[OziBattler]

WARNING: This is long and if BBB can capitalise his title then so can I dammit.

Ozi’s Home Game Trip Report Pt 1

arlighty, so me and a bunch of my friends started a homegame this year. Structure is we play 2 x STT which the blind structure normally leads to a 2-3hr turbo type games. About 6-10 people show up on a monthly basis. Each game is a $15 buyin. 3 places pay with 3rd = to moneyback. Chips and cards are supplied by Chipman. Chipman has played quite a few homegames before and I rate him as second best player at the table. Im the best obv. About half the players were having their first poker experience and we literally had to teach them the rules the last 2 times we played.

So after eating pizza we shuffle up and deal after I again I fail in my quest to do a random draw for seats. LOL notunderstandingwhyitisgoodtodosoaments. To my left ive got an older guy who is having his first time in the game but he tells us he has played lots of non-holdem poker and when he pulls a nice checkraise 2 hands in I figure he has picked it up pretty quickly. IIl call him MrCR. To my right I have a Ultra-Lag who loves the action but doesnt realise that half the guys at the table will not fold the slimest of draws or hands. He is destined to either busto or go robusto. Currently for him (from prev games) he is Busto 4 and Robusto none. Note That I refine all my reads in part 2 of this trip report which occurs about a month after Part 1.

GoGoGo. Shuffle up and deal. I fold a few hands and limp a few that I would limp online. My first big hand is AQ in MP at level 1 with 100/200 blinds and 10k chips to start. Theres a limp, raise it 4x and I get 3 callers with two of them being of the non-fold variety who shall later be called Calling Station and MrWhatTheHell. Flop comes Kxx 4 way. With my expert reads that Ill get called in multiple places I dont bet flop turn or river. They oblige and it is checked down to the river where bottom pair wins. There is no way he CallingStation or MrWhatTheHell (I cant remember who had it) would have folded that flopped pair so I profit with a bigger stack than a readless hero would have J

Few hands later Chipman makes a nice preflop raise with what turns out to be AQ and is in a very similar spot tome in that he wiffs. MrWhatTheHell donks the flop and turn and Chipman calls down with AQo and loses to a random pair. He busts out soon after with a wiffed hand and that be cbet and then cant get away from. Ultra-LAG to my right also busts himself with terrible bluffing against CallingStation and heads to the fridge for a beer. This leaves me in a good spot.....although im down a few chips of of my starting 10000 and blinds are going up.

The game Host who I call FastLearner is picking up the game pretty quickly and seems to be making some nice value bets to rake some nice pots. However the only time I am in a pot with him of any significance before the end game, I spot the a triple "sigh, gently slide in the chips and lean back in the chair" tell and get out of the way with something that I probably wouldn’t have called anyway with. This alone felt good and made me feel like I was playing real poker (Im almost exclusively an onliner). I drink more and that’s probably the last tell I look for and actually pickup.

Then comes the key moments for me. I limp in SB with 78o because I want to give action for the good of the game. Flop is 245 rainbow. checked around. turn is 8. I bet something just less than pot. MrCR who was a big chipleader early (every new player to our game seems to get this luxury and I love it as it makes it interesting and keeps them coming back) calls. river is a 6. I wimp out and check. He says "You have an 8 so Ill check" I sigh, flip and table is "oooh and aaah”. Thanks for not pushing…oh noes…you got a read on me now!

I lose some chips on some drawing hand and then the next orbit I get A10o in SB blinds at 400/800. There is a 2000 raise to open betting by MrWhatTheHell who is playing loose and aggro with junk and has ‘any two’ so I pull the trigger and push with maybe 8k cos Ive got his range crushed and chip covered. I expecting MrCR to now fold. Omg, he calls...not great.. What does he have?. MY question is soon answered…he flips 84s and says "it is suited" and MrWhatTheHell has Q7o obv. I quietly LOL DONKAMENT. Well, my A high holds up thanks to a 55x5x board and Im the chip leader. Woohoo. This is great cos Im now a gambler [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

There are about 5 left and I don’t VPIP for a while and blinds basically turn it into a push/fold game except those left don’t know how to push fold and will still limp 5000 preflop when they only have 8000. tyvm. I play push or fold game, get called everytime and flop pairs, push and bust everyone out. Shipit for the win. Hands like A4 in BB seening a free flop flopping 10104 and getting called by J7 and KK getting called by undercards seal it

Game #2: So I forgot to mention that the beers are flowing which is an evener-upperer since tonight the drinkers are the better players and we are playing with pron cards. These cards make it impossible to pickup reads most of the time but boy, thats ok....I did get dealt my new favourite card. The 9 :hearts: Well this card was awesome. Spidermonkey FTW. Chipman who supplied the cards is impressed with the card and also surprised, this card had apparently been 'hiding' for quite a while.

So yeah, Im getting rather tanked at this point and but my drunkern autopilot helps me not limp with any two. Play some hands, I spike pairs bet them and get paid off. This part of the report will be shorter than the first game because I was getting rather drunkard at this point and there wasnt any hands of particular excitement. Just valuebetting FTW. I find myself in the final 4 however it is getting late and it is decided to start doubling the blinds so pretty soon they are at like 5000/10000 then 10000/20000 (HU) with a total of 70000 in play. It gets heads up and I had about a 3:1 chiplead against the guy who I later refer to as TheScott and he basically doubles through me more than once and I lose. Sigh. I probably would have won it the blinds weren’t ridic. Oh well. Its all goot.

So first and second for me but it was a really fun night. I tried my hardest to play as loose as I could when blinds where cheap but I still am too tonight as I cant bring myself to play junk. Damn my internet poker nittiness getting in the way of seeing flops at home games. I get my chips in the middle when I had the best of it and didnt sufffer any suckouts that mattered. Every time I got all in it was me doing the all in and I think that is a recipe for success given the amazingly loose calls that I will get.

it is great to see that most of the guys are learning and getting better. Yes, better is a relative term but for some of them all they need to do is bet more (betting anything close to pot is a rarity) and bluff less in hopeless spots and they will do better. Interestingly one of the smartest guys IRL who I call CallingStation is also the worst player, he still cant grasp hand rankings and he never bets.

Summary:
Brag: Get Drunk and Wins!
Beat: Still get a hangover the next day. ugh.
Variance: I flop good hands that hold up.