TILT (THE POKER EVIL)

[Alex424]

PLEASE HELP

After playing the game for 8 months i believe that i am a very disciplned player and as statistics show a winning player

Why however, do i occasionally develop an idiotic and uncontrollable urge to bet and raise any hands after i have made a mistake on a hand that has cost me or suffered a bad beat.

I know I am on tilt and yet i still make these plays. Fortunately i have enough discipline to escape the table albeit after losing a big enough portion of my bankroll to **** me off.

I have improved in this area but find it the most frustrating part of the game. After reading about tilt it appears many pros suffer from this which does effect their game. It led me to think that all players have a tilt side to them.

HOW CAN YOU STOP THIS FROM EATING YOUR BANKROLL undoing hard solid disiplined work.

As you can probably tell i have just suffered this evil.

Any advice in dealing with tilt is appreciated

[keeks]

Alex242,

STAND UP when you feel these urges and don't sit back down until you feel better. Leave for the night if you must. Some people might feel that standing up from a table makes them look like a wimp, but do it anyways. You can always start coughing or sneezing and head for the restrooms if you feel like you need an excuse to get up.

If you're playing online, check sit out, stand up and walk away from your computer. The fast pace makes it hard to recover after you've taken a beating. There isn't even time for a deep breath. No big deal if you get picked up, it's easy to join a new table.

Go over the hand once and identify what went wrong, if anything. FORGIVE yourself, resolve to learn from it and move on. Beating up on yourself while trying to play is not going to help.

If you just got angry about a hand, chances are that you have a bunch of stress hormones floating around preparing you for physical action. All you can do about that is give your body a little time to metabolize them. It doesn't take long- try taking a 5 minute brisk walk or run up and down the stairs a few times.

If you feel like you can't move on, end the session. Or, if you're making a lot of mistakes and think you're having an off day, consider ending the session. If you can't stop playing when you're going to play in a way that is losing money you are NOT disciplined.

If it's only your mistakes that are making you tilt, you need to learn to forgive yourself. If it's bad beats, take the attitude of 'Let go and let (the poker) God.' Once you can do those things, you probably won't tilt as much if at all. Hope this helps [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] Good luck.

[gezuz]

tilting at limit is just a nuisance. 4 bb downswing.

[keeks]

You can easily tilt away more than 4 BB at a limit game. Besides that, 4 BB/session is meaningful in limit.

[Harv72b]

Keeks wrote a really good response already, and I honestly don't know if I can improve much if at all on what he already said. But I like to type. [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

Tilt happens, to everyone. Well, okay....maybe the old-time pros like Doyle who've seen it all a dozen times have grown immune to tilt, but that's about it. Don't just read about it, watch the poker tourneys on tv...I've seen Daniel Negreanu, Howard Lederer, Phil Ivey, pretty much all of them go on tilt during games. They generally handle it better, but it does show and it does affect even their play.

The horrible players suffer from it, too--just last night I watched a godawful donk double his buy-in at a 3/6 6max table and say he was going to quit for the night. Well, on the next hand he lost a few dollars, stuck around for the orbit, lost another small pot, kept playing and playing, and the next thing I knew he'd blown through his $300 plus a $200 rebuy in the span of a couple hours. His play had gone from loose/passive donk to loose/aggressive maniac, which of course only increased the apparent frequency of his bad beats as good players called to the river thinking ace high or pocket threes were good & then hit, which tilted him even further...it was ugly.

Anyway, like Keeks said, take a break. The games will still be there tomorrow, and there will still be donks doing whatever they can to try to give you their money. Or even if it's just a 5-10 minute breather to clear your head and refocus, that can be all it takes. Again, you'll see pros walk away from the table after a bad beat time after time. There's no shame--it's just smart poker.

[gezuz]

4 bb in the long run is nothing. I feel I should add in my experience I tilt on one hand, usually a blind play, then regroup. I haven't had major tilt sessions.

[Alex424]

Thanks for the advice. I think we will all suffer from this to some degree but we must learn to manage it better.

If Phil Ivey and Daniel Negreanu suffer from it, it would take some sort of machine to say that they don't.

Bad beats don't generally affect me. My own mistakes do (especially after the hours of Sklansky and Miller i have studied) and that is something i will work on. I find myself wasting 3 or 4 BB in a hand and am only satisfied once i have "reclaimed" that money - (usually through blind steals that i would not normally attempt - leading to desperate betting and raising to try and induce my opponent to hold). Obviouisly when they don't fold i end up losing a huge amount of money. This is poor play and poker at its worst. It is something i will work on.

It could be worse - it could be no limit. Now that would be nasty

[Mygtar]

The other posters made some good points, and I would like to add some things that help me.

If I played correctly and got sucked out on by someone chasing crap I say to them, "good hand sir/mam." and smile nicely. Then I say to myself, "thank God I am at a table were people will calldown and chase crap as this is a VERY good thing for my long term bankroll." After doing this over several sessions the beats don't bother me as much.

When it is my bad play that is another thing altogether. Last session I BUTCHERED a few hands and lost pots because of it. This is usually when I get up, walk around, use the mens room, call a friend, get something to eat or such. After that I can usally let go of my bad play (forgive myself), I look at the situation and try to fix the leak. Return to the table with fresh perspective.

Best of luck,
Mygtar