Discussion: Why you suck at LHE (for newbs)

If you havent had a chance to look at it, its:

http://www.flopturnriver.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=6613

And, since you locked it and we have no further way to discuss it, I decided to make a discussion thread on it.

First off, I'm going to come out and say I dislike you locking your thread, thereby leaving no open room for discussion, among other things.

If you were to number them, they would look something like this:

i got a chuckle out of the going all in remark Very Happy

that just means you ran outta money!

Let the games begin.
I think in number 12 he is talking about the people that will call any raise in the blinds.........there are plenty of them out there.

17.You go all in. I am going to guess this is refering to losing all your money putting you all in. A good player always has enough money to cap every street if needed.

19. All I have to say is sample size Shocked

What about raising the turn heads up with a weak draw. I get that ALL the time. That should be on the list also.

Oh yeah, i forgot to mention, add some of your own Smile

10k hands is 10k hands, it doesn't matter over what duration you play them so talking about streaks and months is silly.

I'm mostly directing the post at the newbies I see comming from the micro tables and the lemmings I see at live games. It pretty much covers the HUGE chip spewing leaks I see over and over again.

Going allin is horrible because it's money that you can't double up on. You should always have enough chips at the table to play your normal game.

*Last edited by jbmagic on Sat, 05 Feb 2005, 2:03pm; edited 1 time in total*

you mean AKs not AKo right?

The difference between AKs and AKo isnt that great.

And the you're a bad player because "you don't" is a double negative as in "you should do X", which is what you're saying.

Of course it isnt always true blah blah but that's a bit too complex for someone these tips would help.

Depending on the game, I may not cap AKo. If its HU and a Rock raises i'll call the three bet. At lower limits though I'd almost always cap it.

5. You don't 3-bet/cap AA,KK,QQ,AK

why not?

i tought your suppose to 3bet/cap AA,KK,QQ,AK

I love the way fnord is so blunt.

It is almost like ok boys, you suck, here's why, you still suck, I can smell the suckage from over here, please come play at my table.

At low limits with gamblers and rec players, those rules are absolutely on point. At higher limits, you break all of them. Knowing when to break them determines whether you win or lose at say 10/20 and up.

Great post Fnord.

Soupie

Fnord, I have a suggestion for # 20 of why people suck at LIM

20. Even though you have a sufficent bankroll(presumably), you only bring $200 to 300 into a 10/20 game. I don't know how may times I have seen the following two scenerios.

1. Guy has KK with $43 dollars left and misses out on a big portion of the pot. He then "whines" a about bad-timing while he is rebuying.

2. Guy had $40 to $50 left and I think he is trying to rep the flop. Everyone else folds and I go after him with 2nd best pair and good kicker. His short stack has effectivley limited my potential loss. I may be behind, but I'll have free cards coming. Also, players get real frustated and (and their starting requiremenst can go out the window) when they are down to $40 from $400 -seems like they just want to get out or get set for a rebuy.

Ayway, I think this is one the weakest things I see in LIM. Short stacks.

Any thoughts, Fnord or others??

I'll agree with you, but i think this is a variation of the 'Going All-in.'

You should always have at least 12 BB so you are to cap every street. A lot of people sit with 25, I like to sit with around 50.

If you get down to 40 from 400 you are probably hoping for some mere luck, when you should have left the table a long time ago.

I've seen it happen too, Players with under $100 at a 5/10 table are my favorite!!

Can we add to this:

Playing at the wrong table with not enough chips.

I think table selection is often under rated and see many people sit down at thw rong table and under stacked. I love it when everyone at the table has 30-40 and someoen sits down with 10.

Just wanted to say, "Nice post Fnord".

I am a No Limit player who occasionly plays Limit in B&M casinos. I'm going to read and re-read these and really think about them, because I'm sure some on them apply to me.

Thanks also to Jeff for getting the ball rolling on the discussion.

Fnord, I have two more for the why I suck list

21. You "always" check when you miss the flop (you never rep the flop)
22. You 'always' bet when you hit the flop (never check-raise or slow play)

There is not better "fish" to play against than the ones that do the two things above. Short of seeing their cards, you can't ask for much more.

From a limit newbie perspective Embarassed

, I think Fnord's post has been incredibly helpful. It's taken me some time to identify some major leaks (and there are still more to find, I assure you) in my limit game after switching over from S&G's and small stakes NL. If you haven't done so, I will attest first hand that you will have some MAJOR ingrained leaks, if you don't make some critical adjustments. Here are the ones that struck a chord with me:

#9 - The "punish a flush draw" item fits me here, as in NL you obviously can take it away from them, or at least force a bad call. I used to get all bent out of shape when low suited take away my pot in limit. But, since I had pumped my TPTK hand, they were more often correct in calling. I've plugged this one pretty well of late.
#18 - Variance - This is SO true for me, as well. The limit swings drove me nuts at first. This also showed me that every little mistake you make worsens this variance and kills you like 1000 papercuts. I didn't realize how dependent I was on the implied odds avail in NL to recover from these little mistakes...

One more for consideration:
#23 - You never study your past play.

I believe the Variance to actually be higher in No Limit, but more frequent in LHE.

After going through some NL players PT database, we found the Standard Deviation to be much higher for NL players.

An average LHE SD is around 15 BB/100.

I 'believe' if I remember correctly, Boondock had a SD around 40 BB/100.

Are there any NL players out there reading this thread that can help that have PokerTracker?

I checked my 25k hands from my $25NL experience, and my SD was around 25 BB/100. My limit SD over 15k hands is about 15/100 BB.

Obviously, these sample sizes are small...other people have stats from larger hand histories?

To clarify my previous point, the 'variance' I was referring to was the frustrating feeling in limit that getting way down meant a LONG time to fight back to profit. It can be just as frustrating as losing a huge pot in NL...just more painfully slow.

I barely deserve to comment on this stuff because I only rarely play limit hold 'em, (I only play limit when I go to B&M casinos), but two of Fnord's points are so true that I just had to chime in..

I used to play NL only, but now i play $1-2 and $2-4 limit (when the game is good).

I see horrible play at ALL limit games even up to $20-40 on my site.

The real trick isn't knowing when to raise AK and shit , its AVOIDING the fish who play A,7 to the river and beat your AK because he caught a runner-runner set.

I don't really play limit holdem, but do mess around at the limit tables some times. But one of your points was:

You go all-in

How can you go allin at limit holdem? If you go allin it's because you are very short stacked. Isn't it?

The blinds must be very big or you must be very short stacked if you manage to go allin.

Obviously, I misunderstood. What did you mean?

PS - Who wouldn't play AK vs A7?

Hi,
This is great advice. I was playing for about 2 hours before reading your article and, luckily it was .02/.04, I was losing like crazy. what I realized is that over time I start playing like everyone else. Since I'm still so new, it's easy too play like opponents without even realizing it. I have a few books on the way, and I've learned to get up often and assess my situation. This really helps me from tilting. Keep up the good work.

uh, thanks? lol, i'll let fnord know right after i lock this thread.

{unlocked}

Its for discussion, let it be discussed.

"6. You fold pretty good hands for 1 bet in big pots"

Horrible! I see this ALL the time. Newb flops two pair and bets out, 2 callers. Turn comes, making a flush draw on the board, newb bets, 1 caller. River comes the third flush card. Newb checks, other guy bets. Newb folds. Ugh!

"8. You ignore the size of the pot"

Most newbs don't even know what pot odds are. I think, after learning some basic starting hand requirements, this should be the next compulsory stage of devlopment.

"1. You play too many hands"

I've left this til last, because I think it's by far the biggest leak most newbs have. In limit holdem, tight is right. I see so many players going with any Ace, any 2 suited cards, 3-gapper connectors like K9 etc. Horrible. Stop it.

May I make a suggestion to replace the current number 2(or at least bump it down the list a little), as this to me is the second biggest leak in most newbie's games:

2. You pay absolutely no attention to the importance of position.

i have a pair to add, being:

23?. You are a worse player than you think.
24?. You are a better player than you think.

one of these applies to me but i'm ironing. Shocked

This thread has been extremely helpful. I'm playing some limit freerolls and am finding that playing tight is getting me in deeper positions than some of my NL freerolls. It's gotten to the point where I am actually thinking of playing some cash limit games once I build up the bankroll.

A.

I completely disagree. I buy in for what everyone else bought in for, as long as its greater than 12bb. I dont want to stand out, I stand out enough as it is being that i'm 22 and most of the casino i visit is 50+

One of the worst habits a LHE player can have :

- You call too often, and don't bet/raise enough.

Aggression wins.

Another common reason why you suck...

- You concentrate too much on results, and not enough on making correct decisions.

- Corollary : You let your "lucky" results influence future decisions.

I don't care how well you got paid off when calling 2-bets cold out of the BB with 96. The correct decision is to lay it down and not get involved.

LHE is a game of small edges. Making bad decisions takes away any edge you might have.

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