3000th post!!

[Green Kool Aid]

I didnt make a carpal/tunnel post, so 3000th post seems good. This is not groundbreaking stuff. All the other STTF veterans won't really find anything new here, but this is just a lot of random stuff I think most noobs would find helpful.

SNG Advice

[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]50 buyins is sufficient, but as soon as I started playing with 100+ I felt so much more comfortable with the swings.
[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]Variance in SNGs seems so bad because of all the all-ins (if you 10+ table like a lot of us it can seem even worse), but it actually has the lowest variance of any form of poker. I've had 3 20+ buy in downswings and a breakeven streak of close to 1000, but I've played close to 10k SNGs, and my sharkscope graph evens out pretty nicely. No one is unlucky. Keep grinding.
[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]Get and use some sort of ICM product (SNGPT, SNGWIZ). Practice with these. The best things to do is not just plug hands in and decide if a spot is a "push" or "fold." I think it is highly more beneficial to adjust ranges, and see how they change your equity, and adjust blinds, and see how that changes things, and just in general play around with things. Notice how much wider you can push from the SB than from the cutoff, etc.
[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]Get a couple other posters who play your limits to exchange hand histories with. I've done this with other members of this forum and it's been unbelievably helpful to start plugging leaks. It's also good to have a couple people to vent to on AIM with messages like, "OMIFUCCKINGGODD EVERY ALL IN 4hauoreiawjadkl;ajkdsl;f", etc.

Common In game mistakes--

[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]Playing too loose early. So many of the posts below below the 55/60 buy in level have problems that stem from hands where people should have folded preflop. Ideally in the first two blind levels you are playing pocket pairs, AK, and AQ (from mid and late position). At lower buy-ins, you are not giving up anything by folding other hands, and it definitely simplifies the game. We are looking to have 1400 chips by the time 100/200 rolls around to steal peoples's blinds. That's how the game works.
[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]Being ahead of someone's range versus making a positive EV play, especially being on the bubble. A lot of the time on the bubble, you can have a hand like A7o or 44 against someone who's been bullying the table. A lot of the time, even if they are pushing 100 percent, its STILL NEGATIVE EV TO CALL!!!! This was a problem that took a long time for me to grasp, while I was still "getting unlucky all the time."
[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]Not being close to perfect heads-up with <10 BBs. SNGPT has a very good HU tutorial. Take sometime to study this, and really work on your HU game. Having an edge heads-up is where A LOT of the money we make as winning players come from. In the stars 9 handed SNGs, 2nd gives you 245 percent ROI, while getting first gets us 409 percent ROI. It is almost a full two-buyins more.
[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]Taking flops when it's push/fold time, unless you are planning to stop-and-go. As an example, when blinds are 50/100 and your stack is down to 1200, let's say you have a hand like 77 or 88 facing a raise to t300. You need to make your decision there, whether you want to push or fold. Calling is just spewing chips.
[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]Tilt. Seriously...just don't do it. I used to have massive tilt problems, or do things like blow my whole 2k roll at 5/10NL. This is beyond stupid, especially when you have worked so hard studying/grinding. I made the decision to stop tilting, and I still occasionally get the urge, but your bankroll will thank you!
[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]As a general rule, when you see guys like curtains and ryanghall (and other successful higher stakes players), they always give the most simple responses. That truly is the way to beat this game. Getting too fancy is what bad players do. Save the 3-betting all in with draws for short-handed cash games.

General Forum Stuff

[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]There's a lot of cool people in this forum. A lot of them don't even play SNGs and openly hate SNGs, but still post strategy! Post in the [censored] thread, and don't flame 215/530/1k SNG players when you are at the 6.50s (not that anyone here does that).
[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]Twoplustwo allows you to search through all of someone's posts. Find STTF posters who you think give really good advice, and basically check all of their posts. See what they are saying. I did this with a couple posters when I first started, and it's quite beneficial.
[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]Don't be afraid to post hands. I've posted some mind-numbingly bad hands, and even winning $55/$60+ posters will occasionally post a hand where I am thinking, WTF are they doing??
[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]Contrarily---please don't post a response if you don't know what to do in a hand. I lurked for a while, and only posted occasionally at first before I started feeling that I could contribute. A better way to contribute to a hand discussion would be to ask someone to expand upon something they have said in a thread.
[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img]The last and most important piece of advice I will give is to post SNG beats (no matter how trivial) in BBV as much as possible. They can't get enough of them!!

If you post, study, and play enough, and don't run horribly, you should be able to build a bankroll. To all of you who have helped me learn to make money, I can't thank you enough. While I'm not a pro, I have been able to support myself in this transition period of my life, and never would have been able to do so without this forum.

If you want me to expand on any of this, or have any questions, ask in this thread or feel free to IM me at "celticsfan55." just plz don't bash the celtics. they don't suck, it's just their 20th year of rebuilding[img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

--dave