The Well: SEABEAST (summary 09/10/07)

Couple of people asked me about doing one of these, and there hasn't been one for a while, so...

This is amazing. I've been waiting!
-Poker story?

Hehe. Ok. This will be long... some of you will want to skip to the cliff notes.

I am pretty competitive and was always into strategy games. In my late teens I played MTG fairly seriously and was the #1 ranked player in my state for a couple of years. Around 2000-2001 a lot of the better Magic players started getting into poker after Rounders came out, and I followed suit. I was a huge nit, terrified of losing money, and I didn't fall in love with the game immediately like a lot of other people did... but after spending a lot of time playing MTG for virtually no money, as a student bum with no money living away from home, being able to earn cash for playing a card game seemed like a good deal, so i got a friend to buy me in for $50 on Paradise Poker and started grinding $.5/1 limit.

I 2 tabled full ring for hours, grinding out a bankroll. Some of the other better Australian magic players told me about 2+2, and I started reading the forums in maybe 2002-2003. Everything was very different then. Most posters were 30+, LHE was dominant, and the tone of reponses in most threads was play weak-tight (Sklansky style).

The forums have changed so much over the years. The increasing popularity of shorthanded play had a lot to do with it, young guns like Schneids etc started coming along playing much more aggressively and posting sick results. Then obviously Moneymaker changed everything, Party Poker became huge and there was a massive influx of morons with cash into the game. I had been steadily grinding along with my nitty styles, and in several years I had never had a losing month, but back then it was different to what it is now - it wasn't just assumed that the goal was to win X amount and then move up, rinse and repeat. I assumed everyone playing high stakes was sick good, so I mostly kept grinding out my 4BB/100 (yes at limit lol, games were quite good back then) at $.5/1-2/4 LHE for several years.

In a way this was a very bad foundation for me in the short term - because I had begun playing before the boom I was too hesitant to move up as soon as I could, when I could have absolutely demolished the 15/30 games if I just stopped cashing out and built up my roll instead. On the other hand this has had a very good effect on me a couple of years later, as I am able to really appreciate the money and therefore grind out a lot of hands while maintaining a high level of play, and avoid the feeling some other people get that playing MSNL is not enough.

So anyway fast forward another year or two of being an anonymous small stakes limit grinder who didn't really love poker but liked the money (back in those days I was still the envy of my student bum friends with my balla $50/hr $1000/week lifestyle) and it's now the end of the year 2005. I had been in a bit of a rut personally and I had a pretty harsh breakup with my girlfriend. I was 23 with no degree and no money, and I realised, wtf am i doing?! I can make so much money from this stupid game if I just resolve to build a roll and work on my play. So I finally stopped cashing out money and spending it on stupid [censored], and started grinding really hard.

Within about 2 months I was at 10/20 LHE taking shots up to 30/60, and I moved into a new apartment right near my local casino. I started breaking up my day into online session first, then walk to casino, play a session, then come home, play another online session, then sleep. This is a pretty brutal lifestyle but I had a singleminded desire to actually make something out of the opportunity I knew was handed to me on a silver platter - already being really good at strategy games before one of them became the biggest cash cow imaginable for someone my age. So I put in a ton of hours and built up a solid roll, by midyear I had over 50K, but I was bored and burnt out.

Near the end of June 2006 I decided to rekindle my interest by finally learning how to play NL. I had been reading the HSNL forum for fun for ages, since back when ElDiablo was Ulysses and Alex Jacob was posting a lot. This gave me an instinctive understanding of a lot of crucial concepts such as pot control, exploiting position, isolating weak players, taking down dead money, etc. Also when I switched to NL the MSNL forum was basically heaven, I swear CTS used to be one of the first 5 replies to every thread, and Krantz, Flawless Victory, and many other amazing posters were very forthcoming with their wisdom, before the legislation basically killed 2+2 strategy and made coaching much more relevant.

I started at 1/2 as I already had a solid bankroll and I won 8PTBB/100 my first month playing 26/16, never looking back after that. For whatever reason NL 6 max really suits me, I have improved a ton since then and am a lifetime winner at every limit up to 10/20, but my main games have always been and continue to be 600NL and 400NL. I have quite possibly been the biggest winner at 600 and below combined on Party over the past year, mostly because everyone else moves up while I just sit there playing vs vastly inferior players. Some might see that as cowardly but I make over $400/hr and bought a really nice apartment right in the middle of my city this year. I have a different perspective on the game than most of the younger guys who want to take on the world - I'm ancient now at 25 and just want to set up my future. Phew, sorry for the essay

Cliff notes:

Ex mtger, good at strategy games
Started playing casually in 2000, half heartedly ground small stakes limit with success until end of 2005
Realised I was wasting my time and had a golden opportunity, finally started taking the game seriously, started crushing midstakes limit
Got bored and moved to NL, did well straight away thanks to having lurked 2+2 for so long
Opted not to move up despite considerable success, won many dollars

-How many tables do you play at a time on average?

My PT for this month says 9.18, I generally like to play 11-12 at a time but I leave bad tables and am constantly closing/opening new ones so the average is a bit lower.

-What do you think makes you different from the breakeven/average player at SSNL/MSNL?

Most obvious thing is that I play 400-600NL when I'm rolled for any game on Party and am probably experienced enough to beat 10/20, but also one other thing is that I am not afraid to look stupid, I don't care if a bluff fails, or I shove a bad hand preflop and get called. I make whatever play I feel is the right one even if I might look ******ed if it doesn't work.

serious question though, why have you stuck to msnl? you're clearly good enough to beat high stakes.

Already sort of answered this in poker story but basically I want to minimise stress and maximise how long I can grind before getting sick of the game. I feel an obligation to myself to set up my future and I am looking to do that with the least resistance possible. I feel like the considerable increase in stress wouldn't be worth the relatively minimal increase in winnings, but I still chase fish onto higher limits because it's obviously massively +ev (and fun)

biggest leak that most SSNLers have/how to exploit it?

Leak is sort of a strange word for it, but I think the biggest problem SSNLers have is their approach to the game. A lot of people seem to see poker as a game of cards, like the way to win is to figure out hand strengths and the best line for each hand in each situation sort of thing. In reality it's more a series of situations which you are looking to exploit, and the way you make money is figuring out what the best way to take advantage of the current situation is each time it is your turn to act.

It's much less about how to play aces or ace king than it is about being able to identify stuff like: that your opponent will fold if you raise, that your opponent will call no matter how much you bet, that if you put in a raise here it makes it very tough for your opponent to continue out of position, etc. Stuff like that, look at the situation overall, not just the cards and the board.

Tell me all you know about 3-betting.
Can you give some pointers for SSNL about what you think is important in 3-bet pots?

Hmm, I don't know where to start. 3-betting is good because it puts pressure on your opponent and is tough to combat. If they just call they will miss most flops and not have a strong enough hand to continue, so to successfully combat you threebetting them fairly often they have to either start fourbetting you lighter (very few people are comfortable doing this) or they will have to start bluffshoving or floating you postflop (most people are too scared to do this too).

A lot of mediocre TAGs are more than willing to open tons of crappy hands because they know they are supposed to for metagame, but they are not good enough to readjust in any real way when you start threebetting them (some just fold, others call and then wimp out on the flop). This allows you to have your way with them fairly often while also building up your image on the table as a bit crazy.

That's my basic description of threebetting! Here is one of the best ever posts about the subject: http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...t=1&PHPSESSID=

could you just describe sort of how you think about the game, your playstyle, what's most important to think about for an nl player, etc?

Sort of already answered this but I am always looking for things to exploit. A loose raiser opened and then someone else coldcalled, time to reraise... A bad player limped and I have 2 vaguely related cards and position on them - cool, time to isolate.

Postflop obviously I think a lot about what it looks like I have. It doesn't matter if your flop cbet got called and you still have nothing on the turn if you know it will look incredibly strong if you bet again (maybe a face card turned).

When I have a very strong hand I am always thinking about my opponents likely hands and looking for spots where there are a number of likely hands he can have that won't fold no matter how much I bet. Stuff like that.

Have you even gone busto or near busto?

Nope. I am still grinding off my initial $50! I have always been a bankroll nit. I am always telling people that if you don't lose your roll you can't actually lose at poker in the longterm as you are constantly improving if you care and are not completely stupid.

If No, what do you feel you have done to prevent this from ever happening.

I am a huge bankroll nit Also I must have run good at first since I only had 50 BBs!

What level gave you the most trouble when moving up? How many times did you drop back down and move up again before you were able to beat the game?

I have always slowly phased into new limits rather than putting my ego on the line and taking serious shots. I think 5/10 is often tougher than 10/20 though and despite being a lifetime winner at 5/10 I have had some pretty terrible experiences there. Also I lost my first 5 sessions in a row at live $10/20 limit holdem at my local casino despite it being the easiest game in the entire world, and didn't go back for a few months

* How do you make sure you are focussed?
* How do you train mental strength/stability?

I don't play when I don't feel like it. I often take breaks and I prefer to play multiple 45m-1hr sessions in a day rather than one long one. Even though I am pretty disciplined in that I play virtually every single day, often I will spend most of a day doing other stuff and not think about poker at all, and then maybe play at night. As far as mental strength/stability though I wish I had more of that as I often decide it's time to quit even when I'm deep vs fish

Top 5 tips for 100nl?

1) Practice figuring out who the biggest morons are and how to play against them (use HUD, learn how people of different stat combinations tend to play)
2) Play tons of hands (this will help getting used to variance)
3) Develop your multitable skills, play few enough tables that you can think about hands clearly but still try and log a decent amount of hands so you can see a lot of situations and get used to swings
4) Don't tilt/don't move up to chase losses
5) Try and analyse your progress as honestly and objectively as you can

Top books to read for this level?

Honestly, once you get to a level of basic competence the 2+2 forums and Cardrunners are much better than books. The best advice I can give you is to figure out who the good regular posters are here and focus on their posts, mostly filtering out the rest.

What do you think of Professional No-limit hold'em by Matt Flynn, Sunny Metha and Ed Miller? (If you've read it)

I haven't read it. From what I gather it seems like it would be better than most other books but I don't really know.

Have you had any coaching? If yes who? And at which point did you decide that you wanted coaching? And how did it help you?

I never have, although I have spent so much time reading and thinking about stuff CTS, Samoleus, Flawless_Victory, Ansky and others have written that I should probably have paid them I have come very close a number of times to getting a coach but my pride always gets the better of me. I know a lot of people that have been coached though and it is obviously very valuable.

And ye, post some sick graphs please.



What's your monitor setup? Do you coach?

I just have the Dell 30" on its own, its sweet. I think I am going to start offering coaching pretty soon. I have taught some friends quite a lot and I enjoy it.

How many hands do you play a month and will you ever move up from 2/4?

I play about 60K hands a month usually. I would like to think that in a few years time I won't still be hunched over a computer 12 tabling 2/4 but who knows. I have no burning desire at the moment to try and take on the world or anything, but I would definitely like to play big live games someday.

What do you think is the biggest difference between playing on Party vs TAG-heavy sites (as far as your playing style and approach to the games)? Is Party being Party a big factor in why you crush the games?

That's a pretty interesting question actually. I play on FT a bit sometimes and the games are fairly different. Party is much more aggressive, the fish are worse but the regulars are actually much better too, I think fighting to isolate the fish tends to toughen people up a lot whereas on FT there are a lot more weak/mediocre regulars but also less fish.

I don't think Party is as much easier than other sites as people think. One thing I definitely noticed playing on FT though was that my style wasn't really appropriate for the way those games play. I am used to having most people know that I am pretty aggressive and a bit of a station and I have gotten good at playing under those assumptions vs people who know me - playing anonymously on FT I was definitely making a lot of mistakes because I wasn't used to people seeing me as a generic tag, and also people play differently on FT - they raise top pair on the flop much more often, and wait til the turn to raise with sets for example. You don't really see this on Party, people instacall down top pair and raise sets on the flop every time.

But I think if I made adjustments I could win as much/nearly as much on FT. jfish and thejared are two really good players there who seem to crush the games pretty hard so it can be done. I prefer Party though, you can get your stack in a lot more often and gambol


thanks for doing this. can you give me your thoughts on this hand? http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...0#Post12026773

i would usually call the flop pretty quickly and re-evaluate turn, usually folding to another bet. him potting the flop is a bit suspicious but if you call relatively quickly and he still fires another strong bet you have to fold without more information.

nb* this might be spew at 100NL as i know people threebet a lot less there. nevertheless 33/14 is pretty fishy

Biggest hurdel you have faced in poker? Outside of poker?
Long term plans within poker?

Ok this is a bit emo, but... probably the biggest hurdle was overcoming my inner nit, putting my ego on the line and the fear of failing. As soon as I decided to go for it, it wasn't that hard - but I missed the first boat back in the old Party 15/30 fullring games with average vpip 40-50 because I was too scared of failing. If I had moved up then who knows, maybe I would have caught the NL train when it first arrived and been at 10/20NL back in the glory days. Long term plans = keep winning more money than I deserve

Overall thoughts on what I do well, Do badly within poker? Do you think I will be successful as a pro?

You understand the nature of the game and it's exploitable components very well. I think though, you can tend to sabotage yourself a bit by getting overconfident when you do well for a while, taking too many shots, and trying to do too much too soon. Sometimes it's just like you don't really care and almost want to lose to make it more interesting or something. Also, you have FPS But yeah I think overall you are very talented and will definitely succeed as a pro.

Also did you really ever forgive me for moving in on you in that 25/50 game?

lmao. that was one of the sickest things ever! but it worked out ok and looking back it's pretty funny. i was never mad at you for it, it was just like wtf!

Do you study your opponents play in PT after sessions? What do you have in your HUD?

Nah I am lazy. I always make an effort to figure out new regulars/TAGs though asap but just through watching them play. My HUD is VPIP/PFR/AF/#HANDS. Pretty original huh? Also I don't have any mods for my client and don't even use 4 colour deck! Such a software fish.

What player types (regulars) tend to give you the most trouble? The least?

Hmm, good question. I have trouble sometimes with guys with nitty stats but who threebet a ton, you know the type - 19/12 or 18/15 but they manage to threebet or squeeze you once every orbit. After a while you can figure out how often they are reraising and adjust a bit but at first it's really hard to deal with. Also I find it hard to play vs guys who play similarly to myself but just a little bit more aggro and fearless postflop - thankfully these people mostly reside up at 10/20. I do very well against people who limp and call raises OOP!

Also, what's your current setup for poker? Pics? Also pics of your crib would be cool.

No pics sry, but I have a 30" Dell with a pretty good cpu/wireless mouse/gaming keyboard. I should really take pics of my hizzle as I finally just finished setting it up how I want it, maybe soon.

Is floating out of position something you do a good amount?
Example, you call a pfr flop comes 8c6c5, which completely missed you. Now you call the c-bet to bluff any club, 9,4,7,8,6? Or how about an A high dry flop. Here you lead the turn (repping turned 2 pair or better not allowing vilain do do a pot control check) I'm thinking its almost impossible for villain to continue without the goods here.

i do it sometimes for sure. both examples you gave are pretty good, when you call a pair and draw flop like 865 it's pretty obvious to villain you aren't folding your hand so he will almost always give up when he doesn't have anything, and when you check call a dry ace flop you obviously have an ace, so you can take down the river. you don't want to go crazy with this stuff, but sometimes sure.

Do you think that your style, which is kinda laggro (opening alot of pots in late pos, 3 betting, 40% attempt to steal etc) is better in todays game environment than that of a 18/16ish tricky tag?
Do you think certain styles are definatevly more optimal than another or does it come down to personality and what you are and are not able to do?

I think this is really interesting and probably deserves its own thread. My personal opinion is that we all probably each have our own optimal style based on our personalities, given that we are not robots, and that we have to make decisions based on how people perceive us. Just because Samoleus plays 40/30 and wins more than everyone else doesn't mean that we should all try and do it. There is no point trying to force it.

It's like anything else - different people have certain strengths and weaknesses in poker and our style should reflect that. The most important thing is to understand your own game and how people perceive you, so that you can correctly assess situations.

while 12tabling, what hud stats u value/check most?

VPIP/PFR, so important preflop. I understand people saying they can play fine postflop without HUD, but preflop having access to VPIP/PFR stats on people is so amazing.

I have two questions with respect to this way of thinking about the game. 1) What provided you with the skills to be able to recognise different the relevant variables in any given spot and respond to them appropriately? Experience, innate skill, 2+2, poker books, session reviews, something else, a combination of things...? I really try to play explotitively in the way you describe, but in game time frequently I'll size up the situation and respond incorrectly one way or the other, but it sounds like you just have a really solid foundation on which you base your decisions. How did you go about developing that?

Another really interesting question. It is a combination of intuition/instinct and fundamental knowledge, weighed up mathematically on an unconscious level I think! Sounds pretty pretentious but that's the only way I can think of describing it. Out of the things you mentioned experience and learning to think about the game the right way (2+2 is great for that) are the most important. Obviously we all need to learn the fundamental concepts at first. Then stuff like handreading skill develops over time as you see similar situations over and over and get a feel for how certain types of people tend to play in certain spots.

Once you have these abilities from there it's just a matter of combining the two and knowing what to do in the moment based on intuitive calculations, obviously when you look at nosebleed stakes they all know the fundamentals and have handreading skills, it is largely a battle of instinctive brilliance in the moment - well that and who tilts the least, gets the most time with the fish, and runs the best

2) How on earth do you keep track of player's tendencies and the flow of a table playing 9 tables on average? Does that require you to rely heavily on stats?
Slightly different but related question, do you datamine and then try to build reads from known stats, or do you approach new players cold and suss them out just by observing them/prodding them and seeing how they react?

I think I'm pretty good at filtering out information ie. basically ignoring any "decisions" that are automatic, like raising aces folding 72o etc. I do them without even thinking about it. So even though I might be playing 12 tables, at any point in time I am *really* only playing maybe 1 or 2 hands in my head, and folding/raising every other hand preflop without even thinking about it. Because of this it's not that hard to zero in on what's going on, and get a feel for how opponents play. I don't datamine but I have stats on most people because the Party player base isn't huge. I like the way you put that though - "approach new players cold and suss them out just by observing them/prodding them and seeing how they react". I definitely do that, and I think my style mostly forces people to react to me rather than the other way around.

Also, I think I've already asked, but are you coaching?

I'm probably going to start coaching soon. Have put it off for a while but I have started really wanting to do it.

Can you post the levels breakdowns too please? Because that is seriously sick!

ok here we go in graph form!









then the rest im up (10-15K or something) is from other sites. as you can see my HSNL career is on a bit of a heater at the moment in very very slow motion!

How come all your screen names are always in all-caps?
good well so far

haha. this was all the rage back in the day! supposed to make you look like a maniac donkey, before using girls names came into fashion. i'm an old man now though i don't know what's cool anymore. and thanks

Do you still table select? Is there anybody you won't give action to?

Yeah I table select heaps. I am often the first person to leave an all TAG table, even if I think a couple of them are pretty bad - there are just better games out there, especially when you are playing across multiple limits.

You mention focusing on a group of posters and kind of filter out the rest.
If you had to name a strong contigent of MSNL posters and SSNL posters which ones would a poster be best to focus on what they are saying in strategy threads?

hmmm. i think in SSNL from what ive seen bilbosan, orange, nickroyale, keyser, 2paul2, jay riall are all pretty good but i dont read there that often. msnl most of the best posters mostly post in the censored thread/party regs threads/coach. honestly msnl is pretty terrible these days

How do you keep yourself from getting into auto-pilot? I know when I play 9-12 tables I get into this mode where I'll make standardized plays into a villain, no matter if he's 14/12 or 63/6. How do you keep yourself focused.. do you attribute that to your 45min-1hour sessions?

I look at HUD stats before I do anything basically, but yeah I can definitely tend to autopilot sometimes and play pretty poorly. Usually when an interesting spot comes up I will still always think about it a while though, I really enjoy the handreading element of poker, like solving a puzzle All you can really do is be honest with yourself, and if you don't feel like playing get off the tables....

u said u played 60k/mo? thats 2k/day .. two ~1h sessions per day? why not more?

you might have missed the part where i started playing 7 YEARS ago it's an interesting phenomenon though, people will put in sick hours while trying to prove themselves but it becomes a lot tougher to keep up the drive when you have done it and are making tons of money. just look at all the insanely talented 10/20 players who play 20K hands a month... i'm sure if i was starting out i would feel like if i could ever make hundreds an hour i would play all day, but it's like anything else - it gets pretty boring and no matter how overrolled you are variance is still a little exhausting.

toughest party msnl regs in your opinion?

hmm. well most of the guys i find really tough are at 5/10 and above but that's probably irrelevant to this thread.

some guys around 2/4 and 3/6 that i respect = straightballin, wowenslowen, ttvts72, lfk2okds, clavour/inusi/nolyx, pahbooh, bleedwithme, tigerhans, ravenq, adamkosh, haribokid, hmirageh, xx_bluff_xx.

I feel that in terms of a thinking poker player, I have hit a plateau of sorts. The dynamics/nuances of the game no longer thrill me the way they used to, and I no longer think about the game in constructive ways as much I used to.

However, I think I've finally come into myself emotionally as player, and I still want to play: both for money and the challenge.

What would you suggest for me to do to retool my game? It kinda feels like everything is stale knowledge and I'm not sure where to go in terms of my game--aside from playing more hands that is.

man this is ironic coming from me but it sounds like you need to move up! either that or play a new site for a while, or play some PLO or LHE or tourneys, change it up somehow, play something you aren't very good at or play on a site where you have to learn how everyone plays. earlier this year i felt like i was getting a little bored again, that was when i decided to start playing 10/20 and 5/10 when fish were around. even though i am playing a fairly small amount of those limits, just knowing that i have the option and playing 100 hands here and there when tables look good keeps the game more interesting.


Where are you from out of interest?

ostralya

if you had to start over again (say at 100nl) with the general experience that you've gained, how would you approach things like br management, moving up, taking shots?

i would still be very conservative with my bankroll (if you are doing well enough at your current limit to justify moving up getting an adequate bankroll shouldnt take long anyway), but i would never cashout or spend any of my winnings until i was happy with where i was playing. and i would be far less scared about moving up - be very protective of your bankroll, but when you suspect you are ready, go for it.


sea,
favorite live poker experience? (ie. a nice hand where you win 800bbs or something crazy like that)?

hmm, i won a live donkament at my local casino when i got it in bad almost every single time i was allin. that was pretty fun. another time after i had been in a fairly long and heated verbal battle with this jerk in a 25/50 game (first time it had ran at my casino) i stacked him when i called his small reraise preflop with J2dd and then cracked his aces. that was very satisfying. but really most of my favourite times playing live were just because i stayed all night with friends cracking jokes and having a good time.

favorite movie?


i really like oldboy, and i think everyone should see the hustler. the movie that i have seen the most times though is the big lebowski

Seabeast,
Have you ever run a pokerev calculation? It would take ages for your DB but I'd love to get a glimpse at even a month's worth of data.

hehe nah sorry i try not to focus on that sort of stuff too much


Where is online poker going in the next 5 years? 15 years? ie regarding dominant games, playing styles, profitablilty, legalitly? Educated guess unless u have some sort of cystal ball.

Tough question. I'm sure poker will always be very beatable in one form or another, because there are certain human faults (like overestimating own ability, overrating the influence of luck, and just plain having too much money) that mean there will always be fish.

But I have always assumed that the current state of poker, where it's not at all uncommon for an 18 year old to pick up the game and be making 6 figures within a year, to be a generational thing. Like maybe it will last for 5 years, maybe 10, but I just can't see that sort of thing being the case forever. I think eventually you will at least need either a natural affinity for the game or to be very intelligent, whereas at the moment there is a enough money being thrown away that you don't need any talent, just the discipline and patience to learn how to catch the money that is falling from the sky.

Seabeast, thanks for doing this.
What sort of hands do you generally call and generally 3bet when you're on the button and the CO opens? and why?
(assume CO is a 21/17 kind of player and the blinds aren't very squeezy)

i threebet tons of stuff in this spot (puts a lot of pressure on them, damned if they do/damned if they dont kinda thing), and coldcall stuff that's not quite good enough to reraise for value but has too much showdown value or is way too nice a hand to fold (88, QJs etc)

Can you be more specific how you combat these types.

If it seems like they are putting in more preflop action than their stats justify then I will start watching them more closely and paying more attention. If it becomes obvious they are exploiting their image then I will start calling their reraises a lot in position and bluffing on suitable flops, and fourbetting much lighter oop. Basically once I get suspicious I just ignore their stats and if they are reraising like a 30/25 would then I will treat them with the disdain I would treat a 30/25 with

what do you think about donk bets, how do you combat them and when/what boards do you use them urself

If they donk a decent sized bet onto a flop I hate then great, they can have it. If it's a flop I want to continue on with a midstrength hand then I will just call cos it's usually either bluff/bigdraw/set and vs that range calling down is good. But if they are incessantly donking especially with small bets then I will instantly raise with any two cards unless the board is really drawy like JT9ss or whatever. I like to bet/threebet allin a decent amount with sets and big draws, so I make sure to donk flops a reasonable amount with other types of hands to balance my range, I will sometimes decide preflop when I call OOP that I'm going to donk almost any flop (just not AAK etc) and I am careful to sometimes donk hands like middle pair, gutshots, overcards + backdoor draw, outright bluff etc.

fourth: when do you overbet if ever and how do you work out whether to call one or not

zeeeeeeeeeebo! i overbet when opponent is terrible or when there are likely hands that my opponent is never going to fold (like maybe i have KQ on JT9, and my opponent raises me... i would often just reraise absurdly big here because he will probably call with anything he will raise on that board). working out when to call overbets can be tough, because they are usually very strong hands, but some people know this and others are just terrible. it's always very important to figure out how your opponent thinks so you can work out his motivations.

fifth: how do you deal with min bets?
thanks again

i ignore them, and usually raise pot basically no matter what i have.


How do you approach c-bets in 3-way pots as opposed to heads up?

I am much less inclined to cbet bluff on coordinated boards with two opponents. On something like J72 rainbow though I will still cbet any two cards because there is still a really good chance of taking it down, if one person calls there are a lot of good cards to second barrel on, and sometimes it can even work to your advantage - the first guy might fold a hand he would call you with HU (like say 44 or AQ on that flop) because he knows has to give up if the other guy calls, so he lets it go. So still cbet quite a bit but pay extra attention to the texture of the board and how likely your opponents are to have something.

How do you approach c-bets in 3-bet pots as opposed to raised pots, headsup, when you miss the flop? (AK on undercard flop, TT on KJ7 flop, 67s on QQT flop...) If your image is important, suppose you play 22/18, you have been 3-betting a wider range than just premiums, but you still get respect from the table. 100BB starting stacks, open raise was to 4xBB, you raise to 15xBB, original raiser called.

I definitely cbet less in reraised pots than in standard ones. But I will also checkraise pretty good hands as well. I'm more inclined to just check when I have a decent chance of improving but will have to fold to a raise (like maybe AK on undercards, small-medium pairs will often check it down with you but will call if you bet, and you have decent amount of outs) and more inclined to fire a bullet when I have virtually no chance of winning if we check it down and they will fold a lot of hands if i bet (like 67s on QQT or basically any hand on an ace flop)

what were some of your favourite threads when you made the transition to NL?
what about all time favourite threads on 2+2 for whatever reason?

This thread pretty much blew my mind. (http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...fpart=all&vc=1 )

Some others I have saved:

Profitable Situations ( http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...rt=1&PHPSESSID )

Aspirations (http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...rt=1&PHPSESSID )

Aaaand this one is just for fun (http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...rt=1&PHPSESSID )

do you ever use the minraise postflop? if yes, can you give an example of a situation where you think a minraise would be good?

not really. msnlers seem to like using it when there's a good chance villain will bluffshove over it but i don't do it much.

lastly, where do you see yourself in 5 years?

hopefully i will be providing something of some small value to the world, not just sitting around on my computer all the time. i want to travel a lot too, and invest, and have freedom. i hope to be decent at trading by then, but i don't ever want to focus too much on money. a big part of the reason i want to be able to invest a lot in the future is that i think it would be really fun, and feel really good to own multiple houses/something like a restaraunt or shop etc.

Teach me everything you know about 4 betting.
You are literally the best I have ever seen at it. I know you prob dont want to give it all away but a few points on what most ppl dont do enough and are there any-ways to exploit it?

This is one of the things that is very math based in a way. You need to have an intuitive feel for how often the guy is threebetting you (so how wide his range is), how light he will go to the felt when you fourbet (how fearless he is) and learn when to attack and when to let him be... It's a sliding scale kind of thing based on his stats, positions, how he plays you, etc.

At the start of this year it was insane, all the regs knew that threebetting a lot was what you were meant to do, so they were threebetting each other like crazy with all sorts of hands to exploit the fact that everyone opens all pairs/connectors/dominated face cards and then folds most of them to a reraise... but noone made the next step and realised that if this is the case, you should fourbet the threebettors for the same reason... people were threebetting anything and then folding all but QQ+AK+ like it was 100NL or something. it was amazing, games were very easy, but now there are a lot of psycho fourbettors and AQ is the new KK

Edit: By far the best way to improve your skills at this is playing tournaments

What are your thoughts on blind play?
Complete range from the SB?
Raise range from teh SB?
Do you raise any two when someone limps on your BB?
I know, player dependent, but assume unknown.
Tnx!

yeah obviously really player dependent. vs a complete unknown who just sat with 100bb, i guess i probably open SB with all pairs, 45s+ suited connectors and one gappers, any medium offsuit connectors like 65o+, any two face cards, any ace, K9o+, tons of stuff. if he is nitty probably raise even lighter than that. but this is all assuming bb is terrible. if they are decent then i will open far less hands because they will usually be reraising or folding. in this case it's more like open whatever you would raise in MP. i usually assume unknowns are bad though. And yeah I raise any two vaguely coherent cards when someone limps in sb and im bb. i might take a flop with 92o, but im always raising 96s etc

Thoughts on cold cold calling from the blinds vs a mid position raiser w/hands like JJ/QQ vs 3-betting and what is your frequency for either action??
I have found both these hands to be difficult to play OOP in a 3-bet pot when the flop comes all undercards, ie you 3-bet MP raiser w/JJ from SB and the flop comes
T43 rainbow.
Edit: My default line is to 3-bet vs CO/Button Raiser here, but vs MP and UTG and I sometimes change it up.

I would always reraise except vs really tight players. Vs tight utg players I'll just call though. Play carefully postflop but don't be too scared.

I'd characterize myself as quite a pessimist, in that I always think my opponents have the top of their range, or at least the one overcard to my big pair ... hence, I do a lot of check calling or check folding with my made hands ... is there any general piece of advice you can give to get me out of this mindset? Should I just bet fold a lot more?
Thanks!

This is a mindset a lot of SSNLers seem to have. It's brave of you to admit it, that's probably the first step! You could try playing some LHE or tournaments, they help you realise that noone ever actually has anything


what is your thoughts on calling suited connectors in position to a raise from a nit? do you ever call sc's oop?

I play them a lot, but only oop vs really bad players or deep

Do you play many MTT's? If so, biggest score?

I don't play them that often but I really enjoy playing them. I've never had a huge score but I've had a bunch of 5-10Kish scores from winning small tournaments (or large ones with a small buyin). I took a month off cashgames and just played SNGs for a month once when I was feeling disillusioned. That was really good for me I think.

did you have a moment of clarification, like a light bulb moment? I suck at english, i hope you understand :P .

Not one specific one, but I've had a lot of them reading 2+2 over the years. I have to credit these forums for teaching me basically everything.

SEABEAST: What is your Standard deviation / 100 hands?
(Session notes -> [More Detail])

56.79 big bets

When you get 3bet and decide you want to 4bet, what is your betsize preferance? Do you always 4bet call or shove, or do you ever 4bet fold? Say $200 stacks at 200NL, you open to $8, he makes it $28.

i always call shove unless it's more than 100BBs. i fourbet a bit too much to be folding especially when noone can fold AK vs me, so my equity is never *that* bad. so i usually just make it 80 or something and get it in if i have to. small fourbet bluffs with the intention of folding to shove can be pretty nice when you're a little deeper though.

Much love. <3

wow, read the whole thing and will prolly read it again a little deeper, thanks a lot for the post and the advice within...

i need to think about y i make the plays i do more so and not just because i should

this goes for many of us

ty for the summary

thx very much. Great read.

wow thnx so much..great read. So moving up in stakes have you always maintained the 100 buyin bankroll? Also if youre going to play cash games do you think HUD is absolutely necessary/how much does it help?