Raknyo

Welcome to the Course and Best of Luck Raknyo,

Good time to start poker and own da pro-s by the time you turn older.

Hopefully you will enjoy around here. If you have any questions don't hesitate to ask, we will be around for you. Meanwhile good luck on tables, we will be waiting for your homework.

You can now start with your 1st Lesson:
Lesson #1

The whole course plan:
Overview of Beginners Course

Best Regards.

Thank you for the welcome Veriz and thank you for such a wonderful course!

Homework 1:
Question 1: What is your motivation for playing poker?
My motivation for playing poker is too one day be able to beat the highest stakes and play with the best of them, whilst getting the chance to live in Las Vegas and giving myself financial freedom. I always love logic puzzles and card games, especially ones such as Gin Rummy. Combine this with my knack for mathematics I feel that poker is perfect.

Question 2: What are your weaknesses when playing poker?
My biggest mistake at the moment is definitely following BRM (I just can't resist playing the $1 or $3 HU SNGs, not very wise with my $10 bankrolls) and after I loose a little bit of money I try to chase the loses by bumping up to the next stake. Ego has a factor in this as well, I feel my HU game is superior compared to the others at the micros and I forget that I can't win 100% of HU matches since a huge factor is how the cards fall. Another mistake I go into is robot-mode, I start playing the cards more than my opponents which is an obvious downfall, I need to start focusing on hand ranges more. I also fail to review my sessions and just love to reset my DB after I lose a couple of games so I can have a clean sheet.

Question 3: What does it mean to play tight aggressive? To play tight and aggressive means to play only a select few starting hands which have great equity against loose ranges. Most importantly they should be play aggressively when you have them, meaning you should look to bet/raise when you think you gain value from weaker hands or can get stronger hands to fold. You should be looking to play these hands when you have position on your opponents as you gain extra information by seeing what action they take. However if your opponents play back at you, you have to evaluate his possible hands and fold if you think your behind.


Feels good to right my mistakes down, my memory isn't the best so having them logged here is an awesome idea. Feeling very motivated, going to do the second lesson now.

Originally posted by Raknyo
after I loose a little bit of money I try to chase the loses by bumping up to the next stake

since you like maths, as an exercise try calculating your risk of ruin for various scenarios. (probability of going broke)

Sounds like a good idea, going work out what my risk of ruin is for a few different game types SNGs (2, 6 and 10 players), MTTs and cash (6 max and FR), would be interesting to see. Thanks for the idea!

Good job! Homework #1 Done!

BRM is very important aspect of poker, which is kind of must to follow. If you ain't following it it will lead you just gambling money away. During tilt phase it could also be the case that you are more moody and which means that you are going to lose more money away. If you don't have a proper BRM then it will lead you to the losses. Therefore try to follow strictly to BRM and set up the buy-in rule for yourself what is a must need. Standard would be ~25BIs at least which for some is even aggressive BRM.

Ego problems are very important to fix cause you more often going to lose a lot money in long run rather than win. The problem comes from you trying to win too many pots and showing everything who is the boss on the table, so called "sheriff syndrome". But is it always about winning the pots? It could easily be even to be capable of folding and trying to understand that we are behind even if we get really good odds. Try to force down the sheriff in you, try to remind yourself what you are doing on the table. I am pretty sure that you are also planning to win money in the long run so try to give your best. Could even write on a piece of paper not to do fancy moves and put it near your desktop.

Robotic play is also very bad, especially when you stop thinking about the overall game and just continue grinding and grinding and totally forgetting session analyzes. Session analyze is the best way to learn your game and get confidence into your play. Without it you will just take long time to improve and most likely not even fix the leaks which make you cost a lot money. Rather start focusing on your game earlier and get used to it, after some time you will just follow your game and wont even do such fancy plays and robotic moves.

What about tilt? Do you adjust something against it? For example:
Easiest way to fight against tilt is to set up stop-loss technique. Which means if you for example have lost more than 3BIs for a session then you just stop the session for some time. The BI amount is set up from your own results. Some may put it higher, some lower. Also after the stop you can spend some time with evaluation part to become better.

Tight style is usually called playing selected hands. Like following the Starting Hand Chart. Aggressive should be also pretty clear that already the word says how you should be playing. But the problem playing aggressively is that you have to watch that you don't play too aggressive. Find good spots, find good targets. About The tight-aggressive strategy you can read in this article: "What is the Big Stack Strategy?"

Hopefully you will enjoy the Course.

Thank you for your post Veriz, you have give me a lot to think about.

Have only been playing freerolls recently as the lower levels of play money are more like lotteries than poker games so I don't have any BSS hands to analyse but have quite a few MTTS to go through as I know playing a slightly tighter version of BBS works well in early stages so I'm still getting some BSS practice. Going to actually do a session review of my when I have a 250+ hands as I don't think I'll spot many common errors with a smaller sample size.

Homework 2:
Question 1: What do you think you could play differently than suggested in the BSS Starting Hands Chart and why? You can open-raise speculative hands from late position if you are likely to have absolute position most of the time and are also either likely to win the blinds or take the pot down pre-flop with a conti-bet. You can also raise medium strength hands against looser opponents if you have a good chance to isolate them, or raise a loose range against tight opponents, specifically hands which can beat sets as these are usually the only hand a tight opponent will make it to the showdown with OOP.

Question 2: Do you have questions about your preflop play? Post your hand for evaluation. Don't have any specific hands to analyse questioning a different scenario for one of the articles examples. Click here for the hand.

Question 3: What is the equity of AKo against the top 5% range? 5% means 88+, AJs+, KQs, AKo.

       Equity     Win     Tie
MP2    53.68%  45.27%   8.41% { 88+, AJs+, KQs, AKo }
MP3    46.32%  37.91%   8.41% { AKo }


Really enjoying this, and feel like I'm start to think more about the situations I'm in during a hand rather than the robotic clicks, progress!!!

Managed to deposit $15 so I can play NL2 for practice as the play money tables aren't really serious enough. Going well so far and made relatively few mistakes but going to do a session review now!

Session Review NL2

• Should not deviate from my normal play as it can lead to sticky situations, eg. [link to be added]
  
• If it's likely opponent will bet and we have the nuts, then check-raise.
  
• Don't isolate with weak gappers from MP.
  
• Look to keep the pot small with weak draws like gutshots.
  
• Avoid marginal (3-bet) situations.
  

Haven't marked any of my MTT hands so I'm only going to review any future ones I mark but off the top of my head my leaks are:

• Bluffing loose opponents.
  
• Getting involved in marginal descisions.
  
• Trying to steal blinds + limps with marginal hands.
  
• Not being tight enough during late phase.
  

Going to play a freeroll now and post my unsure NL2 hands when I get a break and at least get started on Lesson 3 tonight but hopefully just truck through it.

Good job! Homework #2 Done!

Totally agree with you about the stealing ranges. Against specific opponents we adjust, either wider range or tighter range. Against some shorties you can even steal with smaller raise, for example 3xBB. But don't overdo the stealing situations. Sometimes you might just put yourself into too many difficult spots if opening with marginal hands. As for example stealing too many hands from SB and being out of position.

Isolating can be very profitable actually since people on lower stakes take the fast and easy line by just Fit/Folding too much. With that you will earn in long run a lot profit. Which means you can isolate with even wider range, sometimes even with the all range which you planned to limp.

Playing freerolls usually helps to build up the bankroll, so why not to play them. Know enough of poker players who have started from 0 and build it up.

About Question #3:

       Equity     Win     Tie
UTG    46.32%  37.92%   8.41% { AKo }
UTG+1  53.68%  45.27%   8.41% { 88+, AJs+, KQs, AKo }

Hopefully you enjoy the Course so far.

More than enjoying the course, that last video was great and the article on patterns really got me thinking about the best ways for me to take in the information needed to make the correct decisions.

Homework 3
Question 1: You are holding KQ. What is your preflop equity against an opponent who has 33? How does the equity change on this flop: J53?
Preflop:

       Equity     Win     Tie
UTG    50.78%  50.40%   0.38% { KsQs }
UTG+1  49.22%  48.84%   0.38% { 3d3c }

Flop:

Board: J 5 3
       Equity     Win     Tie
UTG    26.46%  26.46%   0.00% { KsQs }
UTG+1  73.54%  73.54%   0.00% { 3d3c }


Question 2: What would you do in the following hand? (Remember that it is important to explain your reasons, simply posting "Fold" or "Call" isn't enough!)
No Limit hold'em $2 (9-handed)
Players and stacks:
UTG: $2.00
UTG+1: $2.08
MP1: $1.92
MP2: $1.00
MP3: $3.06
CO: (Hero) $2.08
BU: $2.00
SB: $2.00
BB: $1.24
Preflop: Hero is CO with AJ
5 folds, Hero raises to $0.08, BU calls $0.08, SB folds, BB calls $0.06.
Flop: ($0.25) 263 (3 players)
BB checks, Hero checks, BU checks.
Turn: ($0.25) 5 (3 players)
BB checks, Hero bets $0.22, BU raises to $0.44, BB folds, Hero...?

Well for the BU to call our raise, I'd put him on a range of 22-JJ (since most people would 3-bet any better here) and some suited connectors / suited aces.

When we get to the flop and he checks behind, we can take overpairs and trip and 45 out his range since he'd most likely bet these to protect them but I guess he could check back trips pretty safely against my range.

His action on the turn leads me to believe he's either just made trips, a straight or a slight chance he could have a flush draw of some sort. I'm going to say he's got 22-66 as there the only hands that seem to fit. With $0.91 in the pot and only $0.22 to call, I'm getting roughly 4 to one odds. After evaluating the situation in Equilab I get the following results:

Board: 2 6 3  5
       Equity     Win     Tie
UTG    19.89%  17.05%   2.84% { AcJc }
UTG+1  80.11%  77.27%   2.84% { 66-22 }


I'm getting just about the right odds to break even when I hit the flush (which doesn't pair the board) or straight so if I factor in the implied odds that the opponent will more than likely put the rest of his chips in, it's a definite call.

Question 3: Do you have questions about your postflop play?
NL2 Middle Pair on paired board vs. one opponent
NL2 AA on high board
NL2 Middle Pair and Flush Draw vs. TAG
NL2 Overpair to paired coordinated board
NL2 Pocket Pair on paired board

Wow, that homework required a bit more thought, enjoyed it.

Now to reward myself with an actual game of poker and maybe I can watch some of 'I bet you TV show' after, just saw a few clips and it looks awesome!

Had a day off studying to socialise but ended up playing a little poker online at my friends whilst we we're watching TV and lost a couple dollars due to lack of concentration and really shitty play. Played a little more when my friend was asleep but lost a couple really awful hands to due a bit of bad variance and more shitty play. Lost the $15 I deposited less than two days ago (was nearly breaking $20 mark :'() by chasing my loses playing HU SNGs which I sucked at.

Going to implement a 1 buy-in stop loss from now on as it seems to go downhill from their. Going to try another $15 and not suck this time.

Overall, I need to:

• Implement stop loss.
  
• Don't play poker unless I'm in a quiet, distraction free environment.
  
• Actively put ranges on hands during all hands.
  
• Follow SHC more strictly.
  

Really need to implement stop-loss, lost over $150 that I deposited trying to play ZOOM NL10 and HU SNGs. I have a hard time walking away from the tables when I'm loosing which leads me to play a 12 hr session and lose significantly more amounts of money, if anyone has any tips on ways around this, I'll love to know.

Feel like such a fish but going to have one last deposit of $15 before I have a break from real money for a couple of weeks. Wished I'd ordered the Mental Game of Poker instead of depositing the last of my money, think it would have been more beneficial than blowing another $30.

Edit: Actually, I'm going to stop playing real money until I've completed the full beginners course and amassed over one million play chips on pokerstars. This is all a test of self control, something which I clearly lack. Also going to develop some projects away from the table, need something else to occupy my mind.

sorry to bump into here but ZOOM NL10 is something you should avoid. its a moneypit and you need uber tight ranges there as due the speed ppl wait for the top 16% or so before putting momey into the pot. Also stats are coming in slowly due huge pool so maybe stick with regular tables. Just my $0,02.

Sorry if i intervened just caught my eye. Zoom is like aquarium. It attracts fish and regs are there to exploit that.

if it attracts fish isn't that a reason to be there?

anyway i agree, normal tables are definitely softer. but i've been playing zoom and turning a profit for these last months, now at NL25.
mostly i just love the format

yes tomaloc!

But am referring to op who apparentky is starting out still learning and zoom can be super swingy. And fast paced decisions in zoom on that pool for a player starting out is not gonna make him learn poker. Only maybe good volume to play tight ranges and get it in if flop hits type of play.

I played ironman 4 tabling rush FR from NL5 to 25 in FT but those soft yanks were throwing their maniez away so zoom is tougher and imo not the place to practice to learn poker. Preflop is robogrind postflop is poker...

Just saying.

Good job! Homework #3 Done!

Also agree with them about ZOOM, it's very often rather a spot where you can lose a lot money during very small amount of time. Especially if you play a lot of hands. Fish even tends to play very tight there and it's difficult to catch him. Try to stick to the normal tables and try to learn poker, it's not always about to put more volume.

About Question #1:
Preflop Equity:

Equity Win Tie
UTG 50.78% 50.40% 0.38% { KsQs }
UTG+1 49.22% 48.84% 0.38% { 3d3c }


Postflop Equity:

Board: J 5 3
Equity Win Tie
UTG 26.46% 26.46% 0.00% { KsQs }
UTG+1 73.54% 73.54% 0.00% { 3d3c }


About Question #2:
There are several occasions on turn:
a) If we take just odds for the FD and we take into account that all our odds are clean. Which means:
Total Pot = $0,91 ; We have to Call = $0,22 -> According to that it means we are getting ~4,16:1 odds. For flushdraw we would need 4:1. Which tells us that we are getting perfect odds.
b) If we consider the opponent having sets here:
Which means we have to discount outs, for example 6 and also 3. Which means we have 7 clean outs so that means we need 6:1 odds. That tells us that we need ~$0,41 on river to make it profitable. If we expect the opponent being loose enough and being able to pay us no-matter what then we can do the Call here properly.
c) We might even have overcards as outs or even 4 as a out:
Although this kind of situation ain't that likely. I'd rather discount that one and either pick a) or b). Most likely towards Call.

You are doing great progress, keep going!

Well after taking a break from education, I think it's perfect time to jump back in. Feeling like I've been playing pretty well most of the time, really need to get into the routine of session reviews as well as continuing to study.

Going to jump back in where I left off, I've read all the articles for lesson 4 and feel I can move on after completing the questions.

Question 1: Post a hand for evaluation in which you have the initiative postflop.

Question 2: Evaluted someone else's hand: nl4 sh AK multiway
Question 3: You are on the flop with KQ. The board cards are J, 9, 8, and your opponent holds 77. What is your equity in this spot?

Board: J 9 8
       Equity     Win     Tie
MP2    41.41%  41.41%   0.00% { KsQd }
MP3    58.59%  58.59%   0.00% { 7h7c }



TODO:

• Remember that this game should be fold'em not hold'em (we make most of our profit making good lay downs).
  
• Mark any interesting hands for review and post one for question one.
  
• Complete a full session review.
  
• Don't play ZOOM.
  

Good job! Homework #4 Done!

This weeks homework was a bit easier. But the idea of that is to help you go through last weeks stuff if you didn't go through everything. Or either way maybe even read some more articles, watch some videos and of course attend in the coaching. What will also help for your game is the evaluation part of other members hands and of course posting your own hands.

If you have interests you could try calculating the equity with a formula which you can use even on tables(either playing online or live poker):
(Amount of outs x 4) – (Amount of outs – 8) = Your Equity

About Question #3:

Board: J 9 8
       Equity     Win     Tie
UTG    41.41%  41.41%   0.00% { KsQd }
UTG+1  58.59%  58.59%   0.00% { 7h7c }

Hopefully this wasn't too easy homework for you.