Focus way more on learning as opposed to constantly grinding
Nail basic hold em concepts, inc hand ranges etc etc

I would start playing heads up a lot earlier. My game took off once I couldn't just rely on playing tight and making hands.

Not even close, but playin HSNL.

I'm a beginner myself so I'm running with all the great advice.

A few regrets I have already are: (most expensive first)

1. Sporadically moving up in stakes to make back a loss
2. Not investing in poker tracking software from day 1
3. Not realizing sooner that it's not about fast money, it's about steady money, which would have compelled me to be more disciplined and less impulsive

In Ed Miller's 2003 book "Getting started in Hold'Em" he advocates that all NLHE beginners should start by playing the shortstack strategy. Most beginners want to buy in for 100bb because "that's what all the good players do" but Ed recommends that when you start out you want to make as few decisions as possible and you want those decisions to be as easy as possible so shortstacking as a beginner is a good and PROFITABLE idea.

Its been longer than a year?

what do you say now?

Mine are,

Learn to fold pre, to 3bets OOP, 4bet AK more,

**** the blinds unless its multiway or im 3betting.

Difference between Fat value and Thin value and how to chew both correctly.

Hand reading (this comes later I think at uNL players for sure)

Folding ATs from EP opens, see number 1,

Homework, go over hands 2/3 times a week or after every big session. But not straight after, let a few hours go by before you decide to be honest when looking at your game.

Not **** up a stake agreement over stupid translation issues and dirty my name on 2+2 when I was not in the f****** wrong.

Not played with my rent money
I was sitting at a $1 - $2 nl game. With the monet for my rent in front of me.
I get qq in early position, makes it around 6$. BB reraises me, to maybe $20. I am too afraid to just move all in so I decide to call. Flop is As and two other spades. BB bets maybe 35$.

I check my crads like a real "pro" and notice that I have the queen of spades. I reraise $100 and to my horror bb puts me all in for my last $100. I realize that I have to call, and to this day spades is my favourite suit. But don't try this at home

I would not have played the Party Poker freerolls
In the beginning Party used to have free rolls where the winner got a seat to a $25 Party Million sattelite. I think the freeroll used to have between 600 and 1500 entrants. 2nd place got nothing. Guess who finished second?

Hired a coach when I was flush with money

A lot of other things as well.

One and only: Have living money for at least half a year
This only should make your life infinitely easier!

Reading this post, a lot of people are saying the same thing of "deposit $100 a month online instead of $25 a week". I'm just starting out online and I've been doing $30 a week but now reading this I think I should accumulate the weekly amounts and deposit $120 a month. But would you still play the same stakes? What happens if you bust out in week 1? Do you just go without poker for 3 weeks until your next deposit? What's the benefits from a less regular larger deposit against a smaller more regular deposit?

Glomb, limiting yourself to one monthly deposit seems like a good way to control the "gambler's itch". Maybe it makes one concentrate a bit more on the tables knowing you ONLY have $XX amount for the month rather than thinking "oh crap, busted. Well, it is easy to reload a buyin....so here we go again"

If you get busted and have to wait 29 days to play again,,,, you may be more motivated to play better......

YMMV

But at the moment if I bust out, I don't reload until the following Sunday. I just feel that if I bust my entire month's buy-in then I have go several weeks with no practice.

life is a biatch, and then you die.

(do what you want to do. you asked why and I gave a reason)

Thanks

How about playing at a level where you are not constantly having to redeposit? Having to deposit every week is a pretty expensive way to practice.

Start at NL2 or w/e the lowest stake is and move up when you are beating that level. Sounds like you are playing too high to me. Unless you just want to gamble of course, and can afford to reload once a week.

I should stay away from unlimited rebuy tournaments and have more discipline.

My "career" consists of private home-games and some online-playing (mostly cash) for the last 10 years without turning a profit. I began to take the game seriously like 2 years ago, and have been getting better since.

I study computer science and was always good at maths, and loved to play (card) games...which seems like a good starting point for a beginning poker player.

My problem was: All of this made me WAY to arrogant in comparison to my non-existent poker skills. I thought like "Behold! I am the smart one, I will crush the game"....even now, I feel bad writing this down, because it still is such a cringe to think about my way of thinking back then.

So, to make my point now:

If I could restart, I would start studying poker, instead of (without any reason to do so) thinking I was already good.

Another thing i would change:

Dont waste too much time memorizing starting-hand-charts till you have 'em perfectly down, just to not know what to do after the flop....I can´t possibly ever remember all the times that I played KQ and the likes, and just didn´t have one single clue as to what are possible actions or strategies on a Q7A- rainbow board, for example.

Another thing with those starting hand-charts was, that I tried to force myself to play accordingly, but didn´t even know WHY I should fold a given hand PF to a Raise. I was playing mechanical and not learning anything. As I mentioned above: cringeworthy. Over 9000.

Maybe I´ll add something later on, but thats enough for now^^

Cheers,

SlamDonk

Well, the best thing to start with a new career is learning from you previous mistakes. Same applies for poker..

not drink

Be born 25 years later.

So much this.


When times were amazing, being insanely risk tolerant. Take shots, move up.

Been playing online and live since 2006. If I could do it all over again, I would have a girlfriend, spend time with her or my family, and workout more. I put in many 40 hour plus weeks playing poker in casinos and online and have nothing to show for it. I neglected family, girlfriends, parties, school, work and I wish I would of never played so much. If I could do it again I would just play for fun, low stakes.

Is there an option for "All Of The Above?" I feel like the more I read this, the more I realize that I wasn't the only one who did stupid stuff at the beginning!

In all honesty, I would be farther ahead in the game if I didn't do all of this stuff, but I don't think I would change anything about it. Everything is a lesson, and I made (and still make) a lot of mistakes, but I have learned a lot from those mistakes too. Some of those mistakes really sucked at the time, but looking back on it, really changed the game for me in a lot of ways (even in my everyday life). I think about things differently than I did before because of what those lessons taught me.

One thing I can say that might throw a little inspiration in the air is one major lesson that I've learnt: "The way you feel when you lose, far out-weighs the way you feel when you win." You always remember the Bad Beats, but rarely the hands you win. It has been said a million times before, but it is 100% true.

My understanding is they are higher variance than cash games. But some people recommend them because they limit your losses more effectively than cash games.

How so?