Tilting and BR management

Just getting over a really bad tilt/spew in the last couple weeks and have finally posted some wins, so I thought I'd share what I think the problems is/was.

- Playing to aggressively
- Playing to loose
- Ignoring proper BR management

#1. To much aggression - There is a tendency to press to win pots when you run bad, trying to make up the loss you get into this mode of I MUST WIN NOW. So that led me to float a shit ton of flops and check raise the turn on any kind of scare card, completely ignoring pot sizing and equity, fancy play syndrome. Then when villain would call me down with 2nd pair it would tilt me more (How the hell can he call that??) Then the pattern would continue until everyone at the table is in all your pots calling you down lightly and you basically have to leave or keep spewing. I chose the latter.

#2. Playing loose - This happens because you cant WIN RIGHT NOW if your not in a lot of pots. So lets open our range and bet my way out of problems later. The problem here is as you become more active you get less and less respect at the table. I use to have a friend that would c-bet 100% and he got pissed because everyone would always float him. He couldn't figure out that when you fold you actually build up image equity that you can use later. Also once you get pegged as loose everyone starts playing back at you more, something that makes poker much harder. Additionally the game gets harder as well because you end up connecting with marginal holdings 2nd or 3rd pair hands shit kicker etc. No respect and crap holdings = spew

#3. BR management - I've been trying to do this and was fine for a long time, but when tilted you go insane. Jump up in stake to recoup losses and lose more faster. Now there have been occasions where I've jumped up and won, it feels great but it is wrong. At that point your just gambling and thats not what we are trying to do if we are trying to win at poker. I'm never playing a stake where I don't have 30x the buy in period.

Another comment about micro-stakes: a TAG style is easier to play and dominates the micros. For a LAG style to work your opponents have to be able to understand what your doing/representing and at micros most players are only looking at their hand and will call down with TPWK. I've always been very active and LAGGY and have a great red line, but have struggled through micros. My stats at 25 and 50NL are better then at 2nl and 5nl. Until recently I didn't figure it out, have switched to basically a straight forward TAG style and that has gotten me back on track and winning again.

Glad you got back to winning. I think your post boils down to one main concept: Don't tilt.

You show some classic signs of what happens when we tilt.

Good post.

Great post! It's something I to which I can really relate. Aggression is good but too much of anything is bad.
Man was it ever easy to go on tilt after switching from live home games to online where people would call down with the dumbest shit.

Originally Posted by Wikkiwikki

Another comment about micro-stakes: a TAG style is easier to play and dominates the micros. For a LAG style to work your opponents have to be able to understand what your doing/representing and at micros most players are only looking at their hand and will call down with TPWK. I've always been very active and LAGGY and have a great red line, but have struggled through micros. My stats at 25 and 50NL are better then at 2nl and 5nl. Until recently I didn't figure it out, have switched to basically a straight forward TAG style and that has gotten me back on track and winning again.

This has been my experience at 2NL, too. People aren't folding top pair when you float and the straight comes in on the river. So if you bluff the straight, they're mostly gonna take your stack. This makes tighter play the best strategy (against unknowns, at least). Just sit back, relax, find the fold button, and let the money come to you when you do have the best hand.

I guess this is an example of restricting your thinking to ONLY one level above your opponents. If they aren't thinking about what you might be holding, it is unprofitable to think about what they think you are holding.

If they aren't thinking about what you might be holding, it is unprofitable to think about what they think you are holding.

Absolutely!

That FPS, floats to rep a flush or straight and getting called down with 2nd pr shit kicker, sent me tilting windmills and reloading.

Most at the micros give less than a damn about what you've got, all they see is:
"WoW! I've got a 82 Awesome, here comes a flush."
Then it's "Cool another heart, and a 2 so now I've got a pr. Wow, that Ace on the flop sure is pretty."
"This guy's betting pretty hard, but I've got a pr and three , so I'll call again."
"Another heart this time, come on baby. Look at this: this guy wants me to put in my whole stack...doesn't he know that if I hit that flush I'll break him!"
"Last card...no heart, but look at this an 8...AWESOME"

And what the hero's hole cards: AK

Before you play set a goal. It cannot be something like win X. Just say I will think at least 2 seconds before I make every post flop play. It will help you quite a bit.

Good luck to you.

Originally Posted by !Luck

Before you play set a goal. It cannot be something like win X. Just say I will think at least 2 seconds before I make every post flop play. It will help you quite a bit.

Good luck to you.

This

How can you not improve faster if you go into every session with something specific to work on?

I kinda have the opposite problem, where I think I tend to stop playing too fast when I loose. The real problem is that it takes me ages to "dare" playing again.

On the upside I am also decently good at stopping when I feel that I start fuming, because I know from prior experience that everything you described above is going to happen if I don't stop. Although stopping to play has a positive aspect, it is also a leak at the same time, because the really "professional" thing to do would be to get over it and manage to keep up my A-game facing adversity. Note that I get more upset (and stay upset longer) because of my own bad plays than by a longish serie of bad beats.