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 Learn Limit
So, i've played about 10,000 NL hands on party since i've started. i've been vaguely profitable.
So heres the thing, I play pretty aggressive. I thought i had aggression problems back with the old party blind structure, time and time again my river aggression was 0% for the day. When i checked into it, it turned out I didn't have any chips left to bet on the river. I'd win via betting. i could usualy pick out a very frustrating bet for a given player... underbet for a solid player, make it look like i wanted a call when really it was a total bluff, stuff like that.
I believe that usualy the cards don't matter. The thing is, in limit they matter a lot. my first 1.5k hands lost me about 1.5 BB/100 on party .50/1.00 my next 1.5k hands cleared the interpoker bonus and won me about 1.5BB/100 @1/2.
So, when you learn limit you learn in great detail how hands improve and decay. it seems a lot easier to put someone on a hand. You learn pot odds inside and out.
Who cares, the cards don't matter right? Well, i wasn't exploiting scare cards as well as i should have. I wasn't chasing the "right" kinds of flushes and straights. I've gotten a better feel for what kind of hand i need to show down, limit gives you a sense of how often straights and flushes pop up.
if you're making 15BB/100 NL, probably don't bother, you're wildly successful already. if you're like me, vaguely profitable (or not!)I think a few thousand limit hands can help sharpen your game quite a bit. It lets you concentrate on playing cards while filtering out most of the intimidation noise that pops up in no limit.
the thing that separates the pro from the amature is solid post flop play. reading the board is a fundamental post flop skill. putting the board together with how an opponent bets is the foundation of all of that. limit is a fairly cheap way to learn the fundamentals. I played a hundred NL .10/.25 hands this morning and picked up $16.00. sure, i got some good cards, but at least $5 is a direct result of paying close attention to the board.
on one specific hand, i made a 4x bb raise pre flop with KQ off late postition, 1 caller. flop is Q 2 6. i bet a buck, get reraised a buck. Before, i probably would have reraised, because i could only play against the action, not the cards. instead i called. turn rag, check, v bets 3 i call. river, rag v bets 6 i call. he flips JJ.
I know that sounds sort of passive, but i was pretty sure i was ahead, i wanted a "cheap showdown". this concept has just entered my world. before, if i was even a little bit ahead, i'd raise. a lot. given resistance, i'd give up on TPTK, but that was wrong. If he had a big pair, he reraise, if he had a big ace, he'd reraise. maybe it was just a lucky read, but i think Limit really gave me a lot of insight into hands i should give up on... and hands i should hang on to.
BTW there's sort of a golden age going on over in the limit section. Fnord, Hyper, and Lonnie are handing out fantastic advice. lot's of other folks are chiming in with g00t stuff... worth reading.
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