Forthcoming book review and…. Don’t Tilt because I’m coming after you if you do…

First off, I am just finishing off the latest from Aaron Davis, "The Poker Blueprint" which is a rare book in that it includes thoughts about microstakes online cash poker, and I will post shortly my review of it on this blog.

2nd , and I make no apologies for stating the complete and utter obvious, and because it’s such a huuuuuuuge big thing, please please avoid tilting if you possibly can. I tend to avoid prescriptive advice in this blog, (happy to leave that to others) and keep any advice here more as descriptive.. Except for tilt.

Because tilt, it’s the biggest killer of bankrolls, even more destructive than plain ole baaaad play for all but the very worst players, so a) don’t do it, and b) so I’m gonna talk about it a bit more.

Tilt is like an addiction….no matter how bad it is, no matter how bad you know you have it, no matter what people tell you, you can only fix it if you actually want to do it yourself. Until you make that step, doom will ensue. Tilt isn’t like not being able to fold AA on a 678 non rainbow 4 way flop facing a reraise. After a certain amount of hands, a little bit of reading, and a smidgeon of common sense, only the aforementioned uber baaad players continue to get it in with that.

No...Tilt is a red mist that affects otherwise talented and knowledgeable players, and raises its head at you as you think you begin to realise all the injustices of the universe, and how they point themselves toward your sorry little poker world. Your boat was cracked by quads 1 time too many matey, and now its time to fucking whine. And since no one can hear this whining, its time to do it through the bad beat jackpot scenario of simply proving your own thesis by example (eg 3 betting any two cards). The illogic of it is irrelevant, because you are gorging on the drug of tiiiiiiilt. And with one bad beat after another, the pure fix of it spurs you on to more and more horrendous plays, pronounced even more in the unforgiving NL environment that we play.

Now I have said before here, and I will repeat, no one can help you with this addiction, so forget about watching fancy vids, finding some formulaic book or whining in the forums. Just like any self-abuse, therapy begins with your own secret soul, the place where no one else goes, and thus only you can fix. That first step, the hardest, the most intimate, the least understood, only your solitary naked self, without your mum, your friends, or doctor, can make it with you.

Now the purpose of my post is not to help you manage your crappy tilt problems, because, as I said above, I CANT DO THAT, ONLY YOU CAN.

No, the purpose of this post, and the beauty of the mercenary, selfish, cruel world of poker, is to help you to take advantage of others’ tilt, and thus take their money.

Example of tilt coming up. 1st hand I am just observing, having folded, but mister big time nit playing 12/9 over 200 hands gets had by a loose fish who calls his 3bet with AJ and sucks out v said ubernit's AK….loose fish proceeds to leave the table to a torrent of abuse by stacked ubernit. We were only 3 handed and now we are heads up, me and the angry ubernit. Seems like someone might want to do some chip donating....

$0.50/$1 No Limit Hold'em Cash Game, 2 Players
Hero (BTN): $134.15 (134.2 bb)
BB: $94.55 (94.6 bb)

Pre-Flop: Hero is BTN with 6 K
I am raising any 2 against this guy.
Hero raises to $3, BB raises to $10, Hero calls $7

Ubernit insta 3bets. Its only the second time he's done it in 87 hands. It's got tilt written all over it and I know he wants to extract revenge on me, the git that's been stealing his small blind for 15 orbits. K6o would be thrown away quickly v an uberbit even with my button, and heads up. Normally I would let his likely AK have it and carry on stealing. But it looks like he is tilted, probably with a weaker holding, and frankly, my cards no longer matter, but my being in position after the flop is everything.

Flop: ($20) J 7 8 (2 players)
BB bets $15, Hero raises to $124.15 and is all-in, BB folds

Great flop for me. No broadway cards.Tilted nit insta bets, no pause, no thought, just click. But I think his range is in fact any 2 cards from his timing tell. And facing an all in bet, there are only 3 hands he can have in my view that he can continue with, AJ, QQ, KK and AA. Even tilted nits don't make spite all-in calls with bottom or middle pair in 3 bet pots, and my shove is going to show a nice profit in the long run against an opponent cursing in the chat box about his terrible opponents.

Results: $50 pot ($0.50 rake)
Final Board: J 7 8
Hero mucked 6 K (high card King) and won $49.50 ($24.50 net)
Happy days..

Reconstructing my game, and "calling to re-evaluate"

These last few weeks I have not wanted to grind at poker. I have hardly played at all. One of my resolutions as I went into the new year was to try to re-structure some things (read leaks) in my game in preparation of moving up a level. That has been my current motivation, and firing up 6 tables everyday just hasn't been there. When I have done it, things haven't gone well, and all my own fault, which is not cool.

One of the things I have been looking at is making a decision on a hand, based on reads and sticking with that. The dreaded “Calling to re-evaluate” to be avoided at all costs.

So when facing a raise on the flop after cbetting with a strong hand, if you are going to call, and the inevitable scare card comes on the turn, you should already know what you are going to do in said scenario.

Here I raise with 88 and a decent aggro reg (33/27/18%3bet) floats my raise on the button. Now its worth noting here that mr aggro reg 3bets a massive 28% from the button over 296 hands. And he calls a raise on the button with 20% of his hands. So thats 48%......half his hands ,he plays from the button. That is simply spewtastic and we can begin to think about his range there. Any ace, any broadway with a king, and suited connectors and gappers are a 3bet I think. Why did I choose that range, and not, say, pocket pairs? Maybe you can guess yourself.

$0.50/$1 No Limit Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
Poker Tools by Stoxpoker - Hand Details

BTN: $116.20 (116.2 bb)
SB: $117.40 (117.4 bb)
BB: $100 (100 bb)
UTG: $71.35 (71.4 bb)
Hero (MP): $106.25 (106.3 bb)
CO: $100 (100 bb)

Pre-Flop: Hero is MP with 8 8
UTG folds, Hero raises to $3.50, CO folds, BTN calls $3.50, SB folds, BB folds

Flop: ($8.50) 2 7 8 (2 players)
Hero bets $5, BTN raises to $14, Hero calls $9

Now I am raised on a drawy flop when I hit my set. I need to decide now whether I think he has the FD or a set, or some combo, or just a pure bluff. Do I shove with the current nuts, or call, or what???..............Well..........Ax of spades I think would 3bet preflop 100pc of the time based on my read. So I need to decide if this guy would raise a naked draw here, there being straight and flush possibilities on board, and one which he wouldn’t have 3bet on his button. And I can’t see it. I just can’t.

Turn: ($36.50) 5 (2 players)
Hero checks, BTN bets $20, Hero raises to $88.75 and is all-in, BTN folds

So when the nasty 3rd spade comes, I have already decided what to do, because I still believe I have the near nuts to his range. So my check is for value - to induce his bet, and the check raise all in is to eliminate him sucking out with any silly flush on the river.

Results: $76.50 pot ($3 rake)
Final Board: 2 7 8 5
Hero mucked 8 8 (three of a kind, Eights) and won $73.50 ($36 net)

And finally, sure my read could sometimes be wrong (actually you should be able to deduce from my thinking he actually has a very narrow range), but I still have 23% EV on the turn against any flush which got there, plus a decent amount of fold equity against a straight and a thinking player.

Full tilt changing player types

I think one of the changes as a result of full tilts responding to the 20bb shortstacker, by increasing the buy in, has been the slight increase of 100bb reg type players. This could be fixed limit players moving over to NL, and players from other sites coming to Full tilt. I have no stats to back this up, but am guessing that its likely.

As a result of this, today I sat at a table with 4 aggro players, levelling each other and getting into some serious Fancy Play Syndrome. Generally I try to avoid these alpha male type battles, as they tend to be high variance and probable neutral EV in the long term.

But I couldn't help myself, as virtually every pot was 3bet preflop or CR'd post flop, and I wanted to see some action.

Here I raise with AQs and get called by a poor player with 9% 3bet over 150 hands.

$0.50/$1 No Limit Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
Poker Tools by Stoxpoker - Hand Details

UTG: $100 (100 bb)
MP: $160.25 (160.3 bb)
Hero (CO): $101.50 (101.5 bb)
BTN: $117.15 (117.2 bb)
SB: $112.75 (112.8 bb)
BB: $388.80 (388.8 bb)

Pre-Flop: Hero is CO with Q A
UTG folds, MP folds, Hero raises to $3, BTN folds, SB calls $2.50, BB folds

Flop: ($7) K 7 3 (2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $5, SB raises to $18, Hero calls $13

When he check raises here to such a big amount, you just have to think what he has that he could be doing that with. The only hand I can think of logically is As3s, which has 42% equity v AK, KQ, KJ, being holdings which I could easily have. I think this guy is 3betting his small and medium pocket pairs, but even a set is not CRing to such a large amount I think. I think he is bluffing or semi bluffing more than half the time......as it just doesn't add up.

Turn: ($43) 4 (2 players)
SB bets $24, Hero raises to $80.50 and is all-in, SB folds
The blank on the turn allows me to shove over his half pot bet, where even a hand like KT or KJ will struggle to call. But I am pretty confident he had complete air on this board.

Results: $91 pot ($3 rake)
Final Board: K 7 3 4

Making these plays isn't that easy, as it involves confidence in your hand reading and putting your stack on the line, but you do have to adjust against aggro regs, and it can be very profitable.

Don't play if you can't pull the trigger

As you may have gathered I haven’t posted in a while. The reason for that is 2 fold. First because I haven’t had much of interest to say, but also because I haven’t had much time to play poker.

As a consequence of the latter, I have not been in my usual mode of raising any 2 from the button. In order to play this style, at my limits anyhow, you need to be in the groove. And, I haven’t been in the groove, due to lack of volume.

Ordinarily I would say, if I were you reading this, so what, you donk! Stop wasting my fucking time.

But I realised if you are indeed in that non-groove mode in poker, you need to batten up the hatches and seriously play solid straightforward poker. Anything else is just going to lose you money by putting you in difficult spots (i.e. a reluctance to play for stacks with 40% EV but counting on Fold Equity to get you toward 60% v villains range). If you’re still reading, thank you, I will try to finally get to the point of this horrendous post with an example.

Villain is a 36/32 spewtard with a 13% 3 bet over 100 hands. I have seen him get it all in pre with 99 full stacks (sucking out v AA), raising 72o and showing down v AK with a 2 on the flop, and all in with 88 v KK in 4 bet pot for 300bb pot on low flop with him in the blinds. Looking him up, he always plays heads up and he is applying those strategies here in true spewtard fashion. It’s even worse than a 6max donk trying to run over a FR table.

Anyway, I have already busted him for his full stack once, and I am ready to leave the tables, when I look down at 78s. I raise, and with him in the blinds, a little voice inside me tells me he will be 3-betting me from the BB.

$0.50/$1 No Limit Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
Poker Tools by Stoxpoker - Hand Details

SB: $116.55 (116.6 bb)
BB: $116.10 (116.1 bb)
UTG: $100 (100 bb)
Hero (MP): $234.90 (234.9 bb)
CO: $151.35 (151.4 bb)
BTN: $205.35 (205.4 bb)

Pre-Flop: Hero is MP with 7 8
UTG folds, Hero raises to $3, CO folds, BTN folds, SB folds, BB raises to $11, Hero calls $8

Sure enough he 3bets. His range is wide enough that in position I think 78s in position can show a profit, given that he had shown a propensity to give up on the turn.

Flop: ($22.50) 2 4 J (2 players)
BB bets $14, Hero calls $14

Big big mistake by me. If you call in position with a speculative holding, the whole point, the whole absolute point, against this particular player, is to shove all in with at least 44% EV v his range. It is such a horrible flop for him. He is folding so much of the time, but even if he does call, it just isn't that bad. My calling is simply horrendous, and shows such weakness (or absolute nut strength) that we could never win anything much further from the hand.

Turn: ($50.50) T (2 players)
BB checks, Hero checks
compounding the horrendous play even more by checking.

River: ($50.50) K (2 players)
BB bets $36, Hero folds
It's so bad I can't speak.

Results: $50.50 pot ($2.50 rake)
Final Board: 2 4 J T K
BB mucked and won $48 ($23 net)
Uggh, I play sooo bad.

Calling in position in 3bet pots is something you should do only if you are in the groove so to speak, being prepared to play for stacks on semi draws and even stone bluffs, even against superdonks and spewtards. Otherwise let it go and play fit fold, which is profitable in itself and no shame.

Sorry I have nothing interesting to say about Rush poker though.......

Playing AK, or is that Ace-King?

One of the things that never ceases to amaze me is just how unsure people seem to be when playing AK. At 6max, players seem positively desperate to get all their money in with it. I don’t get it.

In this post I will talk about having AK and facing a raise preflop.

AK is 47% against a range of all pocket pairs, AQ and the medium suited connectors up to JTs. You hear that…….47%!!!!!!

Therefore the skill with AK is in either making everyone else fold (who wants a call with AK..), or make weaker aces call. That’s making weaker aces call!!!!

Lets discuss making people fold, or fold equity first. Making people fold is a skill. Shoving isn’t. Understanding fold equity is about reads and betting patterns. It’s complex and requires experience of player types and board textures. Pre-flop, knowing whether your AK shove is going to show a profit is entirely down to player reads, and is therefore much more about guesswork due to the lack of information available. And guessing in poker means –EV generally. Especially as most who play the micros lack experience and should therefore avoid tough spots. In my experience, 99+ will call a 3bet almost always from almost all 100nl regfish. They just can’t bring themselves to fold. But after 3betting your AK, and then your automatic cont bet when called (and almost certainly behind) of usually around 18bb puts you in a horrible spot. Yet you miss the flop 60% of the time. Now you don’t need me to do the maths here for you I hope to show how horrible this is for you.

Lets look at it from the other point of view.

How do you make weaker aces call? Lets think…..ummm….by floating. But what do almost all TAGS and LAGS do at the micros? They 3bet. Regardless of the position and history of the other guy, it’s an automatic 3bet. But thinking for oneself just doesn’t seem to be the way it’s at just now in no limit, probably due to the massive amount of information out there that says auto 3bet AK. Very simple really. Everyone 3bets because……well…. just because. Do you think about it? Do you?

Successful cash poker is about extracting value from weaker hands. Not throwing your pile in the middle with 47% equity, as noted above, because that’s the range that’s calling your shove in 4bet pots. Extracting value entails not blowing dominated hands like KQ, KJ and any ace out of the water preflop.

If you can’t understand this premise, you won’t progress.

Finally lets illustrate this idea of extracting value by showing how to play AK in pos against a 20/15 villain with a 100% fold to 3bet. Villain steals 25%.

$0.50/$1 No Limit Hold'em Cash Game, 6 Players
Poker Tools by Stoxpoker - Hand Details

MP: $193.05 (193.1 bb)
CO: $101.50 (101.5 bb)
Hero (BTN): $174.25 (174.3 bb)
SB: $107.50 (107.5 bb)
BB: $60.60 (60.6 bb)
UTG: $100 (100 bb)

Pre-Flop: Hero is BTN with K A
UTG folds, MP folds, CO raises to $3, Hero calls $3, SB folds, BB calls $2
We avoid 3betting here in position, and conceal the strength of our hand.

Flop: ($9.50) 3 K Q (3 players)
BB checks, CO checks, Hero bets $7, BB folds, CO calls $7
KQ and 33 beat us. JT will bet, as will AQ, KT, JQ etc etc. standard to call here to maximise value due to concealing hand.

Turn: ($23.50) Q (2 players)
CO checks, Hero bets $13, CO raises to $26, Hero calls $13
My feeling is a full house and trips against a standard player here continues betting. I am not in love with the check raise but it seems a bit fishy.

River: ($75.50) 6 (2 players)
CO checks, Hero checks

Results: $75.50 pot ($3 rake)
Final Board: 3 K Q Q 6
CO showed 9 K (two pairs, Kings and Queens) and lost (-$36 net)
Hero showed K A (two pairs, Kings and Queens) and won $72.50 ($36.50 net)

I hope you see that if I had 3 bet AK preflop, I would have won a paltry 4.5bb as he was pushing the fold button quicker than light, whereas I ended up winning nearly 10 times that, by maximising value and being prepared to play a bit of poker.