Quote:
Originally Posted by reaper6788
What's different about "today's game"? Softer or tougher? In what way?
I'm asking a lot about hoc because I'm in the middle of reading volume 2 right now. It strikes me as very conservative TAG and 5/10+ stakes are probably way tougher now.
Also there's little discussion of concepts I know are ultra relevant for tough limit games which is blind steal, re-steal, and defense
If you're reading V2, you may notice that there are very few "live" examples. Almost everything is online which is where most players were at that time in the US market. The few live examples are at stakes that almost never run today and would be much tougher today than at that time. I agree with Garick that if you ignored the stakes and just assumed it was LLSNL, it isn't too far off. That said, the chapter on low stakes games doesn't really apply today. It would be rare that a game would play that soft.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Pensfan
I'm more of a nit. I genuinely don't chase draws, even when I likely should. My biggest losses come from not knowing when I'm beat with an over pair. Us tight players wait so long for a decent had that it's hard to fold QQ+ (not pre flop obviously).
If that's the case, you don't need "The Course" yet. HOC discusses this in some detail. At the core, Harrington makes the point that TPTK and OP win lots of small pots but loses big pots. They are good hands pf and on the flop. However, if someone is calling pf and on the flop, then takes the lead on the turn, you're often behind in LLSNL. If most of your stack is in the pot on the river, you're behind.
I treat in general TPTK and OP as two street betting hands. I'm not going to b/b/b and win often. So I'm going to check somewhere in the process. It might be the flop, turn or river depending on the board, not on my hand.
So how do you stop calling raises? One way is to say,
"They aren't playing back at me."
"They aren't playing back at me."
"They aren't playing back at me."
"They aren't playing back at me."
Because they aren't. If some raises you on the river, they have a great hand far more often than they are bluffing.
The second area is to realize that your major decision point is on the flop. If you're going to fold to a turn bet, you're better off folding to the flop bet. Money saved is money won.