I disagree. I used to hate rebuys, but now I appreciate them on a limited basis. The best strategy in a rebuy is essentially to buy yourself into a big chip stack at the break. You shouldn’t be afraid to rebuy 5+ times or you’re giving up a lot of value overall, I think.
I have been playing for about 2 years and really only play sit n goes and tournaments. For the life of me I don’t see how anyone can win consistently at the money tables. I feel like I am playing against millionaires in those games - you can’t get anyone to fold to a better hand. I’ve had spells where I have won at the low limit money games but it always seems that I have had a more than average run of cards for it to happen. In s’n’gs and tourneys I can get a result without an extraordinary run of luck.
If you can’t get anyone to fold, then why play like you will? That’s the easiest game to beat.
Tell me more master.
If they’re always calling you down, why try to bluff them when you know it will fail? Instead, use that to your advantage. Push your good hands. Bet for value. Don’t throw away money trying to push them off a hand, just punish them for calling with crap by showing down with good hands.
Oh I’m not talking about bluffing, heaven forbid that would never work. I’m talking about the pocket AA that you bet all the way to the river and the caller raises you back and you know that he is playing 75 and the 6 just made his gutshot.
On those extremely rare instances where I play a rebuy (and frankly it’s usually because I misread the tourney list and register for it by mistake), I plan to commit 3-5 buy-ins. I find, however, that my money is better invested playing 3-5 freezeouts instead of one rebuy. The payouts are often juicier in the rebuys but my playing style works better for freezeouts.
Learn these phrases: “That’s poker” and “They’ll pay you off in the long run.” Pocket aces are going to win, what, 7-8 times out of ten against a single opponent. Which means they’re going to lose every 2-3 times. Poker is about making as many correct decisions as you can. It sucks when you make the correct decision three or four times in the same hand and still lose, but you still want to concentrate on making the right play all the same.
I’m curious as to what levels you’re playing. If you’re playing microlimits where it costs next to nothing to call down a crap draw to the river in hopes of hitting, then you’re gonna get a lot more players doing just that. Generally speaking as you move up in limits you’re goign to see fewer people playing with that sort of disregard.
I’ve always made decent money at microlimits, but you cannot use basic betting strategy. At a .05/.10 table, a raise to .30 with AA is ridiculous. Every crackhead at the table will call because it’s “only .30” You DO NOT want AA vs 78suited, pocket 66s, and K3 suited all at once. You want AA against AQ. You want AA against KJ. You have to go 8-10x the BB. You WILL get calls. If you aren’t, change tables…
It’s basically the same with KK and QQ, but you have to tread very lightly if an A hits the flop…you will get calls at 10x the BB with suited Ks and any A. Your monster hands will get cracked now and then, but when you have them, you have to punish the players who want to draw against you.
DO NOT ATTEMPT TO BLUFF THESE IDIOTS. They will call down the board with bottom pair. They will call down the board with a smaller pocket pair than every card on the board. Use this to your advantage. Like I said, these are weak, loose players. They will call call call call call with anything. If you hit second pair, lead out with a 1/2 to 2/3 pot sized bet. I don’t know how many pots I’ve won this week with second pair. There can be straight and flush draws, I’ll bet the flop, the turn, and the river, and get 3 calls, and win. I have no clue what these idiots are calling with, but you would think if they are on one of the draws, they would fold or reraise the river when it misses.
Once you put the hammer down on a couple of idiots, they will start to respect your moves…now, you can do basic, obvious bluffs(Ace on flop if you are last to act, or flush card hitting) and they might work.
I have a question for everyone: Do mostly-live-game players think any less of, or at all look down on, people who play almost entirely online? Like, if SenorBeef started this thread as someone who’s made a living playing live poker, would there be any more awe and/or respect, or something?
I’ve worded this awkwardly – I’m not trying to insinuate anything! I think that the people in this thread have been very respectful of, and suitably impressed by, SenorBeef (as am I). I’m just wondering if there’s any kind of rivalry or snobbery between live players and online players. Is the level of play considered to be higher either live or online? I guess a similar question would be is there any snobbery between live “friendly game” players and casino players?
(I’ve been playing Hold 'Em in live, $20 tournaments every week for the past 6 months; they’re friendly games with 10-20 players. I’ve been in the money a few times but am definitely still learning about poker, and have never played at a casino or online.)
In watching pretty much every poker show on TV for the last three years and having read Cardplayer for the last year, it seems to me there’s been a definite positive shift in the general attitude toward online players. It doesn’t hurt that Chris Moneymaker, Greg Raymer and Joe Hachem, the last three main event winners at the World Series of Poker, were primarily internet players. Not to mention the large number of big money winners in other WSOP and WPT events. There does still seem to be some snobbery from some pros but most of them seem to understand that it’s the internet players who are bringing vast sums of money to the game. Of course my experience is through the TV; those who actually play live in casinos may have a different story.
To half the poker playing populace, to be a “pro” at all basically means they’ve seen you on TV, playing tournaments. I’ve had people tell me “you’re not pro!” for exactly that reason. Which is just funny. If I make my income playing poker, is it not my profession? Does it not make me a professional?
In regards to online - there’s some snobbery. It used to be more - they’re “only” online players - but with online players dominating most of the major tournaments over the last few years that attitude is starting to shift. As a general rule, I’d regard players that are succesful online as more skillful than live opponents. At any given limit, the games online are a lot tougher than brick and mortar games. If you compared, say, the $30-$60 game at pokerstars.com to an average $30-$60 game in Vegas, the pokerstars.com game is by far tougher.
The biggest thing I had to deal with when moving to live tourneys was the amount of information you have to process, that you are just given when you play online.
Instead of being able to instantly calculate pot odds and read your opponents stack sizes, you have to keep track of all these things in your head. The first couple of tourneys were very overwhelming in that regard.
OK, here’s my chance to ask ?'s!
- Playing online means being able to have charts and tables and odd’s and ??? at your fingertips (or on paper taped all around the monitor for qucik reference).
Would that help? At least to get you in the ballpark with pot odds quickly so you could then make a further decision?
Also, I’m sure there is some software out there that will analyze things real-time and give you a statistical answer…
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I played a friendly tournament yesterday and the winners were all people who had to go all-in a few times. But no one used all-in at any other point in the game (when they had sizeable pots). What is the power of going all-in? You touched on this above, but is there anything else I can read on the matter?
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What tricks do you use to keep track of the money in the pot? I try, but in a fast game, I lose the exact amount. What about tips for calculating odds? I don’t have the quick math mind like you, it takes me a few to do things in my head, I need all the help I can get.
I guess I’m just trying to wrap my head around the fact that so much of this game is about math, and that at home I think I’d be able to have some tools to help me…but so would anyone else. I normally only play against friends, and those always seem like looooooose games. At the end of the night, it is always one of the guys who plays to the river every hand winning. I’ve been staying ahead by a bit and going home even or with taxi fare as extra, but not a lot to show otherwise.
I can give my experience with some tells - I think Sklansky? wrote that finger-nail biters were always nervous, aggresive players (along the lines of “I’ve got $5 in there! I’ve gotta see this through now.” I play against two and it has been true every game. I’ve been able to check-raise them everytime I’ve had a good hand and come out ahead. But I’ve never found an oreo cookie tell.
-T
Oh, also, do you see a survivorship bias in either live or online games? Meaning, there must be plenty of newbies out there, but how many stay with it? Is the game only supported by the money that these people bring in like some strange pyramid scheme? Are good players only trading the money they make from a constant supply of idiots?
-T
Knowing pot odds and stuff is sorting of like having a spell-checker. It helps the total novices, but it won’t make you Shakespeare. (Bad example considering some of his spelling choices, but you get the idea).
If you need a chart, you’re probably not a winning player except at the lowest levels.
It’s often correct to go all-in when you have so few chips that there’s really little room to play poker. If it costs half your stack to see the flop, you might as well go all-in now.
It’s also useful when you have a really good hand and want to get called. In that sense, it’s just the biggest bet you’re allowed to make. You’d bet more if you had it, but you don’t, so you’re just all-in!
There are lots of other situations where “all-in” is appropriate. For one, it greatly neutralizes any skill advantage an opponent might have, as his choices come down to call/fold, with no room to maneuver on his part.
Haven’t played much live, so I can’t help you here. The dealer sometimes announces how many players are in the pot, so if you’re in on the flop, you can just multiply that by the number of bets. From there, you should just keep track of the bets. It can be tough, especially in a fast and loose low-limit game where bets are flying left and right.
The most important odds calculation is outs. In loose games, you’ll almost always have odds to draw to 8+ outs. For everything less, either memorize or do the math.
Again, limited live play here. But Caro has the essential one nailed down: weak is strong, strong is weak. The guy who’s looking away, doesn’t notice it’s his turn (“Oh, it’s on me?”), etc. has a monster. The guy who boldly announces his raise and thumps his chips down on the felt is bluffing. The key exception is that anyone smart enough to know about this can use reverse psychology, acting strong when he is strong, to throw you off. But most players don’t know this. Another exception is players who are extremely weak, transparent, oblivious and incapable of hiding their emotions. You know, the guy who wonders why everyone folds whenever he hits a good hand. He’s using strong=strong as well, except he doesn’t know it.
There are some players who have money to throw around and keep playing on-line, even as they keep losing. But there’s a lot of turnover as well. Every day, some guy thinks he’s going to be the next Chris Moneymaker and plops down a few hundred, only to slowly dribble it away to the pros and the rake.
One thing I would be interested in is the turnover rate on-line versus live. Lots of live players keep playing because they delude themselves: I’m about even lifetime, maybe down a little. Or they remember the session they walked away up three racks, but not the dozen sessions they lost a rack or two. On-line is much tougher, because your bankroll is necessarily separate from your everyday expenses. If you put $500 into Party Poker, never withdraw, and your current balance is $280, you know you’ve lost $220. No room for self-delusion.
My own opinion is that a good part of it is math, and a good portion is playing the people. While something like Texas Calculatem will give you odds on your flush, do you really want to call an all in, even if you have a 19% chance of hitting your flush?
Unless someone raises pre-flop … right? That happens a lot in my weekly tournaments. Always pisses the rest of us off. 
If you’re getting 4 to 1 or better on your money, then you’d be making a mistake by folding.
You’re could be right. I guess what I meant was, is that you can’t do what the odds tell you to do, just because the percentage looks right. It’s math and people, not one or the other.