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Lordy, don't remind me.
I remember my hand flopped good, & him needing runner-runner perfect perfect.......
I got turned over in Level One of an £11er too, when I got it all-in Pre v Mr Optimistic & he got the jolly lot. Just my luck to run my A-A-2-3 DS into K-8-8-5.
I'm still wading through treacle, barely £40 up in 2016 (& I've received more than that in Rewards Payments), so I'm tinkering with my game, & the more I tinker.......
All good.
Right, tidy up a few things & get today's started, full of hope & optimism as ever.
See you there.
you have to remember that the sum of ROI at a SNG is -10%. so with you and eon always playing, couple of break even players, your winnings are the rake! personally my winnings are the lowest at the 3.30 games. I find that knowone ever folds, so the only way to win a hand is by the cards. If every hand is contested by 3 regs theres no winning mechanism. lower you have weaker players, and higher (11s) there is/was some element of scared money/survival.
You should join the thurs eve PL08 games. apart from drawing extra players with your presence, those games are good fun (and profitable), there alots of different styles to keep you on your toes etc.
I'm very impressed with how uber generous sky is with these tournaments, and the nice thing is with a favourable run of cards, almost everyone can occasionally score.
we still need/want a bigger (11?) PL08 T once a month though, there are PL08 players around who do make the effort to come to sky when the timings right.
Thanks Mr Suzy,
I'll reply to that in 3 parts, as one of the replies might be a bit lengthy.
"......You should join the thurs eve PL08 games. apart from drawing extra players with your presence, those games are good fun (and profitable), there alots of different styles to keep you on your toes etc.
I'm very impressed with how uber generous sky is with these tournaments, and the nice thing is with a favourable run of cards, almost everyone can occasionally score......"
Being as you seem to be the biggest winner in these by far, I guess added value is god for you.
More seriously, though.....
I don't seem able to play DYM's & MTT's (effectively) at the same time, so I'll need to take a night off DYM's when I do. It wont be this week though, as I'll be Offline on Thursday night, (& most of Easter) as I have company for Easter.
I do very much enjoy PLO & PLO8 MTT's, but when we play, say, a £1 MTT, many players seem to play it like a Freeroll, so it's quite a challenge to (attempt) to play these things properly. You seem to manage OK though, & in your case, good MTT technique is why you do so well.
There's an interesting thing I often see in the DYM's, where players with solid MTT results don't adjust when they play DYM's, it's a very peculiar thing to see. They have the mindset that they have to WIN a DYM (finish 1st) which of course is a big mistake. We get paid the same for 3rd as 1st, so banging heads with another big stack 4 handed is pretty dumb, or so it seems to me.
I also like to stretch myself for the Rewards Payments each week, which is difficult with mainly £3 & £5 DYM's, & very few £11ers. It adds up to significant income over the long term. I can accumulate, on average, 130 points per session playing PLO8 DYM's, & generally manage to reach 1,000 points (£12.50) most weeks, but if I drop them & play the PLO8 League, I'd struggle to make many points at all on a Thursday.
Sky are uber-generous with the Prizes for that Thursday PLO8 League? Most definitely, but probably best to say little, in case they realise. That's one of the problems The Business has, they don't tend to review these things regularly due to lack of resource, so as long as nobody complains, things tend to get left as they are. Say no more.....
Personally, if there were a £5 & a £10 PLO8 MTT every night, & maybe a £25 one on a Sunday, I'd deffo be a regular player in them.
Whether we could get the numbers is another matter. Taking £11 PLO8 DYM's as a guide, this week, in total, only 12 have run at £11, & not one ran yesterday (Saturday). At the £5.50 level, 54 have run this week (over 6 nights), so even they are a struggle to get going.
"online poker, its deffo tough and not getting easier.
you have to remember that the sum of ROI at a SNG is -10%. so with you and eon always playing, couple of break even players, your winnings are the rake! personally my winnings are the lowest at the 3.30 games. I find that knowone ever folds, so the only way to win a hand is by the cards. If every hand is contested by 3 regs theres no winning mechanism. lower you have weaker players, and higher (11s) there is/was some element of scared money/survival...."
This is (to me) really interesting, & I could write several thousand words in reply. I'll keep it as brief as possible, but some cliffs.
Originally, going back 7 or 8 years, I had been playing, & winning., NLH DYM's here. Then the lads got my measure, guys like Nutter & JingleMa, & I knocked it in, started losing regularly, & I found myself losing a good few bob, with a nasty looking Sharky graph.
So, in September 2013, 2.5 years ago, I decided to revert to PLO & PLO8. I deposited £200, & since then, I have neither deposited or withdrawn a penny, & as of last night, my balance now stands at £2,743.42. So I disagree that they are a zero sum game, that shows we CAN make money at these, all we need is a win rate above 55% & we are in profit. And I've managed that for most of the 2.5 years. But not the last 3 months. (We'll come on to that later). I totally accept that taking 2.5 years to win that is pretty feeble in truth, as win rates go it's pretty terrible, and my "hourly" must be shocking. But I enjoy it, love it to bits, & I'd happily plod along doing that, I don't have any unrealistic expectations, just relax for a few hours each evening with my poker mates & not lose money is fine.
I should add that of that £2,500 in profit, around 25% - call it £700 - is from Rewards Payments & sundry bonuses.
Looking back over those 2.5 years, the same pattern repeats itself. A sustained uptick, over several months, followed by a downswing. Same play, different results. But on balance, the upticks are bigger than the downswings.
We have to be VERY careful here though, not to confuse adverse variance with sub-optimal play. Everyone blames variance when they are losing, & good play when they are winning. It's not always true though, is it? It's just so easy to take the lazy route & blame variance.
So, my current balance is just £40 above where it was on January 1st. Why is that?
More follows.......
The short answer is "I don't really know".
It's a bit like our golf swing. We tinker with it endlessly. Change our grip, our stance, our mental approach, our ball, all sorts. But when we change one thing it impacts another thing, THIS gets better but THAT gets worse. They are usually connected, of course. Soon, we are in a right mess, & are shooting terrible scores & our swing is all over the place.
And its EXACTLY the same with poker.
When I'm getting bad results (less than a 57% win rate) I do tinker with my technique, alter my calling & betting ranges & so on. Soon, 5 or 6 changes have been made, the results are still sub 57%, & we don't know where we are, so we go back to basics again.
I was trying something new last week, &, you know, sometimes these things go wrong, & we feel daft. We don't need reminding we've made booboo, do we? But one of my "friends" promptly told me "that was a daft play tikay". Thanks for that chum.
So we tinker with this, tinker with that, revert to basics, change something else. Soon we don't know our ar*e from our elbow.
I actually love the mental challenge all this gives me, but if you asked my why I've not done too good since Jan 1st, in truth, I don't really know. I'm certainly NOT blaming run bad, but some if it might be. Certainly not the majority of it though.
The standard of play has changed, yes, I'll give you that. A Level 1 three way all in this week was won by Mr Optimistic with K-8-8-5. One regular on the Tables - decent chap - simply HATES having his Blinds attacked, so will play back with ANY FOUR. All day mate, yes please, because my Range is ALWAYS ahead of his. But yeah, they hit now & then. Good luck to them, I NEED these guys to do these things, they are my profit.
There's also a new breed here who think any A-2-x-x is an auto all in. There are times - 4 handed, big blinds when we can certainly shove with any A-2 or decent ace, but 6 handed, at 15-30? No ta.
(A 4 handed jam with any A-2 is mathematically fine, as we force folds 75% of the time, so on balance it's ok).
There's one more component of the equation though, & this is the one I look at more than any other......
I did warn you I might ramble n a bit, but it's such a fascinating subject, & it consumes me trying to examine it.
So, the last component in self-examination of my results.
Age, & mental dexterity.
I 6 Table, & in fact, PLO8 DYM's are quite complex if you really analyse how many different decisions, at different stages of each hand, & each DYM, we have to make. Of course, the only REALLY big decisions (general DYM strategy apart) are 4 handed. This is where it really matters. 4 handed, this is the part I love best of all, this is the fun part. I could happily sit out the first 3 or 4 Levels, they mean nothing to me. I may be wrong on that, but you'd struggle to convince me. I have an edge - or did have - so I don't need to gamble early doors with Mr Any A-2. Help yourselves fellas, I'm here to finish Top 3, not gamble early.
But do I still have the mental dexterity to 6 Table this game?
It's really hard to know. I'm at the age where our mental faculties DO decline, & I'm acutely aware of that. I test myself all the time on this, not just poker, everything. And I think I'm still OK, but we don't really know, do we?
Does someone at the onset of, say, dementia, or Alzheimers, actually KNOW that? Are they AWARE of their mental decline? None of us know the answer to that, but it has to be a consideration.
Hope that does not come across as morbid, it's not intended to be, & I'm very pragmatic about age, mortality, mental faculties & all that stuff. It comes to us all eventually, if we are lucky enough to live to a decent age. Well I've been lucky, & I've reached that age, so I need to be on full alert, all the time. And I am.
That'll teach you to ask me random questions.....
Away from poker? Some of this MAY have impacted my poker results actually. See, I'm a proper poker player, always looking for excuses.....
UKPC was easily the most stressful I've ever had, but I did a good job, or I think I did. It was very tough indeed, I did 6 x 18 hour days in a row, & the last day, the Monday, was a 24 hour day from when I started until when I got to bed. I had to write a daily article on top of everything else, but I coped OK with that. Some underlying tensions - don't ask - were what made it so stressful though. The event was a success though, & that's my satisfaction.
I missed my daily afternoon nap for 6 days, too. My daily routine is to get up at 5 or 5.30, do my work until around 1pm, grab an hour or two in bed, another quick clear up of e-Mails, PM's & Forum stuff, then start my evening poker session. Even when I'm in Vegas for Sky Poker in previous years, I am up from 5am until 1am, but I have to have an hours kip in the afternoon. That was not possible during UKPC. My official working week is 5 x 7.5 hours, but poker is not like that, is it?, it's a 7 day thing, & especially evenings. It's very odd - to me - that some people think Online Poker can be managed 9-5, Mon-Fri.
Last week was Cheltenham Week, & I penned 2 articles per day, on top of my usual workload, so that was quite challenging. I wanted to watch all of Chelters on the TV, but come Friday, I was all out of gas, & had to go to bed after the Gold Cup & so I missed the Foxhunters. The stone in my shoe continued to pinch, so that never helped.
I'm hard dieting, too, & have shed close to 2 stone since January 16th. No lattes at the moment - boo - & no sticky buns or bread. Marv.
I'm exercising, too, for the first time in y entire life. I walk 2 miles every single weekday, & 4 miles every Saturday & Sunday. Of course, I had to abandon that during UKPC, but that apart, not missed a day since Jan 16th.
This week I have to go up to Head Office. I always feel a little awkward when I go up, there. All of the Sky Poker staff except the TV Team & myself are based there, so we are very much outsiders, & not all of them realise that & they make no allowances for it. We feel like strangers attending a party, or intruders into a clique, so it's all a bit uncomfortable. Most are very good & understand it though.
I suppose it does not help that I'm passionate about Sky Poker doing things properly, & I'm not shy in telling my colleagues what I think about our failings. I'm not exactly Billy No Mates up there, but some sensitive feathers do tend to get ruffled....
Life is good. Mostly.
So in PLO8, no, people are NOT scared to call early doors.
I could name 6 or 8 players who, literally, limp into EVERY hand, & call ANY Raise. They all lose money of course, every one of them, but it's tough to put them on a hand or even a range, so by going to war with these boys early we increase variance.
One fella 4 bet me yesterday with K-Q-2-2 in PLO8. Imagine THAT, lol. In Level 1, what do we put him on? In Level 6, it's easy, we have made our move & we ain't going away due to FE. In Level 1, we just have no idea where we are.
I respect - immensely - the views of Jac & Timmy, but as I replied earlier to Paul, NLH plays VERY different to PLO8, imo, due to the wider range of playable hands.
In an icm heavy format like dyms the only players who benefit from you and Mr anti-steal butting heads are the other players.
You don't auto profit from players being too loose against you. You will profit when they call too loose v other players. I've seen a lot of people correcting comments such as "low stakes dyms are hard as players call you with anythng" by saying that you will profit from their loose calls long term.
It's not exactly true. You don't want to be in 60/40 spots for stacks in a dym; you do want other players to be in lots of 60/40's
If someone really is playing back wide, in a format that is icm-laden and in a variant of poker where ranges match up fairly closely it might be best to allow others to get into those big pots with a fair range advantage and auto profit from his looser that way.
Teddy is EXACTLY correct.
And that's why I avoid banging heads early with these guys.
Level 7, 4 handed, it has to be done once we make the first move, of course. And I'm happy with that, as my ranges are good, & unless I'm short of chips, my ranges are usually well balanced.
one downside of not having access to your own HH database is that you cannot easily see how well you have been running, or do some clever things like seeing what situations / blind levels you do well or poorly at. you just have to make a fair and accurate assesment of your edge v the field.
Whoa, hold up.
I just had a PM from a well meaning friend suggesting why I may be on a losing run.
I'm not on a losing run, but I'm just not making the profits I was previously. BIG difference.
Maybe I explained it badly, but I try to everything to the best of my ability, & perhaps I'm not doing that at the moment, hence the self examination & self-doubt. I'm not losing though. Yet......
I'm a very harsh self-critic, & I think I know when I'm making mistakes & where I do best or worst. But we all do, don't we?
mechanisms by which we win is something I've thought about for a while.
If every SNG was decided by a dual 4BB AI and you always had 60% vs 40%, you'd have an ROI of 10%. if its 55% vs 45% you'd be breakeven. lots of the PL08 SNG end game between good and ok players are decided by 55% vs 45% and often because you have to push to stay alive, players call and they 're ahead!
IMO ICM goes out the window at 4 handed 4BB play in PL08.
You'd always call with AA2, but are only 65% ish AIPF. 65% of 33% (33% is the maximum % equity in DON SNG) is 21%. all things being equal, you had 25% if you folded.
I think you should chip up during the early levels, why wouldn't you? At least in the short term you can use your image, in that knowone will/would play back as a bluff.
One has to enter pots with perceived weaker players to win their chips, waiting to the end game is weaker strategy against better players, because at the end, the edges are probably less than 10%, ie the rake (which I'm not obsessed with btw).
Thanks for mentioning the tournament thing to the bosses, the UKOPS got ca 100 players, maybe more people will play if there are reg higher tournaments, time will tell.
lastly, I disagree about the 1.1 tournaments being a lottery. its a strategy adjustment compared to the 5.5 game. The player pool has the weakest players, therefore your value hands get paid. You can wait till 4BB, get top 5% hand, get paid, even though you always have it, come back and still place! in that respect, you can also recover from mistakes. the 5.5 game is much harder, fewer players making huge errors and it always feels like after 10 mins you have 10BB!
Strategy adjustment in the £1.1 games? Yes, that's completely fair comment. Thing is, I can play 1 £5.50 or £11 game in 35 minutes, & one £1.1 MTT in 2 hours or more. If I could play TEN £1.1 MTT's an hour, yes, I'd be there like a shot. Unforch, I don't have the mental agility to play DYM's alongside MTT's, as e have to think SO differently.
Anyway, you've awakened my sleeping Diary, which I'm grateful for. I used to report my numbers every day, but who wants to read that day after day? So a chance to natter more generally was good.