Hi all,

I spent 20 minutes writing up my first post but I wasn't logged in so I lost my work! That's what you get for writing a first draft online, sometimes that sort of thing happens.

Let me introduce myself, I am Problem Playa and I am a NLHE/PLO gambling addict. Think an American version of Paisting but without the all-in shoves and sucking off the government teet. Yes I do have Medicaid but oh well, we all can't be self sufficient now can we?

I was a winning player back in the days of 2006 to 2010 on Pokerstars and Cake Poker and the Merge network. I'd pay my rent in 2010 with modest microstakes 4-tabling. Back then sheer aggression and basic LAG-ish style would print money autoplaying 4 tables at a time. Fish would let you run them over and then they'd get so fed up with all the betting that they would snap. Not anymore however. Fish have changed. You can't run a table over anymore. Doesn't happen. Fish are smart now. Sure, sometimes you get the mouth breathing drooler but for the most part people are smarter nowadays. No more running people over. They either call down light or properly play back at you. They know about pot control. They know sometimes king high is good on the river. And the nits, everyone is a nit now it seems at the micros. Passive careful nits. Those are the ones that do the best against me because I haven't really adjusted since reading Doyle's system on how to be a lag.

Also, in 2021 microstakes people aren't battling preflop anymore like back in the day. See a cheap flop, play super carefully, and make that 2bb/100 now. Amirite? No more gambling in their blood. Gotta eek out that Eastern European payday. And then there's me. I hate playing slots and blackjack but I play poker in a gambling style. I am good at building up a stack of 3 or 4 times the buy-in but for some reason I hate going to bed with money in my account.

I gambled away something in the range of $10000 in 2020 on a $17000 income from delivering pizzas. My main game of choice is PLO with some NLHE mixed in. Always starting off at 5NL on Ignition and then working my way up if things go well. Sometimes I'll have 10 buy ins at my table, (I single table on my phone), and I won't want the good times to end so I'll play til the wee hours of the morning only to donk it all off somehow.

(continued from first post, didn't want to lose my progress again)

Thankfully I don't deliver pizza anymore. No more working until late hours and starting work in the afternoon. No more washing dishes. No more dealing with 25 year old managers who don't care about serving quality food. (But they sure as hell like to eat the food don't they, odd how that works.) No more dealing with other drivers. I now work for Door Dash mainly with a little Instacart added in for good measure. I absolutely love my job and I absolutely hate gambling away all my money. Thus my goal is to break even. I deposited $10 today and worked it up some (I forget the exact number -- will report on this soon. Edit: Bankroll sits at $35 currently after a short 2 or 3 hour session.) I successfully played a 5PLO and 10PLO single tabling phone session where I only played for a few hours. Not until I was broke like I usually do.

I honestly believe I am a few tweaks away from becoming a break even player even though I gambled away so much of my hard earned money at micros a-la American Paisiting last year. I have been in therapy for my gambling. I now believe a cold turkey approach won't work. If I do lose I will limit myself to $10 a day which won't break me at this point. I want to be a break even player so I can move out of my parents place (I am middle aged, single, no kids), get a newer car (a Civic hopefully), a new cell phone, and pay off $2400 in debt which includes $500 in 350% interest debt! Yay Speedy Cash, you're living the American dream aren't yeah there, buddy?

Anyway, if you made it this far, thanks for reading. I won't be posting graphs because I am unaware of software that runs on your phone. I may be posting hand histories if I can figure it out. I will mainly be seeking advice on how to tweak my mental game and to learn how to play shorter winning sessions instead of long losing ones. Also, I will post after each session to keep track of how things are going.

God is good, poker is evil, and God bless America. Wish me luck!

Been playing for nearly 2 hours single tabling 10PLO, sitting at $45 right now no rebuys! Should I go to bed? ;-P

They play better at 5PLO than 10 I've noticed. Pulled an all nighter, br down to $7. Some really horrific play going on.

I finally stopped playing this morning around 9. I dropped down to 5plo. Bankroll around $16. Deposited another $20. So in for $30 since goal started. Not a good start to my challenge but at least I didn’t move up in stakes and go broke.

Bluffed off my last bankroll in a 3bet pot with AKxx repping AA, ace hits the flop. idiot calls me down with middle set three barrels with 66xx. Reloaded $5.50 lost it bluffing at 5NL and now just reloaded $25 playing one table 10PLO. Running on no sleep. Feels bad man. Good thing I don't have any bills due for 2 weeks.

What is with all the limping nowadays at the micros? Even in NLHE there is limp limp limp. It tilts me to no end. I usually end up being the table captain. Oh well, gotta torch that money.

Please find a new hobby.

Self-reflection seems on point.... until you start trying to justify why you are losing.. "idiot calls me down with middle set", "limp limp limp"..

You can do better than that

Take a break, buy an introductory PLO course, and restart fresh

Bro, I wanted to write this yesterday as soon as I saw this. I am subbing but only because I want this thread to end well.

Please listen to me and listen well. You need to stop asap what you are doing. The way you are doing things you are destined to you lose and be miserable. You will also make the people around you miserable. (My guess) you haven't told us if that's the case. Maybe you will.


You are not a plo killer alright? Not a nl wizzard. None of what you need to be. Right now you are a fish with really bad habbits. Are you taking any kind of substance when you are playing? Beer, wine counts too.

Nobody plays on their phone alright? Only losers.
Or pros on a backup connection when the internet on their desktop goes out. Using a phone is reserved to pros as a alternative. Not even phones, they are using a laptops in that instance.

One tabling on the phone till the wee hours is bad ok? It's not a thing. Really bad and fishy and must lose you money alright? Please get that. The way it sounds you are not starting from the bottom. You are starting somewhere -100 if we had to put a scale on you. First you have to understand this to make progress. If you are immune to advices well guess what, this will under any circumstances not end well.

The good thing is there is a way out but you must follow the steps. If you wanna win you must study and cut this bs that you are doing. But you know this already problemplaya, you have an addiction.

I hope you are not trolling, but if you did you got me.

Subbing to see how this plays out bro. All the best you need it. First step is stop all splashing around with your last dime alright? Not one tabling on the phone till wee hours and listen to us.

All the best you can do it. Paistings can too.

What you can do in the meantime or what you must do actually is invest smart. In yourself and other assets that are essentiell on your path.

Had quite the ride at the tables over the weekend. Deposited another $20 two times and then another $5. In one session I built a $5 deposit up to $100 at 100plo table but lost three huge pots where I was all in as 65% favorite, 54% favorite, and 41% dog. All massive pots. Just kept losing flip after flip in huge pots.

I'm doing a small buy in tonight, $10. Playing 5plo will rise the stakes if things go well.

My goal is to get to $200, cash out $100 and have a $100 BR.

Can you elaborate? I'm not following you. I usually don't limp. I play table captain to a fault.

No drinking. I have been playing on a laptop lately this week. Not trolling. Thanks for the advice. I see my gambling therapist thursday of this week I'll show her this.

What he means is stop blaming others for you losing. So what if someone calls you down and wins? Your not looking at the big picture.

What other therapists do you see?

^ that is bs, grande bullshit!! Ok?!? What's the matter with you? Have you ever heard of bankroll managment? Obviously not. Or you would not talk like that. If you used proper brm this wouldn't happen bro. Stop blaming you can only blame yourself.

At PLO100 my guess is, and im.not a plo player, you would need a br of 10k at least. That would be agressive brm. For you it would be 1000 buy ins. That would be 100k. You have 5 dollars? Less than 1 buy-in! You must go broke! And even if you had a br of 100k you would get eaten alive. You might as well just torch the money on fire. At this point I am almost giving up. I am the only guy who is talking to you here or one more guy it's so painful. Stop with the kamikaze harakiri approach ok? And you are not a captain ok?? The only captain you are is of your sinking ship.

Good. I was gonna say that next. But you beat me.to it. You need a mental coach, therapist etc. You are so far off from breaking even you can't even comprehend it.

Deposited another $16 and lost it at 5plo. Played bad admittedly.

Had 8 buy ins at the 2$ jackpot via points and made $30 from that. The jack pot sngs are so soft I'll be playing those for the time being.

Wish me luck.

Not seeing any other therapists but I probably need to.

You would be jumping to plo200 with half stack if you had 100$ on your account.
How would you call that a bankroll?

I played a $3 tourney yesterday bought in 3 times and didn't cash. Played a few $7 jack pots and ran so bad. Was so close to winning $35 game had kk vs k8 and somehow lost. Busted my roll.

Deposited $10 again today and stuck to $2 jack pots. BR currently at $18. At one point I won 6 in a row. I think I've found my game I can actually make money at.

Just played 20 min of 5plo. Played well ran well. Br at $26.

What part of stop what you are doing did you not understand? With your peanut banana br you will go bust. Always. There is just no way around it. You are playing way out of your br. Do you know the purpose of a br? And stop with the badbeat stories please. Its part of the game and youre just trying to justify yourself.

If you are playing on ignition, you are losing valuable points with those 20 and 5 deposits. Just deposit 30 with bitcoin, and get rewards (juicy). Sign up for the bitcoin exclusive first. Edit: use BCH (bitcoin cash), Its cheaper in fees, takes a little longer. Plan on deposit of $35 to cover fees. Select 50% + 25000 points. You will get 25 free spins on casino game (will add some funds to your account, 15000 additional points that expire in 7 days (so get a 10+1 ticket or 2 5+50 tickets for tourneys), a 10+1 ticket that you need to use within a week, and later a weekly depositor freeroll ticket (I sign up and don't play those, cash out +$4 while sleeping).

You can practice on some tourneys. Watch some twitch streams of tourneys, get a good basic starting hand chart for early, middle and late stages (been to final table a few times without spending a dime). This will keep you occupied while waiting for that next deposit. Winning with free money is a great thing.

Otherwise, stick to a budget of $35 per week. If you lose it, find some other hobbies.

still playing. winning some, losing some, but mostly losing.

A few weeks ago I turned points on bovada into $400 by winning a jackpot sng and then playing micro plo and moving up stakes. it's good that i did that bc my rent was past due and it was much needed.

this past week i started playing plo on acr again and the games are super soft on micro and I've built up a $300 br from a $10 deposit in just a week.

Door dash is going well sometimes I wish they paid me every two weeks instead of every day because every day is a payday for me and I go through my money so quick. A two week pay period would act as a savings account of sorts for me.

I found out door dash isn't profitable but it does have by far the most market share. I hope they merge with grub hub soon so they can become profitable somehow ala sirius fm and the other satelite radio company i forget the name.

im not sure what my goal is now but with how soft the plo games are on micro acr its for sure not break even.