Well done for bluffing play money.

Any updates?

I haven't played much this year, partly because I was away for few weeks, but mainly because I just haven't felt like grinding. Some runbad in January meant my tourney ROI plummeted (still positive though) and I fell behind my schedule for UO qualification at my standard low volume pace. I couldn't develop the urgency to put the hours in and make it, but watching the stream reinvigorated my desire to qualify for the next one. I'm prob also gonna miss the UK Tour in Brighton, as I'm so disorganised/lazy/risk-averse. The bankroll hasn't grown much, but is ticking over. I'll put up some graphs next Monday.

My current thoughts about poker are about as mixed up as the formats and limits I've been playing - on one day last week, I played a 50 euro tourney, some 6-max 25NL, and some full ring 2NLz - so I'm not gonna write many words. Instead, let's have a picture post graphgasm.

I've been re-reading 'Nineteen Eighty-Four'. This is how I feel about hyperturbo satties:


This is why every week is Hate Week:


I don't always jam AK vs a limp on the final table bubble, but when I do I get re-jammed by TT and called by A8. And I make quad jacks. Wait... what?


I played some FR nanostakes Zoom, because a buddy was struggling with it and I wanted to find out what the fuss was all about. It was a horrible experience. The nitregs just never ****ing bluff the river. #TheyAlwaysHaveIt. I crushed for a bit, but then I got pissed off by an horrific 20 second slowroll after I jammed 3x pot with 2nd nuts into the nuts, so I started spewing.



[ ] Fun game.
Maybe I'm being too hard on Stars, as they are clearly investing a lot of money in making the game better for recreationals. This must be the amazing promo Dnegs was talking about:


Meanwhile, back on Unibet, my cashgame volume and play this year has been pathetic. I've mostly only been dabbling during tourney breaks, or when I have a spare 15 minutes.



Last week's tourneys had a range of buy-ins from 1 euro (a bunch of SNGs to meet the promo requirement) to 50 euros (a UO satty where I made the ******ed mistake of 5-betting the flop with the 3rd best hand). Results were swingy AF:



I should probably stop trying to bluff the unbluffable.


For the year so far, my ROI is much lower than last year, but I think it's mainly due to running badly in bubble situations in February.



The plan for this week is to play some more SNGs and at least one UK Tour satty every day. If I can bink a couple of the 25s, I'll take a shot at the 100eu finals at the weekend, as I'd like to qualify for Brighton if I can. Since some of my smaller MTT tickets have been used in normal tourneys and got 'converted' to real money, the ticket bankroll is back to exactly where it was a few weeks ago.
UO: 500 euros. UK Tour: 500 euros. Total: You do the math. #PingItUp

Wait... 10c? I've been getting a bunch of $1s and assumed that was the lowest... maybe the lowest is 2bb for whatever stakes you're playing?

Games have been good the last couple of days, as there have been some incredi-whales at the tables. Unfortunately, it means my hand-reading skills are going to waste, because these guys can show up with absolutely anything. Here's a hand-reading exercise:



This week was supposed to be about finding the quickest route to Brighton, but I accidentally fell down a staircase into Hell.



#PrayForOP

Another hand-reading exercise. There are no prizes for correct answers, but take a stab if you think you can soul-read a random clown.

I put him on J7o all along

43ss

98

A3 must be the most legit hand said clown could have

I was going to guess A3 but seeing as that's already been guessed I'll go with 52

Knowing Unibet it's probably AJd

I think that's a pretty good shout, because I see a lot of bad players proving the 'Wasted Pair theorem', where they chase a draw and then feel compelled to pay off when they hit a useless pair on the river. This clown showed up with something unthinkable though:



#ClownsGonnaClown.

P.S. Please pray harder for OP. My downswing in the UK Tour satties has continued, so I'm apparently heading to Bustoville instead of Brighton.

Week 10 was pretty weird. I played a bunch of 2 euro SNGs because of the promo and I beat those with an ROI of about 15%, but the MTTs and satties at higher buy-ins went disastrously. I bricked all four of my UK25s, so my graph is all over the place, but trended downwards. I knew I'd have a week like this at some point (tournament variance is ridiculous), but it was brutal to have it in the week when I was aiming to play some finals.



I spewed a few times, but mainly I just ran badly in all the bigger buy-in events. The SNGs are full of utter ******s, so once I've used all my satty tickets I might switch to grinding 5-player games full time.

I actually had this guy noted as a semi-reg until he did this:



Some of the MTTs were on free tickets and I've earned a few bonus points that I can convert to more entries, so I've not lost any real money. (I also played a couple of donkaments on Stars and cashed in both). Ticket bankrolls for the main satty strands are now at: 530 euros for Unibet Open, 400 euros for UK Tour. #PingItDown

Now that Brighton is out of the question, I can go back to taking my sweet time qualifying for the next one, so I'll probably play more chess than poker this week. I'll probably show up for at least one of Ian Simpson's Twitch streams though. I'm not really a Twitch fan, but he seems really good at it. Catch you guys later!

Just caught up on the thread. Nice read - been thinking about starting something myself as as Unibet grinder but was struggling to think of engaging content with the lack of HUD etc. But your thread reads really well.

How do you find the mtt's on unibet? I know player numbers are much lower but I'm guessing it's on par with the cash games?

I'm not sure exactly what you're asking.
Re: Player numbers, the relatively low traffic density means Uni is not suitable as a 'one-site stop' for serious MTT grinders of games above $25 BI, because there just aren't enough 'similar' tourneys running at once. In that respect, it's the same as every site not called Pokerstars. You even have to wait a few minutes if you're trying to get 4 tables of 5-max SNGs at the $4 level up and running. There are enough MTTs running for casual/microstakes players to do a mix of $1-$10 games if they just want to do 3 or 4 tables at a time. I find the mix of turbos and slower structures, rebuys, freezeouts and satties, bounties and non-KOs is a bit confusing, but it's OK if you just fancy one or two tourneys in the evening. Quite a few tourneys seem to have overlay too, so if you can be bothered to hunt down the juiciest games there's some free EV out there.

If you're asking about the skill level, then I find the games ridiculously soft. It's not uncommon to play a $25 MTT on Unibet and have two or three limpy whales on each table. The cashgame players on Unibet are bad, but the tourney players are much worse.
I feel bad naming and shaming one particular player (there are loads that play equally badly, alternating between minbetting when weak and potting when strong), but I considered reporting this guy for having an inappropriate username:


The 'minbet morons' as I call them are everywhere. And they keep beating me, usually by limp-calling a 12bb jam on the bubble with JTs or TT. In the long run the 'fun players' get crushed of course. They hemorrhage chips by making calls that are often so weird that I flinch at showdown.


If I missed the point of your question, please ask again.

It's usually me that has the tiny stack at this point:



Binking that was a formality after the guy on the left was crippled on the bubble. Phew! It's such a relief to see my downswing in the UK25s come to an end. Good luck to my buddies that are playing in Brighton. I'm sending rungood to Mathrim in particular, and will watch the live stream at some point, but I'm gonna relax and play some chess in the sun for a couple of days.

Thanks! I hope you qualify for the next one.

rated 5-stars for effort.

And also everything else, fun thread

Week 11 turned out to be a humdrum low volume week.

I ended my downswing in the UK25s, but couldn't get anything going in the UO satties. (My "Sunday grind" began with losing my stack with AA<85s in a 3-bet pot on the very first hand.) I won a little bit in a small sample of 25NL.
I also played the minefield that was the anniversary Sunday Storm. I outlasted 125,000 players, so I shouldn't really complain, but $27.46 profit for five hours of staring at the screen doesn't seem like a great return on investment. Speaking of ROI, I'm only on 5% over 132 tourneys this year on Unibet. Most of the games had small fields (quite a few of the games were 5-max SNGs), but I expect better results in the long run, although I haven't been working on my game as much as I did last year. In cash, I'm winning at about 3.50bb/100, but the sample size is negligible.
Ticket roll is on 940 euros.

The plan for this week is to just play one satty a day, with intermittent 25NL sessions when I'm in the mood. #PingItUp

Due to my low volume, I usually only make 2 straight flushes a year. I've made two in two days. Both times, I overbet jammed the river.

In the Storm, I did not get paid, despite it being 5-way on a paired/straighty/flushy board.
https://www.boomplayer.com/23160195_1418F3F4CC

On Unibet 25NL, I did get paid, even though it's heads up and villain has 2nd pr.

Note to self: Learn to read the board. He didn't call with 2nd pair. He made a straight. ^^

In other news, I just had some insane rungood in my first tourney of the week. Winning these turbo sats basically boils down to getting aces and kings at opportune moments. I felt a bit sick for my buddy Mark, as I trapped him on the final hand, limping KK BvB and snapping off his KQ jam. #EasyGame.

With the way I'm smashing boards at the moment, I'll probably flop five of a kind tomorrow.

Nice SN.