Project: $50 -> $500 PLO

Maybe the reinstallation of the update made it stop running as admin or something?

Well I don't know and I really don't care. As I am not playing on zoom tables and my hud works perfectly on normal tables. Tomorrow is PLO5 time, now I got a sore neck from all the headbanging!

Had 500 hand session this morning at PLO5, got profit for $11.53. Grand total is $78.06 now.

I thought that the games might be little rocky at mornings, but there was some huge value on the tables.

There were couple of hands where I played badly and lost some value.

MP: $6.34 (126.8 bb)
CO: $4 (80 bb)
BTN: $2.49 (49.8 bb)
SB: $6.68 (133.6 bb)
Hero (BB): $6.57 (131.4 bb)

Preflop: Hero is BB with 3♦ J♣ 4♦ K♥
3 folds, SB completes, Hero checks

Flop: ($0.10) J♠ 5♦ J♦ (2 players)
SB bets $0.10, Hero calls $0.10

Turn: ($0.30) K♠ (2 players)
SB bets $0.29, Hero calls $0.29

River: ($0.88) 4♥ (2 players)
SB bets $0.84, Hero raises to $3.36, SB calls $2.52

Results: $7.60 pot ($0.32 rake)
Final Board: J♠ 5♦ J♦ K♠ 4♥
SB mucked 5♣ 8♦ K♦ 5♠ and lost (-$3.80 net)
Hero showed 3♦ J♣ 4♦ K♥ and won $7.28 ($3.48 net)

Villain is 81/29/0, but likes to pot postflop pretty lightly. His postflop aggressions are 30-50% depending on street. He doesn't bet usually with total air, but if he has anything caught he likes to pot. Haven't seen any other betsize postflop other than pot from him.

When he leads on the flop, I don't see much value in raising. He has a lot of jacks, fullhouses and flush draws in his range. I just called and gave him an opportunity to continue firing on the turn. Of course the problem is that he might be firing a worse jack on turn and I am in a tough spot.

Turn gives me a effective nuts, as he limped preflop. He would have raised kings always, so I am pretty sure I have the best hand. And the only rivers I am afraid are A and 5. So I don't have to protect my hand, the only question is how to get the max value. I thought a lot about raising or calling, and decided to call. The reasoning was this:

If villain has a draw, he will fold it. If he has a worse jack, I am getting value for one bet (turn raise or river bet). If he has a fullhouse, he might be calling the raise but might fold the river. So I called, and gave him an opportunity to continue betting on river with AKxx+fd type of hands.

On river I raise the pot and he snapcalls with underfull. As I look that now, I think I missed 50bb of value. I should have realized that when he pots the turn he has a lot more fullhouses in his range than he has any draws/weak made hands. Calling the turn and raising the river isn't enough to get the stacks in. I should have been more cautious about the stack sizes and raise the turn.

Another hand where I might have lost value with quads:

Hero (SB): $6.45 (129 bb)
BB: $5.49 (109.8 bb)
MP: $3.89 (77.8 bb)
CO: $5 (100 bb)
BTN: $5 (100 bb)

Preflop: Hero is SB with T♣ Q♦ Q♥ 4♦
CO posts BB OOP, MP folds, CO raises to $0.15, BTN calls $0.15, Hero calls $0.13, BB calls $0.10

Flop: ($0.60) 5♥ Q♣ 3♠ (4 players)
Hero checks, BB checks, CO bets $0.42, BTN folds, Hero calls $0.42, BB calls $0.42

Turn: ($1.86) Q♠ (3 players)
Hero checks, BB checks, CO bets $1.29, Hero calls $1.29, BB folds

River: ($4.44) 3♥ (2 players)
Hero checks, CO checks
Results: $4.44 pot ($0.18 rake)
Final Board: 5♥ Q♣ 3♠ Q♠ 3♥
Hero showed T♣ Q♦ Q♥ 4♦ and won $4.26 ($2.40 net)
CO mucked A♦ 4♥ 6♥ A♣ and lost (-$1.86 net)

Villain is 85/20 but with only 20 hands or so. His postflop aggressions are very high. My preflop call is pretty marginal, but I thought that I have good enough implied odds as the BB is call happy player too.

I flop the nuts, and the board is quite dry. If I raise here, what I am getting called with? And my hand is pretty much face up. As the villain is aggressive, I give him an opportunity to hang himself. My plan was to check-raise any non-pairing turn, but when the BB called it changed my plan a little. As the aggressive player is unlikely to barrel turn against 2 players. So I planned to donk the turn unless straight card hits.

But I hit the quads, and it got more interesting. If I donk, it screams for at least trips. I might get called with a fullhouse or wrap. But the only way I am going to get their stacks is that they have the fullhouse. And I should get the stack with any line against those. So how to maximize the value against any other hand?

My thought process was to check-call the turn, and check-raise the river. Now the problem in that is the fact that villain shouldn't have bluff range on river. When he bets big against 2 players, he has a hand. And as he can't have Q, he likely has a fullhouse or overpair+something. Or just bare overpair. And he is never going to bet his overpair on the river. He might even check his underfull if the river card looks nasty. So I think that the best line is to call turn, and then donk the river. As he is aggressive player postflop, he might be bluffing a lot with missed draws. So he might see that bet as a desperate bluff and call with his AA/KK. If he has a full house, I will get the call anyway. And he shouldn't have just draw in his hand. So the only question is "how to maximize value against AA/KK?". I failed at this, and left some value on the table.

Hi there Kyy ♠_thumbsup:

I really how you review your hands, i can learn a lot from you. Keep doing this, i love it

Couple more sessions. Yesterday I had 500 hand, made little loss. Today 600 hands, and +4bin. Run a couple buy-ins over EV but I am sure it will even out pretty soon. So the grand total went 3 figures, $101.38.

4199 hands total, average winrate 20bb/100. If I look only PLO2 and PLO5 normal tables, I have winrate of 43bb/100 over 3300 hands. And there are 2 awfull calldowns that cost me about 150bb. Small sample, I know. Might be heater, I know. Feels good, you know?

I marked two hands today, just to show you all how NOT to play your draws.

BTN: $2.40 (48 bb)
SB: $6.11 (122.2 bb)
BB: $7.82 (156.4 bb)
Hero (MP): $5 (100 bb)
CO: $4.81 (96.2 bb)

Preflop: Hero is MP with Q♥ Q♣ K♠ K♥
Hero raises to $0.17, 3 folds, BB calls $0.12

Flop: ($0.36) 3♠ 3♦ Q♦ (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $0.20, BB calls $0.20

Turn: ($0.76) T♥ (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $0.60, BB calls $0.60

River: ($1.96) T♣ (2 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $1.88, BB calls $1.88

Results: $5.72 pot ($0.24 rake)
Final Board: 3♠ 3♦ Q♦ T♥ T♣
BB mucked 5♣ A♦ 4♣ T♦ and lost (-$2.85 net)
Hero showed Q♥ Q♣ K♠ K♥ and won $5.48 ($2.63 net)

Villain is 91/37/3, mostly calls pretty often. His postflop aggression is pretty low.

My flop cbet is pretty standard, and when villain calls he definitely has something that he likes. On the turn, against a passive player, checking would be pretty bad as I would miss a ton of value. Board doesn't really change, so if he liked his hand on flop he propably likes it on the turn.

On the river the board still stays pretty much the same, so whatever villain has that he called the flop and turn with, he will likely call the river. As he is passive call-happy player, I think the correct betsize is full pot. He snapcalls with backdoor trips.

Lesson: Don't draw on paired boards unless you have a very good reason and good plan. Especially when opponent fires a pot on turn.

And another one:

SB: $5 (100 bb)
BB: $5.36 (107.2 bb)
UTG: $2.91 (58.2 bb)
Hero (MP): $10.20 (204 bb)
CO: $3.38 (67.6 bb)
BTN: $14.28 (285.6 bb)

Preflop: Hero is MP with 5♣ K♠ K♥ Q♠
UTG folds, Hero raises to $0.17, CO calls $0.17, BTN folds, SB calls $0.15, BB folds

Flop: ($0.56) 9♦ 9♣ K♦ (3 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $0.25, CO folds, SB calls $0.25

Turn: ($1.06) 5♥ (2 players)
SB bets $0.80, Hero calls $0.80

River: ($2.66) 6♦ (2 players)
SB bets $2, Hero raises to $4, SB calls $1.78 and is all-in

Results: $10.22 pot ($0.42 rake)
Final Board: 9♦ 9♣ K♦ 5♥ 6♦
SB showed A♦ 7♣ 2♦ 4♣ and lost (-$5 net)
Hero showed 5♣ K♠ K♥ Q♠ and won $9.80 ($4.80 net)

Again hero flops the nut boat. Small cbet against two villains, CO is 61/23 and SB is 27/13. SB folds to cbet only 33% and his flop aggression is 47%. So I make a small cbet to give him a chance to raise his draw/air whatever. But he just calls.

Turn is blank, and he donks. Now at this point I was like "wtf?!", cos that doesn't make any sense. I was about to raise with dance moves, but then I thought "why is he donking?". If he has trips or fullhouse, I am sure he would check it quite often to give hero a chance to make a 2nd barrel bluff. And against full houses I will get the money on river as he bet-calls with them pretty much always. So he either has air or a draw. Still it doesn't make sense. As what hands would hero fold on turn, that I wouldn't fold on river? He has the nfd, so he isn't afraid of my flush draw. If I had a weak hand, I would check the turn back. And he can bluff me off the pot on river, as his line would look a lot like trips or better. If I have trips or better I will never fold on turn. So the only hand that I would fold on turn but not on river is a straight draw. And as he has the flush draw, there are just few turn cards that he should be worried about.

When I bet the flop smallish, and call on turn, my hand looks like a draw. So he will most likely bluff any blank river and bet if he hits his draw. So I call, and raise the river and he snapcalls with his flush.

Lesson: Don't draw on paired boards. And do not make stupid donks with them.

Lesson: Don't draw on paired boards..

Wish I would have read that a few months ago
Thanks for posting hands and your thoughts, which are really really interesting. You have such a huge winrate, it's sick. GL man, you'll get to $500 in no time!

Winrate is huge as the sample size is so small. Let's see what the winrate is at 10K or 50K hands. I have no idea what my winrate is at PLO2 or PLO5, but I think it might be about 20bb/100 with my A game.

Deja-vu, again I start an entry with "played another 500 hands, profit for $5.17".

That 500 hand session is good for me, about an hour. Then I do something else for a while, and get another set of 500 hands or so. If I have time.

These PLO5 players continue to amaze every single day. When a 21/10/2 player 3bets me from the blinds (I am button), AND I have a read on him that he has 3bet aces, I surely put him on aces. Over 200 hands on him.

Flop comes 732r, I have 7xxx with 2 backdoor flushes. He bets half a pot, and I call. Turn gives me 2 pairs, and he bets around 1/3 pot. I grin to his aces and shove. He snapcalls with 8776r. I am sure I heard a voice in my head saying "you didn't see THAT one coming!".

Played another FPP satellite, got sucked out 3 times before I dropped. Well, I have now played 2 and got money on one. Running over EV, yay!

50% ITM is def the way to go!

Do you sell the T$ or play PLO 50/50s with them? Do they count for BRbuilding if you do sell?

Good luck my friend. Great insight in your post about Zoom tables, I never thought about that aspect, but all the more reason now to stay away from them whenever I have more than just a few minutes

GL great to see a micro plo blog!

Almost had a losing session, first I lost little over 100bb stack to calling station with my nutfull, he had quads on the river. And then couple of minutes later I lost 200bb preflop flip aces vs. aces. Managed to bounce back and made $7.98 profit in 500 hands. Run 1bin over EV, as I won big pot when I 4bet aces, villain called with 7755ds and flop was Q86ss. He had 63% on flop but I managed to dodge those zillion outs.

Had an interesting hand too:

UTG: $6.57 (131.4 bb)
MP: $5.36 (107.2 bb)
CO: $12.49 (249.8 bb)
BTN: $7.50 (150 bb)
Hero (SB): $5.16 (103.2 bb)
BB: $5 (100 bb)

Preflop: Hero is SB with 8 2 A A
UTG folds, MP raises to $0.17, CO folds, BTN calls $0.17, Hero calls $0.15, BB folds

Flop: ($0.56) J 9 2 (3 players)
Hero checks, MP bets $0.48, BTN folds, Hero raises to $1.98, MP raises to $5.19 and is all-in, Hero calls $3.01 and is all-in

Turn: ($10.54) 2 (2 players, 2 are all-in)
River: ($10.54) A (2 players, 2 are all-in)

Results:

Villain is 9/5/0 nit with over 150 hand sample size. I definitely think he has aces there a lot of times, as he opens from MP. BTN is 44/0/0 passive player. 3bet sucks as that tight villain puts me to aces and he can play perfectly against me. And if he has aces, we will have 50/50 flip without any dead money in the pot. Or if BTN comes along he has the best equity a lot of times. So I call, and see if I can make him fold a split.

Board is pretty safe against his assumed range (aces and kings). He bets big, and that's the betsize for most nits in micros. They are afraid that someone calls them and the have no idea what to do on the turn as they don't have any draws themselves. I check-raise, as I don't see sets in his range usually nor J9xx. I hope that he folds his aces and I win a nice pot with mine. Instead he thinks for a while and shoves. So I was just like "damn, now we just split the big pot and get breakeven". Instead he had a rundown and 55% equity. Luckily my aces held and I won the pot.

That villain is pretty funny. I have 236 hands on him now, and his VPIP or PFR is lowest on the button. He has raised from the button only twice during those 236 hands. That's what I call nitty!

Hello Kyyberi ! I don't play PLO although I played in the past (Rush PLO10 at FTP back in the days). It is still nice to read your posts and your analyzes through the hands

For some reason it always seems to me that PLO and NLFL is softer than NL fields in the micro-low stakes

What your thoughts about that ?

Wish ya luck at the tables,
Boris.

I haven't played holdem almost at all in the last 2-3 years, so I don't really now what the skill level is there. But what I have heard and saw (when I play a little) the micros have got a lot tougher than in the past. When I played holdem (in 2007-2008) no one talked about 3betting or ranges in micros. Now most of the micro players now about 3betting, playing against ranges and stuff.

While in PLO there are some players who actually don't even know the rules. A lot of micro players have no idea about the relative hand strength (like when 2 pairs is good hand and when it's total garbage).

Micro PLO is soft, at least in my mind. But then again, any stake is soft if you are better than most of the players there. I know micro PLO players who are struggling to win at PLO10, while they are trying to learn the game. So it isn't like anyone can jump in and print money. PLO can be deceiving, as there are a lot of big pots. If you happen to get lucky, and you win 10bin in a session, you might think that "oh my god, this is SO easy!". And then you have -20bin session and you curse the whole internet poker.

Took a shot to PLO10, it lasted for almost 500 hands. Lost $17.09. EV looked even worse, as I got a lot of situations where I get almost my whole stack in with better hand, and then villain sucks out and I have to call the pennies. And I got 2 or 4 outered a lot. But can't win every session, now it's time to go back to PLO5 and grind another shot for me.

edit: played a while in PLO5 and got that lost money back. And I took another FPP-satellite and got little over $10 from it. So the current bankroll is $126.82. $26 to play for PLO10 tomorrow, I hope that shot goes better than the one today.

Total hand count is 6282, EV is about 9bb/100. I still think that 20bb/100 is very achievable on Stars, today's sessions reduced my winrate a bit. Still it's over 20bb/100 in both PLO2 and PLO5.

I just can't figure out zoom. Played little over 700 hands there today at PLO10, as I was waiting for someone and I didn't knew how much I had time. I won 1bin, but my EV was -4bin. As I look at the hands where I lost 100+bb's, there aren't any huge mistakes. Couple of spots where I think I should have folded, but then again calling might be ok in the long run. Like when I 3bet, SPR is 2 and flop comes J55. Little aggressive villain checks to me, so I bet 1/4 pot to induce a bluff. And he raises and I call. 5xxx of course. Or a KJ5 flop, I have AQKJ, aggro villain raises me on flop for less than a pot. Should I just bet-fold? It's one of those spots where I think like "I have blockers, he might be raising me with a draw". And usually he has the set. And the worst beat came when I barreled 3 streets, and he hit backdoor trip 2's. Called flop with flush draw, called turn with flush draw, and hit trips at the river. 150bb deep, didn't see that one coming.

It feels bad to run hugely over EV, and I really can't figure out what's wrong with zoom. I just can't win there. At least I am not playing there regularly, this session was again a proof to me that I should not play there ever.

400 hands on normal PLO10, and profit of $48.29. So the total bankroll is now $183.92. Handcount is 7,5K so I am running way above any expectations. All the normal limits have been crushed with nice winrate, but zoom is zooming down. One day I will learn that I just should not play zoom, EVER.

IMO don't play Zoom if you play cash games or opposite, they are two different things. Like Cash games vs MTT.

Zoom is so much different than cash.

In Zoom opposite to cash games

1)There's no image at all
2)Reads are totally different, based on opponent position, stats if you have decent database, and betting patters according to limit you play
3)You can always play one constant strategy and win, because no one knows that you play the same all the time, because tables are switching all the time. For example steal from BB raising 2.5bb all the time, it turns out to be profitable in EV, than it is. No one will notice that and suddenly try to outplay your range. Cause it can't be done, there will be maybe few exceptions, very good regulars who have solid database and they actually pay attention to stats, and see that you steal 100% from SB, and even then they don't know what are you holding at that moment, cause you open with all starting hands.

I prefer Zoom, and only Zoom. I will try to never change to cash, or any other style of game. If you start to play one type of game, go to the end of road in it.

By the way you are running great, nice blog!

Good luck further on!

Best regards, Tilt

Gogo kybberi!.

whats the rake at PLO5/PLO10 like there 12-13bb/100?

how many tables are you playing currently?

At PLO5 the rake has been 15bb/100. Of course as I have run so good it is a little higher. But that is very sustainable as the "rakeback" is decent at Stars. I play 8 tables if possible.

Today I played 128 hands with mobile at PLO2, +5bin. Played one FPP-satellite and got about $5. So the bankroll is about $200. I hope I'll have some time to grind tomorrow, can't wait to get to PLO25 tables!