I have a bit of a chip on my shoulder at the moment in regards to online no limit texas hold em cash games, I just can't see any way to make money.
When I started playing poker online back in 2007 as a Student I placed $25 into a poker site and through study and trial and error I found myself consistently beating the tables and moved up stakes from 0.01/0.02 to 0.25/0.50 so by 2009 I was making $600 a month playing short handed cash games.
After I left Uni I became a recreational player not really having the time or desire to play for 5 hours a day. Well I recently started playing seriously again but there seems to be a massive improvement on the average skill of players, I started out at 0.10/0.25 and made a loss after 10,000 hands so I moved down stakes to 0.5/0.10 where after 5,000 hands I'm just about breaking even (I'm up $8).
Has the world just become so apt on Poker Theory that the fish and lunatic players just dont exist anymore? Sure I see them every now and then but back in the day you could sit at a table and expect to find 50% bad players to take advantage of, now your lucky if you find 1 and they generally dont stick around to long.
I made my money by playing super loose aggressive from late positions and super tight oop making good money when my super loose range in position caught 2 pair/flush/str8/trips and I'd get paid off with premiums. I could even float a 3better and take down pots when they tried to stand up to my raises with hands as low as Q8 off.
Now though it seems like 70% of players are NITs which means they just sit and fold until they get a big hand then depending on the player flat call to trap or 3bet you. They dont do it that often so its not like you can take the risk of 4 betting them without a real hand so you have to fold or make a frustration call/raise and lose lots of money. Seems like the only way to make money is by hitting the nuts when someone has the second nuts. With a wide range you take alot of blinds but its not worth it for the times you get trapped or 3bet and have to fold or make a futile bluff.
Alright so I figure if I cant beat em join em, but it gets even worse playing super tight, you end up just taking the blinds with AA and KK and taking down the occasional pre flop pot with a 3bet. Its rare you ever see a flop and when you do its inevitably with hands like AQ and AJ which just suck to play when your cbet on a flop 869 gets a caller. The only big pots Ive won playing NIT is AA vs KK and KK vs QQ or a set vs an overpair, it just doesnt happen often enough to make it worthwhile.
I just really don't see how anyone can make money playing online cash games, the best it seems you can hope for is to break even and make money off a bonus.
If I'm wrong tell me but I dont wanna hear all that talk of 'in the long run you'll make money if your good enough' and 10,000 hands isnt a big enough sample'. I mean come on, are you really saying that you have to play thousands and thousands of hands to turn a profit? It just isnt worth the effort.
Sit and Go's are just as bad, everyone seems to have learned how to play them to a decent level now so again the best you can do is break even. MTT's are the only source of decent income it seems to me but you need a lot of luck to make deep runs and get on the final table.
So I suppose I'm just wondering if Online no limit Texas Hold Em has become the victim of its own success? I really fail to see how it can be profitable anymore.
