Hello everyone!

About two months ago I discovered poker and its beauty. The first of these two months i spent watching poker videos (non-instructional, purely for entertainment) on YouTube and have probably watched every interesting hand of NLHE you can find on there. Around the beginning of August i made the minimum deposit of $10 on Pokerstars and tried out some NL2. I managed to turn these $10 to $20. Mainly as a fish running good. I was on top of the world and was certain that I'd be the next Tow Dwan. After a while it took a turn for the worse and I was quickly back to my initial bankroll of $10. Losing SUCKED! In fact it sucked so much I was not even able to play properly due to being scared of blowing 20% of my BR being 100BB deep in an NL2 cash game (). That's when I came up with the brilliant idea of playing SNGs. It felt good to be able to decide how big my maximum loss was going to be and I could comfortably play my own game again.

I decided to play the $1.50 Double or Nothing's since they are low-variance and friendly for the roll. Everything went as planned and being the huge gambler as I am I decided to take the insane shot of trying $3.50 Double or Nothing's. It's still going well and my initial roll of $10 is now $43.75. I'll keep playing these stakes until I have figured out the fundamentals of poker and feel confident enough playing higher stakes.

I started this thread to motivate me to play better and get consulting advice on some of the hands I play. My first, and huge, goal is to become a better poker player with a bankroll of over $100 by the end of the year. And yes, I know, for pretty much everyone of you this is just silly, but I really think this will improve my game.

Thanks in advance!

After a decent session of making the right decisions I'm down to $42.31. I now realize that my previous goals was pretty low, even for me. So, I'll also add that I want to transition my SNG play into cash game play and beat NL2 by the end of the year.

All encouraging and discouraging comments motivate me, so please go ahead and comment whatever is on your mind.

GOOD LUCK MY FRIEND!

Do all the studying you can and keep the passion alive.

Thanks mate, I'll do my best!

I'm also thinking about acquiring PT4. Not for the flashy HUD or because I think it will directly improve my game, but because it will counter my current mindset of not caring about the cents in NL2. I often call on draws despite lousy pot odds reasoning I can just grind the cents up elsewhere. This is just plain stupid and proves that I miss one of the most important attributes of a poker player; discipline.

What I, as a gamer, need is raw and persistent stats of how I do in a particular game and stake to always force me play my best. It's also not a bad investment for the future since I plan on playing poker for a long time.

Any thoughts? Should a small baller like me invest in something like PokerTracker or Hold 'em Manager?

Do a trial of PT or HM. Should last you thirty days at least. Once one expires, switch over to the trial of the other. If after 60-90 days you find it useful, pick the one you like and buy the micro-stakes holdem package.

I'll go ahead and do that right now.







Should I have played this differently? This guy loved to play lots of hands and a weaker Ace than mine was definitely in his range and therefore I decided to check-call all the way. How would you play this hand?

This was a DON?
Assuming its a DON, on the bubble I'd probably just fold Pre, but as played I think its fine. I only say fold because you have too many BBs to 3-bet shove and flatting puts you in a weird spot.

If this is a reg. sng then I'd reraise flop.

Yep, that hand was in a DoN. Folding seems like the correct option now, why get greedy on the bubble when you're in a good chip position? I guess it's easy to be wise after the event though.

Bought in to the 70FPP sattelite for the $11+R NL Hold'em [$40K Gtd]. Playing solid poker nearing the bubble. Having a decent chip stack I feel confident getting that ticket and really looking forward to playing a tournament way out of my roll. This hand comes up:





Down to pretty much one big blind and the BB hits. I get dealt a pair of ladies and I feel the happiness of life once again returning, since picking up one round of blind and antes really makes a difference this deep. SB completes and I'm pretty much all in already. Dude shows 82o and the flop comes 722, none of the following cards helps me. I get busted at 28th place, 27 people gets the ticket.

I hate poker, my life and everything else. Literally feeling sucidal at the moment. I, the true balla, lost a 70FPP sattelite and my life is shattered. Poker is definitely not for me. **** LIFE! ****! ****! ****! ****! ****! ****! ****! ****! ****! ****! ****! ****! ****! ****! ****!

Played another one of those sattelites. My better hand got out flopped to quads once again. Couldn't really care less though since it wasn't remotely as close to the bubble as it was yesterday.

Been playing my $3.50 Fifty50's and have played rather decent even though the cards hasn't been running my way. Bankroll up to: $54.91.

After a night of playing the best poker I ever have I'm down to $38.17. I must have lost at least 10 preflop all ins with AA. **** poker, **** life, **** YOU!