Lol. I honestly don't think I would have stopped until we were all in. He was that bad.

Winning huge pots vs very overaggressive players can make up for years of breakeven, or even mediocre play.

My friend was playing micro stakes NL years ago and tilted some guy. The chat box was all "heads up for rollz!" or something like that. My friend was a rec player and saw this player donk off a few buyins so he figured it was worth the risk and sat heads up with the guy for something like 500 buyin and then took the LAG-donk's stack 3 times in an hour and a half running up to $2000. Easily 10-20% of my friend's lifetime poker winnings.

Sup

I'm probably not the only one that missed your avatar.

Played NL for the first time in a while last night because my 8/16 game was a bit of a rock garden and I'm learning to play NL when I have no experience in it as my way of forcing myself to have a rec player mindset instead of the semipro mindset I had back in 2011. It was 1/3 with 300 buy-in.

Anyways, table dynamic felt very very different. There were two other TAGs, then a couple of LAGs and loose passives. The TAGs where chummy with me, knocked the table and nodded my way when I won pots. Mentioned pot odds when talking about a hand. One TAG agonized then loudly called himself a nit when he folded in late position to my middle position 3bet of an early position open by a LAG.

Limit games I never ever hear people use the terminology I read in books or on 2p2. Also, I very rarely meet another player at 8/16 that I'd say is thinking beyond level 0 to 1 but these guys were quietly acknowledging level 2+ thinking on stuff.

People say your edge is bigger in NL, but I find lots of small stakes limit players to be complete idiots who've never read up on the game. NL it seems like people have studied up much more and much less secretive about it. In limit it's like you need a secret handshake and code words before another TAG will acknowledge that they know that you know that they know... After a few orbits the other NL TAGs were smirking at me for inducing and snapping off the LAG bluffs and v-towning the stations thinly.

Have you guys noticed big differences in the player pools? What are your thoughts on playing limit v NL? Like, NL game gives skilled player much more edge but the typical player skill level seems higher...

I like playing lots of hands in limit but it felt nice to be able to pause and think about decisions (even if to fake pause ) and actually be able to hand read the tighter more thoughtful ranges.

Stuff like that is just to massage their own ego.

Yeah I think that generally stuff like that is bad for the game.

Also I have met some competent players with games I respect playing 20/40. There are a few 8/16 regs at commerce and the gardens that are decent.


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Hence why I never do this. I don't ever say or do things in front of other players that they might perceive as me thinking they are playing badly. When they suck out I do **** like "oooh nice hand" never "ugh 3 outer". I only comment on hands I wasn't in if there whole table is chatting up and joking about it and I just contribute to the silly discussion about how close we were to promotions and stuff like that. These guys weren't yucking it up too much but they were obviously cheering me on against the fish.

I was really surprised and wondered if it was an NL thing that people see more.

On the 8/16 comment. Yes, I can see how I'm so low in the stakes that decent players aren't around, I want to move up but I'm waiting for my next fun money injection so I have more than 20 BB to sit with

Well 8/16 definitely has worse play than 20/40, but only in the same sense that 1/2 has worse play than 5/5. The play is worse but the mistakes are similar, people are just more aggressive in general. There are competent players at 8/16 though, and sometimes you have decent players that play 8/16 because they are too broke for 20/40 or because they don’t like the stress of playing the game.


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Played 8/16 last night. Gentleman to my right (30-ish, half drunk, slow even when he's not drinking) has exactly 2.5 bets in his hand for the kill pot. I raised UTG, button 3-bet, and he is cutting out the remainder of what he has in his hand before announcing "raise." So, he has effectively put out less than the 3 bets, made commentary regarding the other person's raise, and then announced raise JUST before drawing his hand back.

1. He's a reg
2. He knows better
3. He has kings for sure
4. Is this slimy?

How would this be slimy? You think he's putting it out, guaging reactions then saying raise when he thinks you are relieved he's calling?

You know the reg better than I, but I'd just assume someone is being careless and has his mind on his cards more than what he is physically doing.

Action gets sloppy at my card room, I usually chalk it up to impatience or not paying attention rather than shooting an angle. What I can't stand is when people hold their cards to the right of their chip stack though, I know you want me to think you don't have a hand so I act out of turn you bastard!

Funny hand I just played.

Open J6ss on the button 3 handed .10/.20 limit. Both blinds call.

Flop cones 234sss. Check, bb bets, I call, sb calls.

Turn (234sss) qh. Check, bb bets, I raise, sb folds, bb calls.

River (234sss) (qh) 6d. Bb bets, I raise, he 3bet, I 4bet, he 5bet, I 6bet, he 7bet, I 8bet, he 9bet, I call. I almost ten bet but figured it was a little too thin.

Needless to say j-high flush was good.


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I lol'd.

What'd villain have? And please share cliffs notes on what hijinks villain was up to that made you know the 8-bet was good.

I pretty much never play NLHE when there's any other game running at all. I just don't like it. But when I'm, for example, travelling and the nearby casino only has NLHE, I'd usually rather play NLHE than not play poker at all. I use the shortstack strategy. I'd also recently read Ed Miller's The Course, Harrington on Cash Games, and Sklansky's No-Limit Hold'Em book.

The main problem with the shortstack strategy is it's mind-numbingly soul-crushingly boring. But, that boredom is easily staved off by not only paying attention to the table but watching how the villains play, trying to put them on ranges, thinking about how you would be playing if you were deeper-stacked et al. It's also useful to consider the finer points on which Miller, Sklansky and Harrington differ and decide which advice is best for the current table conditions.

He had q5 offsuit with the q of spades. So he was drawing live.

Funny enough this was the first button that I had. However the previous hand, I saw him bet all the way down in a 4bet pot with a4 of diamonds on a qj684 rainbow board and call a check raise on the river when he hit his four (he was good). So he seemed a little spewy to me.

Mostly he just didn’t play like a big flush would play. A big flush would probably check raise flop and definitely 3bet turn.


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I agree with you re nle, but employ a strategy the involves whiskey and playing every hand.

I finished 2nd in a big tourney last night for about $900.

I didn’t win.

Still alive.

Gogogo!

Was he trying to get it all in?

Did he say he didn't notice the flush on board?

How many bets would you go if this were a live 10/20 game? Once we get up to 5 bets it would take a very special maniacal villain for me to go more bets.

No limit has infinitely more tryhards. Probably a lot of reasons for that. I think NL players also tend to have a bigger difference between how good they think they are and how good they actually are.

This is sloppy/bad form but not slimy unless it is intentional. I would guess that he did not realize the kill was on when he moved forward with chips, thought he had plenty of chips to 3-bet, and then realized he was short.

Fair. His reaction to me calling it out as an "almost-stringbet," and the dealer agreeing but both of us acknowledging that it wasn't, was to start talking **** to me under his breath. I can't say I blame him.

Haha.

Saturday I saw a guy at the NL table lose a big hand right after sitting down. He hadn't put in all the chips yet for a call so he splashes the pot at showdown then says "ugh I accidentally threw in an extra chip" dealer pauses the guy repeats "I know I put in an extra chip". Dealer goes "floor!" then the guy has a moment of brief sanity and says "nah it doesn't matter... even though I know I did". Dealer tells the floor it's cool and pushes the pot over to the winner who starts stacking the chips.

After a brief silence and the next hand starts to get dealt the guy EXPLODES at the winner: "seriously?! I tell you I put in an extra chip and you don't just give it to me! **** you ***hole!" Rage mucks his hand, gets up in a huff, and cashes out.

The whole table was flabbergasted.

If it was live I would only call the 3bets. People are nitty as **** on the river live, especially on a monotone board.

He didn’t say anything, he just rage quit. And he had plenty money behind. Maybe he just didn’t think I had a flush.


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So nitty on the river. I've only seen a river three bet live a few times but every time someone at the table said "oh chop chop"