Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

This might be the last/second to last post for today because of the board being so slow - I'll reply to everything I see and then try again in a while.

[ QUOTE ]

Have you read any poker books? If so, which ones? and which ones helped you the most?

[/ QUOTE ]

The ones I think you have to read, in no particular order: TOP, TPFAP, HEFAP, HoH1, SSHE, and the Theory and Practice NL book (even if you don't play limit, and even if their advice is outdated now, the limit books on this list are really helpful for poker in general). A few others are useful for thinking hands through (like HoH3) even if some of their parts are wrong or badly written, but those are the ones I think everybody should pay attention to when reading.

[ QUOTE ]
What are some key concepts of poker that you know now that you wished you knew when you first started?

[/ QUOTE ]

This is sort of a diversion, but...

When people start out, I don't think they really need to learn how to 'play poker'. Just betting your hand, and checking when you don't have a hand, is enough to beat microstakes and even small stakes.

Everything else comes in as you naturally move up, but there's not really such a thing as a 'key concept of poker' that people need to know at, say, 25NL. At 2000NL, yeah, you'd better learn about all the fine points of river checkraising, but at lower stakes, basically anything other than checking when your hand sucks and betting when it doesn't is FPS, IMO.

[ QUOTE ]
Any advice for someone who just can't seem to win?

[/ QUOTE ]

See above. Poker isn't a hard game at low stakes - people just make it hard because they take a bunch of things they've learned from message board posters playing 10 limits above their buyin and apply it to their own game for no reason. If you start from the ground up, and then use tricks only against people you suspect to understand poker, you'll have a bankroll long before you have to worry about any advanced moves.

This is one of the theoretical underpinnings behind me coming up with a pushbot SNG system in all of 2 hours. At the time I made it, it beat the 55's on Pacific. It probably still does.

[ QUOTE ]

Any advice about bonus whoring? I am not sure if this is correct but I remember you advocating or recommending it someone?

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't know anything about it now, but I'm sure it's still good for a few grand to start out with, just like it always has been.

[ QUOTE ]
FT of some WSOP event. You, Ansky, MLG, and Nath are there. All have equal chip stacks of 75BBs. Who wins?

[/ QUOTE ]

The person that gets aces when someone else four bets light [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

[ QUOTE ]
Is it true that some people just "get it" and some don't?

[/ QUOTE ]

100%

[ QUOTE ]
If you had to break these things down, in terms of how important they are to be a long-term winning player, what would the breakdown be? (yes, they're not mutually exclusive, but deal with it --- I guess just rank them or something).
- Mental discipline (i.e., tilt control and control of the gambling instinct)
- mastery of the mathematics of poker
- good poker "feel"
- solid bankroll management
- experience
- having poker buddies to discuss poker with
- hand reading
- confidence
- being ranked on p5s
- being a well-rounded poker player
- poker/work/life balance
- happiness in other aspects of life

[/ QUOTE ]

Hmm...tilt control and BR management are probably one and two. Hand reading probably shouldn't be in this group, because any midstakes or higher winner is gonna have that by definition, *but* if you change it to "trusting your reads" it will be way up there. Poker buddies are really important, too, because once you graduate past hand questions, AIM is how people figure out advanced play. Everything else sort of depends on the individual.

[ QUOTE ]
Do you find yourself getting bored with poker ever? Honestly, is it something that challeneges/intrigues you equally, decreasingly, or increasingly over the past 4 years?

[/ QUOTE ]

Every time I do, I switch games. It's worked well so far, although I don't see myself going back to limit (because I don't think I understand how 50/100 is different from maniacing .50/1, so therefore I would be the fish) or SNG's (because they are the devil...I keep wanting to brush up on my final table pushbot play, but that'd require playing SNG's) ever. When in doubt, there's always HORSE and I can also always learn PLO next. Seriously...it's not rocket science, but then again, rocket science is probably way more boring than poker.

Also, winning large donkaments is awesome.

[ QUOTE ]

adanthar,
you have a very different style than many of the typical winning online MTTers...both on this board, and playing in general. What do you think the biggest differences are, and why do you think you developed a different approach?

[/ QUOTE ]

The prevailing wisdom is that most of the really big winners in poker are LAGs, and TAGs are sort of the junior varsity squad that cleans up lower games/get eaten alive at high stakes.

This is true, and it isn't. LAGs have a few big advantages at high stakes - I won't list them all, but I think the one people don't realize is the psychological mindset of a real loose aggressive gambler playing with 100K on the table vs. a tighter guy who has the same 100K, has aces and gets raised on the turn. Suddenly, it's not that the LAG is even playing that well, it's that the TAG is giving up a big mental edge. So they adapt (which means shifting their entire viewpoint) or die, and everyone thinks that this means no TAGs can ever cut it.

That's one reason. Another reason is that most TAGs don't fold. Read SSNL - they're all trying to play ABC TAG, and every time somebody has 22 on a K72r board and 7 people have raised and reraised in a row, the forum's collective advice is that 22 is the nuts. Because TAG's play fewer hands and get less chances to get paid off, they try to push everything hard and don't develop as much hand reading. So, again, it makes a generic TAG into a minor leaguer that can clean up midstakes but doesn't cut it any higher.

When I play my best, I am something different. I'm a TAG that trusts hand reading and can make some really big laydowns, but also make some 3 street calls and big resteals. In the right spots, this makes me very dangerous. When I play bad, it turns me into a weak/tight calling station. I try not to play bad very often...it hurts my roll.

[ QUOTE ]

As a lawyer, is this legal: http://www.cardplayer.com/poker_news/article/8111
Is the sky falling?

[/ QUOTE ]

It's sort of unsurprising given the current climate and I've no idea why they were still living in the US. This isn't about them being stockholders, it's about them founding a site with a mission statement of transferring money from the US to sportsbooks. Neteller will pull out a few months early, I guess...no permanent harm done after a couple of weeks. It's gonna stop further growth for a while, but that's about all UIGEA managed to do, too.

Still, that doesn't mean this is making me want to keep living in the States or anything.

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

how in gods name do you play fullring, im planning to play cake poker 1/2 and 2/4, been watching the 5/10 game a bit, and ionno how full ring works, if i can get that i will def start feeding that 1% of yours with my hard earned rake, but any tips on FR before i try it?

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

Hey sweet, 2+2 is back after mourning Neteller or something. I've got a 7:30 AM wakeup call for a client (gee I wonder why I wanna quit soon) so let me wrap it up for tonight:

[ QUOTE ]
are you the best tournament player in the mtt forum (define that however you will)?

I had this conversation with someone at the pca who thought you were too tight, but (at least from your posting, since I've played very little with you), I would pick you as the best tournament player on 2p2. Maybe it's just cause of the extreme confidence you give off in all of your strategy posts, I dunno. Who's better than you, and why? And are you too tight?

also, nice to meet you at the pca. I like your style.

[/ QUOTE ]

Thanks man. I definitely played very tight at the PCA, which had as much to do with the table as with the cards I was getting (at one point I went ~3 hours without a top 10% hand at a table with ZJ, AJ and a super bad maniac to my left...I swear, every time I wanted to open something like J9, I'd look left and he was stacking his chips). But one thing that nobody knows because I didn't tell them, until now, was that out of the four times I reraised somebody PF on day 1 (three of them in the last level with big antes), I had air 3/4. Also, on one of the few hands I did play, I doubled up with a set against a guy that checkraised me with middle pair on an ace high board. It goes with the image.

No, I'm not the best tournament player on 2+2 or in MTTC. But I believe I can hold my own with the best of them...which isn't to say I am as good as them, it just means that I'm a tough out. It's also worth mentioning I will never play the same tourneys most tourney pros do except on Sundays, because I do a lot of game selection and stuff like the 109r is just totally not worth it to me with all the soft spots out there.

[ QUOTE ]
how in gods name do you play fullring, im planning to play cake poker 1/2 and 2/4, been watching the 5/10 game a bit, and ionno how full ring works, if i can get that i will def start feeding that 1% of yours with my hard earned rake, but any tips on FR before i try it?

[/ QUOTE ]

Okay, for starters, don't take my game today to be a lesson in anything because for some reason I was playing B- and left early, heh. In addition, Cake is very opponent specific. That said, here is a rough guide to playing full ring on a site like Cake (lots of loose passives PF, LAGgy horrible play postflop):

Step 1: limp/call everything
Step 2: make the nuts
Step 3: bet (unless the guy will bluff a lot, then check)
Step 4: if you have an overpair and are raised on the flop by a bad player, fold

That's pretty much it. I take my 1% cut in any possible way except Neteller?

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

[ QUOTE ]

Step 1: limp/call everything
Step 2: make the nuts
Step 3: bet (unless the guy will bluff a lot, then check)
Step 4: if you have an overpair and are raised on the flop by a bad player, fold

That's pretty much it. I take my 1% cut in any possible way except Neteller?

[/ QUOTE ]
Step 5: Don't get sucked out on HYACHACHACHAHAHAHAHHAHCAH.

Anyway, my question is: what are my leaks lol?

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

oh, the person I talked to was a 2p2er and meant you were too tight in general, not just at the pca. thoughts?

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

[ QUOTE ]
Irieguy in STT's posted a long thread about this that, unfortunately, I don't remember the title of...it's worth trying to find it, though.


[/ QUOTE ]

Holla

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

adanthar, a fair number of intelligent posters talk about how easy sngs are to beat and yet, few of them seem to want to play them. why stop beating the 55s on pacific?

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Irieguy in STT's posted a long thread about this that, unfortunately, I don't remember the title of...it's worth trying to find it, though.


[/ QUOTE ]

Holla

[/ QUOTE ]

I hadn't read that post before. Glad it got brought back up as it's a very good post. Short too. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

[ QUOTE ]
adanthar, a fair number of intelligent posters talk about how easy sngs are to beat and yet, few of them seem to want to play them. why stop beating the 55s on pacific?

[/ QUOTE ]

I played on Pacific(2yrs ago maybe?) to bonus whore and you could only play one table at a time. I've heard now you can play 4 although I'm not 100% sure. This table limit makes it a waste of time to play there since you could be playing 8 tabling at other sites with thousands more players.

Also, SNGs have a profit ceiling and once you hit that at the 215s, 530s, or whatever the kids are playing these days, the general progression has been a switch to cash games where there is more money to be made.

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

You've mentioned before (and in passing in this thread) that your playing style is very read-dependent. Some questions about that:

1. At a table of ok to pretty good (but not very good) players, what specifically are you looking for?

2. Do you base reads on frequencies that a player does something, even if there's no showdown to confirm what they had? For example, I cbet the first three heads up flops I see...can you draw any assumptions from this? I open raise twice from MP the first time around after I'm moved to your table...anything to do with this knowledge?

3. Do you consider reads to be more valuable against good players, or against bad players?

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

[ QUOTE ]
oh, the person I talked to was a 2p2er and meant you were too tight in general, not just at the pca. thoughts?

[/ QUOTE ]

*shrug* One thing I can think of is that when I'm on autopilot, I definitely also play very tight, maybe 13/10ish in PT. If I have other things to do, I play on autopilot a lot, so that could be it, too.

A bunch of this is because I don't care about LP steals all that much, really (especially in the last six months when tournaments have started playing more aggro). In fact, with a healthy stack I rarely steal at all. One resteal is worth almost 3 steals, y'know...

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
adanthar, a fair number of intelligent posters talk about how easy sngs are to beat and yet, few of them seem to want to play them. why stop beating the 55s on pacific?

[/ QUOTE ]

I played on Pacific(2yrs ago maybe?) to bonus whore and you could only play one table at a time. I've heard now you can play 4 although I'm not 100% sure. This table limit makes it a waste of time to play there since you could be playing 8 tabling at other sites with thousands more players.

Also, SNGs have a profit ceiling and once you hit that at the 215s, 530s, or whatever the kids are playing these days, the general progression has been a switch to cash games where there is more money to be made.

[/ QUOTE ]

I never played at Pacific myself (a guy PM'd me he used my strategy there and it worked through a decent sample size, heh), but basically, this. Playing the 530's requires a very specific skillset, memorizing pushbot charts endlessly, and then gets you (5% x # tables)/hour...so, a very highly trained monkey could do it, and then on top of that, in order to net actual money, you need to do 20 tables of them at a time, so you also go through 1500 break even stretches over the course of, say, a week. It's enough to kill yourself and I've got no idea how people still do it.

[ QUOTE ]
You've mentioned before (and in passing in this thread) that your playing style is very read-dependent. Some questions about that:

1. At a table of ok to pretty good (but not very good) players, what specifically are you looking for?

2. Do you base reads on frequencies that a player does something, even if there's no showdown to confirm what they had? For example, I cbet the first three heads up flops I see...can you draw any assumptions from this? I open raise twice from MP the first time around after I'm moved to your table...anything to do with this knowledge?

3. Do you consider reads to be more valuable against good players, or against bad players?

[/ QUOTE ]

These are good questions, but the answers are pretty specific and I don't want to give away too much. Okay...let's say we're playing on Stars. Stars has the mighty 4x raise tell, which alone is worth a ton, but basically *any* raise size on Stars that isn't a 3x slider raise is some kind of tell 80%+ of the time. Then it's just a question of whether those people call light or are giving off reverse tells, etc.

Now let's say we're playing at Bodog. Bodog doesn't really have default bet size tells, but it does have (to name two things) big stacks that limp light (but don't raise light) and a high share of bubble stallers. So, there, I try to pwn limpers fairly often and abuse the bubble like crazy - it works far better than at Stars, where people have been trained to call light on the bubble for months now.

That's how the basic, site level reads should work (and yes, they exist for every site/are extremely important for some.) To go further, you take that default profile and modify it based on the person's PA HUD stats, what you've seen him show down, how likely it is that that reraise you saw was a squeeze, and so on.

Whether a player is good or bad is nowhere near as important as the type of good or bad he actually is and what the metagame is at the moment. There are some really bad LAGs that are very hard to exploit ordinarily if they're, say, on your left in a tournament when everyone has 20 BB, and there are some normally really good, tight players that nonetheless make ridiculous bubble folds/just don't understand their implied odds in a given situation aren't what they think they are. Basically, it's not whether they're good or bad, it's whether they're accidentally playing (in)correctly at the moment and what you can do about it.

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

This is another teenage list question. [img]/images/graemlins/blush.gif[/img] There is a 6-handed poker invitational and you make the final table. The money is worth winning enough to be motivational but not enough to skew the point of the question. Which five players would you most like to pit yourself against?

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

I get the point of the question, but I don't care too much about being the best, just winning the most money. Game selection matters enough to me that you'll never see me at a table with anyone remotely 'good' unless it's in a tournament or there's a gigantic fish or six to balance it out.

but to answer your actual question, Ivey, Negreanu, Cunningham, Patrick Antonius and Barry G. would probably be it...and then they'd own me so I'd win no money, which sucks. Therefore, I'd like to pit myself against five people that have never heard of the word 'poker' before. That works out well.

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

Hmmm...now I'm going to have to post those questions on MTT and see if anyone else is willing to spill the beans. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Another question - how much time do you spend analyzing/learning vs. actually playing? Was the % breakdown different when you weren't that good yet?

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

1. Do you see much differences in action/play styles between online MTT vs live MTT? If so, what are they?

2. Do you consider playing online MTTs as practice and live events as real war field?

3. Do you any negative parts (if there are any) of online poker by allowing teenagers to play real money poker before they reach 21?

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

[ QUOTE ]
Another question - how much time do you spend analyzing/learning vs. actually playing? Was the % breakdown different when you weren't that good yet?

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't really have specific percentages, nor do I actually play that much poker, heh. I don't think a day goes by that I don't spend at least some time thinking about a hand or AIM'ing with somebody about something they just played, though. A lot of the learning part is just multitasking while playing nowadays.

[ QUOTE ]
1. Do you see much differences in action/play styles between online MTT vs live MTT? If so, what are they?

2. Do you consider playing online MTTs as practice and live events as real war field?

3. Do you any negative parts (if there are any) of online poker by allowing teenagers to play real money poker before they reach 21?

[/ QUOTE ]

1. Oh god live players are so bad...

2. ...so bad that live is pretty much the practice part, if anything. I mean, the PCA was an obnoxiously tough field this year, but it wasn't exactly the WCOOP ME. Hell, I might've had the toughest draw in the tournament and a guy at my table still managed to just call with the nuts on the river.

3. For starters, if America ever fully legalizes poker, 21 and up will be a requirement for sites to avoid prosecution. I don't think that's even a question, and I do think that poker will eventually gain some sort of legal status, so what's happening on gambling sites now is short term at best.

My personal feelings on the matter, FWIW: winning players have a very different perspective on poker than losing players, and teenagers have a different perspective on money than people that have held down a job. The psychological effects of *winning* upon teenagers are written all over this forum, and to be honest, they aren't exactly a positive (just look at the amount of money the average 20 year old BBV poster has saved vs. the money he has spent on coke and hookers.) The psychological effects of losing money is equally bad even for winning players - I'm sure there are people on antidepressants from losing streaks right now in this very forum - and while I have no idea what it is on losers, I assume it can be worse.

Yeah, we all know some underage players that can handle it, but I don't think the vast majority of 18 year olds is or should be trusted to handle online bankrolls, winners or losers. I'm not foolish enough to think that this is a popular stance here, but regardless, my personal beliefs don't even matter in this situation. The reality is that if and when America decides to tax online gambling rather than ban it, an age limit will certainly be part of that deal.

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

One last question for you.
[ QUOTE ]

3. The psychological effects of *winning* upon teenagers are written all over this forum, and to be honest, they aren't exactly a positive (just look at the amount of money the average 20 year old BBV poster has saved vs. the money he has spent on coke and hookers.) The psychological effects of losing money is equally bad even for winning players - I'm sure there are people on antidepressants from losing streaks right now in this very forum - and while I have no idea what it is on losers, I assume it can be worse.

Yeah, we all know some underage players that can handle it, but I don't think the vast majority of 18 year olds is or should be trusted to handle online bankrolls, winners or losers. I'm not foolish enough to think that this is a popular stance here, but regardless, my personal beliefs don't even matter in this situation.

[/ QUOTE ]

I appreciate your honest and frank statement for this *unpopular* stance. As grown-up, we all know the reality doesn't have to be popular in naive minds. We know poker is a "zero sum game", players don't produce anything but rather than transferring money among people. 5% top players take the rest 95% ones' money. The deny of reality drives the losers to participate in the game.

If you later on become a well-known pros and own a popular poker website, will you allocate significant budget to educate young players from being too addicative and being unrealistic about the game?

Thanks. NYW.

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

Poker is actually a negative sum game, not a zero sum game (other than home poker).

Are you suggesting that Cake Poker should publicize the potentially negative effects of poker on youth?

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

[ QUOTE ]
Poker is actually a negative sum game, not a zero sum game (other than home poker).

Are you suggesting that online Poker should protect the youth from potentially negative effects of poker.

[/ QUOTE ]

From business point of view, you think it's more profitable to rake the entire $40k education fund from a young kid and let him broke without ever graducating OR let the same smart kid finishes the best law school and get a $200K job then come back playing poker at your site for a lifetime? which one is a win-win situation when you take the entire society as a whole?

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

I'm not disagreeing with you at all. Just couldn't tell from your post whether you knew that Adanthar actually owns 1% of Cake Poker or not.

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

I was the same way through law school. Found poker and hardly ever went to class again (B+ avg lol) only problem is i never got good enough to be making posts like this [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]. Now I'm an attorney two years out and F'ing hate it. Knew I should have gone to pharmacy school.

In any case, a couple things, if you are still answering:

1. You mention being a winner at the high mid level cash games but because of your sng/mtt cautiousness you are not so much a winner at HSNL. COuld you elaborate on the mentality you feel is necessary for those level games. I would also like to point out that I have heard it said by several TV pros (The Grinder comes to mind) that in the HSNL games they play much more cautious then when in a MTT.

2. I was interested by your comment that you wish you had developed your cash game fundamentals before your tourney skills. Elaborate? I too have come to feel this way. (NOTE: i am an all around small stakes player). I started out online briefly with cash games until i found SNGs. Moved from 5s to 10s to 20s over the course of a year w +15% ROIs at each level. Then started to play MTTs and have by far made the most money in that format. However, I felt i was a weak later street poker player and have spent the past 5 months or so at the micro stakes. Sadly, I am barely beating this level (~1.5-2BB/100 over 15000 hands .25/.5). Is this a waste of time? Should i just go back to my nitty bot-like tourney ways that at least made me money? Being unable to soundly beat the microcash games makes me believe i am likely one of the ones who does NOT "get it". sigh.

3. What are your thoughts on overmanaging one's bankroll? I began to play online poker about 3 years ago through some promotion where I got a free $50 bucks. Since that time I have never put a dime of my own money into online poker. Over that 3 year period I have withdrawn around $10K from MTT scores (primarily) and SNG grinding. Over that time, I have never let my online BR remain over $700. although i am proud of my BR discipline, I know this behavior has stunted my growth to higher stakes of play. I guess im just a nitty dude.

4. Do you have any particularly nutty poker stories you would care to share?

Thanks for all your responses thus far. It has been a great read.

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Poker is actually a negative sum game, not a zero sum game (other than home poker).

Are you suggesting that online Poker should protect the youth from potentially negative effects of poker.

[/ QUOTE ]

From business point of view, you think it's more profitable to rake the entire $40k education fund from a young kid and let him broke without ever graducating OR let the same smart kid finishes the best law school and get a $200K job then come back playing poker at your site for a lifetime? which one is a win-win situation when you take the entire society as a whole?

[/ QUOTE ]

the 40k. and it's not even close.

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

Adanthar,
Thanks for the great thread. My question is concerning distractions. When I play I typically have 3-4 tables (cash/mtt's) running, the tv is on, and im browsing espn, 2p2 etc... And im also have conversations with my wife. This might somewhat explain my horrible results lately.

What is going on in your world when you typically sit down and get ready to play a session? Do you browse, watch tv, talk to wife etc...? Thanks.

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

Adanthar,

Are there any threads that clicked the light bulb on for you?
What are they?

How often do you review your own play? What is your method for reviewing?


What are you working on these days to improve your game?





many thanks


MT2R

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

[ QUOTE ]
I appreciate your honest and frank statement for this *unpopular* stance. As grown-up, we all know the reality doesn't have to be popular in naive minds. We know poker is a "zero sum game", players don't produce anything but rather than transferring money among people. 5% top players take the rest 95% ones' money. The deny of reality drives the losers to participate in the game.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't think this is true. My guess at the actual number is...let's call it 10/70/20. Most poker players are neither big winners nor big losers; they are marginal 'something''s that wind up paying some money to a poker site or a casino, at around the same rate that they would spend on other entertainment, or perhaps even making a small profit. A few are big winners. A sizable chunk at the other end are big losers, who may either be rich or actual degenerate gamblers. (Sometimes, a marginal player will be in this group, too, as a winner at lower stakes moves up too fast or a break even player decides to blow his roll at Party blackjack.) That should give you an idea of where I come from on the next reply.

[ QUOTE ]
You are an owner of Cake Poker, 'sup with this stance/will you spend lots of money on anti-gambling ads?

[/ QUOTE ]

Well, first off, there's the significant issue that I'm not even allowed to do anything other than hold stock, and second, the other significant issue that just because I won a tournament with the first place prize of "a bunch of stock" doesn't mean that anybody has to actually listen to me. Therefore, 100% of the following answer is strictly theoretical.

If I *ran* a poker site, I would say this: on the one hand, poker players are (presumably) consenting adults. On the other, gambling addiction *is* a real problem and nobody wants to be this generation's Big Tobacco executive. Having said that, poker, unlike casino gambling, is something that anybody can be a winner at; it doesn't even take a lot of study. Again, we all know of average 18 year olds (less in some cases, heh) that have six figure rolls from poker...so, clearly, a losing player is losing of his own free will.

Personally, as a player, I like the fact that Cake has a couple of prominent tabs devoted to limiting deposits/banning yourself from the site/etc., not least because I do feel that this encourages a losing player to take responsibility for his own choices (BTW, I also like the Stars way of letting people ban themselves from certain *limits*, too). In addition, as I said earlier, the vast majority of teenagers are not good at making decisions involving tens of thousands of dollars, so yes, I would support a 21+ age limit.

Am I a hypocrite for doing that when half of 2+2 is under 21? Meh. I'm glad you guys (meaning, those of you that are non-degen teenagers) are winners, and I'm also glad that I don't run a poker site, I just happen to have won a bunch of stock the week before last. Otherwise I'd have to, like, employ a PR guy to be good at not saying anything meaningful in message board posts.

[ QUOTE ]

1. You mention being a winner at the high mid level cash games but because of your sng/mtt cautiousness you are not so much a winner at HSNL. COuld you elaborate on the mentality you feel is necessary for those level games. I would also like to point out that I have heard it said by several TV pros (The Grinder comes to mind) that in the HSNL games they play much more cautious then when in a MTT.

2. I was interested by your comment that you wish you had developed your cash game fundamentals before your tourney skills. Elaborate? I too have come to feel this way. (NOTE: i am an all around small stakes player). I started out online briefly with cash games until i found SNGs. Moved from 5s to 10s to 20s over the course of a year w +15% ROIs at each level. Then started to play MTTs and have by far made the most money in that format. However, I felt i was a weak later street poker player and have spent the past 5 months or so at the micro stakes. Sadly, I am barely beating this level (~1.5-2BB/100 over 15000 hands .25/.5). Is this a waste of time? Should i just go back to my nitty bot-like tourney ways that at least made me money? Being unable to soundly beat the microcash games makes me believe i am likely one of the ones who does NOT "get it". sigh.

[/ QUOTE ]

I *am* a winner at every game I've ever played, including 10/20 NL (okay, I think I might've been breakeven or a slight loser at 30/60 HORSE back when that game ran on Stars, but not by much). However, I practice game selection more than 90%+ of the pros on the site, so when I say 'win at 10/20 NL' I don't mean 'while sitting down with a bloody sweater'.

The pros at 10/20+ (and by this, I mean the ones who don't quickly go busto) possess three skills that MTT and SNG players do not ever develop. One is high level bankroll management and risk tolerance, to the point where they are fine with losing five or six figures in one night. No tournament player ever experiences that, and the switch to it is very jarring unless you run *really* hot. The second is deep stack play, which has been covered extensively in other threads, but is also much easier to develop if you start at the bottom. Finally, there's deep shorthanded play, something that sit and go players don't really know anything about (with 10 BB doesn't count) and a very good MTT player might see once every couple of weeks.

Therefore, when MTT and SNG players switch to cash, they tend, with some exceptions, to play very nitty. This usually hinders their development (note my post on page 1) and almost always cripples them against the *good* LAGs that you rarely see in MTT's.

So back to the point...I win, and intend to continue winning, at stakes that would've been called nosebleed a year ago (let's not forget that 18 months ago, Party maxed out at 200 NL and most people were happy playing 15/30 limit). I also beat midstakes 6 max, so I'm not going to say I'm a bad cash game player. But I do think that I would be further along at this point if I'd played NL cash from the start, and I also know I'm going to fall further behind the standard "rush up the stakes as soon as you see a fish" development curve (because the games where I know I'm a big winner at happen to be full ring) before eventually catching up.

Do I really care? Nah. I make plenty of cash anyway, and like I said earlier, I don't feel the need to get my sweater bloody. It would be nice to move up at the same rates as durr/raptor, though.

[ QUOTE ]

3. What are your thoughts on overmanaging one's bankroll? I began to play online poker about 3 years ago through some promotion where I got a free $50 bucks. Since that time I have never put a dime of my own money into online poker. Over that 3 year period I have withdrawn around $10K from MTT scores (primarily) and SNG grinding. Over that time, I have never let my online BR remain over $700. although i am proud of my BR discipline, I know this behavior has stunted my growth to higher stakes of play. I guess im just a nitty dude.

[/ QUOTE ]

Okay, let's be logical about this: you are an attorney making, I assume, a decent amount a year. Your hobby makes you a few thousand a year, too. Not bad, but you want more, and yet you never keep a roll over what is needed to beat the mighty 50 NL game. Obviously, this just isn't going to happen.

You're scared that you might not really get the game. Since you've maxed out at 50 NL, that's probably true right now, and what's more than that, you're not even supposed to (because optimally playing 50 NL isn't poker, it's TPTK mining.) So...what's stopping you from taking all 10K and moving up to .50/1, where you still have a hundred buyins? You aren't relying on it for income, so...just go for it. At worst, you'll break even for a while and learn something more than at 50 NL...then win a bit, keep moving up and so on. Most of us got there that way at one time or another.

[ QUOTE ]

Adanthar,
Thanks for the great thread. My question is concerning distractions. When I play I typically have 3-4 tables (cash/mtt's) running, the tv is on, and im browsing espn, 2p2 etc... And im also have conversations with my wife. This might somewhat explain my horrible results lately.

What is going on in your world when you typically sit down and get ready to play a session? Do you browse, watch tv, talk to wife etc...? Thanks.

[/ QUOTE ]

I generally autopilot MTT's early on unless they're big and/or important...some light TV, some websurfing, and my wife is in the chair next to me usually surfing, too. I blame the case of ADHD that is causing me to go ooh look bikes





okay...yeah, I play suboptimally when I'm not concentrating, and yeah, I don't usually *fully* concentrate. I think I'm reasonably equipped to handle that by now solely because it's something I'm used to, but the other part of that is once on the bubble and later, and while playing 5/10 NL+, you really do have to pay attention. How you get yourself to do that is up to you.

It helps that my wife's been with me since just before I started playing, so that she 'grew up with this' and completely understands/agrees with me when I tell her I need to tune her out for a while [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] Having somebody that knows what you're going through next to you while making a big decision is really awesome.

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

[ QUOTE ]
4. Do you have any particularly nutty poker stories you would care to share?

[/ QUOTE ]

Honestly, the worst thing in the world when going through a casino during a major tournament is listening to some jackass talk about his bad beat for the 763'rd thousandth time, so not really [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

FWIW, though, since I'm just getting into 10/20 now I still have some 'wow' factor every time I realize I just won (or lost) a used car on one hand...okay, a whole bunch of it.

[ QUOTE ]
Adanthar,

Are there any threads that clicked the light bulb on for you?
What are they?

[/ QUOTE ]

Once upon a time, there was an SNG pro called Gigabet. Gigabet crushed SNG's...I mean literally crushed them, for ROI's that would be considered 5x unattainable today...and no one knew why. (Well, it turns out a bunch of that was from cheating, but the cheating came long after this story.) He was so ridiculously LAGgy compared to every other ABC player that had the same exact playstyle in SNG's, and yet he won more than DERB ever did playing limit. Most people boggled.

At the same time, I was coming up through the SNG ranks and discovered satellites at the same time as Party came out with the Step 5 2-tables. Oh look, satellites to satellites...yum.

A month into this new 'play as many of those as you can' craze, I had stockpiled a few Step 5 freerolls, but by then people were directly buying in and feeding off the conveyer belt of fish straight off the top. Rather than jump in, I wound up datamining the games. At some point I made a post about that, Gigabet PM'd me and asked what I could get out of PT from those datamined hands.

So...I spent two weeks compiling dossiers on the top dozen SNG players at Party, including every hand they ever played and ever showed down, and then talking about them with Gigabet to determine how to exploit their tendencies. As a bonus, I got about fifty Gigabet HH's, just to see if I could track anything on his play that needed to be fixed, too.

I came out of that 10x better than I went in, and it's not close. If there's *one* way to get better...take a pro with a style you want to know more about and datamine all his games.

[ QUOTE ]
How often do you review your own play? What is your method for reviewing?


What are you working on these days to improve your game?

[/ QUOTE ]

These days, it's mostly AIM. If a hand isn't basic to me, I wind up talking about it to one person or another. Occasionally, I'll still post it on 2+2, especially if it's 6 max or HSNL which I'm not used to, but most talk between posters with '04 and some '05 regdates takes place on AIM these days. It's not that we don't want to post, it's that it's often not helpful to put a hand on the board and get a bunch of replies that are starstruck/others by random people with 30 posts. At any rate, most hands at this point are either heavily read based or do tend to be basic...there's only so many ways you can play AK, y'know?

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

how fast did you move up to 5/10, i.e how many hands did you spend at each lower level? what prompted you that you were ready to move up and what was your br when you did? im currently playing 1/2 and am not too far away from moving up, but not sure exactly when, so wondering if you can give me any insight on the above questions.

also, i was wondering if you think, aside from stupid things people do with their money, if you think it is a negative or a positive that a lot of players, those under or around 21, get to build a br and not have to worry about busting it, or if they do their life isnt over, they get a few years to build a br and learn so when they do have to live on their own they aren't risking as much already knowing how to play the game to some extent. i'd think it a positive that people are allowed to learn to play poker when hte money doesnt really matter to them so they can learn unafraid

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

Great Well so far. I dont have any questions at this time but I do enjoy reading all your posts.

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

We'll give this a try since you're answering everything. I always make it a point to read your posts to improve my game. Your logic in your posts is very well written. How would you like to take on a mini protege (like Negreanu)?...namely me of course. I'm a teacher and have the whole summer to devote to poker.

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

[ QUOTE ]
how fast did you move up to 5/10, i.e how many hands did you spend at each lower level? what prompted you that you were ready to move up and what was your br when you did? im currently playing 1/2 and am not too far away from moving up, but not sure exactly when, so wondering if you can give me any insight on the above questions.

[/ QUOTE ]

Since I switch games so often, I don't move up so much as sideways. But generally, since I know I beat MTT's at pretty much any buyin, I went to 2/4 at first solely to make sure I had the concepts down and then moved up immediately. If I had bankroll to worry about, I'd probably do 30-50 buyins and/or 'whenever I feel like everyone else sucks'. The second rule is more important than the first, since it minimizes the swings.

edit: this is for full ring and the bastard stepchild mix of FR/shorthanded that runs on small sites at high limits, though. Let's say I wanted to learn 6 max again: I know I can beat 2/4, so I'd play it for 10K hands or so just to acclimatize, move up to 3/6 until I was sure they sucked, move up to 5/10 immediately afterwards etc. If there was a big downswing in there I'd immediately move down to work some kinks out, or stop playing with guys I thought were owning me until I checked out what I was doing wrong. Again though, this assumes you have the BR for it and aren't afraid of the stakes.

[ QUOTE ]
also, i was wondering if you think, aside from stupid things people do with their money, if you think it is a negative or a positive that a lot of players, those under or around 21, get to build a br and not have to worry about busting it, or if they do their life isnt over, they get a few years to build a br and learn so when they do have to live on their own they aren't risking as much already knowing how to play the game to some extent. i'd think it a positive that people are allowed to learn to play poker when hte money doesnt really matter to them so they can learn unafraid

[/ QUOTE ]

From the outside this just sounds ugly...think about it. Not everyone's a winning player, and not everyone wants to learn to play nosebleed stakes. You're basically saying that 18 year olds should train themselves to play for less $ now so they can lose more and not feel bad later on.

I mean, I know that you, personally, are a winning player. I understand your position, and if I were you, ActionJeff or Ozzy, I'd easily do whatever I felt like to circumvent a site ban solely because it'd be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars to me. But should Vegas open up to 18 year olds because some of them win? (Also, when you answer this question, keep in mind we're one week away from pics of a 19 year old snorting coke off a naked hooker and everybody sort of halfway accepting this as normal/standard behavior)

[ QUOTE ]
We'll give this a try since you're answering everything. I always make it a point to read your posts to improve my game. Your logic in your posts is very well written. How would you like to take on a mini protege (like Negreanu)?...namely me of course. I'm a teacher and have the whole summer to devote to poker.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't take on proteges because that's way too much like effort, but I've always been more or less accessible on AIM [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

[ QUOTE ]
(Also, when you answer this question, keep in mind we're one week away from pics of a 19 year old snorting coke off a naked hooker and everybody sort of halfway accepting this as normal/standard behavior)

[/ QUOTE ]

link?

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

Regarding NLHE cash games. I see many postings where it is stated as fact that 6 man is more profitable than full ring for good players. In my experience I find the only advantage 6 man has is hands per hour per table and I can play more FR tables to counter this.

If all the better players are at 6 man tables I would tend to want to play on the FR tables if only for this reason.

Please compare and contrast full ring vs. 6 man NLHE.

Thank you very much for your time.

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

I think you brought this up in one of your Sat threads...You thought you could win a step 5 on PP for less than $20 and wanted a $1000+ prop bet on it. Did that ever happen / how did it turn out?


Why do I feel like I'm randomly clicking buttons even in low stakes NL cash games but am comfortable in tournaments? Low stakes players tend to buy in short (like <$30 at .25/.50), so it's not even that much deeper. (You can translate this to what's the biggest difference between low buy in tournies / cash?)


How far off am I in this sat thread to say fold except KK+, revised to maybe JJ+?


I never got around to really thinking through it, but after playing a 27r sat to a WSOP sat ($370, $640?) tourney with a certain master of tilt, I decided that the really aggressive maniac rebuy kind of approach is pretty bad in these. Generally it works in normal rebuys because the looseness is contagious, it builds up a huge stack for you and others at the table. The rebuy ends, the chips you've thrown around stay put and hopefully return to your stack, and then you have a good shot at getting really deep and winning huge $.

Obviously here more rebuys = more seats, but that's not nearly as good. The top prize is only 10 to 20x your buy in, and coming in 30th is just as good as 1st. Regardless of how well the rebuy part goes, you're not going to be guaranteed a seat, so investing 1/2 the top prize sucks, and playing it more like a normal freezout is proper.

Does all that seem reasonable? How much would you loosen up over a FO in something like the 11r to the $215 Sunday million?

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

[ QUOTE ]
what are the main holes in my game? (joke, just asked cause you cant say "dude, I don't know who you are")

is it wrong for my to hate you when you talk about bad runs, when I know you play less and make more/hour at mtt's than anyone other than Jamie Gold?

50 sng's played in the last year, over or under?

whats the % breakdown these days on lawyering/playing poker? (ie you ever go get that "real" job?)

Steve

[/ QUOTE ]

Steve, you don't have any holes in your game! [img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img]

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

What did you score on the LSAT?

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

[ QUOTE ]
What did you score on the LSAT?

[/ QUOTE ]

Anyone want to place a prop bet on my LSAT score vs. Adanthar's? [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
(Also, when you answer this question, keep in mind we're one week away from pics of a 19 year old snorting coke off a naked hooker and everybody sort of halfway accepting this as normal/standard behavior)

[/ QUOTE ]

link?

[/ QUOTE ]

yvesaint, BBV...search through last week.

[ QUOTE ]

Please compare and contrast full ring vs. 6 man NLHE.

[/ QUOTE ]

It's hard to do this in one post. Let's say that while a 30/20 style can work in 6 max, it'd get slaughtered in FR. 18/12 is actually standard and maybe even on the loose side. Also, when your overpair gets raised on the flop, the correct play is usually to fold (only half kidding.) It's a nitfest, but it has its own set of rules and can be killed just like any other game...but not using the same playstyle as 6 max.

[ QUOTE ]

I think you brought this up in one of your Sat threads...You thought you could win a step 5 on PP for less than $20 and wanted a $1000+ prop bet on it. Did that ever happen / how did it turn out?

[/ QUOTE ]

It was less than $30, and I gave up with $8 left in the account because it was so godawfully boring [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img] I did get to a step 3, though, just took a couple of bad beats.

rebuys/sats: I don't play super loose in regular rebuys, either, but yes it's probably a worse idea in satellites. However, you should push your big hands/draws very hard during the rebuy period anyway, since going busto isn't that bad.

[ QUOTE ]

What did you score on the LSAT?

[/ QUOTE ]

brag: 172 on the first PR diagnostic, after which they kicked me out and told me to go get a tutor
beat: had to wait for 3 hours outside the building because the guy with the tests didn't show up, in 95 degree weather with 400 other nervous people; when he did, the building's air conditioning was set to like 60, and no one had anything to eat the whole time, so everyone was shivering/nervous/hungry
variance: 173, but 6 of the 10 I got wrong were in the first section that I'd have probably aced otherwise =/
variance: if I'd done better I'd probably have gone to Columbia and no poker for me, so the above's more of a brag

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

Adanthar,

What do you think would be the quickest way to teach someone to make $15-20 an hour playing poker, assuming they know nothing about it?

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

[ QUOTE ]
Adanthar,

What do you think would be the quickest way to teach someone to make $15-20 an hour playing poker, assuming they know nothing about it?

[/ QUOTE ]

low limit sngs, no question about it.

Re: The Well: Adanthar (1/16/07)
 

What players, be they live or online, that you've run into have really impressed you?

What is your largest tournament score and how did you celebrate it?

In order to become an excellent tournament player which are the most important concepts to understand?

What are the most and least profitable tournaments online?

One of the very few pieces of direct advice my father ever game me was 'don't go to law school', was this advise accurate?

If all online poker sites closed down besides ultimate bet, would you ever play online poker again?