Banging my head,

This may be a stupid question, but would like to hear some feedback. I play usually two days a week live, 400nl and do quite well every week. Have been able to pay my bills & house payment with what I take in. But when playing online micro stakes... I usually get my ass kicked. I never play more than 2 tables at a time, only big difference is online usually 6 ring & live is usually 10 ring.
I play a TAG style play.... any idea's

how long have you been playing live? are you playing professionally?

and what stakes do you play online. i was able to beat live 200NL when i was still at 5NL online so....

that is mental, please don't confirm my fears that mirco stakes are incredibly hard and high variance.

Dutch, are you bankrolled for 400nl? as in, you have at least 20 buy ins?

Wonderland...live poker is so easy that you don't need 20 BI's. You need less than that imo.

Dutch...I am also a live player that has turned to online poker. What stakes do you play? I used to think I was able to beat $1/$2 online. I did well at time...but eventually lost my roll. Deposit $50 and start with 2NL and work your way up. If you are a lot better than 2NL, you should get to 5NL in no time. Work your way up and relearn poker all over again! The 400NL game you're playing at is probably a lot worse than the $.05/$.10 games online. Good luck!

guys, don't tell me this or i'll move to vegas!

i played two live cash games and was so short stacked and on such scared money that i must have seen 3 flops in the whole 2 games.

anyway dutchy... few questions:

1. what micro stakes?
2. you use poker tracker?
3. how many hands you played?

micro stakes are mad coz people call you with all sorts beCAUSE it's so cheap to call. No?

Ive been playing now just over 2 years now. I usually play about 6 hrs. a day online. I have a coach that is helping me through the micro stakes, but still get creamed online. I have both P.O. and Indicators, but the site I play at I cant export hand histories.... so finding leaks has been a bitch. ( I know its mostly in love with pocket Aces & Ks that have cost me alot ) My coach insisted I take $200,00 and build it up from 10NL and move up from there.... with swings and everything 200,00 is now just under $50,00 in 3 months. My coach is great, but now he is been hiatus in Thialand the past 5 weeks.
I am playing live in the Netherlands, 2SB/2BB 400 max. do I have a 8000 bankroll? No... I have a small business that like the rest of the world is taking a beating, so I havn't been paying myself for the last 6 months. So to keep bills paid, been playing cash tables usually 2x a week. Usually go in to the table 1/2 stacked, and play tight aggressive... usually after 2 hours Ive doubled up. Dont play with scared money, but Im not snap calling a all-in shove w/TPTK, from a maniac on a flush draw. Just gets frustrating leaving live with 500 euros after 3 hours play, and see my piece of crap mini bankroll online get hammered 10 bucks at a time the very next day.
Is it mental?
Any advice?

Nice link and great graphs, notiable comments on 6 ring which is what Ive always been playing. I may have to rethink and step down and try full tables online and see if there is more success for me there.

It is partly mental.

If you are playing on a site that doesn't allow you to use tracking software I suggest you change sites. If you are looking to just play against terrible players playing on a site that doesn't allow tracking software is helpful, but if you want to work on your game getting the tracking software to work is a pretty good idea. PokerOffice doesn't have much of a crowd supporting it - most people tend to prefer either PokerTracker or HoldemManager. I'd suggest transferring your online bankroll to any site that allows tracking software and approach the online poker with... humility.

Stop thinking in amounts of money when playing (especially online) but think instead in multiples of the blinds. Review your play religiously and post hands asking for feedback. And move down. Start over at 2nl, concentrate on playing well and move up when the roll permits.

Online plays differently from live - what online gives you is an opportunity to really learn the basics and the fundamentals of the game and put together a strategy for playing that allows you to become a more complete poker player. Live play is much slower, so your sample sizes will always be smaller and I think most people agree that the lower live limits have a lot more idiots. Or recreational players. Or fish. Whatever term you prefer.

Online is very beatable, but the challenge is as at any table to find out how to beat it. If you have a formula (that you call TAG) that you use when playing live that beats the game - good for you. But are you winning the most money that you could win that way? Probably not. The best way to play takes into account the playing tendencies, abilities, thought patterns and psychology of your opponent and play against them in a way that maximises your expected value against them. Online is no different. Don't just play in a certain way because it's probably good - instead try to take your opponents seriously, establish exactly what they can and cannot do and try to figure out how to you can exploit that to your advantage.

That doesn't make any sense. Live games are very soft, but not softer than 2c/5c ...

wonderland, you're starting to piss me off. Stop looking for your failure to beat the online stakes elsewhere... post more hands, review your sessions, and stop making stupid plays. You suck at poker... learn not to suck so much -> profit.


Dutch, if you haven't played for at least a couple of months regularly, you can't really know what your winrate is. Live games are so insanely slow. You can be a loosing player overall, but win over the course of 5-10k hands, just because you caught a surge of positive variance. On the other hand, even the best live players will have loosing months - if you don't even have 8k (that's not even close to the minimum for 400NL) then you're going broke sooner or later.

Read the starting hand requirement stuff (should be stickied in the beginners circle) - stick to that.
Most likely mistake: you're playing too many hands, and you're not playing your good hands aggressively enough.
If you're never ever folding AA or KK, they will still make you money - heroic laydowns are more likely to cost you money.

My advice is sinple, play more live than online.
As long as you dont mind taking chances with your roll. I wouldnt advise playing those stakes live under rolled but if thats what you want and you dont mind the risk then continue on.

Make sure you get your online coach to discuss the importance of table selection. Find a table with fish and start there. Dont sit at a nit table.
I dont want to be rude but if your getting consistently cooked at online, you need to go to the lowest limits and start from scratch. You need to remember that at the smaller stakes, many people dont care about losing their $5....they are there just for shits and giggles and perhaps will not play as scared as some at a 2/4 live table where possibly the majority of them cant truly afford to play.

I would advise the opposite.
Stop playing live for a while, and rebuild your roll online. Once you start beating 25NL+ - if you have the money for 200 / 400NL live - go back.

And every time you play live, track you winnings losses. It sounds like you're not being very honest with yourself. You're not just magically doubling up every time you play. Make an excel sheet and enter the time you played - an estimation of how many hands and the profits / losses.
From that you can also get your standard deviation and crap like that, so you can see if playing with a 20x buy-in roll might actually have an acceptable risk of ruin.

Originally Posted by oskar

I would advice exactly the opposite.
Stop playing live for a while, and rebuild your roll online. Once you start beating 25NL+ - if you have the money for 200 / 400NL live - go back.

I'm kind of supporting this. I think online is probably the better arena to analyze your play, find out what's right and what's wrong - easier to ask for discussion and advice (as hand histories are perfect records of what happened), cheaper lessons as you play at lower stakes money wise and just better for you to get the understanding of hand value, odds calculations, basic strategy etc figured out. It should make live play even more profitable in the long run.

I don't think that anyone needs a 20 BI live roll.

I have about 75BI for online play, and I routinely play live with a 4 BI cash roll. I don't play live every week, so I don't need a huge live roll, and I still have the comfort of knowing I have so much online to draw from if necessary, so that does change it a bit. However, I would say 8-10 BI for a "regular" live player ought to be plenty with the pace of the game.

PS I'm a BR nit too.....

I still have the comfort of knowing I have so much online to draw from if necessary, so that does change it a lot.

fyp

Most people playing with 1/8 their BR on the table will not play there best game even if they are OK moving down after every losing session or whatever it is your are suggesting. "The pace of the game" doesn't change downswings.

Originally Posted by cardsman1992

I don't think that anyone needs a 20 BI live roll.

I have about 75BI for online play, and I routinely play live with a 4 BI cash roll. I don't play live every week, so I don't need a huge live roll, and I still have the comfort of knowing I have so much online to draw from if necessary, so that does change it a bit. However, I would say 8-10 BI for a "regular" live player ought to be plenty with the pace of the game.

PS I'm a BR nit too.....

If you are playing for a living, I would think that you would need MORE than 20 BI's for a live roll. Of course, the risk of ruin might not be very large considering how soft it is, but I don't think there isn't anything wrong with being safe. If I was paying my bills with poker, I would have a SHIT ton of BI's lol. I wouldn't consider doing it with <50. But then again, I'm a nit too

I have seen a few coaching video's that $400NL live was comparable with 50NL online. After reading the comments and some consideration, I may have an explaination, seeing a maniac, a fish, or even good players, tend to see much easier live, and are even easier to remember. Even with notes on online players, specific hands the same types play dont really always come to mind. And again the comment of fewer hands and slower play is also so very true.

live 300 NL = NL10 online

I haven't played much live... just the 100NL beginners tables and some low buy-in MTT's - and I've seen things in those < 5k hands that you almost never see at 50NL - or even lower. Like people misreading their hands and stacking off with 4 card straights, or shoving when their hand just got counterfitted.
It's definitely very weak. But you still need to be a somewhat solid player to beat the enormous rake + tips + drinks and food + hookers (optional)

Originally Posted by oskar

I haven't played much live... just the 100NL beginners tables and some low buy-in MTT's - and I've seen things in those < 5k hands that you almost never see at 50NL - or even lower. Like people misreading their hands and stacking off with 4 card straights, or shoving when their hand just got counterfitted.
It's definitely very weak. But you still need to be a somewhat solid player to beat the enormous rake + tips + drinks and food + hookers (optional)

Bold 1: <3 when people do this lol. Drunk pokerz ftw.

Bold 2: Hookers are never optional imo

lol, hookerz. Not where i live *shudders*

umm... so this is weird... so are we saying that online is super hard, or live cash is super easy??

glad the OP got some confirmatory feedback though.

and, wot the FUK is online 400nl like in comparison to cash... $4k??

Originally Posted by wonderland

lol, hookerz. Not where i live *shudders*

umm... so this is weird... so are we saying that online is super hard, or live cash is super easy??

glad the OP got some confirmatory feedback though.

and, wot the FUK is online 400nl like in comparison to cash... $4k??

Both imo. The 200nl live game where I live plays so much like 2nl-5nl online that its laughable. Once I get a decent live roll going I will be playing probably 4-5 times a week.

The reason that online is so much more tough than live (imo) is that there is a larger player pool than where most people play live. Many of the people online (at the higher stakes like 200nl) aren't playing for the "fun" of it. They are playing for the $$$.

On the flip side, people playing live are just playing for fun and 200nl happens to be the lowest stakes where I play. (I think this is true for most other card rooms as well.) So the guys that are playing <25nl online are all on the 200nl tables donating to the players that know how to exploit them.

My experience with micro stakes is that the games ARE high varience. People will lay beats on you left and right but if youre a good player you still should not be losing in the long run. The thing that pretty much turned me from losing at micros to crushing them, is just getting Massive value from my legit hands... At the micros you can litteraly go raise,pot,pot, shove with TPTK and win 100bbs from players who will call you down. Theres no reason to bet 2/3 pot at 2 and 5nl if youre playing against players who will call full pot bets with worse. Dont be afraid to get that money in if you figure to have the best hand. You need to HAMMER these players who will call you down light. Spenda said it best in one of his GS videos: "The way you beat these stakes is to BET when you have a good hand. And when you bet, BET A LOT!"

Value Value Value. Sure its swingy, but you will profit TONS in the long haul

IMO you should be able to beat the micros if your winning consistently live. I don't really understand how you can't win 2nl but you can dominate 400nl live. Poker is after all poker. Granted you can't get physical tells and reads sitting behind your pc but still overall you should be winning. I'm not trying to come off like an A-Hole i just don't understand how you can loose that many buy ins playing micro-stakes, expecially if your sticking to a good range read 4x pfr 3 bet stick and go regime Tag-Style play. There might be a leak in your game?!?!? I don't know about your trainer either maybe you should switch to the man thats got a sticky post here in the beginner section.

I know online is an adjustment to live play, i think that you will learn a lot about poker by playing online that will really improve your live play. Stick to the abc's of poker when playing micro stakes. You dont need to get to fancy. Read the strategy section!!!!!

I hope things change for you my friend!

Good information!

Thanks everyone for their feedback, after reading the comments, and other postings. I went back and reviewed not so much my play on either live or online. More so my preperations before playing live. Stupid prep things I remind myself while driving to the casino, ( Big Hands Big Pots... never risk your whole stack on TPTK ect. etc. etc. even try to visulize while driving hands Im going to get and how I want to play them... BTW that does really work, few weeks ago I did that, and first hand a straight flush, 10 hands later quads. ) Anyway, Im reminding myself to do the same mental prepwork even in the micro's. Reviewing training films before playing etc. Anyway thanks again everyone for thier advice & feedback.

Hey there micro-donk (hehe, juuust kidding)

well sir, not sure what stakes you've been playing but i've recently been on a roller coaster up and down the micro stakes like a yo-yo. Started with 2nl, did that nicely, went to 5nl, did that with only one small set back, then went to 10nl and happened to run bad so went back down to 5nl but then ran a bit bad there and decided to have a play with 2nl.

I won 8 buy-ins in two days (about 4-5 hours devided by two sessions). Having come from tougher stakes, going down was hillariously easy.

So, if you want to scrape some bankroll together @ 2nl then try these things:

- Get up one table at a time with your HUD running and just make a note of who is actually terrible, you'll probably find they all are. When you've done that, open another table, and so on until you have about 4 tables. Buy in for as much as your bank roll can handle. My bankroll is too big for 2nl so i buy in for $5, if you can, do this.
- symptoms of wonder fish: vp of over 45/50 and a very low, almost zero pre flop raise percent. These people just limp call. We all know this but i want to target the uber fish, not just the semi-fish. You'll also see them call with 2nd pair no kicker, or go all-in pre flop with A9.
- Play a loose aggressive style. Raise 4-5xbb in all positions, fish don't think you have strength when you raise PF, they just think you're trying to be funny, so they call if they feel put out by your raise. Bet with your open enders and flush draws, play a bet fold game, make them see you a) turn over poor hands and b) fold to any pressure.
- Find the ONE fish at EVERY table that is your enemy, he'll be the one that is always calling your bets and raising you coz he knows you'll fold. Keep a GOOD eye on him, you'll be taking his stack later. Note: one @ each table x 4 tables.
- Now we just wait for our big hands. You can limp a lot with your hands with big implied odds, suited connectors, Ax, Kx suited and of course raise with all your pocket pairs, the will NOT see trips coming and will stack of at least 50% of the time.
- Bet almost every flop when you hit anything. Represent anything.
- By this time, everyone thinks you're an agro idiot and will have no respect for you, especially your table enemy calling station.
- You get your TPTK against your enemy, bet large and then you can do one of two things: shove or show weakness THEN shove. He will totally think you've just lost your temper. A shove will probably get called more than if you bet half your stack. Coz it just looks like naked aggression.
- Two pair are also gold here.
- Fold when they REALLY start to play back at you and you can slow down in later streets if it looks like your hand is going nowhere. They key thing to realise is that they can't tell the difference between when you're strong and when you're not. Mainly, when you're not you'll be folding, when you are you'll be stacking off.

Disclaimer: this is a terrible style of poker and should only be used in emergencies when you want to reclaim some $$. I fully endorse a non $$ oriented game play based on skill. This technique does NOT work at any other stake than 2nl.

hahahaha..... maniac!! I seen the same style live,,, ( I swear to God!! ) Worse yet they draw out on me. Eventually they lose it all, but not always to me.... I will paste and print, and try it once... maybe . My coach would sht.

...I thought the move down to $2nl was to pick up good habits?

Not that there's anything terrible about what you've written there wonderland, but you're not going to improve without playing your A game against A game opponents, try to find a challenge as well as free money

hehe, kinda maniac. But the trick is that YOU are in control. You will fold when you don't have a good hand, they won't.

Last night was beautiful. Had this idiot who would just call me with anything, yet i never hit. You invest your leads with such a person though, your bets-with-draws that don't hit are all investments. So... eventually i get QJ and with these guys' ranges that's a good hand. I raise, he calls, flop comes J high and i bet pot and a half. He calls. Fuck sake... so i say, right, have this, all in. He calls with pocket nines! i take aaaall his money.

Also, to THEM it's just two bucks *shrug* they don't mind, but to us it's big blinds and bankroll, so we can fold when we need to.

Just stay well clear of the ones who show some degree of like being able to raise pre flop, cbet strong etc. They're not the uber fish to hunt for.

Luco, was it you who suggested i move down and play one table?

yeah. No i TOTALLY hear that, i'm in no was going to argue with that.

This is just a quick replenishment technique if you've hit a few downers and need to recover some ground. Nothing more.

Besides, i don't think one can be all that profitable playing nice clean poker at that level because your opponents are almost unreadable. Last night i got raised and raised when i had TPTK and he checks the river, so i give him the benefit of the doubt and check back. He had pocket fives. BUT... he hit a set on the river!!!

It's also to give you a confidence boost. Top up with $$ so you know you can win and you also aren't scared of losing yet more buy-ins.

SHORT TERM. Again, incase of emergency, break glass. Luco is totally right. I'm going to get straight back into ABC clean poker now.

Dude, you can totally CRUSH 2nl/5nl/and so far for me 10nl just playing straightforward ABC fishpwning poker. Just value bet, value bet, value bet you hands. EZ game. No need to get fancy and play every hand that comes your way. Just play a solid game and you will profit.

Yes it was me who suggested you move down, glad to see it worked and gave you your confidence back.

ABC nit poker is a tried and tested method for profitable $2nl. So to get back to the OP's question, TAG is the way to go. Maybe you'll do better playing $2nl FR if that's what you're used to. Sushiwizard gets +1 for his post too (Bet big on your good hands, don't mess about).

So wonderland, you have found a fail-proof way of making money? Sure sounds that way when you say its "a quick replenishment technique.... incase of emergency... etc".

You really need a look into long term poker and actual poker variance. One session, or even a few sessions does not create a large enough sample size to make assumptions on many situations.

Winning at the micro stakes is not all that difficult in theory. They will call with a lot of terrible hands. Therefore, since they have a wide range, it stands to reason you should bet a wide range of value (but one that is ahead of their calling range obv), and bluff relatively rarely (as their calling range is so wide, they aren't folding too often). Obviously winning isn't as cut and dry as this either, but it's a good starting point.

Your "strategy" is actually built at the above theory, with just a few more flaws. Mainly the bet nearly everything portion. Which is absolutely foolish. If they aren't folding you don't need to represent hands, bet your missed hands, or really bluff all that often. And they will still have a hard time folding when you get a hand and they have the 2nd best hand.

Originally Posted by XxStacksxX

So wonderland, you have found a fail-proof way of making money? Sure sounds that way when you say its "a quick replenishment technique.... incase of emergency... etc".

You really need a look into long term poker and actual poker variance. One session, or even a few sessions does not create a large enough sample size to make assumptions on many situations.

Winning at the micro stakes is not all that difficult in theory. They will call with a lot of terrible hands. Therefore, since they have a wide range, it stands to reason you should bet a wide range of value (but one that is ahead of their calling range obv), and bluff relatively rarely (as their calling range is so wide, they aren't folding too often). Obviously winning isn't as cut and dry as this either, but it's a good starting point.

Your "strategy" is actually built at the above theory, with just a few more flaws. Mainly the bet nearly everything portion. Which is absolutely foolish. If they aren't folding you don't need to represent hands, bet your missed hands, or really bluff all that often. And they will still have a hard time folding when you get a hand and they have the 2nd best hand.

Well from personal experience it helps to know about pot control and SPR even in the microes. I was breaking even in NL10 because I was overplaying my hands, even against bad players it's not a good thing. Or sometimes folding a good hand despite the SPR telling me I should stack off. I started beating NL10 after I read PNL.

nooo, stacks wasn't supposed to read my secret shame. Chasing the micro dollar through maniac play style. Just to clarify though, i only advocate leading a lot of flops because, while you lose in the short term, you will generate a shit image and take a large buy-in every so often. It's leaky though but what you take back at the end of the session is nice. It also involves a bit of intuition: hmmm, they don't realise i have two pair, they don't think i'm betting my flush here because i bet the FD just like this before etc.

Well from personal experience it helps to know about pot control and SPR even in the microes. I was breaking even in NL10 because I was overplaying my hands, even against bad players it's not a good thing. Or sometimes folding a good hand despite the SPR telling me I should stack off. I started beating NL10 after I read PNL.

Dude this sounds interesting but i can't figure out what you mean, could you elaborate at all? what is PNL and SPR? cheers.

PNL is Professional No Limit Hold'em and SPR is Stack-to-Pot Ratio, it is a topic covered in detail in PNL. I suggest this be the next book you buy pertaining to poker, as it will be a massive benefit to your poker career once you learn the topics covered.

Also, generating an image at 2nl/5nl/and for the most part, 10nl is absolute ludicrous. They just don't care/realize that you have raised the last 4 hands in a row, or that you haven't played a hand in 5 orbits, it just doesn't matter. I never strayed from playing solid nit/TAG poker and I've turned $10 into $400 in just under 5 months. It IS a winning strategy, given time and over the long run the short term variance will even out, resulting in profit for you. You just have to put in the hands to make this so.

Additional thought from a fellow micro-grinder ($5NL ATM)....

Think everyone would agree that 2NL/5NL can be beat by a variety of styles due to the major leakages and fundamental lack of basic poker strategy in the micros.

Assuming our long-term objectives are to move up in stakes, shouldn't we be trying to beat in a method that establishes and practices the good solid foundational skills that will scale-up as we move ahead?

That way, when we move up, we aren't trying to "unlearn" the bad habits that were effective at the lower limits but put us in an exploitable position at the higher levels.

I occasionally try the FPS when the appropriate opportunity presents itself to try out new things (with very "mixed" results TBH). But as has been said so many times before, value-bet, value-bet, value-bet and try hard to fold to the 4x pot river bets without the nuts (never say never!).

Cougar: we play not based on how we should play vs. good opponents, but based on how we should play vs. our current opponents

there are fishy players at all levels
I guarantee you there are fish at NL50 and NL100
if you can't beat these players for the BEST possible rate, you're wasting precious time since they can give their money to someone else

so what if 3b bluffing is profitable IP vs. tags? that doesn't mean you should 3b bluff fish
and exploiting fish to the max IS good practice because if you can't exploit the bad players, how can you exploit the better players?

Originally Posted by iopq

Cougar: we play not based on how we should play vs. good opponents, but based on how we should play vs. our current opponents

^^^this

The reason moving up through the micros is such a good learning experience is because each level has just a few less fish and just a few more players with the ability to put us to tough decisions. If we continue to exploit player tendencies at each level, we pretty quickly develop a well-rounded ABC game, with the ability to exploit the most common mistakes.