When I read the opening post I thought it would be a breeze; obviously I had no clue about the traffic in this game. I think you will find this one very tough so good luck with finding a way round that.
I hope the doc visit goes well for you to. Take care.
Dec 09
Yeah, I didn't think that it would this hard to find tables.
Throughout November, I was observing the $1/$2 and there always seemed to be people playing.
I finally got in 177 hands $1/$2, but it was horrible.
Card dead for most of the first 150 of those, and when I did get a hand, I lost.
On the plus side, these guys open a lot of buttons and fold after-draw if you 3Bet, D1 and CBet.
At one point I was 8 big bets down, but in the last 20-odd hands, it all came back.
Once again playing the lower limits brought down my score, but I'm happy with today over all.
Today MTD To Go
VPP: 37 191 309
Hands: 531 2,880 2,120
$Won: 9 -2
BB Won: -7
$1/$2 hands: 850
To be on track I would need 1450, so not an insurmountable deficit.
Points should be easily doable.
Peace,
--VS
Dec 11
Today MTD To Go
VPP: 1 192 308
Hands: 21 2,901 2,099
$Won: 2
BB Won: 4 -3
21 hands !? What's up with that!
No poker yesterday either.
Real life is encroaching on my poker!
In this case, it was supper, and we're going out tonight, so today is shot.
Home tomorrow, so I'm really hoping to get in some decent volume.
Be sure to enter the EN vs FI match (see my sig!)
All the best!
--VS
Dec 12
Marathon session -- perhaps the longest I ever played.
Two sessions totalling 8hr and 9 min
Total $1/$2 hands now stands at 1879 of which I played 1029 today, and even finished up.
$0.50/$1 was a totally different story. It was won of those days when everything went sideways. All my bluffs were called, none of my bluff-catchers caught anything, and even my good hands got beaten.
My winrate was not so bad, but due to the length of the session, the $ loss is formidable.
I have now changed the table so that it shows $1/$2 hands...
Today MTD To Go
VPP: 183 374 126
Hands: 2,417 5,318
Hands $1/$2: 1,029 1,879 3,121
$Won: -40 -40
BB Won: -36 -39
I posted some interesting hands in my blog.
I'm home again tomorrow, so we'll see how things go ...
Best of luck to all...
--VS
Dec 13
Two sessions today, each about an hour in length.
Today MTD To Go
VPP: 59 433 67
Hands: 565 5,883
Hands $1/$2: 551 2,430 2,570
$Won: 8 -32
BB Won: 5 -34
So it appears that I was worried needlessly.
5 days like today and I'll have the hand total.
Only 1 more and I'll have the points for Silver Status.
There are a couple of interesting hands in my blog.
Cheers,
--VS
Dec 16
One session so far today.
Today MTD To Go
VPP: 7 440 60
Hands: 92 5,975
Hands $1/$2: 92 2,522 2,478
$Won: 4 -29
BB Won: 2 -32
Nothing special -- I quit when the tables dropped to 4-handed.
I'll play w/ 4 or fewer if there is a cash donor at the table, but 3 good regs -- hah.
No special hands -- I'll check back later and maybe play some more.
Just over half-way through the month, and just over half-way to the goal
--VS
Dec 017
I found a couple of $1/$2 tables and played 3 tables with some $0.50/$1 alongside.
Today MTD To Go
VPP: 71 512
Hands: 795 6,770
Hands $1/$2: 411 2,933 2,067
$Won: -5 -33
BB Won: 5 -27
So the VPP goal is reached, now for the hands.
Checking the prices of various items in the FPP store, it seems that the best deal I can get is $11 tournament tickets for 700 FPP
If I buy $25 outright it costs me 2250 FPP or $0.011 per FPP
An $11 ticket at 700 FPP is $0.016 per FPP.
So I'll probably buy tickets -- though if I don't win anything...
Lets not think that way...
One hand in my blog.
Nothing noteworthy -- just me whining again.
Peace,
--VS
But this $11 ticket is for Sunday Storm and a couple more huge field tournaments only?
Variation is too huge IMHO. You could do it for fun mainly, not as real bankroll builder.
Fair point.
However this is about the only way I would ever enter them, so maybe.
What do you recommend as the best way to use FPPs?
--VS
Dec 18
Yesterday, I made Silver, today I hit 3000 yearly VPP, so picked up another $10.
Two interesting hands from today, but otherwise nothing special.
The story so far...
Today MTD To Go
VPP: 14 526
Hands: 118 6,888
Hands $1/$2: 84 3,017 1,983
$Won: 8 -25
BB Won: 8 -19
So 13 days left in the month, and I need to put in 10 200-hand sessions to hit the hand target.
I'm not going to be able to play 10 days, so somewhere along the line, I'm going to have to have another marathon.
Peace,
--VS
Originally posted by VorpalF2F
Fair point.
However this is about the only way I would ever enter them, so maybe.What do you recommend as the best way to use FPPs?
--VS
I believe at the lower stakes people generally tend to say the 6max hyper FPP satellites are the way to go. Easily beatable, and if you do well in them they have a better $/FPP.
I personally always just trade my FPPs for cash though because I can never really be bothered to play those satellites and would rather just keep grinding cash games.
Good luck with the rest of the challenge! Hopefully you'll be able to pull it off 
Dec 19
Short session. Could have been worse, could have been better...
There were tables, but I didn't like 'em.
Picky, picky, picky
Today MTD To Go
VPP: 10 536
Hands: 116 7,004
Hands $1/$2: 53 3,070 1,930
$Won: 6 -19
BB Won: 3 -16
Best of luck at the tables!
--VS
Dec 20
Two hands neither of them particular interesting
Today MTD To Go
VPP: 27 563
Hands: 204 7,208
Hands $1/$2: 204 3,274 1,726
$Won: -31 -50
BB Won: -16 -32
About half-way to my stoploss. but within sight of success.
We'll see what the next few days will bring.
--VS
Dec 21
OK, enough of the darkness -- we're on our way back to summer now!
Today's hands -- I'm not sure I'd call either of them interesting, but they're very different from my usual play.
Today MTD To Go
VPP: 14 577
Hands: 361 7,569
Hands $1/$2: 6 3,280 1,720
$Won: 9 -41
BB Won: 7 -25
Enough for today.
I think I have a brain cloud.
Cheers,
--VS
Dec 22
These hands characterize this session, which isn't even the worst this month.
Although I'm well under the 125 BB stop loss I had set, I'm not sure I'm up to another session like this.
Also, I had miscalculated the number of FPPs I would have on making SilverStar, so the 3300 FPP goal is nearly out of reach.
That would require about 300 more VPP, and at $1/$2 I get about 10 VPP / 100 hands, so about 3000 more hands. Doable, but not at this winrate.
Today MTD To Go
VPP: 100 678
Hands: 769 8,356
Hands $1/$2: 769 4,049 951
$Won: -38 -75
BB Won: -19 -36
Today's session graph:
Best of luck,
--VS
Hah!
I finally got a great hand to post, and the second session win came within 4 big bets of cancelling out the first session loss.
Perhaps the worm has turned...
The difference today is I had a spewtard to my right, and two decent regs to my left. The beauty there is that when you 3Bet the spewtard, the regs only come in with monsters, so it is easy to back out if you 3Bet w/ something like 8833x
There has been a lot of action at $1/$2 over the last few days -- I lot of players trying to make a points target before year's end?
Today MTD To Go
VPP: 51 729
FPP: 77 842 325
Hands: 411 8,767
Hands $1/$2: 411 4,460 540
$Won: -8 -83
BB Won: -4 -39
I added in a line to track the goal of 3300 FPP.
'twould be nice, however I would need to have 5 days like today to do it.
Today's session giraffe is in today's blog post
Or maybe 1 day of $5/$10 ?
Best of luck,
--VS
Dec 27
There was one table of $1/$2, however I did not like my position versus the other players, so I left. I was going to go back, but got wrapped up in freerolls, going deep in 6 of 6, cashing in 4 of them -- nothing major -- just enough to enter a $1.10 NL 5-Card Draw MTT also -- and cashed in that..
Today MTD To Go
VPP: 2 731
FPP: 4 846 321
Hands: 23 8,790
Hands $1/$2: 23 4,483 517
$Won: 11 -72
BB Won: 5 -34
Only one hand of interest
On review, I think there was no need for all this.
The AA was probably good, but would I have 3Bet it?
Feral Cow Poker
PokerStars Limit 5 Card Draw $1/$2 - 5 players
Button: $7.20
SB: $40.50 (Hero)
BB: $10.47
UTG: $55.40
CO: $17.00
Dealing Hands: ($1.50) A♠ 2♥ A♥ 9♥ 3♥ (5 players)
UTG folds, CO raises to $2, Button folds, Hero raises to $3, BB calls $2, CO calls $1
First Draw: ($9.00) (3 players)
Hero discards 1, BB discards 3, CO discards 1,
2♥ A♥ 9♥ 3♥ || J♦
Hero bets $2, 2 folds
Hero collected $8.64
(Rake: $0.36)
The purpose of playing this way, is that it is almost identical to the way I play most trips. The problem (or not) is that both villains know me over several hundred hands each, and likely assumed I had trips again.
If I DO get called, then they may be more likely to pay me when I have trips.
This is something I gleaned from The Education of a Modern Poker Player -- highly recommended.
All the best,
--VS
IMO it's a wrong play. You should/could play this way Ahigh FD without good pair, but as you have good 10% hand with AA, you just should forget about FD in this hand.
Dec 28
Ugly session.
I have posted a few hands, and some analysis in my blog
Today MTD To Go
VPP: 127 858
FPP: 191 1,037 130
Hands: 1,295 10,085
Hands $1/$2: 1,089 5,572
$Won: -37 -109
BB Won: -19 -53
I decided today that I'm no quitter.
I *still* think that for the most part I'm getting out drawn, but I have to admit that perhaps I should be folding more post-draw.
The strange part is that I DID cut it way down. I have no idea how I did so well before.
I'll pay a few more sessions over the next 3 days, and I think I can meet the original challenge. I'll then have all of next year to build my bankroll back up. ♠_cry:
Oh, today's giraffe:
I wish I knew what changed around hand 900.
Peace,
--VS
