Problem: I Can't learn poker 623u4e

This is not a whine thread, whining doesn't solve anything.

I'm going to do more homework on poker this week than I have all year.

But in all honesty, I just can't grasp the concept of this game. I'll read a few pages from a book every now and then and while I can grasp individual facts and concepts, it would appear I have an extremely low reading retention rate at least for the topic of poker.

Some advice I get is outright contradictory to other pieces of advice I get. One guy was sweating me, I flopped flop" HUh?

One hand the other day I was letting someone nuts not that that should be surprising to anyone.

As soon as I moved up to 50nl I got hammered back if not two weeks worth of 8 hour days given my win rate which is like 6bb/100 at 25nl.

I gather people who attempt to coach me get extremely frustrated with me because I just m actually capable of crushing 25nl. Except for the worst of the worst players, it appears that most people have a much easier time learning this game than I do.

My friend says of all the people he's tried to teach poker too I am the worst poker player by far.

For example I had AQo raise had tipped him off to my given hand strength and essentially trapped me.

I got a friend who is a very good poker player, I would definitely say he's a full time professional to be exact. He's very upset that I'equity and when villains can continue in a hand and when they can not.

I was trying to appease him, I had the "No Bullshit 6-max" poker document pulled up while I only played a mere 2 tables, which is a very short book by BestPokerCoaching.com and was trying to the best of my ability to play according to that document (although there were concepts I missed and misread boards, and adjustments I failed to make today which lead me to playing a losing poker game as opposed to a winning poker game. It was making him frustrated that the document that was suppose to help me get a good start in my shot at 50nl was actually butchering the game because I failed to comprehend key concepts and advice in the document, at one point he said if I was there he would slap me if I pulled up the document one more time or referenced it as the sole reason why I made the play I did.

Not really sure what to do, friend says he's going to quiz me on Flopzilla and NoBullshit 6-max in a week and if I fail his tests he'll tell me best of luck but he no longer wants to remain friends with me.

I'tell you I still play like a beginner.

Over and over I'm getting the theme that you want to know "what" to do to be a winning player, but you shy away from "why" it's done. You'll probably need to be vigilant to ask deeper questions about poker for a while if you want to get out of this rut.

Poker is a thinking game which requires diligent study time, but your focus is off. Always be asking why something is recommended and not just what is recommended.

I hope your friend was joking about slapping you, but he's right that if your reason for doing something is that you were told (and nothing more), then that's not an intelligent, grown-up reason to do anything.


Anyway, your friend who said the AK called you because you were broadcasting your Villain put you on your hand.

Even still, AQo should be near the bottom of your bet size gives nothing away.

MMM - since he's using NoBs its likely that its 6max.

OP - have you won your way to 50nl from profits or are you depositing to play those stakes as the way that you talk it doesn't look like you have actually ground the bankroll up to play the highe stakes.

Originally Posted by Keith

MMM - since he's using NoBs its likely that its 6max.

OP - have you won your way to 50nl from profits or are you depositing to play those stakes as the way that you talk it doesn't look like you have actually ground the bankroll up to play the highe stakes.

My m making pennies on the hour.

Your study is massively ineffective & lazy.

It should be obvious from your post and thinking where it applies.

Originally Posted by JimmyS1985

friend says he's going to quiz me on Flopzilla and NoBullshit 6-max in a week and if I fail his tests he'll tell me best of luck but he no longer wants to remain friends with me.

I'd make it a point to avoid using the word "friend" to describe this person.
It sure sounds like he doesn't respect you.
It sounds like he's a jerk who bases his appreciation of your personality on what you have memorized, rather than how you approach your life goals.

I mean, hey, don't let some internet stranger pick your friends for you, either.


***
If you've grinded up your behind the game.

We can help you with all of these things, but I promise you now that it will not amount to you learning things like, "always trips." because there are no statements so simple that will actually make you a better player.

[IMG][/IMG]


As you can see I'm crushing 25nl and getting crushed in 50nl.

He had this guide I was suppose to follow from no bullshit 6-max by Bestpokercoaching.com but it made no adjustment to play styles and barely ever let me 3bet or 4bet. For example lets say I have initiative if I had 3bet because I followed a guide but it seemed to be leading me to play really badly at 50nl when I tried it.

I'IMO thinking about pots I lost when someone sweating me told me to make a play I otherwise would never have done.

I've allowed people to tell me how to play including that shitty guide from No BUllshit 6-max because he reinforces the belief that I am one of the worst poker players he's ever come across and virtually everyone he knows is a better poker player than me.

One hand where I lost a $100 pot yesterday, I 3bet with Flop comes 10JQ. Ordinarily I tread on boards with 3 broadways very lightly. I reference the guide on 3bet pots as the aggressor, it says

"Flop
• Same rules like in the single raised pot, with the only difference that you are getting
it all‐
in versus a bankroll.

Then when my friend reviews the hand he heavily criticizes that I went broke here, HIS GUIDE that he told me to follow if I wanted to win at 50nl.

Some tough love due here.

It really sounds to me like you want to be post some hands on this forum and outline your thought process.

You alsoneed to be aware of how shocking spot not worth tilting about.

Any advice you hear which doesn't prompt you to think about the villain and to make an educated guess at his ranges before and after he responds to your play is bad advice.

Any advice you hear which tells you how to play based solely on your own cards and the board is bad advice.

Your goal is not to beat the deck, it's to beat the other players at the table.

OK, Villain's ranges to evaluate these 3 choices. You should consider how his responses effect your EV and choose your play to maximize EV.

There are many times in poker when you go all-in every time you had the chance because the times you win, though infrequent, are worth so much $$ that they makes up for the frequent losses.

As an extreme example, let's say there is a pot of $95 OTT and somehow, fold to his $5 bet, you make exactly $0 in the long run.


Your goal is not to win hands, it's to make every decision in every hand a +EV decision. Furthermore, your goal is to always be trying to find a more +EV way to play every hand. Just because something is +EV doesn't mean that it is the most +EV thing you could have done.

Who here is crushing 50nl or higher? Doesn't sound like he's a bad player relative to most of us here.

I'll it I'face up.

Some advice I get is outright contradictory to other pieces of advice I get. One guy was sweating me, I flopped flop" HUh?

This is interesting. Neither of your poker pals here have given you good advice.

You should not "always" be doing anything with raise or something like that, then betting into him is an excellent idea.

Let me be clear... I'well but I've never crushed 25nl. But I can at least identify one problem you're having... you're paying too much respect to people who think they know what they're talking about.

At the risk of a minor derail, I just took the "donk bet" link and it tells me it's a "deliberately oversized or disproportionate bet made for strategic reasons, so named because it looks like a bet that might be made by a poor player".

I was under the impression that a post above, anyway.

I'll add this nugget...

When I board texture.

If you "always" do a thing in poker, then you're making exactly the same mistake as you did when you got fucked opening AQ x3.

Originally Posted by OngBonga

I'll add this nugget...

When I board texture.

If you "always" do a thing in poker, then you're making exactly the same mistake as you did when you got fucked opening AQ x3.

m notorious for in my skype groups but hopefully it hasn't come this way.

I agree with the level to 50nl then I'll be making for me what would seem like a solid income.

RIght now the only thing I'm working on atm.

Originally Posted by JimmyS1985

level to 50nl then I'll be making for me what would seem like a solid income.

Just so you are prepared, be aware that it is generally not the back down to 25NL... since stepping down to 25NL would be 1/2 the value per bb.


*As you have said yourself, if you can beat 50NL at a decent rate, you can earn a living income. This applies to everyone. So the step from 25NL up to 50NL is a bigger step than most others. There are actually pro players (meaning they earn their living playing poker) at 50NL. There are fewer recreational players (fish) in the player pool.

how closely did you read the intro for NoBS or specifically the "what i do is m here to make you a winner.........."


It isn't designed to get someone beating 25nl to crush 50nl, its designed to get losing players to start at 2nl an actually start winning by cutting out lots of their leaks. It plays against population trends rather than top of these basic skills to increase winrates or move up and beat higher stakes.

Originally Posted by JimmyS1985

I agree with the nuts, there really isn't any "Always do this" and "Never do this" in this game.

It seems you're missing the point somewhat. Even the stone cold check" pretty much every time you face that decision.

If you "always" do this or that, then you're playing a robotic face-up style of poker, which, while it might be profitable at flop is bad. You should be doing both.

I would say I probably "always" NLHE it happens so rarely that for the sake of this discussion, it's practically worthless to consider.

m notorious for in my skype groups but hopefully it hasn't come this way.

Oh, and this... noone here cares if you want to whine, so long as there's a point. Your OP is detailed and honest, you improve and is willing to hear brutal truths without crying about it.

Mostly just a lurker here, but in regards to "never nuts"

Saw this in a 5/10 live game I observed.

Three limps and the draw and it hit.

V2 for sure could have folded the back 4BB's

In my experience (13 years?) nobody can look to master poker in as short of time as you'd like. You can't be given a simple m sorry that your "friend" makes you feel inferior to his playing skills.

When I began playing poker I just couldn't grasp the concept right away but my older brother (Former Marine and built with the patience of steel) he patiently walked me through it answering all of (and there were a lot of questions) my questions until I was top in the game. I when algebra took me forever to grasp but once I "got it" I was tutoring people in my class so they could graduate. Wow! I type a lot.

Originally Posted by BananaStand

Mostly just a lurker here, but in regards to "never nuts"

Saw this in a 5/10 live game I observed.

Three limps and the draw and it hit.

V2 for sure could have folded the back 4BB's

He limped ace face up, this is never actually going to be folded.

I've seen a friend nfd. The board paired.

That was a fantastic NLHE is making a mistake.

We can river.

But not in this example. turn get sucked.

Originally Posted by OngBonga

He limped ace face up, this is never actually going to be folded..

I think you and I could probably have some very ionate debates on the differences between live and online poker. I realize that online, which is what this site is about, most people are at least somewhat balanced, and have ranges, etc. In live poker, that all goes out the window. I would bet my house, car, and 1.5 of my lungs that everybody has an ace here.

I didn't mention exact chop.

He's basically giving his opponents a free-fold.

Chopping is EV neutral. We have about a 20% chance of losing about 1000 dollars, so let's call that -200.

In order to overcome that -200, we need both V's to have a ridiculous two pair, or sets.

Chopping is almost never exactly 0 EV outside of tournament play.

The dead money from blinds.
This makes a chop slightly -EV

There can be more money that that in the pot, due to other players who bet/fold at some point.
Then, it would be (perhaps not slightly) +EV to chop.

I mean even if we accept that once every million hands, we're going to find ourself in a winrate because it happens once every million hands. This is a ridiculous derail.

I think it's a good point Ong that comes up probably every 10k hands or so. If I have the nut straight, I'll rip it in huge relative to the size of the pot (and sometimes for 200bb+ effective) and get snapped off every time.

Originally Posted by OngBonga

This is a ridiculous derail.

Sorry, I guess. Though the thread has been dead for 6 months.

The amount of m just not seeing it.

But we can agree to disagree I suppose. Folding the nuts is an extreme example, but I do think that there are lots of spots in live poker where "always" and "never" are totally appropriate words to use. And this is one of them. We're never winning more than 4BB's here, and we're sometimes losing a hell of a lot more.

Yeah that wasn't meant as a moan, I'spot, and it happens so rarely that our focus is better served on common spots.

I have the same problem. All the time I sit and try to learn the rules of poker I suck. I love your tips guys, thank you

Originally Posted by JimmyS1985

This is not a whine thread, whining doesn't solve anything.

I'm going to do more homework on poker this week than I have all year.

But in all honesty, I just can't grasp the concept of this game. I'll read a few pages from a book every now and then and while I can grasp individual facts and concepts, it would appear I have an extremely low reading retention rate at least for the topic of poker.

Some advice I get is outright contradictory to other pieces of advice I get. One guy was sweating me, I flopped flop" HUh?

One hand the other day I was letting someone nuts not that that should be surprising to anyone.

As soon as I moved up to 50nl I got hammered back if not two weeks worth of 8 hour days given my win rate which is like 6bb/100 at 25nl.

I gather people who attempt to coach me get extremely frustrated with me because I just m actually capable of crushing 25nl. Except for the worst of the worst players, it appears that most people have a much easier time learning this game than I do.

My friend says of all the people he's tried to teach poker too I am the worst poker player by far.

For example I had AQo raise had tipped him off to my given hand strength and essentially trapped me.

I got a friend who is a very good poker player, I would definitely say he's a full time professional to be exact. He's very upset that I'equity and when villains can continue in a hand and when they can not.

I was trying to appease him, I had the "No Bullshit 6-max" poker document pulled up while I only played a mere 2 tables, which is a very short book by BestPokerCoaching.com and was trying to the best of my ability to play according to that document (although there were concepts I missed and misread boards, and adjustments I failed to make today which lead me to playing a losing poker game as opposed to a winning poker game. It was making him frustrated that the document that was suppose to help me get a good start in my shot at 50nl was actually butchering the game because I failed to comprehend key concepts and advice in the document, at one point he said if I was there he would slap me if I pulled up the document one more time or referenced it as the sole reason why I made the play I did.

Not really sure what to do, friend says he's going to quiz me on Flopzilla and NoBullshit 6-max in a week and if I fail his tests he'll tell me best of luck but he no longer wants to remain friends with me.

I'tell you I still play like a beginner.

Hey! You better start to learn some rules in ultimate texas holdem for example

In first - start play with friends)

For anyone who still sucks at poker in 2020, watch LexVeldhuis on twitch (no need for live, can watch all his old videos). It's all free and you will learn everything. It's a different world of infinite knowledge right now. The only limitation is the content of your skull. Good luck.