Anosmic's adventures at 2xNL thread

[Anosmic]

Right. So by hook or by crook (and probably mostly by hook... I mean no more than 12.5% came from crook) I managed to get my BR up to $500 and decided to give $25NL a go.

I deposited half my BR over at Paradise in order to claim the $50 sign-up bonus and started playing.

It went well, really. So that inspired some confidence. After clearing the bonus I took out my original $200 deposit plus the bonus and just left my winnings in Paradise so I could play the ocassional game if it was slow on another site.

I put my $200 into Trident who were offering 100% match bonus and started playing on the prima site.
The bonus offer is to clear 10x raked hands (raked=$5 pot) and so I started playing their $20NL tables.

I've set myself the target of 10k hands in July at 20/25NL and hopefully will show a nice profit + the bonuses.

This didn't go at all well and I was soon down over 2 buy-ins over about 500 hands. The trouble was that they were a loooooot tighter than at dise. Fewer limpers, fewer callers, big hands not being paid off; when I called people down they often had suprisingly good cards...

Anyway, I've made two adjustments at Prima:
1) When the table loosens up I play fairly tightly, really wait for big hands/sets etc.
2) At the off-peak times when it's a rock garden I tried to raise a lot more of my hands and satisfy myself with picking up the blinds + 2 limpers with 67s in the CO and accepting that I don't get much more when I raise 3-4bb with AA.

That said, despite my more agressive play (PT gives me as T/A as opposed to earlier on Party where I was rated Tight/Aggressive-Passive) my figures still look a little low to me.

I've been mutli-tabling as much as possible (5-tabling when traffic allows, sometimes opening up a 10NL table if it's quiet) and after the slow first period I've finally got myself even on Prima.

My PT stats at the appropriate limits:


Target 10K hands in July.
Days remaining 14 (Time used: 55%)
Hands completed 2914 (29%)
BR: +66.67 (4.97 ptbb/100)
Bonuses: $75

(Not included are the last two days in june which would give me a ptbb/100 of 8 and a profit of $137... but this is a July target.
I've also not included 10NL stuff (+$15) and the time I accidentally sat down at at a 50NL table, and sat one round waiting for the blinds to come around again... that was another couple of dollars up and a few raked hands)

Well there you go. Comments/encouragements are welcome. But mainly it's just because I've seen other people's threads and I'm hoping that this'll help me get focused and get the rest of the hands in...

[Miffed22001]

try to get off prima during U.S dayhours, im in the UK and its slaughterable at 10nl 20nl and 50nl during european/UK daytime evening.

Your prima stats look fine for pwning these tables if you can get on when its not rocky.

[jackvance]

Miffed, how hard are prima 100NL and up?

[Anosmic]

Okay. So that was the worst day ever. PT says that today I am -$71 over 578 hands.

That's actually some hands from last night and then the nightmare session this evening.

My main losses came as I dropped $30 on one table mostly to the same guy. He called a pot-sized bet and caught an inside straight draw, picked up a flush on the river to break my AA and QQ and tripped TT to break my AK which hit A.

It's almost enough to make one tilt.

Target 10K hands in July.
Days remaining 12
Hands completed 3631
BR: -16.4 (- 1.73 ptbb/100)
Bonuses: $100

[flomo]

Anosmic-
prima is not paradise, listen to miffed, stealing from the tight works great at prima, position is KING, and good luck

JackVance
100NL? you stop cashing out?

[jackvance]

JackVance
100NL? you stop cashing out?

hehe.. I was just curious actually

[biondino]

I played Prima $100 once. Lost my buyin. Gave up.

[spoonitnow]

Prima 100NL shall feel my wrath.

[Anosmic]

Okay, another bad day at the tables, really.

It started well when I got that guy who took me for two buy-ins yesterday and got a stack back.
I got rr as I held AKs and although I know it's debatable I beleive in pushing AK, it's only minorly behind PPs up to QQ and to get best value out of it I think you're better off seeing all five cards.
Technically I didn't win the hand; that was won by a shortie who tripped his 77 and won $5. The other forty came back to me when an ace hit.

I played a looooooooot of poker today, by my standards: 1110 hands. Up about $50 on Prima, but lost $72 on Empire... shocking.

Still, picked up the $100 bonus on Empire (completed that bonus in one day, which was nice as it took some of the sting out of some sucky variance, lots of stacks going when AA busted by rags that hit).

The big problem I've been going over today is how to play a hand where I either have AK, AQ or something and hit the flop or even AA, KK, QQ on a uncordinated flop and have a villain who calls down my pot-sized bet (assuming a nice large pot on the flop).

To begin with I was just value-betting the turn too, sometimes picking up the pot and sometimes getting stacked by someone who had hit trips or two pair on the flop.
So I started checking the turn but I lost a couple of hands where I basically gave a guy who had unwisely called with a drawing hand on the flop a free hand: and paid the price.

So I'm sort of going back to the idea that I'm going to value-bet both turn and river providing no obvious scare cards come up (i.e. a flush hits and villain wakes up, or I'm KK and the river comes up an ace and villain wakes up- in those cases I'm probably folding without a read).
I think I'm going to be paying off PPs that hit, but it's better than chickening out and letting fish hit because I'm giving them better pot-odds.

Target 10K hands in July.
Days remaining 11
Hands completed 4765
BR: -$39.60 (- 1.77 ptbb/100)
Bonuses: $245

Thank goodness for bonuses, otherwise my BR would looking much shabbier this month.

Thanks for the tip flomo. Prima's still not too bad, I'm ahead overall even without the bonuses, just not by as much as I was at Dise...
The biggest problem is adapting to the table, they seem varied and they can change quite quickly. Half the time a really tight game seems to work well and then suddenly it tightens up and you have to quickly loosen up and get more aggro, but watching out in case it loosens up arougn you again!

[spoonitnow]

So you're saying you 3-bet all in with AK preflop? I hope you had a hellacious read or the guy is a complete nutjob, otherwise this is a mistake.

[Anosmic]

So you're saying you 3-bet all in with AK preflop? I hope you had a hellacious read or the guy is a complete nutjob, otherwise this is a mistake.

Sorry. Don't believe you.

[Anosmic]

Things went okay today in general as variance swung back the other day and I sucked out once or twice to balance the universe.

I've started playing a little $50NL on Prima when the $20NL tables are slow. (Let me anticipate that comment: "Grr. Bankroll management. Grr." Yes, I'm a little outside of my roll, but not a significant amount).

It went pretty well really. Although I've noticed I've got a problem that when cards are going well I loosen up automatically, not a good sign. But a little concentration brought that back into line.
Also, at $25NL I'm still over-valueing TP and not allowing for my opponents going up my A with good kicker with ace-rags.

Only managed 500 odd $2xNL hands, and came out $3 over the day, so I'm still not getting the BR up.
The $50NL went better, up on 2/3 tables and cleared another $25 bonus entirely during the session (e.g. 250 raked hands on Prima)

Plus, My biggest pot ever

Prima No-Limit Hold'em, $0.50 BB (9 handed)
- Villain (MP1) $57.92
- MP2 $16.25
- CO $9.75
- Hero $48.75
- SB $52.40
- BB $48.90
- UTG+1 $34.70
- UTG+2 $14.98
- UTG+3 $31.55

Hero is button with: Q Q

CO posted to play - $0.25
2 folds, UTG+3 calls, Villain raises to $5, 2 folds, Hero raise to $9.50,
3 folds, Villain calls.

-I'm thinking probably should have called here? Although his call makes me think not AA/KK.

Flop: ($20.50) 2 :6 8 (2 players)
Villain checks, Hero bets $6, Villain raises to $24, Hero calls.

-Trys to push me off after my low c-bet. I don't believe him here. That may be fishy thinking though.

Turn: ($68.50) Q (2 players)
Villain bets $9.50, Hero calls.

-I've hit my set, but chances are here that he's made a flush. But I have 7 outs as I make it and I have pot odds here.

River: ($87.50) 6 (2 players)
Villain bets $13.50, Hero calls $5.75 and is all-in.

Final pot: $96

Villain showed A J

This was probably all suicidal without a read...

My thoughts are that I should have probably just called pf.
Pushing the flop may have been better as I was confident I was ahead, but wanted a call and that seemed a likely amount to get called/induce a bluff.
Didn't beleive the check-raise so, again, should probably have pushed.
Believe in the turn call.


Target 10K hands in July.
Days remaining 8
Hands completed 5870 (6500 at all limits)
BR: -$17.99 (- 0.57 ptbb/100) (+$34, 1.2 ptbb/100 all limits)
Bonuses: $270

Currently up at $20NL, down at $25NL.

[flomo]

Currently up at $20NL, down at $25NL.

funny
i am just over even on 25NL party/empire for june and july(5,000 hands)
while on 25NL and 50NL prima(5,000 hands) for the same period up a bunch

maybe we should quit party

[Anosmic]

Well the R.E.M. song "It's the end of the world as we know it... and I feel fine" seems strangely apt

Firstly, I should rename this thread the 20/50NL adventures because during the course of the month I've moved up to 50NL on Prima and until today it was going well.

Following on a nightmare of a time at Empire where I managed to lose about $150 (not quite covered by the $100 bonus I got from them, so that sucks) at their $25NL I went back to Prima.

Today I managed to lose about $100 on Prima too, this time at the $50NL tables. The thing is I feel fine about it. I played some good poker tonight, even though it resulted in a huge loss.

Started badly when I got 55 and hit trips on a K45 flop. Got all the money in the middle versus AK.
cards win %win lose %lose tie %tie EV
5c 5d 958 96.77 32 3.23 0 0.00 0.968
Ah Kh 32 3.23 958 96.77 0 0.00 0.032

Of course, turn is 4, river is Ks.

Took me another hour of play, but variance swung my way and suddenly I was up for the day.
I'm sitting with about $60 and so is villain.
I get 33 and the flop comes up 663.
The money goes in and I'm ahead.

cards win %win lose %lose tie %tie EV
3s 3c 824 83.23 166 16.77 0 0.00 0.832
Ad Ah 166 16.77 824 83.23 0 0.00 0.168

Turn Ts, River 6d. Sucks to be me. Oh well.

Stats look like this now:


Than one bad beat has put me in the red; but as I say, I got my money in while I was ahead, so I feel good about it.

Target 10K hands in July.
Days remaining 6
Hands completed 8160 (6725 @ 2xNL)
BR: -$196.57 (- 3.99 ptbb/100) (-3.97 ptbb/100 2xNL)
Bonuses: $320

I think I've learned a lot from this experience. Going to try to get the other 2K hands in this week and then I've promised myself a bit of time off poker (busy at work, time to pull my weight at home).

There's $50 of the Prima bonus I can get. But my BR's going to be up only a tad and my stats are looking poor.
Still hopefully I can console myself with the right decisions I made and then spend some time looking for leaks. There's obviously some somewhere here.

[Anosmic]

So the adventure comes to an end (-ish) and it's not been a very fruitful experience, but hopefully a learning one.

I have lost a lot of money (a LOOOT of money).
But it was interesting.

Basically my PT stats look like this. (wince)


Bankroll 1st July was $580.
Prima poker went like this:

Losses offset by $200 bonus. (Oh and finished 3rd for $6 in a multi-table SNG )

Empire went like this (includes a few hands on Party with their free $20):

Huge loser even though I got $120 in bonus.

Paradise was the redeeming point:

Plus the $50 bonus there.

Bankroll now, is $710 or so. Bankroll moving in the right direction, but still doesn't hide the fact I donked a lot of money away, mainly on Empire.
At the point when I was breaking even for the most part (was -$50 on Empire and had the $100 bonus) my BR had reached $1K and I'd started to play $50NL, (was clearing the bonus faster that way too).
$50NL was not as scarey as I thought... but now I've had to move back down to 25NL and I'm going back to Paradise for a bit.

Anyone see why or can tell me why the same poker can have such wildly different results? Is Paradise just more fishy? Anything jumping out from my stats?

Finally my month in all it's gory detail:


Right, I may play a few more hands this week, and then August will be a low-poker month for me. See how I feel in September.

Tx, gl, gn.

[cardsman1992]

Regarding the QQ hand....

I would reraise PF to $12-15. If he pushes you can put him on AA/KK, and MAYBE AK. You can decide what you want to do with your stack then. Keep in mind you are in position....

If you coldcall, you are reducing this hand to playing for set value only. I may do that OOP instead of reraising. You have to be careful if an overcard falls anyway, but even more so if you don't reraise PF. If he calls your PF raise and reraise with AJ, he is making a mistake.

On such a flop, you have to bet more than $6 into a $20 pot. Bet minimum $15! If I were villain playing the flush draw, I would thank you for such a cheap draw. I like his line, trying to push you off your overcards. Remember on that flop that you already have a made hand.

As played, the money is going in by the end anyway....I can't see folding any river with the small amount you have left. If you are going to call with that scare card, just push the turn and have him berate you for sucking out.....

As far as stats go, your went to showdown and won at showdown stats are very similar to mine. We both need to make sure we get the win percentage nudged up to around 50%, I think. I may be running hot right now, since I am still booking wins with low win at showdown %. The bigger thing, though, is to make sure we aren't paying off better hands and taking marginal ones too far. This is a big reason my % is where it is, taking AJ up against AQ, AT vs AK, paying off sets with overpairs. We need to better determine when we are beat and not call big river bets "because I have come this far with it". I am going to call it the "cardsman syndrome"--winning little pots and losing bigger ones.....