without trying to get a world poker tour read on the guy who smiled when he bet. just ignore it and think about your hand strategically for now. later on, when you can automatically make the right decision 90% of the time, then you can use your spare processing power to try to figure out what the smile is likely to mean. the smile is unimportant anyway, since most of the tme even when you become a good people-reader, you will be forced to ignore it anyway because the pot is so big. at the end of every hand, ask yourself if you played it properly. when your top pair is beaten by a rivered gutshot, ask yourself if there was a way you could have gotten that gutshot to fold if you played the hand differently. probably at this point in your thinking you just think the guy sucks and gave you a bad beat. you bet the whole way and he called with a gutshot! a lot of the time though, it is your fault you lost. now you think about it... okay, betting didn't get him out. the pot was big so he was not really making a big mistake drawing to the gutshot. then the light will go on, what if i tried to check raise someone else so that the gutshot-drawer had to call two bets? then he might have folded. ohhhhhhhhhhhhhh, i messed up. ok. and you are on your way to zooming up through the limits. you should practice important things when you are not in the hand. practice playing every hand responsibly, so that you do not give away you are going to raise or fold or anything when you are going to. 83o? who cares if you look disinterested? you should. do you bet in a messy way? then when you bet, make sure it is nice and neat and controlled. every time. whether it's putting your big blind in or capping the river. you aren't in the hand so play a game that is try to guess what everyone has. don't get full of yourself and talk out loud. don't talk out loud ever. just sit there and guess. and look. and guess some more, and look. and, what will eventually happen is you will review your own play after the hand, and notice mistakes. and then that guy you thought played well, you will look at the hands he turns over, and notice mistakes because if the person really played perfectly, he probably wouldn't be playing 4/8. and then you will look around and notice that every single person you are playing with makes mistakes on every street. and then you will wonder if there are any good players at all in the casino. and you win a bunch of money and move up to the bigger games. and get crushed, of course, until you learn how to play in them. get crushed, but don't cry about luck or bad beats. you think hard about why you got crushed. was it really bad luck? the first time it happens, you will say yes. but you will rebuild at the lower limit game you can beat and then you will try again. and get crushed. and then, because you have been analyzing your play for so long, you notice new mistakes. you don't bluff enough or you fold too much or whatever. new, different mistakes. but the important thing is you have a habitual self-awareness that will allow you to (eventually) recognize and (hopefully) eliminate those new weaknesses. don't make excuses, ever. if you lost, you played bad. if you win, guess what, you played bad too. you will always make mistakes. always miss a bet here and there. you don't have to get down on yourself for it, you just try to work out all the kinks, every last one. and that is just the beginning. [/ QUOTE ] damn man, nice post.
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#84
10-24-2006, 11:08 PM
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Re: moving up
been reading TOP over and over, studying it.i was studying HEPFAP, but turned to TOP cause i thought HEPFAP was basically for higher limits.also, HOLDEM EXCELLENCE by krieger. every once in a while i turn to loose games section in HEPFAP.
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