If you say "call" and your lone opponent mucks his hand, you don't have to show your hand to claim the pot as the last man standing, right? Or do you? (I'm guessing poker rooms may differ on this)

If this is the case, I'm with the others; I'd just drag the pot and move on. You're going to be playing with all of these guys for many years to come and they are your customers; treat them as such, imo.

If you have to show your hand to win the pot / this guy is a hoodie dick / etc. then I wouldn't have had as much problem with it, but I think in general a happy atmosphere is the best atmosphere so in general I'd lean to keeping it that way.

GimoG

If they muck first, you can muck. But as you say, going to be playing a lot with these people, and for that same reason I think it's +EV to get the information I've paid for.

There are three main reasons. The first I believe is the most important, but i think the 3rd will reach you the most.

1) the "vibe" of a game

I wrote a great deal on this in another thread about seat changing.

seat changing thread

The cliffs are that the "vibe" of a poker game is a very important and underappreciated part of live poker. People dont realize that one argumemt about who the big blind is can change a table from 70%seeflop to 20%seeflop. One delayed game waiting for the floor can make the whale realize its 1:30AM and he's tired. Etc.

The vibe is a very delicate thing and as professionals our job is to try to maintain it at all times. It is what creates good winrates for us.

2) Ranging

As a good player, you know what he has. Thats why you played the hand the way you played. You dont need confirmation, thats your ego talking. Rise above it.

As for wanting to know whether he had a flush draw combo or straight combo or pure air, 1) you dont need to know. You know you were ahead of his range which includes all of this which is why you called. 2) people usually arent embarassed to show missed flush draws. So you can lean it towards something ******ed.

3) Expected value

When you embarass people, they bluff less. They certainly quiet down for a bit anyways. When you super snap fastroll the table moves on to the next hand and villain retains all of his bluff equity, that is good for us. It improves our winrate. Because his range in future hands includes more bluffs than it would if we pulled his pants down in front of everyone.

The second part of this EV argument is the importance of non showdown wins. Im not talking about angling or anything, but when you snap table a hand, and villain does not table his, there is always a >0% chance he mucks the best hand.

One of my favorite poker stories:

2/5 $600 eff

Guy has QQ otb. Im CO and not in hand, just witness.

UTG raises $25, Guy makes it $100, UTG calls.

Flop ($200) JT9

UTG checks, Guy bets $150, UTG all in $500, Guy snap calls.

Board runs out JT98J

UTG says "i think i rivered you" and shows KJ (lol live poker btw)

Guy gets all red faced, holds up his queens for me to see but does not table. Mutters to himself how bad he is running. Tells UTG how bad he is. How could he call pre with KJ. Etc.

Im thinking wow this is an epic slowroll. I got really excited.

Queens guy finally says "yea you got lucky alright" and throws his hand face down in the muck.

It happens more than you think.

^good post from Ava

This is even more of a reason to just take the pot and move along.

In my casino, when I call a river bet and my opponent mucks their hand, I have to show my hand to win the pot (stupid rule, but it is what it is); and even still I instantly show my hand as soon as my opponents hit the muck.

One decent option nobody has mentioned which works as long as you are friendly at the table, is when you take a break or whatever just go up and ask him 1 on 1 what he had that hand. You'd be amazed how many people will tell you.

The fact you are so opposed to understanding such a basic reason why its not well mannered doesnt look very promising.

Your image as a live player should have more weight than the 2 insignificant cards the player across the table mucked.

I guess it boils down to maturiry at the end of the day.

Regardless keep on keeping on.

Sent from my SM-G930W8 using Tapatalk

I'm done with the hole card thing lol. I understand everyone's opinions and quite obviously I disagree with most. Anyway.

Daily Update - Fri 08/09

Hours Played: 6
Profit: $20

Notes: Weird session. Some weird hands as below.

Hand 1

MP opens $20, hero calls A4 in CO, two other callers.

Flop $80: 779hsd
Checks through.
Turn $80: 3hh
BB checks, EP bets $55 (I know he's very wide here and expect my ace high to be good), hero calls, BB calls.
River $245: Jhhh
BB checks, EP bets $115, hero calls, BB raises to $420, EP calls, hero folds.

Notes: I suspect on the turn when BB overcalls he's going to be sandbagging something fairly often. On the river, I know I'm 100% ahead of EP's range but don't want to raise in case BB is sandbagging a big hand. Turns out he was.

BB showed 79s and EP K8hh. Really happy to have found a solid and disciplined fold here.

Hand 2

Limp, hero limps 76ss in HJ, limp, BTN (very wide) isos to $30, two calls, hero calls. Not stoked about isoing 76ss from HJ, don't love overlimping and then calling but think it's okay considering how wide BTN has been.
Flop $95: AJ8ss
Check, check, BTN says "this is my flop" and cbets $77, fold, hero ???

Notes: Weird spot. We can't profitably call flop here OOP and not getting a great price. At the time I felt it was far too nitty to just fold a flush draw so I raised to $225. Villain tank jams for $400 more than that and I have to fold. Kind of annoying but I THINK raising is slightly better than folding flop - I imagine I'll have fairly good fold equity here most of the time.

would you ever 3bet the A4s pre? Even with a tight strategy seems like a good spot for a 3b bluff
2nd hand, hard to imagine someone will say "this is my flop" then bluff, most wont want to attract unecessary attention when bluffing

I don't think you'd say that with like two pair+ though right? They don't want to give away hand strength? Re A4s, I would sometimes but I'd rather do it with something like AJo because A4s is going to play really well multiway.

h1 going to 3b pre a decent amount of time here depending on MP - post-flop looks okay; river is an awkward spot but good read on the BB/disciplined fold

h2 is pretty bad all around, especially post-flop. what makes you think you'll have 'fairly good fold equity' there most/any of the time?

Just based on how wide he'd been playing. Still think there's okay enough fold equity. Do you advocate just folding flop?

I raise pre so I wouldn't be in this spot but yeah as played I probably just fold unless you think he is bad enough to pay you off on spade turns with worse.

You can't limp/call from the HJ and x/r a AJ8ss board - just think about your range vs his here.

Hand 1,

Pre, Flop and Turn look good.

River I would raise small; loose openers are going to have tons of silly flushes like Kxhh Qxhh etc etc - if you think the PFR is loose then would 3b preflop. As played, would fold to the BB; he's going to have basically any two card in the BB getting those odds, all O/S 79, J7 combos etc.

Hand 2, not a fan of the limp prefer isoing or folding. Based off the hands I've seen would just fold, 76s does not play well in multiway pots and going to be in these kind of awkward spots a lot. As played would xf.

Yeah, I'm trying to iso less when I don't think I have a lot of fold equity. If I iso the 76s to like 25 or 30 on this table I imagine it'll still go 3-4 way which was why I wanted to overlimp. Not sure if this is too strong to overlimp fold but I actually think it should be a fold and then we can overlimp call hands like AXs and pocket pairs that will make nuttier hands. So for hand two I think either limp fold or iso if we think there's fold equity.

Keep it rolling, impressed with your volume week after week. Good to see it. Nice fold H1

Thanks bruv < 3

Just caught up on the last 5-6 pages. Strong regrind! Keep it up boss

glgl

Much appreciated Ben!

Good luck. "How to be happy" and "as a live pro" do not belong in the same sentence though lol. I encourage you to read dgaf, read cushlash, read some of the crash burn pgcs to understand what you're getting into.

You can try and cut it up any way you like, but it's still the same... literally no one should be a professional gambler/poker player etc. If you're buying into the illusion of fast cash/ gold rush then idk probably crypto trading would be better? And if you like the strategy and problem solving then IT is a good field (with much better pay than basically any non celebrity pro).

good luck though

The token tell people how to live their life post.

I know some people who play for a living and love it (many don't). I know people in IT who hate their life. I know people who have taken massive pay cuts because they hate their job. Here's a shock, but not everyone is the same/have different priorities

Yes you're certainly right, there are people in all professions who hate their job and their life. But if you are implying that professional (lol) gamblers/ poker pros are like any other field than you are sorely mistaken. The amount of "pros" who survive past 5 years is incredibly slim. The amount of "pros" that make it to 10+ years is incredibly small, and the amount of pros that have gone 10+ years who are still happy are basically none (save celebrities). Let that sink in. I know tons of people, who have gone 25+ years in their respected fields who still really enjoy their work. So... nice attempt at trying to lump poker pros with real professionals.

I'm not telling him how to live his life or what he should do. I brought up crypto and IT work because those two are absolutely booming right now. What I am saying is giving him fair warning/ to reconsider and to do some research from people who have shared their often jarring, depressing, gut wrenching experiences as a professional poker player (see: DGAF). The one thing that this site has taught is how incredibly fun poker can be, but how incredibly stupid being a professional poker is.

Hey mate, thanks for the comment! I appreciate your words of wisdom and the warning.

By no means am I buying into an illusion of fast cash/gold rush. I'm a 2/5 live player. There's nothing fast about it and the ceiling for earning potential is low. I'm not delusional about that and I've made peace with the fact that I won't ever make a lot of money playing LLSNL.

I actually studied IT for years and can say, although the Strat aspect of a programming career is appealing, it is vastly different to a poker career. Mostly because it's still a job, you're still (usually) an employee, you still have a boss, clothes you're required to wear to work, and a time to be out of bed every morning. My room mate actually has a job in IT/programming and his schedule is very different to mine.

As I mentioned much earlier in this thread, I'm MORE than happy if I can win 50-75k aud annually with this thing. The reason being it affords me the lifestyle I want to live. If I had a normal job, I couldn't be sitting at a cafe at 10am on a Monday morning after sleeping for the last 17 hours while writing this to you!

If I can "work" 40 hours a week earning a modest living for the rest of my life, I'll gladly take that over a career in IT, even if the earning potential is much higher. I'm not interested in money.

I'm pretty curious as to why you'd say this? There are many many online players who make extremely large amounts of money year in, year out from the comfort of wherever the fk they choose. There are literally cash players who win at $200 an hour for sitting on their laptop in their underwear. How can you say these people shouldn't be pros?

Ofc, there's a large difference to these guys and myself, but you ought to be more careful imo when you make such sweeping statements. I have friends who I play with regularly whose main income is sportsbetting. I know sportsbettors who live in mansions and support a family of five very easily.

Can you explain why you think no one at all should ever gamble professionally? Or was it just hyperbole?

Daily Update - Sat 09/09

Hours Played: 4
Profit: $650

Notes: Short session on Saturday, decided it was time to go out and party and be social. Went to a homegame for 4 hours, won some money, then uber'd to the city to participate in a Penthouse apartment party before heading out to town. Didn't know many people at the party, but in my drunken state, was able to make plenty of new friends and had an absolute ball! I put the allotted $100 "social fund" in my wallet for the night and told myself I'd only spend this... knowing full well I'd have around $2k cash with me as well that I brought from the homegame. The reason we love alcohol so much is its ability to remove inhibition, and I was certainly not going to be inhibited by a $100 social roll for the night. So I probably spent $150-200 more than I should have last night. I don't know exactly how much. It was silly **** as well... I left the club at 4am with this girl, ordered an Uber, it was going to be $12-$15. It was about 30 seconds away when I decided it would be hilarious if we took one of these instead...



So I cancel the Uber that has practically arrived ($8 to cancel) and we take one of these back to my apartment. The guy driving said it would be $50 and when we arrived I gave him $70 for his insanely skitz driving ability and for not killing us.

Yes, I did spend too much on Saturday. No, it is not the end of the world. The $100 I allotted was always a "guideline" and I'm not going to shoot myself if I live a little and splurge. I probably spent $300ish max on Sat which isn't too bad, especially since I've been known to spend north of twice that on a big night out.

Anyway, me and this girlie went for brunch on Sunday morning, and then I was going to come home and go to the gym but didn't really feel like it. So I just slept for about 17 hours straight to bring me to the present moment, Monday! I just went out for breakfast about half an hour ago as well - once again, we've already gone over our "cheat meal" allocation for the week. So I'll tighten up my spending range for the rest of the week.

Just on that though, although Saturday to just now has been "bad" in terms of spending too much and not going to the gym, and being ill-disciplined, I think it's important to just say "**** it" every once in a while and do what you want. I've chosen this lifestyle because I value being able to do that. As long as I don't slip into a spiral of degeneracy or spend more than I can afford or stop going to the gym - if any of this becomes a long term issue, that's when it needs to be resolved.

Anyway, let's take a look at some hands from Saturday's session.

Hand 1

About 6 to the flop, I'm SB with KQhh, no idea whether it was limped pot or opened, flop is 24Thhh, I check, villain bets $27, I raise to $75, he calls.

Turn: 4o

I bet, he jams, I call (prob 400ish deep to begin with?), and we lose to 42s. Pretty unlucky but the hand played itself.

Hand 2 - The power of the snap-topup

This happened the VERY NEXT HAND, I always try to stay topped up in a juicy game. The SAME villain opens EP to $20, I'm on the BTN and look down at AA. I 3bet to $60, he calls. This is a dream come true because I look so "tilty" after having just lost a big pot to him.

Flop $120: AJA
Check, check. You gotta check the quads at least once right???
Turn $120: T
Villain bets $75, I call.
River $270: 3
Villain bets $125, hero jams, villain snapcalls.

V had TT - turns out checking quads at least once IS optimal.

So bit of a rollercoaster there getting raped by 42s and losing a bunch of profit to owning the same bloke with quads the following hand to get back into profit.

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

Today I'm going to head to the gym shortly, then at 6pm tonight there should be a rotation game I'm going to play in. It's two orbits of NLH (2/5) and one orbit of PLO (1/2) - it's designed for hold'em players who are new to PLO and want to learn. Needless to say, it's a bit of a goldmine. As always, when playing PLO we'll look to buyin short (prob $300ish) to reduce some of the PLO variance we might incur.

For the rest of the week, I'd like to A) get back on top of my spendings, B) get back on top of gymming, and C) continue playing great poker.

Yeah both those hands played themselves. Got any sticky spots? I'm in the same boat with the spending on nights out - So hard to spend only $100 on transport + food + drinks + entry fees.