How to progress as a player

I am wondering what things a successful small stakes player should do to progress his game further. I am a TAGG that is trying to loosen it up some and I am wondering if there are any ideas as to how to do this. Obviously trial and error is the best learning tool. Are there any suggestions above and beyond this?

I can suggest a lot of almost obvious things.

Study the handhistory forum and replies from members whose opinions you really respect. Post your opinions. I try and post my opinion before reading the rest, that way I'm not biased. In the archives you can probably find every tricky situation you'll ever run into, along with the ones that plague us all the time.

Keep moving up. You'll get shot back down fairly often, even if you can beat the next level already. But moving up is crucial to progressing your game. The nut-camping you do at 25NL doesn't work after a certain point.

Read books. Several authors do a great job explaining a lot of critical skills. You should be able to take away a few key points from each read.

Lastly, don't loosen it up that much. There's a lot of top name pros that are known for being really tight. But they're still pros. Play the table.

Lastly, don't loosen it up that much.

I second that.Don't start playing K8o in LP unless your opponent is thaaaaat bad......and even then you may still lose.

Play the table.

Amen.

Don't loosen up until you move up in levels. I hear that 50NL is a place where loosening up becomes mandatory. Until then, just play good cards and bad players.

I think the most important aspect of anyones game would be to improve on their hand reading skills. Try to best understand what your opponent has, if you know what they have, it doesn't matter what you have... just don't loose your stack with this idea.

Practice makes perfect. Play as many hands as possible, while making the correct decision everytime. Read this and the hand histories forum everyday, or as much as possible. The best way to improve is to simply play a lot of hands, and have them analyzed be us. Good luck to you.

Originally Posted by WhooFleuryScores

I second that.Don't start playing K8o in LP unless your opponent is thaaaaat bad......and even then you may still lose.

Crap, I guess by that logic I should start folding Aces pre-flop? Once you think you're pretty good at this game, someone just turns your whole view upside down...

Originally Posted by BankItPayette

Don't loosen up until you move up in levels. I hear that 50NL is a place where loosening up becomes mandatory.

Otherwise the increase to .25/.50c blinds eats you alive if you just camp all day?

Originally Posted by BankItPayette

Don't loosen up until you move up in levels. I hear that 50NL is a place where loosening up becomes mandatory. Until then, just play good cards and bad players.

There is no way you can determine how loose or tight you play relative to the stakes. Just becuase it is 50NL doesn't mean you play looser. Your style of play should only be determined by your opponents, nothing else.

Originally Posted by Fnord

Originally Posted by BankItPayette

Don't loosen up until you move up in levels. I hear that 50NL is a place where loosening up becomes mandatory.

Otherwise the increase to .25/.50c blinds eats you alive if you just camp all day?

No, I was thinking along the lines of better players playing at higher stakes who are not going to pay you off as much on your made or AA hands as 10NL & 25NL do.

Loosening up on $50NL is not mandatory. Unless you play only AA-QQ , but still you can find some fishiez, thre are many of them.

Originally Posted by IOS

Originally Posted by BankItPayette

Don't loosen up until you move up in levels. I hear that 50NL is a place where loosening up becomes mandatory. Until then, just play good cards and bad players.

There is no way you can determine how loose or tight you play relative to the stakes. Just becuase it is 50NL doesn't mean you play looser. Your style of play should only be determined by your opponents, nothing else.

I suppose my messesge wasn't clearly stated. What I was suggesting was that there are, on average, better players at higher stakes. I have played a different style of game at each level I have played at, this is because I had adjusted to each level. The adjustments were a result of the change in quality of players from one level to the next. My suggestion to players playing @ 50NL was only a hypothesis.

One cannot play the same style within 2NL as in 400NL, unless the players are the same. We all know however, that this is not the case.

I don't think much changes at 50nl, speaking for pokerstars anyway.. you can play like a rock and 8-table on autopilot and be profitable up until about 400nl (although it's definitely not the best way to progress your game).

I 100% agree with whoever said not to loosen up too much, or at least do it very gradually. It's just a matter of determining your hand's EV in specific circumstances...which you should always be doing of course, but when you're playing more hands it's especially important because bad decisions are compounded. Remember, 90% of losing players are just bad LAGs.

Don't raise J9s UTG because it seems like the "LAGgy" thing to do, raise J9s UTG because there is good reason for you to believe you have the best of it in doing so. Experience is a huge factor in making these decisions.

my 2cents