If i bet QQ i go smaller, ap I fold. Mostly just checking OOP to one player and 3way though

Awesome man. How you finding it? I'm reading it every day and loving it.

I appreciate you guys looking out for me. <3

Although, It's pretty much impossible that this Russian guy knows I play poker, like the odds are so ridiculously small. I obv just heard "poker site" when he was very clearly speaking Russian, not a word of English. Definitely heard what I wanted to hear there.

I also don't really see how a VPN is going to help at all. But yeah it's not like I'm being stupid about it and telling everyone here what I do.

Although one of the guys ITT told me on Skype that there's homegames in Pattaya run by expats. I've played my fair share of illegal homegames but I imagine in this country you'd be prosecuted just for playing (back in Australia it was only the organisers who got in trouble). FWIW I think it's really over-hyped this "don't get caught playing poker" thing, but def best to be careful.

Yeah, I folded as well. Have to be real careful on these sites betting 1/3 pot - in just about every single instance it triggers something in the primitive Chinese rec player's mind sounding "WEAKNESS" and they'll jump all over that bet with all sorts of nonsense. It's a fairly well-known point amongst app grinders that you should only bet 1/3 pot when you have the nutter butters because you'll get punished otherwise. Granted, in this partiocular spot, with 1.5 spr it's probably fine.

================================================

Daily Update - Saturday 29/09

Woke up feeling exhausted. I'm still really struggling getting to sleep when it's bed time. Like I give myself from 1am-10am to sleep, so I call it 9 hours of sleep. But realistically I'm spending many of those hours trying to actually fall asleep. I don't drink any coffee and I have no idea why I'm finding it so difficult to fall asleep still. If anyone has any tips, send em thru!

Anyway, I decided since I'd forgotten to program in a day off this week, I'd take today off. But I also said that I didn't want to take days off during the weekend. So I did a half day instead. Only 5 hours of poker.

Nothing too interesting results wise. Negative $137.20 for the day. Struggling to get much going and still not feeling very confident overall. Still, I owe it to myself to stick it out a bit longer to properly gauge how much of this is just variance or whether my strategy/approach isn't fit for these games. If bankroll permits, I'll definitely grind tomorrow and all of next week to continue feeling it out.

Final day of the week tomorrow. Going to be an intense day for me, legs in the morning and then 7 hours of my best poker in the evening. After that I'll do up a plan for my day off on Monday. I have a hundred and one things I need to do on Monday. Not really the way I want to spend my first full day off, running around doing errands etc, but need to get it done.

Hoping I can post a winning day tomorrow to finish out the week on a positive note.

GL all.

Funny thing about Russians and poker, I was walking along the beach out front of my condo a couple weeks ago. There's these 3 young Russian guys chilling there on their phones. As I walk past I hear the Stars alert sound go off. :') At least one of them was definitely grinding WCOOP on the beach. Ballers. :')

So you are exploiting them somehow with this big sizing because .... ??

If you have a solid strategy them doing some nonsense vs. it sounds great because if they deviate wildly vs. you you'll simply print.

How long after your grind are you sleeping? I was having trouble recently and was given these bits of advice which helped - no tea/coffee 8-10 hours before bed, no alcohol during any 'work' days, do something like reading a book or another activity for an hour before bed.. don't go straight from your computer to bed, don't use your phone 2/3 hours before bed, don't toss & turn and if you're struggling then go & 'meditate' during ten minute walks.

My struggles always came IMO just because I wasn't active enough though I think, just grinding and barely getting out... if you're at the gym every day and a having long ass grind you should be passing out. I presumed you are gym'ing it in the morning and grinding before bed obviously before I gave the tips above, if you are doing it that way maybe reverse it?

I've always had trooble sleeping in SE Asia tbh given the heat and having air con/a fan on you all night just isn't the same as being at room temperature, the only times I slept well were after being out on a sesh (obv) then I turned to sleep meds but it's a dangerous road because when you decide to come off them it can be months again before you're sleeping properly again naturally and most can't handle it and get back on them. You can get 10 Xanax for $1.25 in Cambodia and for new users one/two of them will put you out for 8-10 hours good deep sleep so it's obviously tempting given how hellish it is to suffer Insomnia.

@sleep issue try melatonin if you've never tried it before, has worked well for myself and other friends in the past
https://www.webmd.com/vitamins/ai/in...-940/melatonin

I started using it after I was having tons of trouble sleeping post quitting Xanax (after being addicted and a slow 2 month taper off). Had success with it and have used it a few other times since then for a couple weeks at a time

Melatonin works greats. I find just trying to shut off your brain previous to attempting to falling asleep, watching mindless tv or listening to some podcast/music that wont require any deep thinking.

Meditation

Are you spending the entire time in Pattaya or are you gonna head elsewhere in Thailand at all to purely grind as oppose to travel?

Pai seems like it'd be a pretty sick place to grind in if you can suppress the inner degen for a while (replace it with your inner hippy).

That being said, more degen stories needed itt.

Sent from my CPH1805 using Tapatalk

go to bed earlier imo, also meditation and maybe juste read a book before going to bed

Try turning off all the digital things 1h before bedtime, try using night shift light for the computer and cellphone after starts to get dark (f.lux makes that too), and try to read a book before bed. I think that should help

I don't really get what you're saying. I cbet 1/2 pot, it's not exactly big in this game. But yeah, I'd say my strategy is anything but solid :")


Going to try respond to all of these points quickly...
>how long after grind do i sleep?
In bed about 30 mins after on average I'd say.
>tea/coffee/alcohol
I don't drink any coffee or alcohol (once a week on days off).
>meditation
I've tried for the life of me to do this but time and time again have come to the conclusion that it's not for me. And IK all the proponents out there will be like loljust try again. And maybe I should. But I've given it serious effort numerous times over the past couple years and it is the least pleasant part of my day.
>xanax/melatonin
Probably my best options tbh. But I reeeeeallly don't like the idea of medicating for this. I feel like it's a massive cop out and I'd rather not go down that route if at all possible.

Like there's absolutely no reason why I shouldn't be able to sleep... I workout for 1-2 hours every day. I don't drink any caffeine whatsoever. The only thing I can think of is screen-interaction before bed but surely that itself isn't going to cause my issues? I can't really switch off from technology before bed either. I have to play night sessions due to timezones so I can't grind mornings and train at night. Last night I read a book for 20 minutes before sleeping but still got fkall sleep.



Spending entire time in Pattaya, yeah. I have my PC here, screens, I bought a $1.3k desk, sound system. Internet is paid for for the year, etc. You can't play these apps on laptops so I'm bound to a PC unfortunately and that means no travel for me.

+1 to the degen stories. I wish this thread was more like the old Thailand PGCs :')

================================================

Daily Update - Sunday 30/09

Profit: -$485.21

Another pretty average day in the books. I'm pretty sure I ran a fair bit under EV again today. A shame to finish the week on a losing note but I'm just glad the first week is in the books.

Weekly Review - 24/09 - 30/09



Hours Played: 49.35
Profit: $2,063.46

Well my first official week is in the books. Overall I think I ran preeeetty poorly in terms of EV as well as situationally. Regardless, I'm happy to have made it through the week without going busto. Admittedly, I'm very much struggling to adjust to the pace of these games. I've learnt a lot over the past 50 hours of gameplay, but I feel as though the forthcoming 50 hours is going to be even more crucial.

Tomorrow is my day off and I've set aside 1 hour for me to go over all the trouble spots I'm having, what adjustments I am making, and what adjustments to make going forward and why. I'll post it all here. I'll also do up a weekly gameplan for next week.

Obviously pretty happy with the volume this week. Getting the 7 hours in each day was a piece of piss, although I made it way less pleasant than it should have been by being so overly results-oriented. My bankroll has been fairly decimated over the past couple months with running bad and also moving over here to Thailand cost way more than I expected. So I think I have about 22 buyins for my current stake before I need to move down. I think the fact that my BRM is currently fairly aggressive has made losing flips and getting sucked out on all week much more difficult than if my BR was twice what it is.

Really happy with gym as well. Killing it in there every day. Have done 2xpush/pull/legs and have seen strength gains already (to be expected since I basically partied for last couple weeks). I'm also getting a pretty mean tan on kicking it out here on the beach everyday which is a plus I guess.

What other stuff have I learnt... I'm spending way too much on food... Bulking while eating every single meal out is just not profitable. Tomorrow I'm going to go buy a rice cooker, shartloads of chicken breast, and some oats. I'm going to cook breakfast and dinner at home - this will save me plenty of money as well as allow me to hit macros/portion size a little more efficiently. I'll probably eat one meal out per day just to get out of the apartment.

Anyways, to those of you who have messaged me, I'll be responding to you all tomorrow. I apologise for taking so long.

Stay tuned ITT for tomorrow I should have a big write-up of some strategy debugging and will create a few focus areas for next week.

<3

I take melatonin every day and it helps me a lot.

Don't take Xanax, its terrible for you. Taking melatonin and taking Xanax are really nothing alike at all

Instead of responding to every PM individually, you could post a list of FAQ and answers in the thread.

This could save you some time and also prevent people from asking you the same questions again and again.

Have you tried using binaural beats to help you sleep?

Nice Job with the volume!

Still cant figure out if OP is actually complaining about games being soft...........

I've seen a number of (profitable) players go from Stars nl50-nl200 and struggle insanely on PM, only to go back to Stars in a month or so.

It's almost a different game there and if you're not flexible enough it'll be hard and very frustrating.

Cool man, sounds like that might be the way to go tbh.

Yeah I don't really want a benzo addiction to replace my insomnia lol.

Yeah that's a decent idea re the FAQ tbh. I've just replied to 6-7 PMs all asking the same thing, how to get involved on the apps etc. HIT ME UP ON SKYPE PEOPLE! info@harveymeale.com

I've also given the binaural beats a crack one time 2 years ago. Didn't really do anything.

<3

Yeah it's strange. Like on paper the games are horrible quality. People playing terrible poker all over the shop. BUT that doesn't mean it's immediately easy to beat...

Think of it this way: you're at a 8max table. 2 of the players are nits playing 11/3/2, 3 of the players are playing 51/11/2, and the other 2 are playing 37/25/14. The latter two players will 4bet bluff every opportunity they get, the first 2 players will only do it with AA. The other 3 players trap. That's preflop. Preflop your steals have very little success, often going 4-5 way to a flop. Even in HU pots, every cbet you make will be either floated or raised, regardless of who has the range advantage. Preflop every 3bet you make will be called or 4bet, or a 50bb stack will move allin. Postflop every time they cbet and you peel, they'll double and triple barrel. Every time you 3barrel bluff they'll call you with 2nd pair. Most of the opponents fight hard for every. single. pot. nothing really comes easy. If you isolate a limper, you will get 3 callers every time.

All of these points I'm making seem like they have very obvious strategy adjustments. But not knowing whether your opponent is the 11/3/2 or 51/11/2 or 37/25/14 is what makes it difficult. If you get 4bet, you don't know whether it's the nit with AA only or the LAG with many out of line bluffs. How do you implement a blanket strategy effectively?

I'm not yet sure. But I'm working to figure it out. At least on Pokermaster you can see HUD stats and adjust on the fly, making life a LOT easier.

If you become the nit with AA that seems like a pretty good blanket strategy that beats all of them

I think in general being super tight is the best approach, yes. Although with big ante it's not quite that simple unfortunately.

having some sort of limping strategy might be optimal, i guess it doesn't need to be super advanced.

From experience, overlimping in CO/BTN on most tables with hands like offsuit Broadway's, small pairs, can be a decent approach. But limping from EP probably isn't going to work unless limp3betting some and that really conplicates things. It's crazy how frequently people isolate limps in these games and then seemingly cbet 80% even when it goes 3-4 way.

So much about what I've seen so far just doesn't make sense. Like I'm getting 3bet a TON. To deal with this, you have 3 possible adjustments: open tighter, call more, or 4bet more. When I try 4betting more, I get shoved on. When I try calling more and bluff catching more, they always have it.

Another one, these guys just don't fold post flop. They peel flops with anything, float flops (esp in SRPs where ranges are wide, i.e. bvb)... So again what do our adjustments look like? We can cbet less or double/triple barrel more. I generally steer away from 3 barreling liberally in these sorts of games but I've done it a few times in good spots and been snapcalled on the river by the most outrageous hands. It's as though they can see my holecards! So I don't like that approach, I guess the next best thing is to cbet less... But the problem you run into there is they stab 100% vs check, so it's still a losing proposition but probably slightly lower variance.

A spot in having issues with is, and there's lots of them - I'll do up a big list when I get home - two ep limps, hero iso co AKo, str calls and one ep limper calls, 3 to flop.

Flop: any combination of,
QT8tt
Q92r
529r
223r
JJ6r

I feel ingame that we cannot cbet ANY of these boards as our fold equity simply isn't there. That's 3 handed, even in HU spots, I think the first two boards we still generate not much FE and the 4th+5th we get floated 100% so playing turns and rivers is tricky, we end up having to make hero calls with A high for really large pots (chip geometry is on cocaine in these games, pots get big fast and inflection point is usually turn).

I'm gonna drive home now but I'll post more re this shortly.

yeah but u can also check your stronger hands if that's the case. spoiler:im pretty much clueless about cashgame strat but if I was playing those games I would try to go out of the box with exploatation

If they really bet 100% when checked to and fold 0% when bet into, you never bet any hand ever and praise the gods for giving you this ATM.