Playing a bit less poker, and not going too well ...
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Time to bank something!
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if you have time for MTTs, great π with children i prefer cashgames, you can play even 5minute sessions with phone ♦
Yes I'm spending a lot of time playing now ... not much success this challenge yet though, trying to build a roll now that means something, but ... might be a slow grind. If I ever succeed ...
Last few mtts I had a fresh mindset, really making an effort trying to win again vs grinding away trying to make some volume 1-tabling. Call it coincedence or not, but I won $100 since then.
I read in a post in this forum about variance that a high winrate or ROI will have a very high probability of actually winning in the longer run. So I focus on quality, not quantity (forgot that for a sec). And in my life I can play enough mtts to call it a long run. Well, hopefully the quality play is back!
I think at micros more than 50% of the player pool is losing in long run, but there are those that succeed. It is rare but if you have big edge vs the field of the other players and you work hard on your game, you end up winning in online poker in the long run.
Originally posted by taavi1337
I think at micros more than 50% of the player pool is losing in long run, but there are those that succeed. It is rare but if you have big edge vs the field of the other players and you work hard on your game, you end up winning in online poker in the long run.
Yes in the very long run you will always win as a winning player, but if your winrate is very small, you can still lose a bit for a very, very long time, even as a winning player. If you have a high winrate, this will not be the case.
This is the post (by Kyyberi) about variance that I was talking about ... I hope it's okay to quote it here:
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Originally posted by Kyyberi
Originally posted by sld11
Is 12000 hands enough to say I am getting screwed by the poker Gods. OR is this normal variance ?Yes and yes. In terms of "getting screwed by poker gods" even one hand is enough to say so. You go all-in with AA vs. 23o, and you lose. Your EV (expected value) was highly profitable, but due to bad luck you lost the hand.
You can simulate poker variance with https://www.primedope.com/poker-variance-calculator/ but be warned! Doing so might cause injury on your brain, when you realize how brutal variance can be. Here are some examples (I used Holdem standard deviation):
In this image you see 20 simulated runs for 12000 poker hands. The dark red is the worst run, which is losing 10 buyins. Light blue is the luckiest one, winning over 12 buyins. Both of them have the same EV (+2,5bb/100), meaning that for the simulation they are as good as the other in poker. Light blue was a lot luckier than the dark red. Each graph is one player, and beneath them all there is a black straight line that shows the EV. Meaning the winnings if there was no variance in poker.
Now the depressing part is to check the same stuff for bigger sample size.
This is for 10x more hands, 120K. For some players, that is a year or even two years. And we can see, that the cursed dark red player (the unluckiest one in the simulation) is losing over 75 buyins, although his expected value is +30 buyins profits. Winning player, just unlucky one. Meanwhile the light blue, who is as good player as the dark red, is winning about 130 buyins.
Ok, let's say you grind a lot. And I mean A LOT. Let's up the volume to 1 million hands!
Poor dark red is down 100 buyins, and that 1 million hands might be his lifetime hands. Meanwhile lught blue is rolling in money, winning way over 500 buyins. To put this in other words:
Your skill level might be a small winner, but due to variance you can end up winning twice as you should in your lifetime, or you can end up losing money for your whole life due to variance.
That is REALLY hard for human brains to understand and accept. But this is the reality. There are good players, who have been running under EV or just lost for years. And the are bad players who have constantly won. Is it fair? No. But thing in our universe don't function on fairness. It's cold mathematics.
There are things you can do. One is increasing your skills, to increase the expected winrate. If we get it to 10bb/100, here is that 1 million hand simulation:
Now even the dark red is making 7bb/100 profits and is happy. By running more simulations, you can find one where dark red runs really bad and wins "just" 5bb/100.
Important note: either player can run over or under EV in tracker/pokercraft graphs. Variance is more than just how well you run in all-in situations. It's also what cards you get in different situations. Like in the example, where here had solid hand and opponent made straight on the river. Bad variance, but not shown on tracker EV graphs. It's important to understand what that graph means.
To the other question, online poker itself doesn't favor loose-aggressive strategy as default. If it would, then most pro's would be loose-aggressive. Poker is a strategy game, where one player puts his strategy against opponents strategies. Even in single hand, the odds for better strategy to win is are better before the cards are dealt. Once the cards are dealt, things might change. And even when the odds are better, as long as there are cards yet to come those odds might change. The longer the run (= hands), the higher the odds are that player wins as much as his skills dictate his winrate to be. But the odds are never 100%. Hard part is also that we never know for sure what our expected winrate is. And actually that number is constantly changing, it's not a permanent number.
All we can do is to play as good strategy as we can, embrace the variance and see the results.
This is my mtt graph since I joined PS again ... losing for a quite some time now. But recently I regained a better focus again, and it goes much better again!!
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Party at my house at 500 games! 
... almost 3 months and still no 1K games, man, Will never get the very long run 1-tabling! But, that's the way I like it and have fun. Maybe I will try 2 tables one day.
Oh, because I don't have any real way of studing for mtts, I also downloaded some poker coaching study-material (I hope it's good), and I started to record my play with the OBS Studio software.
If I want to study, I can watch my own play from my recordings! (didn't do it yet though ... takes time, I'm playing too much)
obs is great for streaming/recording for stream; you can also add webcam pic+audio to entertain non-poker people 
Originally posted by Stackoffski
Week 03:
Starting bankroll: $600
Target bankroll: $3,000Previous bankroll: $456
Weekly Profit: -$59
Current bankroll: $397Played 53 mtts and some stt's
I think I am going to play more stts at Unibet now, and a bit less mtts. Less variance than mtts and the level at Unibet is pretty ridiculous! I really have to adjust my play going from GGPoker to Unibet and back 
These are the mtts only:
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This is a video of me playing a $10 5-max STT at Unibet (and running good)
I am really playing different than at GG ... players are different ... you can do some weird stuff here ... I am still feeling my way through to see how exactly to adapt, and trying some things out every now and then ...
I'm running good though (new graph because recently my hard drive broke):
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I was just trying out a $10 game, but I keep winning, so I keep playing the $10's for now. Have to play the $4's if I start loosing pretty soon though.
I won an MTT as well! ... Well ... mtt ... it's more like a multi-table sng because there where only 23 players :f_tongue:. Not a lot of traffic at Unibet haha.
Well, thanks to Unibet (*not sponsored) My bankroll is $544 again!!! I started with $600 and went on a losing spree 'till I had $350 I think.
Almost there! almost profit!
Really, playing at Unibet kinda feels like cheating! :f_pleased::f_pleased:
Hey, hey! I see you're finding your groove again. Nice to see your graph going up. STTs have def way less variance than MTT for sure, however you can't really hit that big one from time to time π You should try finding and studying push or fold materials and really learn the role of ICM since these are probably the two most important aspects of STTs. Also AFAIK stts are solved (there is a known perfect way to play) so keep that in mind when climbing the limits. If there is no fish they won't really be good to play.
Originally posted by tonyozhelev
Hey, hey! I see you're finding your groove again. Nice to see your graph going up. STTs have def way less variance than MTT for sure, however you can't really hit that big one from time to time π You should try finding and studying push or fold materials and really learn the role of ICM since these are probably the two most important aspects of STTs. Also AFAIK stts are solved (there is a known perfect way to play) so keep that in mind when climbing the limits. If there is no fish they won't really be good to play.
Hey Tony, thanks for stopping by! ... I know you lots to do ...
It's true, you can never hit big, but I noticed the MTTs at Unibet are like multitable sng's because they don't have a lot of traffic. So they are something in between the mtts at GG and the STTs. Will keep playing them all!
I didn't even know STTs are solved ... however isn't that also true for your spin and go's then? should be ... (I read you are looking at PLO now ... also a nice game with plenty of bad players I imagine). It makes sense they are solved though.
Luckily they are also a training for my mtt-game, even if I can't play them at higher stakes.
You really can't play these Unibet games like a solver though, you really have to adapt your ranges to the specific player because they are not playing near anything a solver would suggest. Which is sometimes kind of hard because you don't have any history because of the player-name changes. I wish I could afford some software for this, but for now it is all too expensive compared to my br ...
Graph in the meantime going downhill a bit:
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Good luck to you Tony and all others! 
Hm... you're right I guess. Technically as long as there is fish, any format can be profitable (and spins attract a lot bc of their gambly nature and hoping that you can hit it big time). I think I read somewhere that Sit and Gos were not played that much anymore since they have been solved. Looking at your posts seems like the info was not really correct though. I loved Sit and Gos a while ago when I was getting in poker. They have way less variance than some of the other formats and still have that tournament feel, that you get to win a bigger prize when you finish first. Good luck and keep the graph pointing upwards!
Originally posted by Stackoffski
Week 04:
Starting bankroll: $600
Target bankroll: $3,000Previous bankroll: $397
Weekly Profit: -$2
Current bankroll: $395
I can't believe I'm already 4 weeks below the $600 I started with. 
That's a whole month with loss and no profit.
I won a 30-man MTT and my BR is $473 now. ♠_thumbsup:
I really hope I can close that gap soon, and start building some profit! I need another score for that! ♠_cool:
Originally posted by Stackoffski
I can't believe I'm already 4 weeks below the $600 I started with.
Stay strong and keep on playing the right game, results will follow. I do not know much about MTTs, but true is that, if you make +ev decisions, results will follow sooner or later
Good luck brother 
Thanks N3bojsa!
I just won the next 25-man mtt as well, back to back!
BR = $556 !!
Getting close now! feels good ... some relief, less stress, can't lie 