evolution of a poker player...

[B Buddy]

some specific things about sr's play hu:

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showth...rue#Post6214467


bldswttrs:

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...1931&page=

2 lag players w / discussion of plays they liked to make / their styles.

[jomatty]

imo there are very few "new" concepts that none of the players from the last era understood. imo the big difference is simply how many of these concepts the best players of this era understand. also the concepts are much better verbalized today where in the past many players may have only understood some concepts on an intuitive level.

im not saying that there is nothing new just that there is prob not that much truly revolutionary.

[ZingZhang]

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for me, i've spent a long time discovering new spots where nobody would suspect you were bluffing, then bluffing a lot there until somebody caught on. eventually it wouldnt work against that guy, so i'd stop doing it against him (and players whose styles are like him) and keep doing it to players who hadn't caught on. and then i'd find a new spot that was given too much credit, and bluffed a lot in it. so on and so on.

one standard example of this is the stackadonk line. (raise preflop, get called by a guy in position. bet flop, he calls again. then you checkraise the turn allin, if stacks are appropriately sized for it). It used to be used all the time by good players with a big overpair or something else equivalently huge when they were playing against bad players (right about the time that floating with medium pairs and stealing the turn when checked to became popular amongst bad players who thought they were good). It didnt take long for these players to catch on as to what was happening and stars folding most things they showed up with in that spot, so once I noticed that I began to use the line a whole lot as a bluff or semibluff, and it worked to perfection against weak-tight regulars who werent that creative but just assumed that poker by the book (or small/midstakes online forum) would get it done. Eventually the good players caught on to the fact that i was doing that as a bluff often enough, and so then I stopped bluffing that way against them, but doing it even more for value. (But kept doing it against the weaker players as a bluff, of course). Now, my range in situations like that is mixed between value and semibluff and bluff, and depends on the situation, the player, and my semi-subconscious random action generator (which I can't really explain, other than the fact that I think my play is pretty well mixed up in most situations because I don't play by any 'book'). But i've got other spots that are similar, but a little more recent. Until they become well-known, you kinda just have to groove on them and hope not to show things down often. And when they do, you switch it up and do something other than what the standard opponent expects.

So, basically, what i'm saying is, the best players at any given time and place don't have some ancestral tome of wisdom that makes them the best. They are simply the ones who understand their opponents play and their own image the most accurately, and know the underlying math and game theory well enough to implement effective counter-measures. Give any great player a short amount of time in a new game, and he'll figure out how to beat it.

As to the question of old players versus new players, I think the new ones would have an immediate advantage because they understood the game theory and probability to a more efficient degree, and the internet poker scenario had trained them to learn quickly and play tons of hands to learn all types of strategies. But the long-term winner would be the one who best adjusted to the style of their opponent, and predicted the future adjustments that their opponent would make so as to be ready as soon as those adjustments came.

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Excellent post, will read again

[MilkMan]

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considering words like "crushed", "dominated" and "owned" were being thrown around...is anyone underwhelmed? i know i love poker stove/twodimes, i know im a better player now than i was 5 years ago, i lknow that if you were able to go back in time and play me in the commerce 10-10nl you would have no better chance of "crushing" or "owning" me than you would if you came and played me today in the 10-20nl. (you would be a major pain in my ass for about a week...underwhelming to say the least)

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what did you expect? you still get dealt two cards face down, there are only a certain number of betting rounds, there are only a very limited number of options at each decision point. you are taking each individual small improvement that has been made, pointing out that by itself it is not particularly ground-breaking but ignoring the fact that it is the widespread knowledge and application of these subtle improvements collectively that have caused the arguable paradigm shift in the (online higher stakes) no limit games of the last year or two. meh.

[Triumph36]

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considering words like "crushed", "dominated" and "owned" were being thrown around...is anyone underwhelmed? i know i love poker stove/twodimes, i know im a better player now than i was 5 years ago, i lknow that if you were able to go back in time and play me in the commerce 10-10nl you would have no better chance of "crushing" or "owning" me than you would if you came and played me today in the 10-20nl. (you would be a major pain in my ass for about a week...underwhelming to say the least)

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what did you expect? you still get dealt two cards face down, there are only a certain number of betting rounds, there are only a very limited number of options at each decision point. you are taking each individual small improvement that has been made, pointing out that by itself it is not particularly ground-breaking but ignoring the fact that it is the widespread knowledge and application of these subtle improvements collectively that have caused the arguable paradigm shift in the (online higher stakes) no limit games of the last year or two. meh.

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to this end, some of the tight nits you see at live games would just be small/medium sized losers at online games at similar stakes. they miss value bets left and right and their hand ranges are transparent. Watching Live at the Bike - the river check behind is just so much more common with a hand that should be value-betting.

it's hard to lose a lot of money as a nit. still, it's very possible that in a live game filled with online players, that player goes from a big winner in the normal action game to a slight loser. Poker is all about pushing slight edges - in 99% of games, it's not about paradigm shifts or massive strategic overhauls. Online players have found more edges to push.

[sdfsdf]

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The cowboys are underrated in this post.

Take a good online player (not the top .01%, just a good player) and stick him at a live table for the first time. While he sits and calculates ranges and ev and makes his plays accordingly, he gets run over by the sharks that see his brain working, and he goes home bitching about how bad live players are, the poorer for it.

I don't see why some version of this phenomenon wouldn't occur if players from the highest levels met at a table for the first time.

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there isnt a single online player who is beating 5/10+ for 4+ptbb/100 over 50k+ hands that would not crush live games at casinos played at the same stakes

[Matt Flynn]

limon,

i think the biggest changes are increased aggression, accuracy of math application, an increased willingness to get all in based on assigned hand ranges, more frequent precision bluffing such as the post on stack-a-donk, more players using position to advantage such as floating and three-betting, a partly accidental better application of implied odds, and much greater likelihood of making big bluffs.

defensively the lower second tier players (e.g., 2-4 to 5-10 pros, not including the top 10-15% of those) are far more aware of global strategy issues for proper betting/raising frequencies and amounts to maintain a broader range in their opponent's eyes and avoid being exploited.

also, huge obvious change is the internet as a training tool. you run into the same situations so frequently that they are easier to remember, and now you can find them in databases and analyze them. before only a very few players with superb memories and concentration could do that. now it's everyone.

people are far better at assigning hand ranges and far, far better at playing shorthanded. they have also figured out that hand reading trumps everything provided the stacks are deep enough.

people are not far better at adjusting to games imo. bobby hoff in his day would still hurt you.

as for specifics, the fair question isn't what's new but what has changed. a great example is checkraising the river. i never did that before i got cut up by it a few times. also, lines like raise preflop, check flop, raise turn big. not saying these are new but we have learned that they work and use them far more often. similarly, value betting has become an art form. sam bhatson was brilliant at this; now lots of people are good at it. plus the art of hand reading has been taken to an entirely different level. e.g., before we'd consider the pot odds and mull it over before making that river call. now we review the line, narrow the range, and figure if the hands that beat us make sense and fit with the player's actions. far more first-tier and second -tier players use these techniques well than before imo. another example is pot control. before you have KQ and raise in position get one caller. flop is Q96 or whatever. check to you, you bet, he calls. turn is a 7 no flush. first-tier players usually checked that turn to keep the pot small. now you think about how often you'll get checkraised and what percentage on a bluff and how often you'll called by a worse hand or draw or force a draw to fold. often that sums to bet. and when you are forced to check the turn because your opponent plays aggro or tight enough to force that line (commonly the case now but didn't used to), you might backtrack and check the flop to deprive him of a street and induce action, then fire on the turn. there are dozens of such examples.

[Bokonon1972]

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there isnt a single online player who is beating 5/10+ for 4+ptbb/100 over 50k+ hands that would not crush live games at casinos played at the same stakes

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That may be the silliest thing I've ever read on this board (except for a couple of my own posts).

[JooWish622]

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i constantly hear tale of a new style of player, a new level of poker. players constantly sweat the top players and the big matches, they post and discuss hands ad nauseum. sooooooooooo, where has this all got us? what have you learned in the last 5 years, seriously. please post one hand, one play, that you use now that you wouldnt have when you were just a "good" player. before 1,000,000 hands of online play and live nosebleed play made you a great player. it can be a hand you played or a hand someone else played. just one example of a NEW concept that has changed the game. dont be shy, dont be afraid youll be ridiculed, no concept is too small even if it only nets you an extra .01/100. lets hear 'em...

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we've just become better

we seem to understand the concept of playin against hand ranges, thin value betting, and more generally, just have more concrete reasons for acting than players have had before.

[NoahSD]

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there isnt a single online player who is beating 5/10+ for 4+ptbb/100 over 50k+ hands that would not crush live games at casinos played at the same stakes

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That may be the silliest thing I've ever read on this board (except for a couple of my own posts).

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Loc: Way over my head

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Not only was that not a silly statement. It's boringly true. He could've said something much stronger like said they could crush at much higher stakes.