I haven't actually added regular speed tourneys yet. I'm so used to playing turbos that the regular speeds seem like such sn inefficient use of time. But I hadn't even considered late regging - it's something I never do but I wonder if starting at 50bb and playing slower might actually be better for my ROI. I might give it a try.

I suppose you're not entirely wrong. It's hard not to focus on bad beats when you have so few positive results to offset the negative.

[QUOTE=OG_Tuff;57526418]Not on Stars anymore I reckon, after our government basically eliminated 90% of our playing options since the new law changes?


Yes correct, can't play on stars till late 2022 i guess.

gl at the tables guys

Yeah, will have to wait and see when they get licenses to offer their services to Dutch player base again. Maybe as soon as mid '22. Little information is out there atm. Lets at least hope the big sites come back again at some point.

Good luck on the grind bro.

WZAWZDB!

So I looked into the whole late regging idea and it doesn't make much sense to me. In a regular tourney you late reg an hour in and you get 20-25bb. In a deep stack you can get 50bb by regging an hour in, but then you're only shaving an hour off an 8-10 hour tournament. Doesn't seem worth it at all. It does make me wonder, though, how many people try to max their volume by late regging as many tourneys as possible and just playing push/fold to try to run up a stack.

Subscribed and in for the ride.

We look to have similar situations and goals, though I am focused on cash. Good Luck!

The ICM value of a starting stack goes up as people bust and as you get closer to the money. Sometimes this effect is dramatic as being able to late reg and literally fold into the money.

I decided to give it a try a few times. Basically reg really late with a 20bb stack and try to spin it up. Managed to cash in one tourney on GG doing it. One of the only bright spots in my session so far today! The good news is I feel like I'm playing well - I've really cut down on the big mistakes. Just nothing else going my way again today. Busted 3 minutes into one tourney flush over flush.

Sigh, AA cracked by KK for a massive pot to bust me from one of my final two tourneys of the day. So now it's all down to my final tourney, the Daily Big $3 on GG, to salvage the session.

I was cruising in a HU PKO earlier until I started to bleed chips, so I've been going through the HH to see if I can figure out where it started going wrong. I can't seem to find any major mistakes or big pots that started the downfall, just a lot of small pots going to my opponents. I did come across this hand after I had already bled down to about 47bb, but I don't see how I could play this one any differently either:

PokerStars - 150/300 Ante 30 NL FAST (2 max) - Holdem - 2 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

SB: 241.51 BB
Hero (BB): 46.92 BB

2 players post ante of 0.1 BB, SB posts SB 0.5 BB, Hero posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 1.7 BB) Hero has A T

SB raises to 3 BB, Hero calls 2 BB

Flop: (6.2 BB, 2 players) 6 8 J
Hero checks, SB bets 3.1 BB, Hero calls 3.1 BB

Turn: (12.4 BB, 2 players) A
Hero checks, SB bets 9.3 BB, Hero calls 9.3 BB

River: (31 BB, 2 players) 4
Hero checks, SB bets 226.01 BB and is all-in, fold

SB wins 31 BB

Maybe he has some busted backdoor heart draws but there's so much that beats me and this is exactly the kind of spot where I've been carelessly calling off lately.

Wasn't meant to be today. At least I can take the positive that I plugged some leaks and played a much more disciplined game. I also really tried to focus on staying positive and getting past the bad beats and coolers. Perhaps next week will be the breakout.

Late regging works best when the number of spots to min cash & the number of players left give you a better chance of cashing than playing from the start.

You won't necessarily have this edge every time you late reg. For instance, if blinds are 1000/2000, your starting stack is 5000, and there are 40 people left before the bubble, with 30 of those people having 30k stacks, that would be a waste of money to late reg into.

Basically, you can coinflip your way past the bubble instead of potentially drawing dead and donking off your stack.

I do a mixture of strategically late regging in satellites in +EV time slots to avoid having too much competition, or a huge zerg rush of people early/mid regging

Your mileage may vary.

So I guess it really only makes sense in smaller tourneys then

In an effort to focus on the positive, I'm going to dig up some hands I think I played well from the last session and run through my thought process. I still might have made mistakes, so feedback is welcome.

This is from a 4-max PKO.

PokerStars - 50/100 Ante 12 NL (4 max) - Holdem - 4 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

BTN: 113.28 BB
SB: 63.04 BB
BB: 27.45 BB
Hero (CO): 100.6 BB

4 players post ante of 0.12 BB, SB posts SB 0.5 BB, BB posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 1.98 BB) Hero has T J

Hero raises to 2.55 BB, BTN raises to 9.63 BB, fold, fold, Hero calls 7.08 BB

That 3b ain't small, and I'm OOP, but effective stacks are deep and I have a hand that can flop very well. Worth seeing the flop.

Flop: (21.24 BB, 2 players) J 8 2
Hero checks, BTN bets 10.62 BB, Hero calls 10.62 BB

Not exactly the flop I was looking for but a pretty standard check/call here with a marginal TP on a very static flop.

Turn: (42.48 BB, 2 players) 3
Hero checks, BTN checks

River: (42.48 BB, 2 players) 7
Hero checks, BTN bets 21.24 BB, Hero calls 21.24 BB

Pretty safe runout but it would be really difficult to get value from anything worse here, and he's going to have quite a few hands he might decide to bluff here (AK/AQ/KQ) and some weak made hands he might turn into a bluff. So it's a standard x/c for me here for a pretty nice pot.

BTN shows A K (High Card, Ace)
(Pre 60%, Flop 23%, Turn 14%)
Hero shows T J (One Pair, Jacks)
(Pre 40%, Flop 77%, Turn 86%)
Hero wins 84.96 BB

Another one from the 4-max PKO

PokerStars - 60/120 Ante 15 NL (4 max) - Holdem - 4 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

SB: 49.25 BB
BB: 31.79 BB
CO: 57.2 BB
Hero (BTN): 115.4 BB

4 players post ante of 0.13 BB, SB posts SB 0.5 BB, BB posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 2 BB) Hero has 5 A

CO calls 1 BB, Hero raises to 3.11 BB, fold, BB calls 2.11 BB, CO calls 2.11 BB

I have the guy covered so I want to isolate him with position. Didn't love BB coming along for the ride. Probably should have gone a bit bigger with my raise.

Flop: (10.32 BB, 3 players) J A A
BB checks, CO checks, Hero checks

Zero value in betting here and I do have to worry about better Ax, so easy check behind.

Turn: (10.32 BB, 3 players) 4
BB checks, CO checks, Hero bets 5.67 BB, BB calls 5.67 BB, CO calls 5.67 BB

When both check it greatly increases the likelihood my A5 is good, and the delayed CB could look like I'm now trying to steal the pot with my entire range. Heads-up I would go smaller with the bet but I choose larger against 2 opponents. A bit surprised when they both call, but still not concerned.

River: (27.35 BB, 3 players) 7
BB checks, CO checks, Hero bets 9.57 BB, BB calls 9.57 BB, fold

If they're both willing to call my turn bet I might be able to get thin value on a brick river so I size down to see what I can get. I'm targeting Jx or even a crying call from a middle pair here.

Hero shows 5 A (Three of a Kind, Aces)
(Pre 53%, Flop 96%, Turn 84%)
BB mucks 8 7 (Two Pair, Aces and Sevens)
(Pre 47%, Flop 4%, Turn 16%)
Hero wins 46.5 BB

Play live. IMO less than 1 percent of online grinders have a good life. Probably 10% can survive (hardly a model to follow) off poker.

Online grinders have and use all sorts of tools at their disposal in order to eek out small edges over a high volume of hands.

I'm not really looking to be an online grinder, just a serious recreational player. If I can make enough money online to afford a vacation now and then, I'd be happy.

Arggggg!

So close to a major breakout. I didn't have much time to play today but when I got home I fired up a few tourneys and managed to cash in two of them, both $2.20 PKOs on Stars. The first one, the Triple Threat, was a min-cash with a couple of bounties but the other one was a full ring MTT and the best run I've had in, oh, a good 18 months. Managed to finish 27th out of 670+ runners plus a handful of solid bounties. But man was it one hell of a rollercoaster. I got off to an incredible start, tripling up early and kept picking up pots, and then went on a bit of a dry spell but was still sitting in the top 1/3 of the field. But then I lost about 35bb of my 87bb stack when I defended with QJ against an SB open, the guy then open shoves for 3x pot on a J32hh flop with a decent bounty on his head, I call and he flips over AA.

So I thought that was it. Here we go again - got off to a fantastic start and then lose half my stack to a cooler. But I really tried to stay positive and focus on rebuilding and somewhere along the line I started running really well. Picking up big pairs and holding, flopping sets, just running well. Not only did I manage to rebuild my stack, but eventually found myself in the top 5. Then the rollercoaster continued. I ran into AA twice within a short period of time, losing the first one to (thankfully) a short stack and sucking out on the river against the other guy with QQ. I had him just barely covered so I picked up a solid bounty but losing that hand would have effectively busted me. A shorter stack minraised in early position, I 3b to isolate him, and the AA guy ships his 45-ish bb. It was such an ugly spot, especially after working so hard and running better than I've run in a long, long time. But how could I fold QQ there? I called, he turned over AA and my heart sank...until the river. That happens so rarely to me in important pots; normally I'm on the receiving end of those brutal beats.

Unfortunately once we got down to about 60 people I just couldn't find a hand and the stack started dwindling pretty quickly. I held on as long as I could and eventually 3b-shoved A2cc, got 3 callers, and prayed for a club flop. The three hearts that fell crushed my dreams pretty badly. That said, I feel worse for the other guy who busted in the hand with his 40bb or whatever. He flopped a flush and lost to a boat on the river. Ouch.

So it was positive in a lot of ways but so frustrating to run that well and still not be able to take full advantage. After I sucked out on the AA I thought to myself, "This is it, this happens to me so infrequently that I have to take advantage of it when it does." Ah well, baby steps towards success I guess.

This hand cost me some chips, but I actually like the way I played it to minimize the loss. This is from the Daily Big $5 on GG.

GG Poker - 80/160 Ante 20 NL (8 max) - Holdem - 8 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

BTN: 56.44 BB
SB: 137.19 BB
BB: 56.04 BB
UTG: 54.79 BB
UTG+1: 77.23 BB
Hero (MP): 56.23 BB
MP+1: 70.06 BB
CO: 65.67 BB

8 players post ante of 0.13 BB, SB posts SB 0.5 BB, BB posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 2.5 BB) Hero has K Q

fold, fold, Hero raises to 3.1 BB, fold, fold, BTN raises to 9.2 BB, SB calls 8.7 BB, fold, Hero calls 6.1 BB

The 3b and cold-call from the SB are concerning so I can't 4b here. Worth seeing the flop with my suited KQ multiway.

Flop: (29.6 BB, 3 players) 9 A T
SB checks, Hero checks, BTN bets 9.77 BB, fold, Hero calls 9.77 BB

Decent flop but the Ace sucks. The small sizing is a bit surprising in a multiway pot on such a dynamic flop but he gives me a good enough price to x/c. Given that he has hands like AA/AK/AQ and maybe even ATs/TT, I can't x/r here. If that Ace is any other diamond, though, this would be a great spot to x/shove.

Turn: (49.14 BB, 2 players) 4
Hero checks, BTN bets 37.34 BB and is all-in, fold

BTN wins 49.14 BB

Haven't updated in a while because there hasn't been much to report. Had another session this weekend with a few min-cashes but nothing to write home about. At least it seems as though I've stopped hemorrhaging money with the min-cashes. Hopefully this means I am at the bottom of the long slide and things will start turning up soon.

I've been focused more on my preflop ranges lately and I have noticed some leaks there. I think my instincts have been good for the most part, especially with deep stacks, but I have found some spots where I'm either opening too loose or too tight from certain positions. I've been digging up what I can for free online since it isn't cost-effective for me to pay for ranges. Trying to avoid shelling out the $50 for Modern Poker Theory for the same reason. I'm going to play around with GTOWizard to see if I can fill in the gaps, but if anyone has suggestions for how to round out my preflop ranges I'm all ears.

GL Nothing wrong with mincash. Once you are doing it frequently enough, you can start "playing for the win".

I have never tried a range trainer product. I love HRC beta because (it's cheap and) you can specify opponents stack, but might be hard on a laptop with too many opponents, too many sizings and deep stacks.

One vid from Poker Coaching on shortstack study was really good for me. Basically, random roll for if you're shoving or calling, opponents position, your position. Then, guess the range with pokerstove or pokercoaching's range analyzer, and compare to the range you have defined. Just do it over and over. Helps to make sure you don't get out of line.

Unsolicited, but postflop I use TexasSolver since it's open source. It is not at 1.0 level but you can calculate single streets with a gaming comp. I just open 3 instances and narrow down the range through the streets.


About that previous hand, how many levels in and starting stack? My instinct is betting 10 to win 5 pre is not premium but probably an ace, but weird size from him pre(he didn't do exactly 3x). I might call if he is loose. His shove doesn't make much sense if he has an ace.

Not sure, but still relatively early I think. Blinds only 80/160/ante at this point.

The sizing is strange for sure, like went 3x and then took it down a couple of notches. Could also be that he manually entered a number. Who knows.

I don't think it looked like Ax either because I think he would have gone larger on the flop, but he does have plenty of monsters in his range. I block draws but I don't block any sets, so he could play hands like AA/TT this way. Size down on the flop to "slowplay" and then put the rest in for less than pot on the turn. Either way I can't call it.

I'm feeling more excited and optimistic than I have in a while thanks to this range work. I've spent the past several days playing around with GTOWizard and I'm finding some real gaps in my shorter stack ranges. What really jumps out at me is how much limping the solver advocates below 20bb, and how it switches to 100% limp/shove below 15bb. That's something I definitely haven't had in my game.

The other thing I'm noticing is how aggressively the solver plays the big suited Tx hands, particularly at shorter stacks. KTs/QTs/JTs become open-shoves in the CO at 17bb. There are even some surprising spots at deeper stacks. For example, even as deep as 40bb it has KTs/QTs/JTs as 3b-shoves from the SB facing a BTN open. I never would have considered shoving in that spot.

Seems fine, you can block bet river small or x/c. 25% wouldn't be too bad since you have some hands like QTs that will want to fold out their AQ/AK. I expect that most players will continue turn with overpairs so I think your JTs is usually good.

Fold pre, we should be iso-ing tighter vs limps. Also A5o plays really poorly deep stacked, you'd rather have a hand like 78s IMO.

AP just bet flop small, don't be so afraid of better hands. It's hard to have bluffs when you check flop bet turn/bet river, and if the CO is a big fish you're looking to get max from KJ/QJ type of hands. You checking kind of illustrates my point that you should just fold pre.

On turn/river I'd go at least 1/2 pot.

You played this fine. Just curious why your open size is so big?