Warning beginning players, reading 2+2 can be bad for your health

[Troll_Inc]

This is a story of caution for beginning low-limit players that come to this forum.

So, I probably played PLO for a year and a half before I started to read and post to 2+2. I was a winning player (kept track by bankroll) at the 1c/2c and Party 10c/25c (PLO 25) game. I knew the basics, pot odds, etc but really had no advance moves and made several obvious errors in bet thinking on later streets.

I have pokertracker results from this stage (~4,800 hands):
15.5 BB/100 hands
69.9 stdev/100 hands

Then I started reading this forum and began playing PLO 50 and sometimes higher. I learned a lot, but I feel that a lot of what I learned from this group was more suitable for higher games. Without really paying attention to my results, I began playing a non-winning PLO 25 game.

During this time period (~18,000 hands), my stats
0.5 BB/100
64.3 STDEV/100

About a month ago, I was reviewing my total stats and realized that I couldn't really beat PLO 25 anymore. I set about to figure what I used to do and what I changed, etc. I essentially rediscovered how to beat PLO25 (post is available still) with some modifications. Here are those stats (~5,000 hands):

15.3 BB/100 (winrate)
45.1 STDEV/100


*In summary, if you are new to PLO and are playing at the lowest limits, save yourself some money while you better your game.

[wazz]

I'm sorry Troll, but this post is really stupid. You're comparing small sample sizes, and saying stuff like 'I ran hot over this 5K hands, but broke even over this 18K hands - coincidence? I think not!' when you should know that even aba20 can have 30K breakeven stretches in the blink of an eye, I know I do.

There is some truth to what you say. When I was working in sales they used to say 'the more you learn, the less fluent you become' as you're trying to incorporate too many things. This is just as true with poker, it is easy to try to take on too much new information and it can screw up your game quite easily if you haven't internalised it properly or don't even understand the concepts as they've been laid out. This is why, on the whole, it's better for your long-term developement as a player to learn concepts for yourself so you understand them. If you read slotboom (as an example) and say to yourself 'yeah i've been doing that all along and for exactly the same reason' you're doing good, but if you read it and say 'i guess that makes sense, i'll try that next time' then you'll try it the next time, maybe it'll work and maybe it won't, but will you remember to do it the time after that?

I'm not making my point very well but I'm just trying to show you that the best players are mostly self-taught while infusing others' experience to help along their game. If you learn by rote, you will play by rote, and you'll never make it.

[Troll_Inc]

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This is why, on the whole, it's better for your long-term developement as a player to learn concepts for yourself so you understand them.


[/ QUOTE ]

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[BluffTHIS!]

Troll,

Another factor here for you and all, is game selection. Especially for hyper-multitablers. Every "bad" table you add to your playing mix only marginally increases your WR while negatively impacting your overall variance to a much greater degree. Thus if there are 8 tables going in your stakes level, and you only deem 4 of them good, insisting on actually playing all 8 can harm your overall results and vice versa. So you need to account for how/whether your table selection has changed or not.

[joewatch]

True, PLO25, 50, 100, and 200 all play pretty differently. I haven't every played PLO25 but I'm sure it's just like play money. The winning style at PLO50 is tight, and peddle the nuts. If you want a more interesting game, you need to move up.