Definitely gotta post this

minSim PMed me a bunch of questions and this is what I replied with. I figure there's enough information in here to provide with insights for others and criticisms. Seriously, I would really like criticisms from other players. Especially on the Doubling Tripling Air section.

**********

Wow strong post. Agreeing with me is a sign of greatness. lol

I don't completely agree with your analysis of why lag is better at micros. You do cover a few good points though.

It pretty much has to do with stealing money, developing poor image, and playing hands vs worse players ip.

Stealing A common theme of bad players (or players worse than our current skill), excluding maniacs, is that they play too weakly vs us. They don't see when and why, but we do, and we capitalize on that by stealing from them. Usually this boils down to isolations, 3bets, and cbets. I am not quite sure about how well barreling works at micros, small, and even some medium stakes. It definitely has its place, but it's a very advanced aspect of the game that I haven't figured out.

Image Everybody notices image, everybody is affected by image, and everybody adjusts in a variety of ways and degrees. We can play like a maniac pf and flop only and then will lose soooo much respect that we'll get paid off by sooo many hands we wouldn't on the bigger latter streets. This is extremely important. Also, poor players adjust poorly pretty much always. I was so surprised when watching Aejones' 100nl 100vpip video and how he was raising like 75% of hands yet the entire table wasn't adapting well at all. They just played pretty much the same. Their mindset was "Well this guy's crazy I'm gonna wait till I like my cards then go to town." and what they don't realize is that 1) that's so not how to do it since they should be loosening up big time, and 2) even if it was how to do it, they're doing it wrong. What I mean is that they were stuck thinking on a low level and while thinking they could out play a better player they were actually shooting themselves in the foot. This is because their mode of play evolves around playing their hand.

Example: Hero raises pre, villain has T9s (loves his hand as he should) and calls. Flop is J95, hero bets, villain has middle pair and a backdoor straight draw (which he loves to hit) and hero is a bluffing maniac so he calls, turn is 7, hero bets, villain cannot even fathom how calling is bad since hero is a bluffing maniac plus he picked up a GUTSHOTTTT so he calls, river is 5, hero shoves, villain thinks a little because he's afraid that hero could have luckboxed a jack or maybe a 5 but he cant get out of his head how hero is a maniac so he calls especially since he 'knows' trips is a prime bluffing spot besides he's been waiting for a hand vs this maniac so he can't fold now, hero flips over AJ and takes it down.

T9 soooooo often finds a fold there vs a standard player, but not as often vs a maniac. Hero developed his image on early relatively inexpensive streets and got a shallow-thinking player's stack because of it.

Position is so importantly awesome that it is just awesome. It is where we make our money. Think of it has 'having position' and that we make our money when we 'have position'. We make money in LP more than other positions partly because when folded to us we have position on the rest of the hands dealt. When a player enters a pot we want to play vs him pretty much only when we have position. Somebody limps in front, raise his ass, he's an idiot to call since we have him owned with position. Not only are our jobs easier since we have position, but his job is HARDER because he is OUT OF POSITION vs an AGGRESSOR. Read that last sentence again, it's fucking huge. We make our money vs bad players so we need to isolate them. We do this in position and with a very wide range because 1) they suck 2) they suck 3) we play more hands with them AND we have position 4) they suck 5) others play fewer hands with them and thus we increase our likelyhood of taking his stack instead of one of the other douchebags at our table who think they're gonna eat our fish and 6) they suck.

Doubling Tripling Air I also do not have much experience with this (some though) but I think thats partly because I tend to avoid getting into circumstances where they're optimal (avoiding regs, playing vs donks). However, I do have many speculations here.

A big theme of good poker play is setting ourselves up. This is the theme behind me stating we should be looking to triple when we double. It is possibly exactly like planning to cbet when we pfr. We're not gonna do it every time, but we're planning on doing it most of the time. Every action we take we should have things planned out. Obviously so many variables hit that we can only seldom make one plan and stick with it for the entire hand.

Example: Hero has KJcc and raises, standard reg villain calls on btn, flop is Qx8c6x, hero cbets, villain calls, turn is Ac, this is a mandatory double for hero so knows he's gonna make it but also knows that if called he's probably gonna triple since a double makes it mandatory most of the time. He knows this because he knows it is the only way to fully rep his hand, that villain probably doesn't have a strong hand or an ace, there's a lot in the pot, and he's gotta 'protect' his value bets.

I really don't know if this is a good triple, but I cannot see how it's not, and I cannot see how hero shouldn't be firing most rivers after firing a double on this good card. Doubling just for the reason of tripling is usually gonna be bad, but I conjecture that doubling without the intention of tripling is usually bad since we have chosen to double a card that helps us fold out better hands. Pause on that last sentence, it is also huge. How are we supposed to think that giving up there is often correct? What else does a hand that calls us think other than 1) 'I want him to bluff or bet a third time into my monster' or 2) 'I hope he doesn't bet again because I'm gonna be in a shitty spot with my marginal hand'? And with the nature of the games, the former situation isn't gonna happen nearly as often as the latter.

Man this makes so much sense to me I cannot imagine how it would be wrong. Eventually I'll be able to have this figured out quite nicely.

Another thing is the hammer (the fear of facing a larger bet on the next street). Nobody really consciously thinks about the hammer, but it really seems to apply the most to double barrels. This then suggests that the hammer is only fully applied when a triple is fired. How often do you call a bet hoping that you don't have to call a bigger one on the next street? Those times you obviously were not afraid enough of the hammer to fold, but may be too afraid to call once the hammer follows up.

I dunno, I really feel like when playing vs those who are good to double, it's gotta be profitable to be tripling often after the double. It's full hand reppage, the falling of the hammer, range balancing, and probably so many other good things.

Concerning your personal situation: Breakeven at 25nl is unacceptable. Those games are too easy. 5ptbb is hardly acceptable even. That game can be beat for so much more. Everybody's always wanting to move up and play bigger and blah blah blah. Take it from somebody who has been there and done that. Get better. Once you're better, get better some more. Once you're better some more, then if you're pwning all the noobs at your current stake you can move up. This is done partly by playing but mainly by studying. I have found that I don't have much time to play since I'm spending so much time studying. This is super awesome too since it's what makes me play better and move up and make more in the long run by a sweeping margin over playing a bunch.

17/14/1.5 is also unacceptable, but you know this. It is very rudimentary poker. Poker is about finding weaknesses and exploiting them. Sooooo much is left on the table as a nit. Learn how to exploit position, learn how to exploit poor hand readers, learn how to exploit fear, learn how to exploit odds, learn how to exploit yourself and apply that to the other regs in your game, learn how to exploit every little thing in the littlest way and then learn that you have soooo much left to learn. By this time you will find that you are comfortable, free-thinking (non-robotic), and your table views you as insane.

I recommend reading and posting more in forums, discussing strategy and hands with other players usually via some form of instant messaging (which I don't do neeeeeeeeearly enough. Probably because nobody likes me), analyzing stats of others and comparing and figuring out how their play makes theirs different than yours, and most importantly watch instructional videos or just get coaching. LeggoPoker and CardRunners are probably best.

This was my PM to wufwugy. I actually thought mine was long, but I was amazed by wufwugy's reply.

Lately wufwugy got my attention because imo he was giving spot on advice in a lot of threads. He seems to hit on specific points where I feel I am missing knowledge or reasoning and let's me think outside the box. So maybe it's mostly preference and personal, but I think wufwugy is one of the better posters here at FTR.

Hi wufwugy,

I haven't used AIM in the past. I tried it yesterday but couldn't get it working at my work. I'll try getting it going in the future, but it's possible that something is blocking it at my work. It could be that we're having a time issue as well tho as I live in the Netherlands.

But I'll give it a go in this PM:

More than on thing you mentioned that last few days got my attention. First on was your reply on my hand about calling 99 OOP and not knowing that to do on certain flops where we are likely ahead. I think your reasoning how to play against different opening ranges was spot on.

Also, in your thread about double barreling you mentioned some really interesting stuff.

Even at micro's it's not optimal to play very tight.

Confentional wishdom at FTR and other sources say playing tight at micro stakes. I see where this is coming from, as you don't need to play wider to get paid of (and likely you won't get paid of a lot more) and most players are too bad to play more hands profitably.
But it isn't said that playing tight is optimal, it's just a relatively easy way to be profitable.
Opening up a wide range is optimal against (when we know how to play postflop decent) both tight calling ranges and loose calling range (not only tight calling ranges), because:
I. tight players have an easy range to read, so it's quite easy to see what flops hit them or not.
II. loose players have a wider range and therefor have a weaker flop range, so c-betting should be quite profitable as they fold often.
III. tight players are good candidates for 2 barrels on certain boards, looser players are less good candidates for this.

The last days I have been analyzing different calling ranges on all types of flops. I haven't finished my analyses yet, but when finished it should give a complete view on all types of flops against different calling ranges.
The state my analyses is in now, I can only completely agree on the points you have made in that thread.

Another thing you mentioned was:

We should often have the intention of triple barreling when making a double barrel.

My analyses is still in state of flop play. In the end it should give a good view on ranges on the turn and river as well, as the flop takes us 5/7 (cards) into the game.

I happen to think there is a lot of truth in your statement about 2nd and 3rd barreling. At this moment I can't really back it up with analyses, but the state it is in now gives me a feeling it will lead to something similar.
That made me wonder 2 things:
1. Have you done similar extended analyses?
2. What is your reasoning behind it?


Also, on another subject, I'm a break even 25NL player atm. I am easily rolled for 50NL, but I want a decent/big winrate at 25NL before moving up again. I'm aroung 17/14 atm, which makes me a nit and and I play WAY TOO weak-tight to make it really profitable. (weak in AF of 1,5 and W%WSF of 35%).
The way I am playing is not the way to go. I don't need charts, I don't need a Sauce strategy and I don't need a rule I have to c-bet. I have to know WHY to do it, and WHY it is profitable. If I get that, the stats and winrate will go up fast naturally, I'm confident on that, it's only be a result of controlling my own play.

So I started with a flop analyses, as I'm about always the PFRer so it's the most common situation I'm in. And it is already very insightful.
Maybe you have some tips for me:
1. to get me of my weak play
2. subjects to focus on to analyse after flop play
(i.e. where (on which street or which situations) do people make the most mistakes, where is the most money to be made)

I appreciate the kind words.

Someday I won't suck at this game. Someday....

nh wufwugy. Thanks.

I found myself mentally saying 'ldo' over and over while reading this post.

Just kidding (for the most part ).

Lagg is not better at micro stakes unless you are a very very good player. If a player is calling too much than the logical counter is to have it "too much." The easiest way to do this is to play super tight. /thread.

PS didn't read any of this thread besides the part about minsim asserting he thought playing lagg was better.

17/14 is completely acceptable. We are exploiting ^^^^^, you gotta look at the big picture first.

The big picture is all I see.

We will be better off if we learn how to play well in smaller games than in bigger ones. Playing a robotic nit style, where we're not attempting to exploit any edges beyond the big and obvious ones, will make our journey up the limits more difficult. Waiting till we get to the higher games to learn things we could easily at lower stakes is costly.

Originally Posted by IowaSkinsFan

Lagg is not better at micro stakes unless you are a very very good player. If a player is calling too much than the logical counter is to have it "too much." The easiest way to do this is to play super tight.

Yes, this is how we usually go about it, and yes, it's sub-optimal. The looser they play, the looser we should play. It is, however, much easier and often encouraged (encouraged because it's still profitable), to just remain tight. When we do this it's not so much that we're exploiting our competition, but that our competition is losing money no matter what, and we can take a chunk while keeping ourselves away from possible spew if we just play our hands tight and fast. The fewer fish we play against the less this profits us, and we then learn we need to loosen up vs them to optimize profits. Why then should we not do this when we're at a micro table vs five donkeys instead of wait until we're at higher stakes and only vs one donkey?

One of the main things I've learned in my journey from small to medium stakes is in identifying and isolating the fish. Not just with stuff like JTs 22 like is standard, but with stuff like A2 67 85s and even complete trash more often than most would expect. My play hasn't changed much at all vs them except pf. We can still be a marginal player and profit in these thin spots because we're exploiting the game in the way is closer to optimal than nit and they are terrible and non-exploiting.

The main difference between the fish at 2/4 and .1/.25 is that there are simply just more at the latter. We don't somehow need to be excellent to exploit them when laggy. They're so bad they're gonna adjust incorrectly and make it even easier for us to stack them with the best hand. When playing laggy vs shallow thinkers we're not running any wicked bluffs on them, no fancy play; we're just exploiting our position, our deeper understanding of the game, stealing on cheap streets, and valuowning them on three streets when we have a hand that beats their range. Doing this is all requires intermediate skills at best.

Originally Posted by IowaSkinsFan

PS didn't read any of this thread besides the part about minsim asserting he thought playing lagg was better.

You're should know better than to do this.

Another point is that a big thing about lag is that we're not opening up our overall hand standards so much as we're opening our hands played in certain positions/situations.

Take a 17/14's range as a standard and just add in optimization of isolations and stealing/restealing, and we'll be much looser. Playing lag isn't playing stupid. We're not opening T7 UTG even if we're crazy 40vpip. We're simply just playing more hands when they become profitable, and in some positions vs some players even 42 is plus ev. Not often, but sometimes, and a bunch of different sometimes in this hugely dynamic game adds a lot.

Originally Posted by spoonitnow

I found myself mentally saying 'ldo' over and over while reading this post.

Just kidding (for the most part ).

A big reason for this game's profitability is that things that are standards for some are secrets to others.

Originally Posted by IowaSkinsFan

PS didn't read any of this thread besides the part about minsim asserting he thought playing lagg was better.

Why? How'd you feel if people read two lines of your long, deeply considered posts?

Sweet, so we send Wufwugy long PMs and he writes us long answers, good to know .

The reason why tight play brings home the money in most small/micro games is that the rake is high enough to punish you for getting very active. Reduce the rake and certainly you should be in there GAMB00Ling it up with the guys who play even worse post-flop than they do pre-flop.

Every now and then there is a $20 game at Xianti's place. The guy who really cleans up in that game is playing nearly half of his hands.

Rake definitely punishes you, but not enough I bet. Lower stakes have higher rake, but they also allow higher winrates since players are that much worse.

Originally Posted by wufwugy

Rake definitely punishes you, but not enough I bet. Lower stakes have higher rake, but they also allow higher winrates since players are that much worse.

It depends on the game. NLHE is unusually forgiving here and the penny games at PS weren't raked last I checked.

The play is terrible, but rakes can get really oppressive. To a play a hand and expect to turn a profit, your edge needs to be bigger than the rake.

When does the rake structure change on pokerstars 100nl, 200nl, 400nl?

Originally Posted by meeloche

When does the rake structure change on pokerstars 100nl, 200nl, 400nl?

Across the board I think it's 5% up to a cap depending on number of players delt in. The effective rake decreases as as you move up because more hands cap out faster. Anyway, most other games/formats aren't like this. Hence, the strong advice for tight play in loose raked games.

Well fwiw, my OP isn't focused around lag for micros. In fact it has nothing to do with lag for micros specifically. Just theory, a lot of which has to do with lag.

w,

I just wanted to say that is one perfect ass.

Originally Posted by bjsaust

Sweet, so we send Wufwugy long PMs and he writes us long answers, good to know .

Try me

Most players don't realize the personal value in illustrating our thought processes.

Originally Posted by riverturnflop

w,

I just wanted to say that is one perfect ass.

r,

there's three.

Originally Posted by biondino

Originally Posted by IowaSkinsFan

PS didn't read any of this thread besides the part about minsim asserting he thought playing lagg was better.

Why? How'd you feel if people read two lines of your long, deeply considered posts?

So I guess I shouldn't have posted at all?

YOU SHOULD NEVER POST