[Closed] I have no idea what I'm doing...

Hi there lollujo. I'm also from the UK, 27, married with 2 kids (well one kid and one coming in Sept!). You have my sympathies for trying to fit poker into that life !! I'm sure it will be a great journey to follow

I'm terrible at giving advice but here goes...

Use the Hand Evaluation Forums
& a good read for a SSSer - Gervs Blog

I'm sure others will help you out too, all the best with your poker

nibbana

Hi lollujo & welcome to the community.

Just wanted to wish you all the very best with your blog and your poker. I look forward to hearing how you get on in due course.

Good luck & best regards,

Bart

Thanks guys. I'm gradually working my way through all the blogs on here. I've read all the basic articles and watched all the videos! Very eager to get started now, but I don't suppose my $50 will arrive before Monday now...

A combination of impatience and receiving some birthday money yesterday has led me to start my poker career slightly earlier than planned, by depositing $50 in my old Party Poker account. Which is where I learnt my first lesson!

1. Research Before You Act!
It wasn't until the software was downloaded, money added and I was trying to select a game that I found out the minimum buy in on NL10 on Party is $3.50, meaning I can't follow SSS rules on there as planned. Which leads me to lesson 2...

2. Stick to the plan!
What I should have done is withdrawn the money again and waited for my Everest money to arrive. But what I did was load up 4 tables (another mistake having not played poker for 3 years and not being familiar with SSS), and started playing.

In the end I played for just under an hour. After about 15 minutes I realised I couldn't cope with 4 tables open and constant references to an unfamiliar starting hand chart, so I closed 2 of them and just had 2 tables open for the rest of the session.

The session itself was a steep learning curve. Everytime I raised, everyone folded to me (apart from one big hand that I'll come to in a minute), so winnings were minimal. Unfortunately, I had one big hand which kind of ruined the night. I think I'm happy with how I played it, but any feedback would be welcome (sorry if this isn't posted in the correct format, remember I'm a newbie!):

** Hand History for Game 9418181784 **
$10 USD NL Texas Hold'em - Saturday, July 10, 16:28:32 EDT 2010
Table Speed #1769262 (Real Money)
Seat 1 is the button
Total number of players : 9/9
Seat 6: Putnik885 ( $10.24 USD )
Seat 3: Tr4FiK2007 ( $9.72 USD )
Seat 4: adricop ( $4.90 USD )
Seat 8: carlavicente ( $3 USD )
Seat 9: gasik1 ( $7.84 USD )
Seat 7: nikola_so ( $13.84 USD )
Seat 2: pecsorin ( $10.05 USD )
Seat 5: poshchappers ( $3.35 USD ) - Me
Seat 1: yari77 ( $9.56 USD )
pecsorin posts small blind [$0.05 USD].
Tr4FiK2007 posts big blind [$0.10 USD].
** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to poshchappers [ Qc Qd ]
adricop folds
poshchappers raises [$0.40 USD]
Putnik885 folds
nikola_so folds
carlavicente folds
gasik1 folds
yari77 folds
pecsorin calls [$0.35 USD]
Tr4FiK2007 folds
** Dealing Flop ** [ 3h, Tc, 5c ]
pecsorin checks
poshchappers bets [$0.60 USD]
pecsorin calls [$0.60 USD]
** Dealing Turn ** [ 7c ]
pecsorin checks
poshchappers is all-In [$2.35 USD]
pecsorin calls [$2.35 USD]
** Dealing River ** [ 2d ]
pecsorin shows [ 5d, 5h ]three of a kind, Fives.
poshchappers doesn't show [ Qc, Qd ]a pair of Queens.
pecsorin wins $6.46 USD from the main pot with three of a kind, Fives.

I think I played this hand by the book. I raised 4x big blind pre-flop with my Queens, and got just the one call. I had an overpair on the flop, so bet 2/3 of the pot and again just got a call. I wasn't certain what to do on the turn because of the 3 clubs on the board, but the SSS guide tells me to push all in at this point, so that's what I did. I think I'm happy with this move. I again got called. And then unfortunately he showed his set of 5s.

Looking at the hand again this morning, I don't think there's anything I could or should have done differently. It hurt a bit more because I had too many chips on the table because of Party Pokers rules, but that's my fault for deciding to play there in the first place!

The rest of the session was pretty uneventful, and I finished down $5.15, with $3.35 of them coming from that big hand. Not a complete disaster for my first session in 3 years, but not good either.

From now on, I'll be sticking to Everest for the SSS where I can play the correct rules with only $2 on the table, then I won't lose so much on hands like the one above. I think I'll leave this money in Party though, and use that account for SNGs and the odd MTT, with Everest being my SSS account.

Starting bankroll: $100 ($50 from Poker Strategy has been approved and is on it's way...)
Session Time: 53 minutes
Hands played: 142
Amount Won: -$5.15 BB/100: -18.13
Final bankroll: $94.85 ($50 in Everest for SSS, and $44.85 in Party for tournaments)

There's been a few changes since I last posted in this thread:

Firstly, I've given up with Party Poker, and cashed out. The SNGs just move too fast (I could only find turbo's for $1 buy in), and the blinds were increasing every few minutes which is just crazy. And the cash games don't allow SSS due to the 35BB minimum buy in.

I've now received my $50 starting capital at Everest, and deposited $5 to activate the $200 bonus which I'm now working towards unlocking. Because of this, I won't be re-investing the rest of the $50 that I cashed out of Party, I'll just try and unlock as much of the $200 as I can in the next 30 days.

I've played around 1500 over the last couple of evenings, multi-tabling between 4 and 6 tables. My bankroll is still around about the $50 mark and I've started unlocking the bonus. I don't think this is bad for someone only in their second day of SSS!

I'll try and post a couple of hands tomorrow, but apart from a few mistakes I'm generally happy with how I'm playing, and I'm pretty comfortable on 6 tables now. In a few more days I should have completely memorised the starting hands chart, and then I'll be able to push on with unlocking this bonus, and hopefully start making some profits from the games themselves!

Starting Bankroll: $55.00
BB/100 Hands: -5.00
Winnings: -$13.03
Bonus unlocked: $6.11 (Of a possible $200)
Current Bankroll: $48.08

As promised, the following are some hands from last nights session. I went to bed last night thinking I'd played everything by the book and it was just luck/variance that left me with a losing session. This just shows how valuable it is to review the session before playing the next, because I now realise I didn't play as well as I thought...

Hand 1

SB ($9.63)
BB ($14.36)
UTG 1 ($11.73)
UTG 2 ($1.80)
Hero (UTG 3) ($2.09)
MP 1 ($10.41)
MP 2 ($1.75)
MP 3 ($12.53)
CO ($10.58)
BU ($5.36)

HOLE CARDS
Dealt to Hero [Tc Td]
UTG 1 & UTG 2 Fold
Hero raises to $0.40
MP 1, MP 2, MP 3 Fold
CO calls $0.40
BU raises to $1.35
SB & BB Fold
Hero raises to $2.09, and is all-in
CO folds
BU calls $0.74
Hero shows [Tc Td]
BU shows [Kd Ah]
FLOP [Ad 5s Qh]
TURN [8d]
RIVER [5h]
SUMMARY
Hero shows [Tc Td]
BU shows [Kd Ah]
BU collects $4.43

Looking at my starting hand chart now in the cold light of day, I see that my TT from early position should have been a fold, not the raise I went for. Not sure why I raised, because I thought I was following the chart at all times. Obviously a lapse in concentration, but it cost me a whole stack!

Ignoring that to have a look at the rest of the hand: Having raised, then been re-raised, I'm not sure if I'm happy with my decision to push all in. The Equilator tells me I was ahead 56/44, so basically a coin flip. So it wasn't neccesarily a bad decision, although I perhaps should have paid more attention to someone re-raising a raise from early position. It's difficult to on such low stakes though, when I see such crazy plays all the time...

I think the main learning point from this hand is that I should have folded to begin with anyway, and I'll be paying much closer attention to the starting hand chart today!

Hand 2

SB ($1.90)
Hero (BB) ($1.70)
UTG 1 ($17.07)
UTG 2 ($2.68)
UTG 3 ($10.00)
MP 1 ($10.15)
MP 2 ($2.53)
MP 3 ($2.10)
CO ($2.10)
BU ($9.35)
HOLE CARDS
Dealt to Hero [6c 5c]
UTG 1 folds
UTG 2 calls $0.10
UTG 3, MP 1, MP 2, MP 3, CO, BU all fold
SB calls $0.05
Hero checks
FLOP [5h 5s 6d]
SB checks
Hero bets $0.15
UTG 2 and SB both call $0.15
TURN [Ad]
SB checks
Hero bets $0.45
UTG 1 folds
SB raises to $1.65, and is all-in
Hero calls $1.00, and is all-in
Uncalled bet of $0.20 returned to SB
SB shows [6s 6h]
Hero shows [6c 5c]
RIVER [7d]
SB shows [6s 6h]
Hero shows [6c 5c]
SUMMARY
SB collects $3.41

With this hand, I'm not if I could or should have done anything differently, and I'd really appreciate some feedback!

Having only checked from the big blind with my suited connectors, I then flopped a full house. I bet $0.15 into a $0.25 pot (approx 2/3) and both my opponents called. I'm happy so far!

Turn brings an ace, but I'm not worried with my full house, so bet $0.45, again around 2/3 of the pot. This time I get re-raised all in by the small blind. This guy limped in pre-flop, and only called on the flop, so I'm now putting him on an Ace and happily go all in myself.

When he showed his 66, giving him a better full house, I almost cried! With the way he'd only been calling and checking, I just couldn't picture him on the only hand that would beat me!

I don't think I did anything wrong in this hand (possibly could have gone all in straight away on the turn, but he obviously would have called anyway). Should I have been expecting him to show 66? I don't see how I could have. Like I say, and feedback on this hand would be great...

Other than those 2 hands, I'm pretty happy with the rest of yesterdays session. I finished down $3.82 after 706 hands, but $2.09 of that was from the TT that I should never have played (and I've hopefully learned from), and another $1.70 was just bad luck (I hope) with the full house. So if I take those 2 hands out of the equation, I'm only down $0.03 for the session. When you add on that I unlocked around $3 of bonus in that session, I'm getting close to being break even! Which isn't bad for only a couple of days into my poker career!

Next stop, consistently breaking even, and then looking onwards and upwards to the land of profit!

1. I don't really play SSS, but it shouldn't be very wrong to raise 10's from UTG3. Pushing over raise is probably wrong (unless you know that villain is a maniac)

2. Thats just a cooler/unlucky setup, don't see how you can ever fold on the turn playing short stacked. Villain could easily have something like A with a good kicker, or 6x which isn't A6.

I had planned to spend the evening playing poker. But my first 45 minutes went like this:

For anyone who can't see the graph clearly, that's me 114BB below EV after 239 hands! I know it's a small number of hands, but in the last 45 minutes I've managed to blow over 10% of my bankroll! Every time I bet or pushed in, I lost! I could feel tilt approaching, so I've put myself a time out. I might go back to it later tonight.

In fact, that's not strictly true. I wish I'd been able to see tilt approaching and stop before it hit me. But I didn't actually stop until after I did this:

SB ($10.14)
Hero (BB) ($2.00)
UTG1 ($10.00)
UTG2 ($10.00)
UTG3 ($1.55)
MP1 ($1.55)
MP2 ($7.97)
MP3 ($1.93)
CO ($4.03)
BU ($10.70)

HOLE CARDS
Dealt to hero [3h 2h]
UTG1, UTG2, UT3, MP1 all fold
MP2 calls $0.10
MP3, CO, BU, SB all fold
Hero checks
FLOP [7h 8h As]
Hero bets $0.20
MP2 calls $0.20
TURN [5c]
Hero bets $1.70, and is all-in
MP2 calls $1.70
Hero shows [3h 2h]
MP2 shows [Ts Ad]
RIVER [7c]
MP2 collects $3.79

I don't know why I pushed all in with a flush draw. Especially when I only had the 2,3. I honestly can't say what I thought was going to happen. I need to learn the discipline to stick to the SSS guidelines at all times!

So, my results for the day (if I decide to play again later, I'll include it in tomorrows results):

Starting bankroll: $48.08
Time played: 3 hours
Hands played: 998
Amount won: -$7.10
Bonus unlocked: $2.99
Total amount won: $4.11
Bonus progress: $9.10 of $200 unlocked (deadline 9/8/10)
Closing bankroll: $43.97

Originally posted by malosanmaka
1. I don't really play SSS, but it shouldn't be very wrong to raise 10's from UTG3. Pushing over raise is probably wrong (unless you know that villain is a maniac)

2. Thats just a cooler/unlucky setup, don't see how you can ever fold on the turn playing short stacked. Villain could easily have something like A with a good kicker, or 6x which isn't A6.

I'm hoping I've just started my career on a downswing. I don't know how much I should trust these graphs that Poker Tracker makes, but this is my career so far:

I've played less than 2.5K hands, and in that time I've managed to get 200BB below EV. I think my play is improving (apart from the odd silly mistake), I just need some improving luck to go with it before I lose all my starting capital!

I'll stop updating my blog so often sooner or later, but for now it's really helping me to focus my mind especially after a bad session.

I did end up playing again this evening, now done and going to bed, but I wanted to post this and show you what a difference an hour of chilling out can make:

Starting bankroll: $43.97
Time played: 1 hour
Hands played: 311
Amount won: $7.99
Bonus unlocked: $1.13
Total amount won: $9.12
Bonus progress: $10.23 of $200 unlocked (deadline 9/8/10)
Closing bankroll: $53.09

So in an hours play, I made up everything I lost earlier in the day, plus a little bit extra to put my bankroll now almost back up where I started, and around $5 higher than it was at the start of the day!

This session was the complete opposite of the earlier one, I got called everytime I pushed in, and won every showdown.

It would be nice to play a session that's not one extreme or the other at some point, but for now I'll go to sleep with a smile on my face having grown my bankroll for the first time since I started!

I've not played a lot of poker over the last 24 hours or so, because I went to a football match last night so missed out on my evening session. I did manage about an hour yesterday morning and again this morning though.

I'm still struggling to reach a break even point for my sessions, but I'm still hopeful that it's because I've started out on a downswing which should sort itself out eventually. I'm certainly not making as many mistakes as I was a few days ago.

Firstly a review of the session from yesterday morning, and in particular a hand that I'm not sure I'm happy with. In fact, I would probably play it differently now and just fold pre-flop:

Hero (SB) ($1.45)
BB ($4.82)
UTG1 ($15.37)
UTG2 ($15.25)
UTG3 ($6.93)
MP1 ($3.26)
MP2 ($4.50)
MP3 ($2.00)
CO ($5.10) - posted dead blind
BU ($11.74)

HOLE CARDS
Dealt to Hero [Ts Td]
UTG1 raises to $0.20
UTG2 and UTG3 both fold
MP1 calls $0.20
MP2, MP3, CU and BU all fold
Hero raises to $1.45, and is all-in
BB folds
UTG1 folds
MP1 calls $1.25
Hero shows [Ts Td]
MP1 shows [Js Qd]
FLOP [3c 3d Ac]
TURN [7s]
RIVER [Jh]
MP1 collects $3.08

Although I was ahead all through the hand, only losing out on the river, on looking at my starting hands chart I should have folded TT to a pre-flop raise. I decided not to because it was only a min-raise, but perhaps the fact that that min-raise was called before the action got to me should have led to a fold.

I'm really not sure about that hand, so any feedback would be really welcome. Other than that hand, the session was fairly uneventful, and I'm happy with my other plays. In fact, without that hand, I would have been in profit for the session...

Today's session started really well, and I doubled up 4 times in the first half an hour. Unfortunately, that was it for my run of luck, and I only won another 6 hands in the rest of session, none of them for a big amount of chips. I also lost 2 stacks within a minute of each other towards the end of the session, although I'm happy with the way I played them both.

In one of them, my AKo lost out to AKs when they hit their flush on the turn, and in the other my JJ was beaten by 88 when they hit their set on the river. After the run of luck I had earlier in the session, I suppose this was always going to happen to balance things out! The rest of the early profits disappeared with the blinds as the session went on and I had a very dry run of cards.

I'm hoping to unlock the silver articles ASAP, because I think my profits would improve greatly if I could add some blind stealing to my game to stop the blinds having such a massive effect on my winnings. I'm halfway there already, so I suppose I need to just keep on grinding!

Results:

Starting bankroll: $53.09
Time played: 2 hours
Hands played: 578
Amount won: -$2.16
Bonus unlocked: $2.15
Total amount won: -$0.01
Bonus progress: $12.38 of $200 unlocked (deadline 9/8/10)
Closing bankroll: $53.08

I suppose I can't complain too much at only losing $0.01 in nearly 600 hands of play when I've only been playing for less than a week, but I would really like to get into profit as soon as possible and stop relying on bonus to save my bankroll, as it won't be there forever!

I'm happy with the way my game is improving though, and hopefully that improvement will continue...

The Jacks are out to get me!!!

3 Times tonight I've gone bust with pocket Jacks! 3 times! I've only played for around 90 minutes. I'll post the hands either later tonight or tomorrow morning.

Despite that, I think I'm playing well this evening, and should end up with close to a break even session even though my rotten luck is continuing...

As promised, a bit more detail about the Jacks...

In 658 hands last night, I was dealt pocket Jacks 4 times. In those 4 hands, I managed to lose $6.41. That's 64 big blinds! I just couldn't believe the run of bad luck I was having with them.

On 3 of the occasions I got all in with them pre-flop. Twice I was up against someone with pocket Kings, and the third time it was a 3 way pot against AA and AK! I didn't really stand a chance, and didn't hit any of my outs on any of them. All of this happened over a spell of about 15 minutes. A few minutes later, I got dealt them again, which led to this hand:

Was I right to fold? Looking at it this morning, I think I was just being a bit chicken because I didn't want to bust with JJ for the 4th time in 20 minutes. But then it was an all diamond board, and all I can imagine he'd check raise with is a set of Kings or the flush. Either of which have me beat. So I'm not sure...

My run of bad luck carried over into the early part of my session this morning as well, as within the first 15 minutes, I'd gone broke with QQ against KK and AK against AJ. Again, I'm pretty happy with the way I played the hands, getting all my chips in pre-flop each time, and I was just unlucky firstly to come up against a higher pair, and secondly that someone called my all-in with AJ!

After that though, my luck turned around, and I actually ended up doubling up on 5 of the 6 tables Everest had open this morning, and gave up playing when I only had one table left that I could short stack on!

I even doubled up with JJ against AK, so hopefully my run of bad luck with Jacks is over too!

All in all, a good couple of sessions, and my play is definately improving all the time. By my records, I should be unlocking the silver articles on here today, so I'll be looking forward to incorporating some blind stealing into my game, because my biggest losses every session at the moment are the blinds...

Woohoo! Silver unlocked, now to learn some stealing and restealing ready for the night ahead.

Next stop, unlock the Elephant licence before my 60 day PokerTracker trial expires (54 days to go...)

Hey man!

My initial blog name was 'Jacks I love' aka Jackalof ^^

Was doing research on pocket jacks, had sick trouble playing them. But it was fun. But later I found PLO so I dont care about starting hands anymore ^^.

GL in your endeavours

PLO looks far too complicated for me at the moment. I'm still struggling to get my head around Hold 'Em!

And the Jacks got me again tonight... Just got to keep on pushing them in, and hopefully they'll come good eventually!

Hello nice blog. However, as you are using PT3 let me give you a tip :).

When posting hand histories goto the "Hands" tab, double click the hand that you wish to post, then goto the "Hand Formatted" Tab and on that page you will find a little button next to where it says Copy to clipboard with 2+2 on it. Click that and then return here right click the page and select paste, and it will look like this.

Grabbed by Holdem Manager
NL Holdem $0.05(BB) Replayer
SB ($2.95)
Hero ($5.61)
UTG ($8.11)
UTG+1 ($12.92)
UTG+2 ($5.07)
CO ($5.07)
BTN ($8.41)

Dealt to Hero J♠ J♦

fold, fold, fold, fold, BTN raises to $0.15, fold, Hero raises to $0.40, BTN calls $0.25

FLOP ($0.82) J♥ A♦ 7♠

Hero checks, BTN bets $0.50, Hero raises to $1.50, BTN raises to $8.01 (AI), Hero calls $3.71 (AI)

TURN ($11.24) J♥ A♦ 7♠ 5♥

RIVER ($11.24) J♥ A♦ 7♠ 5♥ 7♥

BTN shows 8♥ A♠
(Pre 29%, Flop 2.9%, Turn 0.0%)

Hero shows J♠ J♦
(Pre 71%, Flop 97.1%, Turn 100.0%)

Hero wins $10.68

I did mine with HEM manager but you will get the same effect. It looks nicer and is a lot easier to follow for the reader. Let me know if you want me to delete this long post off off your blog and just leave the opening.

Best of luck, I hope you make it through the limits, when I first got here I played the SSS and really enjoyed it, but it is becoming harder to find rooms to play at so when you feel a bit more confident I'd recommend looking at the BSS as the SSS route can also be very much like a rollercoaster in terms of variance also.

Thanks for the tip, I'll do it that way from now on.

Like the title says, I really have no idea what I'm doing with any of this poker stuff...

Originally posted by lollujo
Thanks for the tip, I'll do it that way from now on.

Like the title says, I really have no idea what I'm doing with any of this poker stuff...

That's what people are here for. Some to learn and some to pass on knowledge. Stick around and post some hands in the evaluation threads and revise the strategies, I'm sure you'll learn a little, if not a lot