So this is my first foray into pokering videos... there will hopefully be some more to come. Here I played four tables of 5NL for an hour and did my best to talk about what various villains are up to while nothing important's going on with my own hands. Disclosure: I did a pretty mediocre job of explaining things, and really no terribly interesting hands came up. But it might be helpful for those of us that are still working our way through these levels to watch my semi-LAGgy play.

There are several spots in this video where I made bad spewy calls... don't do that. Tip: If you're a half decent player, you'll be able to spot the spewy plays a mile away.

I don't have nearly as much talent for dry humor as some of the other video guys around here... I'm afraid there's not a lot here for you higher-stakes guys. In the near future I'm going to record a 25NL video for peer review/criticism. For now, I hope this is somehow helpful to you 2NL/5NL/10NL players.

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=0JE5N63Q (126 MB)

Of course comments, criticisms and questions are welcome and encouraged.

downloading now

you play 25nl? i just started 25nl, have about 6k hands but i dont think i've seen you? whats your name on ps?

i'll comment later (i'm glad there is another spewtard like me on here ;D)

typing as i watch...

@5:50 i float him here for 3/4ths pot. partly to float, partly to charge him for draws, and mostly to value bet him. as played i like your call.

@9:45. i'm not sure if i like the call here pf. i would probably 3bet because there is quite a bit of dead money here. also, it gets you heads up with a good hand (i'm not sure kqs plays well multiway? i may be wrong?). also, cbets will get respected a lot from 3bets except maybe not this flop. basically take down all the dead money preflop and if you have to see a flop, kqs isnt that bad a hand.

@11:20 fold wtf? i take this here just to check if he has a9+, kt+, etc. at these levels (even up to 25nl) people basically tell you what hand they have on the turn. i wait to see turn to see if he still likes his hand. also, if it comes an ace, you can bet if he folds and make him fold 99. just more options. i like callling ip with an overpair here

@19. lol. just lol

@20:47. not sure why heads up you fold overpair yet in a multiway pot with a passive preflop raiser you are calling his pot sized flop bet. he obviously has overpair most of the time (because he is pot sized betting into a BUNCH of players on crappy board texture) and sets, straights, and two pair nail the other two players ranges. i think this is a fairly easy fold w/no real redraws. just saw results of hand. ya he had an overpair... and other guy had pair+oosd. like i said, this flop sucks for you. i would fold

@24. another lol moment. gotta love lower limits. ps if you have hands on these guys, raise big because they almost always call haha

@27. kqs 2 pair. bet big (close to pot) here every time. if he likes his hand, he will call no matter the size and same for folding w/ size. at this level dont worry about them thinking about bet sizing meaning anything. they look at their hand. if they like it, they call no matter what. if they dont, the fold no matter what.

@28:25. this looks like another easy fold. i think its just spew to think you are ahead here enough to make this +ev. micro limits is about maximizing your huge +ev hands not squeezing out marginal spots

@29:15. awesome value bet. take note ppl who struggle at these levels.

@30:55. set of 777. i actually prefer the raise to be between 1.75-2. again, he either has something or he doesnt. you are looking for max value and you want to get him in easily by river. LOL AT RIVER!!! for a second i thought you were facing aq and got sucked out!

@43:15. kk bet more on flop. he might call 33-tt hoping to catch an ak bluff.

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overall great video. i think ppl can really learn from this.

I can't watch yet. Just wanted to offer my thanks for putting in the time into do this. I'm at 5nl now, so I'm sure this well help me out.

Yeah I downloaded it and am going to watch it later tonight. No one ever gives love to NL5, so thanks.

Thanks for the taking the time to watch and comment, Lucid.

I'll raise there a lot too, call sometimes... just depends what mood I'm in. Both are productive plays at 5NL IMO. Once you're less than 100BB deep, you want to skew a lot more toward either raising or folding.

Saying 'an overpair' is generic and a little misleading... 88 on a 7-high board just is weak. I don't really beat anything but a bluff or a 7. Yeah, maybe he's just stabbing with ace-queen or something... but my feel for that particular opponent was I was pretty sure he was on an overpair. If he wasn't he still had 6 outs on me; if he was I had 2 outs on him. Since:

1. I don't want to get heavily involved with what is really a very marginal holding;
2. I expect him to fire a lot of turns;
3. I'm going to hate pretty much ANY turn card; and
4. I never want to assume I can bluff anyone off a hand, especially not when I'm turning top or second pair into a bluff;

Just folding now is the safest, and I think wisest, play.

You're right. This was one of my spewy calls I hated after I re-watched the thing. The main difference that made me call was the aggrodonk behind me; I expected he would raise a lot as a bluff, and then I'd get to see what the original raiser did before making my decision (and I would probably stack off TT there to the aggrodonk if the original raiser folds.) But the original raiser is on QQ-AA so much there, for the reasons you stated, that folding is better.

I actually disagree; I should have either bet smaller or checked. The reason is, I'm in against an extreme aggrodonk. And to jiggle an aggrodonk's ****** switch (and induce him to bluff off his stack), you act weak. Betting strongly into an aggrodonk is the WORST thing you can do. Big, big -EV move by me there IMO. I should have made a weak bet like 1/3 pot, or just checked to him. Check turn if he calls.

I call because I'm getting more than 3 to 1 for a small bet, and I can easily let go of it if the moron that led for a minbet reraises. If he'd made a real bet or if the second guy had made a real raise, it's an easy fold, yes.

all good valid points. the point is this is an excellent video for 5nl folks. i like to play slightly different (i do agree with you though on the kq hand. i forgot that was the agro donk) but any way you play these levels, you cant go wrong.

great video and cant wait for the 25nl one!

Guys, I'm having some trouble getting this video (and another couple taken from this forum's threads) to work. Can anyone offer some advice?

I use a apple mac, running the latest operating system (leopard?). The default program to watch it in is Quicktime (flip4mac converts it). Here though I get a frozen image of Zeth's desktop with no sound.

When I tried in VLC I can at least get the video (4 tables), just no sound.

And so I tried it in DivX. Again flip4mac converts it. Now there is no sound or no video.

(Should I perhaps be taking this to a software forum?)

Thanks in advance

That's missing codecs. In Windows you can download K-Lite Codec Pack and run pretty much any video ever made. I'm sure there's something similar to mac.

PS.: I'll download the video, Zeth. I always like your posts, so I'm sure the video will be fun to see.

Downloading now

at 5NL? Im intrigued. dl'ing.

nice video. There were def some points where it was nice to see how and why you played XX hands certain ways.

the only bone I'd pick with you about it is the amount of overlimping you did. while it works for you (you've got the implied odds and the post flop skills) some one trying to learn a bit more is going to get themselves in a lot of trouble when they over limp hands like 47s and QTs at UTG+1... no?

for me, I work pretty hard to steal a fair amount of blinds, and I feel like limping as many hands as you did in this particular video just gives those blinds right back in a different manner.

Overlimping from HJ-BTN with the QTs I would have felt better about what you were trying to accomplish. Also, it really never worked out this time where your spec hands flopped anything that you considered a strong flop... I would have at least like to have heard you talk about what kinds of flops you'd like to see...

like say you limped in with that 47s... you said it was spec, but would you rather see a flop like 44A. 77T. 47K rainbow. or monochrome boards. or draws to baby flushes? obv a flopped straight or OESD against passive would be nice, but passive doesnt pay you off enough, does it?


over all thanks. this is the first real vid i've watched, since you don't get much 5NL vids out there. but I feel like the last 2 weeks my game has really improved and I've moved from being a break even player to being a winning player... at least in this short term.... but really, i can see improvements to my game and i have more of an understanding to WHY i'm doing certain things. thanks 2p2, and all the players that share their experience and knowledge so freely.

Figured it was that, I've got the mac equivalent to what you recommended (perian) and it still doesn't work. Asked a techie today (mac specialist) he said it's more likely that it was encoded (? sorry if this is the wrong word, he's talking a different language to me!) using the newest windows media software ( 9, 10 or 11) and there's nothing to read it properly on Macs yet.

Is this what you done Zeth? Cry me a river's video (http://archives1.twoplustwo.com/show...umber=11208034) works fine

thefrog: To be honest my technical expertise is pretty thin itself; the codec I used is probably pretty new, as it achieves a pretty sweet compression rate, but I don't really know much about it. If you put a gun to my head I would guess your techie friend is right. Split taught me the basics of recording videos, so he might know more about it than I do...

Yeah, since then I've mostly cut out the overlimping in EP/MP except for cases where it's a super loose/passive table and I have a strong speculative hand. And...

I still love overlimping in the back with really weak hands like seven-four suited and eight-seven offsuit. I loved it so much I did it at 25NL, too, but quickly realized it doesn't work there. It works at 5NL because the field is weaker and you're deep.

But a hand like queen-ten suited I now make a big iso-raise over limpers with most of the time, when I'm in the back. You can profitably overlimp it, but iso-raising is more profitable against most villains, since 5NL types will often limp-call with queen-eight and ten-nine and crap and you can actually (hilariously) flop top pair with queen-ten, get action and have the best hand.

Situation dependent as everything is in poker, but a flop with two fours or two sevens is obviously great. I can live with bottom two, but that has to be played a little more consciously (even at 5NL, if you flop bottom two and get heavy action, it will often be no good). Flopping a draw is nice in some spots for semi-bluffing--but that works a lot better in late position.

One reason you can profitably overlimp trash in LP is it's actually a little surprising how often the board will come J75r or such, and it's 4way, and you can still take the pot with a half pot sized bet, because the flop missed everybody.

I liked the video a lot.

Thank you for making the video. I watched it today and liked it a lot.