If that hand is any indication, you aren't following the guide at all. What do you do when you flop a set multiway? You shovel the money in the pot as fast as you can.

You should be leading the flop for .15 or .20 (not sure how often they'll call pot at 2NL), be betting 3/4 at least on the turn and shoving it in on the river. You played that hand worse than the villain did (and he played it pretty badly).

Also, 8,000 hands means nothing.

Sircuddles,

+1

*clap clap*

Rip, and others struggling to beat the lower micro stakes...

The reason you aren't beating the games is because you have tons of leaks. You just don't know what they are yet. Your opponents also have tons of leaks, but you don't quite know how to exploit them yet. You need to play hands and gain experience, exercise proper bankroll management, and be patient (both at the tables and in the macro sense of improving your game).

If you can't beat 2NL, you shouldn't be playing 200 and 500 live. Yes those games are super soft, but someone struggling at 2NL online is just another fish at a live table (No offense intended - I too was at this stage early in my poker career). Take a break from live poker and work on your online game. You will get in more hands, and improve at a much faster rate. In a few months, you will be back at the live tables and start to see the mistakes your opponents are making are the same leaks that you have fixed in your game. [x] profit

I doubt there is much difference between 2NL at PS and FTP.

20/9 aren't "reg" stats. You are playing WAY too many hands pre flop. Optimal stats are much closer in VPIP and PFR. 12/9, 16/14, 14/10, 10/8. All are OK.

Play hands in position (fold that JTs from UTG, despite how pretty it looks). Stop completing so much from the SB. Stop calling raises from the BB. etc etc etc

The fact that you made your first post means you have realized it's time to improve. Congrats! It's your first step to making a lot of money in this game. Keep reading, keep posting, try to make some poker friends, get some AIM names and talk about hands, think about hands. etc.

Thanks for all the feedback so far. I don't usually play anything lower than AQ (or a pair lower than 77) UTG or UTG +1. I may need to tighten up my range in other positions however. I probably do fall in love too much with the pot odds presented from the SB, esp since I am always OOP. I'm sure this is something to watch, especially at this level. And Ive pretty much stayed away from live tables for the last couple of months. (Because I already realized what CCCP said, that I'm still a fish with a lot of holes in my game. The last hand I played in a casino sealed that knowledge for me).

I realized after looking over the posted hand (before receiving any responses), that checking the turn was a big mistake. Thanks for confirming that.

I definitely don't think I'm ready for massive multi-tabling. I think I can handle 2 or 3 at most, but I definitely wouldn't mind some opinions from those of you who have more experience with the online game. Is it possible that playing just one table is the ideal scenario to really find my leaks and make sure I am playing for the most value?

Thanks again, and I appreciate the honesty. Im a huge critic of myself, so I can talk to myself and swear and tell myself how horrible of a player I am, but getting constructive critical feedback from another perspective will certainly accomplish more in terms of actually doing something about it.

2-table and build a bankroll. add another table when you are comfortable, and another, and another etc (for now, maxing out at 4-6 is probably optimal). When you have enough buyins to move up - do it.

You aren't going to learn much from 2NL because the play is horrendous there and it doesn't really feel like poker. But you can, and should, use it to build up a bankroll. To do that, maximize value with your big hands, and DO NOT BLUFF because they call everything. If you can stick to those 2 simple rules, you will have the bankroll to move up in no time.

GL

I've read a lot of articles in this forum which were very useful but I want to thank the author for this because it really helped my game. My biggest mistake was bluffing lol.

Rip, I play uNL and you sure have come to the right place to improve your game. I consider the Guide from sircuddles to be the best primer available and I have read all the stickies. I also have developed an erotic fascination with his icon.

Play with a full stack. it is not really much money and it allows you to win more with your monsters.

The FLOP is a possible straight but you are only behind 66, 57, 25 and only 66 is likely. A common play would be to check intending to c/r, but with the possible straight draw the donk bet is not out of line. Bet the pot! Winning right now is always OK.

Do not check the TURN. The jack is a good card for you and you should get more money into the pot. Allowing a free card facing a possible draw gets you beat. Slow playing has never worked for me at these stakes (and I have tried). Bet 3/4 of the pot for value as well as denying correct odds for the draw.

Terrible RIVER, but you gave villain the free card. I would have bet again regardless of final results.

Remember that it is just one hand. Not really a cooler or a bad beat considering the betting in the hand. Play ABC and keep grinding. Reread the Guide and absorb the information. Good Luck.

In reading the guide again, I see some discussion of c-betting and calling c-bets. I get that you should not call a c-bet in the micros if you miss, but what are the guidelines for firing a c-bet after missing a flop with a hand like AQ?

Depends entirely on the limit, the board, your positions, your opponent, and your image.

Thank you very much sircuddles for your hard work, I've just read your guide and can't wait to put it into practice. Unfortunately (for you), I'll let you know if I have any problems .

There are a few things from the below paragraph that I need some help with.

First of all I don't know what a 'double barrel' is? More importantly I'd like to know what you mean when you say 'add in some double barrels, float some flops and steal them on the turn.'. I ask because in the guide you advise not to play thin value, and from what I've learnt just from your guide () this is thin value. Do you mean add this to my game as I go up in BI's?

A double barrel is a continuation bet on the flop, with another bet on the turn (with air). It's very board and villain dependent.

Once you're into 25NL (and winning steady) or at 50NL you can start to add in some extra 'moves', i.e playing real poker. That section of the guide is just to show what you can add to your repertoire as you require to expand your game. I'm just giving an idea of where you go once you've mastered the basics and how to open up your game.

I don't recommend those things until you're winning solidly and at 25NL or above. Even at 25NL I wouldn't do any of those things unless you're playing weak tight regs and you know for sure they're weak tight regs.

I thought that's what you meant, cheers .

if i'm winning at 2.5ptbb/100 at 25nl and i decide i'm never gonna fold or call a bet (always raise) tptk and overpairs what do you think my winrate will be? do you think i'll still be profitable?

It's not something that anyone would be able to determine. Besides, it wouldn't matter what your winrate would be because this thinking is horribly flawed.

I've had a on/off relationship with poker since 2004 and thus I keep around the microlimits. I'm not sure when's the last time you seriously played microstakes but in my experience the days that the total donks who hold any 2 cards form a majority are over since quite some time. At least at PS. Sure they are still there, but I'm experiencing now there's a whole lot less of them than there used to be. Most of them seem to put atleast some thought to their play. Logical evolvement due to all the information available, like these forums. It was a true donkfest at the start of the online pokerhype but now I think one shouldn't think too lightly about the level of play down there. And I'm not seeing much action on flops with a scary texture.

Still, thanks for the postings!

I felt the same way when I was moving up (only a few months ago). I would ask, why is everyone telling me that 90% of players are ******s when this isn't the case at all? The thing is that those 10% of players are where your real profit is when you're just beginning. I can't speak for 2NL because I personally skipped it, but at 5NL and 10NL it's true that huge fish are not the majority. However, they are where the money lies. With the 'regs' (no one should ever become a 'reg' at below 50NL in my opinion, at least anyone wanting to improve) you aren't going to make much money. Why? Because they're playing like you are. Exploitable weak tight. You'll trade coolers and likely stay out of each others' way. When you're playing the fish, you'll make your money.

You can't start making nice profits from regs or exploiting regs until you're much better at poker than this guide covers. In fact, I would say (and suggest) that you don't play back or get fancy against regs until you are making a profit over a large sample (50k hands), are at at least 25NL and have at least 500 hands on an opponent that you play with often. Fancy play syndrome (FPS) is one of the biggest killers of your profit margin out there. In fact, I myself am having issues at 50NL for this exact reason. 50NL is a little different, but you get the point. Fancy play at the micros is just not good.

You can play exploitable weak tight poker at 25NL and below and make money. From what I've heard you can actually probably do this until 100NL. The reason for this is two fold. Firstly, your exploitable play can only be exploited by someone who knows how to do so. 98% do not. Secondly, your opponents (aside from regs) are very bad and that's where your profit lies long term. Your decent play against their bad play spells money for you in the long term.

Let's say you're at 25NL, have followed this guide and are making decent profits and are learning to play decent poker. You notice someone you've seen at the tables frequently and have about 750 hands on him. He's running 14/12 and seems to be a pretty weak tight nit. Every time you get a hand against him and bet or raise the turn, he folds. Every single time you flop a set, he is check/folding the flop or cbetting and then giving up. You notice this (over the course of 750 hands remember, not 100) and decide that he is likely playing much like you. He raises from MP and you have any two cards. Nits are in the blinds and you're on the BTN. You call and he bets the flop. You have absolutely nothing, and you call. He checks the turn. If you bet, he folds 99% of the time. So you do, and he does.

You will eventually start to do things like the above example, but again I can't stress enough not to do it until you meet ALL of the conditions. You have to have a large sample on him. You have to know from personal experience what his tendencies are, and you really should be making a nice profit so that if your plan backfires (say he had an OP in above example and he shoved over your turn bet) you aren't going to worry about it. You tried to steal, he had it this time, and you move on.

Fancy play syndrome is really bad, and following this guide will ensure that you don't get the urge to play fancy. It's detrimental until you're at the right spot (and level) with your poker game and that is when you start to really learn poker and play. Even so, the large part of the time you're going to be playing standard, straight forward poker. The above example is something you'll want to do against that opponent once every 200 HU pots you play with him, or something similar. You don't do it often, otherwise you have FPS. Technically you want to push this type of opponent until they try to adjust (which they usually fail at, which is +EV for you) or until they play back, but I only recommend that when you're very, very comfortable with the game of poker and can recognize the subtleties involved with table image, game flow, and that sort of thing.

This post has been way too long, but I know that most players at the micros aren't ******ed whales. But that's where you make your money. You don't make your money from the 14/12 guy who only stacks off with overpairs. You make your money from the fish, so learn how to reap the fat value first, then start getting to work on the thin value (from regs).

You said never bluff at micros. How come con betting missed flop isnt bluff Lets say i raised preflop with AK and then c-bet on 58J board. AM I bluffing or not

Im returning to micros and playing at 26/14. 21bb/100 over 5k hands @ $10 nl. I know not enough hands to say much yet.

But the example vpip pfr you give is way too tight isnt it?

If there is a lose vpip +40/15 on the table, im sure your going to losen up starting hands big time. Sure your gonna fold/lose tiny pots against these guys but when you do catch a nice hand, they arent looking at the board and giving anyone credit, you will take their whole stack in 1 hand.

Ive been watching the tight players with low stats and Ive been just stealing blinds against them and rerasing their steals when they on the button.

Sometimes Ive been check raising missed flops and flush draws against them and usually on turn im giving up unless they passive with a check. Im not playing anything past flop against them unless i got a really solid hand.

So where do these tight/low stats players make money from if im taking them for a run and avoiding them past flop or keeping out of anything big, folding if they reraise my preflop raise.

I see them mutitable and they are rarely stacked. Im confused, i should sleep.

Technically it is classified as a bluff, but continuation bets fall outside of that category in general when people are talking about bluffing. Continuation bets are their own thing.

you could be valuebetting............

Wow, I never seen this thread before. I wish I saw this when I first started playing online back in December. Nice Job, sircuddles.

All comments in Bold.

if i iso raise ATC on botton at 10nl with tight blinds and cbet, and make this play once every 5 opportunities its generally proffitable?

If I have two nits in the blinds I'm open raising from the button almost every time. If I get called, you can still cbet and most likely take the pot down. It helps greatly if you show down strong hands a couple of times.