rate the 2nl advice

ok, some players give good advice, some bad, and most of us give a combination.
Thoughts on the 2nl advice tendered below, from someone who has definitely managed to give tips covering the whole spectrum (i fall into this category too, i think/hope?)

i think everyone needs to calm down sometimes

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Originally Posted by someone

I'll go to 12c or more with QQ, JJ, AKs. Standard raise with average-good hands, such as AJs, KQs, TT etc would be to 8c (4xbb) + 2c (1xbb) for each limper.

As for being worried about people making their draws, just bet like 80-90% of the pot. If they call, that's good for you, long term you win money from this call. The chances of someone making their flush on the turn is around one in six, so if they're paying a pot sized bet to see the turn, they are losing money long term, unless they get paid off huge if and when they hit. So don't pay them off too much, and bet enough so if they call you're making money. It's important to see poker as a long term game, you're playing more than just one hand. He might make his flush when he pays a pot size bet, but he isn't making it every time. Over 100 similar hands, he's missing more often than he hits, which is exactly why you win more than you lose if you bet correctly.

Don't be afraid of folding to a bluff. It happens, we all get mugged off, and for sure it's annoying when you fold top pair and he shows two rags. But if you call every time he *might* be bluffing, you're gonna lose money. Call river bets that offer ridiculous odds if you have a hand, like 40c into a $2 pot with 2nd pair, because you only need to catch a bluff one in five times to break even, compared to folding. But if he bets twice the pot on the river to a thrid spade, and you have top pair, it's a fold, because you need to catch two bluffs in three hands, and that's not happening. Top pair is losing to this bet more often than one in three times

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I agree people need to calm down. Giving wrong/bad advice is good for learning, but someone has to come in and tell them they are wrong and why or else no one is learning. I don't think people should be flamed for giving bad advice, but I also dont think people should get pissed when someone tells them they are wrong.

I don't like adjusting our PFR based on our hand strength, even if it is 2nl and no one notices. However, I think it's probably fine and it may actually yield a higher expectation than using a fixed raise size strategy. If someone wants to carry this strategy to higher stakes they will need to balance/randomize their sizing in a way to avoid being easily exploited.

Betting big when you come into the pot is pretty key in these games. Betting big = maximizing value. Peoples calling ranges aren't going to change much in regards to your bet sizing, so betting close to pot alot of the time (especially on early streets where peoples calling ranges are wider) probably isn't a bad idea (when betting for value). I think one of my biggest leaks at 2nl was not cbetting/barreling big enough. As a result, I missed alot of value and gave great implied odds to anyone drawing.

Last paragraph is great because we all want to be a calling station, yet in many spots people simply aren't bluffing enough to make bluff catching profitable, depending on the pot odds of course as stated by the OP.

Overall advice is fine, could be worded a bit better and I hate mixing up the raise sizes based on hand strength but that's really just a style thing I guess.

Seriously, none of it matters. It's $2NL. Read the stickies, bet your hands, never bluff and just fold when you miss. You will be out of $2NL in a week unless you absolutely screw it up. Bet 4BB +1 for every limper in all positions until you get to a stake that matters. You screw things up by betting stupid amounts that are noticeable, playing your monsters slow or your TP's too fast. Don't get married to pairs and just bet, bet, bet, and fold to aggression. Easy game.

There used to be this highly debated , generally hated system called "19hands" that an old poster thought up. It pretty much ran him out of town around here because it sucked. But it also worked becasue it was so simple. It worked because you couldn't screw it up. Fold all but the best hands and bet the hell out of them, some you folded to aggression and some you just kept betting. It sucked because it didn't teach you anything like position, implied odds, opponents tendencies or even board textures. So you learned nothing, and you won until the competition got better, around $10NL-$25NL depending on site and tables. There is no reason to over think the micros. Learn the game, play some hands and figure out why. Your BR will grow faster than your knowledge without a doubt, so just keep trying to learn. Your not trying to learn to beat $2NL by shoving AA preflop, your learning to beat the game at the higher stakes and we don't do that by having rigid rules like betting a certain amount based on the two cards in our hand. The cards in your hand are only going to matter if you get to showdown.

Here's an interesting little tidbit. We average about 20VPIP meaning we only play about 20% of our hands, we go to showdown about 25% of the time which is only 5% of our total hands and win about 50% of the hands at showdown, meaning only 2.5% of our hands will be winners at showdown. The rest of the time we play poker. Play a 1000 hand session and you will only show your cards 50 times. I think there are more ways to win than having the best hand, don't you think?

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Originally Posted by jyms

Seriously, none of it matters. It's $2NL. Read the stickies, bet your hands, never bluff and just fold when you miss. You will be out of $2NL in a week unless you absolutely screw it up. Bet 4BB +1 for every limper in all positions until you get to a stake that matters. You screw things up by betting stupid amounts that are noticeable, playing your monsters slow or your TP's too fast. Don't get married to pairs and just bet, bet, bet, and fold to aggression. Easy game.

There used to be this highly debated , generally hated system called "19hands" that an old poster thought up. It pretty much ran him out of town around here because it sucked. But it also worked becasue it was so simple. It worked because you couldn't screw it up. Fold all but the best hands and bet the hell out of them, some you folded to aggression and some you just kept betting. It sucked because it didn't teach you anything like position, implied odds, opponents tendencies or even board textures. So you learned nothing, and you won until the competition got better, around $10NL-$25NL depending on site and tables. There is no reason to over think the micros. Learn the game, play some hands and figure out why. Your BR will grow faster than your knowledge without a doubt, so just keep trying to learn. Your not trying to learn to beat $2NL by shoving AA preflop, your learning to beat the game at the higher stakes and we don't do that by having rigid rules like betting a certain amount based on the two cards in our hand. The cards in your hand are only going to matter if you get to showdown.

Here's an interesting little tidbit. We average about 20VPIP meaning we only play about 20% of our hands, we go to showdown about 25% of the time which is only 5% of our total hands and win about 50% of the hands at showdown, meaning only 2.5% of our hands will be winners at showdown. The rest of the time we play poker. Play a 1000 hand session and you will only show your cards 50 times. I think there are more ways to win than having the best hand, don't you think?

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There's a weird contradiction here. You start off by saying 'stop thinking, follow advice and play straightforwardly and you'll beat 2NL.' Then you talk about how horrible following rigid guidelines is and that we should 'play poker.'

Are you saying that beginners should just worry about getting past 2NL and try to learn how to think about poker at higher stakes? I think this sets up more problems than it circumvents.

i agree with OP, and I also agree with Jyms. Thing with $2nl, $5nl, $10nl is that players are sooooo bad there are many ways to beat them. But mainly the idea is to play very tight, then Value Bet the shizzle out of all big hands/made hands.

the best thing to learn at the micros is not to level yourself. If you think they have it, they prob do. If you think they're bluffing, they're prob not.

In answer to Parasurama - i can honsestly say i learnt nothing at $2nl except how to be tight and how to fold. Thats all you need. Then as you move up you pick things up here and there, but when you get to $25nl say, you have a solid foundation of Tight poker to build on.

Nothing wrong with following rigid rules, as long as you know where they come from and why you should stick with them. You don´t play tight hyperstraightforward ABC poker because the other are so bad, but because usually you are as well when you´re playing 2nl.