Ben - Small Stakes player - French fishcake

I know Ben pretty well, he used to be living in Gibraltar and he probably lives in Newcastle now because I told him how great it was on a daily basis ♦

Ben has serious potential, there is no reason why he shouldn't be able to beat 400/600 as he has a very good mathematical/theoretical approach to the game. However as he is relatively new to the game he has come on very well so far.

Just quickly going from your positional stats:

EP- Seems fine

MP- Probably a bit too tight. Could you send an equilab screen shot of whats your opening range?

CO- Again probably a bit too tight. Could you send an equilab screen shot of whats your opening range? 3bet from the cut off also looks a little bit tight,

BU- Looks good

hey Erik thanks for coming along

Originally posted by ErikStenqvist

1. Is the ratio between studying and playing 50/50 or is the ratio actually different?
2. If you look at this "issue", why do you think that you react this way? It's usually referred to as chasing losses and protecting wins. Do you feel that whats going on with you?

1. probably 60/40 play/study. i usually start by one hour or two watching vid, going through forums, talking strat etc and play for 3-4 hours. if an interesting spot comes up i usually stop analyse it/talk abt it on skype.

2. i dont feel like i chase losses - i prolly do a little bit. when it comes to winnings, maybe it is protection actually. didnt even think abt it but when im winning big time i usually play a lilbit tighter, passive like im thinking "oh well im in the green, dont need to push up the variance, lets just play solid" or sth along those lines.
I just feel too good abt myself when i booked a big session and start being a bit more lazy i think.

-Ben

Originally posted by pleno1
MP- Probably a bit too tight. Could you send an equilab screen shot of whats your opening range?

CO- Again probably a bit too tight. Could you send an equilab screen shot of whats your opening range? 3bet from the cut off also looks a little bit tight

MP open

CO is quite dynamic
if solidregish table

if nitty button and/or whale in the blinds

for co 3bet, i dont really 3bet utg that often, flat every KQ, AQ stuff. flat AK, TT-QQ a lot too even vs tightish MP's.

-Ben.

Originally posted by BC1989RF

MP open

Spoiler

Cool, 18% RFI is actually ok, however I think you should still need a reason to not open QJo from MP.

Can also be speculative and open the suited 1 gappers on tight tables and when theres fish in the blinds I would open wider, JTo etc all in my range.

Originally posted by BC1989RF

CO is quite dynamic
if solidregish table

Spoiler

if nitty button and/or whale in the blinds

Spoiler

for co 3bet, i dont really 3bet utg that often, flat every KQ, AQ stuff. flat AK, TT-QQ a lot too even vs tightish MP's.

-Ben.

CO range vs nitty guys seems good. Can open 98/T8o too as well, but not a "leak" by any means. If they are really tight then A2-A5o becomes auto profit too.

On a solid table I still think you can open wider though, T9, J9, A9 all seem like opens. Also opening T7s-K7s as well as 96s, but again not major leaks by any means.

1. probably 60/40 play/study. i usually start by one hour or two watching vid, going through forums, talking strat etc and play for 3-4 hours. if an interesting spot comes up i usually stop analyse it/talk abt it on skype.

2. i dont feel like i chase losses - i prolly do a little bit. when it comes to winnings, maybe it is protection actually. didnt even think abt it but when im winning big time i usually play a lilbit tighter, passive like im thinking "oh well im in the green, dont need to push up the variance, lets just play solid" or sth along those lines.
I just feel too good abt myself when i booked a big session and start being a bit more lazy i think.

1. When it comes to studying and playing its always a good idea to be structured when it comes to poker. Picking one or two poker strategy concepts and two mental game concepts and really focus on them until you feel you are confident to play even the best regs in those situations. Most guys jump around from one thing or another or this video and that video without a goal on what they need most as a player. Find you biggest weaknesses, high freq spots etc and focus on them. Studying before a session is something i don't recommend if you tend to want to try out the new concepts you see in the video. Chances are you haven't learned them well enough yet and they might just "clutter" your brain while playing. Are you actively dedicating every session to study specific spots you are struggling with for example? If you have two PS concepts and two MG concepts you can just pick and chose for every session on what you will be working on.

2. Chasing losses and protecting wins is usually the two sides of the same coin. They are both connected to results orientation. If you think yourself a better or worse player Can you think of any other spots where results orientation shows up.?

Hello there Ben,

I love the effort which you've put in your thread so far :). I did see an interesting discussion regarding the studying/playing time ratio.

I personally think that this can vary a lot depending on goals and player's personal abilities. So we can't really say if having a 5:1 ratio is better than having a 1:1 ratio ;).

What I would advise you is that you take some time to think about these two statements:

1. Do not learn if you have not applied everything that you've learned to your game yet.

2. Do not play if you are not applying anything to your game while playing.

Many people make a mistake of learning a lot, but not applying enough of the concepts which they've learned. So for example, if you watch videos for an hour or two a day, it's likely that you will gather so much information that you will only apply a couple of % of it.

Another mistake which people make is that they don't focus on applying the concepts which they've learned during the sessions, but just autopilot play instead. I don't think that you have such problems however.

What I would suggest is to watch a video, make the notes from it, decide which new concepts you could apply or which leaks of yours you could fix. Once you've done that, you should work on implementing these in your game during your sessions.

I think it's best if you only focus on implementing one new theoretical thing in your game per session. Some concepts will take more time to implement and others less though. So only move on to the next concept/leak once you're sure that you've applied the previous one to your game.

And then, once you've gone through all of the major concepts/leaks/weakness which you've found using the video and applied them to your game, you should watch the next video.

This way, you will be able to use your learning time way more efficiently!

If you are more interested in the subjects, I have discussed them a bit more in depth in my Learning to Learn video series ;).

Let me know if you have any other questions regarding productivity, mindset, motivation or learning in poker, as I'd be happy to help you out on your journey!

Take care,

Primož

Nice disccusion and great advice!

Are you actively dedicating every session to study specific spots you are struggling with for example? If you have two PS concepts and two MG concepts you can just pick and chose for every session on what you will be working on.

I used to put much more focus on some aspects on the game while learning the basics. now that i feel that a) i know the theory behind most of the spots and b) dont reallyu know wwhere my problem is, im usually just playing...
ive tried to focus on 3 things in the last 2 weeks because i thought i was playing rlly good with that in mind:
- defining preflop ranges as accurately as i can (postflop play becomes natural then i realized)
- postflop sizings (ppl give so much away at my stakes this is insane)
- increasing BTN 3bets.

2. Chasing losses and protecting wins is usually the two sides of the same coin. They are both connected to results orientation. If you think yourself a better or worse player Can you think of any other spots where results orientation shows up.?

Can you rephrase that? not sure to understand - i try to be as few result oriented as possible. my HM is set up without the win/loss colours, i looked at my roll /results once every 2 or 3 months etc. This is something ive been doing since the beginning - i just hate the feeling of "wow i play great lately i thin.. wow -7buyins!" happend to me in january. i think i played my v best and somehow my look felt on my roll and i saw that i broke even for a week/20k hands. subconsciously i insta play less aggro/not confident in my reads etc.
But on the other hand maybe its something i should actually do? accountability/folowing my results more often? would force me to play more "professionnally"/taking things v seriously.
If i had to go with my guts i would never ever look at my roll ^^ just love the game too much.
Any advice is appreciated here Eric.

@Primoz
wow thanks for your words.
sentence #1 applies so much to me imo. i just love to learn #learnfreak. like i could spend a week watching videos/discussing without playing. i just enjoy it v v much.
my best months/periods so far have been when i shut down ps.com/skype though.
I only autopilot preflop i think. hence the focus on preflop ranges.

Your series seems nice - will look at "Fixing Leaks" + "Focus" right now.

Originally posted by BC1989RF
My standard deviation is 9bb over last sample.

You seem to have a different/rather negativeapproach of the game ("crushin is a myth"), insisting on the variance factor etc. Id be interested in hearing your view of the game, and whats your general approach to it.

Also, id be interested in ways of improving my understanding of variance - im pretty sure that, yeh, i dont grasp its importance at all. I read Fooled by Randomness ; if you have other suggestions... happy to hear them.

Thats a bb/100 SD. I.e if your win rate is 0bb/100 your actual win rate will swing between 9bb/100 and -9bb/100 over the course of that hand sample.

Using a variance graph for a group of players over 100k hands each with a theoretical true win rate of 4bb/100 would lead the unluckiest player to earn -5000 bigblinds while the luckiest earns +15,000 bigblinds.

I wouldn't say 'negative' attitude towards the game. Just more realistic about variance in an overly optimistic profession. Gamblers tend to be

My general approach and play will probably be similar to most regs. I have tried pretty much every style over the course of playing. I doubt many regs can say they've done this. They just stick to one strategy and become bullheaded that it is the best way to play. When imo, its nearly impossible to know given variance.

Originally posted by BC1989RF
JJ+ nearly always. TT id say flat/3b at a 4:1 ratio.
surprisingly, i 3bet AQ around 50% vs co open. thought i would flat much more than.

Fine. I think your 3bet is likely to be fine. Its also related to what players you've been playing. If you are playing tough regs then you will 3bet them less because they are less exploitable and this will have a knock on effect to your average 3bet.

Theoretically you should 3bet more in position than opp but this theory wherever it came from originally, doesn't take account that most players just don't open much on the cutoff, and most player do open a lot on the button and sbvbb. So you will always have a higher 3bet vs the higher open%'s. I would worry less about your ip 3bet specifically.

Originally posted by BC1989RF
looking into it now tp and weak pairs seem to cause me problems...

You seem pretty scientific, like me. Which makes us naturally look at these fine detailed stats. But when you truely get your head around variance. All of these stats on HEM2 look really attractive, but I've learnt from experience that its impossible to know which stuff is worthwhile looking at. For you to compair: Top pair weak kicker or worse is -197.84bb/100 for me over 40k hands and my others are positive. So basically same as yours. Nothing to worry about here.

All of these stats on HEM2 look really attractive, but I've learnt from experience that its impossible to know which stuff is worthwhile looking at.

THIS THIS THIS THIS!
Its probably the 3rd/4th time i poured DB's since i started breaking even. But how the hell am i supposed to find my leaks? Okay sure it mite be variance lady only - but i deffo have some.

Will post thoughts i had this afternoon about some potential leaks/ways of fixing them thanks to Primoz and a poker friend.

-Ben