[Apologies if this is the wrong forum. I'm new here. Thanks in advance for your help and patience.]
I used to play live games fairly regularly many years ago, but kids and work got in the way and made me stop. I'm trying to get back into playing, and looking for advice to get started.
What I've noticed is that poker has changed a lot in the past 10+ years! The home games in my area are mostly $1-$2 NL Hold'Em cash games. I used to be a fine, but not great, limit player. Not a big winner, but good enough to beat the bigger fish and be a consistent enough winner to have fun and keep coming back. If I sat down at a $1-$2 NL game right now, I'd blow through a lot of cash before I improved to the point that I wasn't just setting money on fire.
So, I figured I'd learn to play NL cash games by playing microlimit games online, starting at 2NL and working my way up.
But, TBH, even deciding where to play online, how to get money into the site, and how to play on a site, is pretty intimidating. I'd appreciate some advice.
My goals:
- I just want to be a recreational player. I already have a good job. Poker is a game for me and I play it for fun. What makes poker fun is winning chips from my opponents, and improving my skills over time.
- I'd like to be able to get to the point where I could sit down in a live $1-$2 NL cash game and not just donate my chips to all the other players.
My questions:
(1) What online sites should I look at? It's hard to tell which ones are legit. I'm in the US (CO). If at all possible, I'd like a site where I don't have to download a client, but if I have to, then I can live with that.
(2) Does starting out at 2NL and working my way up seem like a reasonable plan?
(3) I hear a lot about software, like PokerTracker. Is this something I really need as a beginner recreational player? Or would it just be a distraction for me right now, and instead I should just focus on learning some fundamentals of the game?
(4) Can I just use a credit card to move money to an online site, or do I need to use bitcoin or something?
(5) Anything else I should know or think about as I come back to the game after such a long break?
Undoubtedly if you read a lot of reviews online, you will find a lot of negative comments about Global Poker. But I've been playing there for 3 years, and recommend it. They have a weird system - two forms of currency, like the others - real money and play money. But they call the real money Sweeps Coins and the play money Gold Coins.
They do not have 2NL- the lowest they have is 10NL, though they have a lot of tables where the max buyin is on 2 SC - the blinds are still .05 and .10, but only a 20 BB max buyin. I don't know that this is still true, but when I signed up they gave me 20 SC (equivalent to $20) just to sign up, and they also give you a little free every day if you log in and click the right buttons. You don't ever need to actually give them money, but my guess is that it is pretty easy (I've never done it, but have on another site owned by the same company - and it is very easy with a linked bank account).
If you are concerned about linking a bank account (I was) you might want to take an account with very little or nothing in it, and use it just for this (maybe open a new account at some bank that gives you something to open it). Cashouts, which they call redemptions (you are not actually winning money, you are winning Sweeps Coins which can be redeemed for prizes, and the prizes just happen to be money) are very quick and easy.
The negative comments you might read are all about how the RNG is rigged, or not a true RNG, and all the bad players suck out all the time. This is pretty much nonsense - I've read complaints like this about every site I ever played on. Yes, you do see a lot of bad play getting rewarded, but that is because there is a lot of bad play. Most of the time the hands that get it in bad lose - but people remember the times that they get sucked out on.
Just to give you an idea, about an hour ago I played in a 6 handed SNG. On the second hand I got all in preflop against 3 of the other 5 players. I had QQ, one had JJ, one had KQ offsuit, and one had 75 suited. And my hand won. My point isn't that I won, but that it isn't uncommon for these players to vastly over-value their hands. And sure, sometimes they will beat you - but so what?
The also have a way to get lots of free money, without depositing any. But I'll leave that for another day.
You are not allowed to use Poker Tracker or other software that might help you. If they suspect you are, they will close your account. Also, you don't need to download their software, it works in a browser, and can be played on a computer, tablet or phone.
Hey, VBAces! Long time no type sir! Hope all is well with you. Nice to see you still singing Global Poker's praises! I haven't been on any online poker sites since, oh gosh, 2017? 2016? I can count on my fingers the number of times I've even played in a casino since summer 2019.
If you know a host you can trust on the Pokerrrr 2 app with lower stakes, you might try that.
The app seems a little rigged toward rivers and/or bigger hands, but it seems as if most are. I used to think there was cheating in the app, but I no longer believe that. As with any online site, there could be collusion. I like it because I know to whom my money is going and can totally trust that I will get paid.
