Cad's Mind

I have been holding off on my first post until I completed a full week of play, because I knew that depending upon what day I wrote this, it would have a different tone to it until I got some semblance of volume in.  I am now 5,250 hands into my journey and it has been quite a rush so far.  Although a bit of a rough initial start, that got turned around pretty quickly and I am now up over eight buy-ins.  Here's the graph so far:

 

Given the timing of my start to be at the end of one month, I decided that a good way to motivate myself into playing every day and progressing was to participate in June's Iron Man Challenge.  For those who have not participated, Iron Man requires that you generate X amount of FTPs every day for Y amount of days in a row within the month to be awarded a medal.  Given that I don't get a chance to start playing until the evening, and I only have until 11pm in my time zone to generate FTPs for the day, I am only gunning for Bronze this month, which is 50 FTPs a day.  I realize this is not a very large bar, but the key is not so much the amount per day as it is that I am playing daily.  Like a well-seasoned wok, the more regularly you use it, the better the result.

My sessions so far have been four-tabling with a lot of table selection.  One of the big things I noticed almost immediately different from my 2NL and 5NL experience is the amount of waiting to get into decent tables in the 25NL, and it is not a result of tables not being active.  On the contrary, there are so many 25NL 6-max tables full that for the first few sessions, I would be waiting anywhere from 15-20 minutes to sit down at any of the top 30 tables of 25NL (and by top I mean based on Players/Flop and Average Pot considerations).  After a couple sessions like that, I said to hell with it and started waitlisting four or five tables and then sitting at some mediocre tables.  

The second thing I learned about 25NL is that generally speaking, if a table has only a couple people sitting at a table for more than a minute or so, you just found a table of nits.  So far this has held true for eight straight tables.  If I sit at a 2/6 or 3/6 that hasn't just lost players leaving, the people I just sat down with are 14/10 or tighter.  This isn't so bad in that I am ok with raising them with a wide range and mucking if they play back at me, but with all the fish in 25NL I am certainly not looking to make that be my entire night.  Once a few waitlists pop up, I phase out the nitty tables and enjoy a salmon or two.

As you can see by the graph above, I have been on a sick rush, and riding it as much as I can.  I wish I could say it was all talent, but when your AA/KK/QQ/AK Frequency over the last 3000 hands is 2.9%, you are getting a pretty big set of training wheels.  My best run of was AA 9 times, KK 8 times, QQ 7 times, AKs 9 times, AKo 8 times, all in a 65 minute session of four-tabling.  I am actually a bit glad that I had an immediate drop in four buy-ins before this rush started.  I think there is a tendency for people to think that if they start right out the gate with a huge upswing that it has less to do with the cards and more to do with their ability to play, which results in over-confidence and a self-induced downswing.  By losing and then going on a downswing I feel like I get a better understanding that while there are plenty of fish at these tables, I need to be mindful of my play and keep looking at ways to play better and maximize the wins and minimize the losses rather than ride on the fact that fish are fish and do fishy things.  After reviewing my sessions, I know I could easily be up another three buy-ins because of leaks in my game with my big hands that didn't get paid off because I played them poorly..  And that will be my focus going forward; play daily, review daily, adjust daily.

Now that I have finished my first week and gotten my first real post of progress done, I will be posting more regularly with discussions of my progress and the things I am noticing while I play.  Tonight is my weekly homegame with friends, so I will have to jump into my session earlier in the day than normal if I want to get my points in.

Finally, after a ridiculous amount of waiting and harassing the IRS, my tax refund has come through and I can start playing 25NL.  It is a bit unfortunate I have had to wait almost four months since making the decision and starting to study MSNL, but at least I have the knowledge of my extended studies and watching on DC to help me put my best foot forward.  

As I originally said in my blog, I will be posting regularly here with my thoughts and progress while I play.  So, let's get this party started!

I had originally intended to write this tomorrow however some abdominal pains this morning led to an emergency room visit which revealed appendicitis and an emergency operation. So, since I am stuck in a hospital bed with a firewall blocking all ports except 80, now is as good a time as any to talk about why I have moved off PokerStars and onto FullTilt.

One aspect of serious poker playing that I believe does not get very much attention is the incentive for regulars to play at a particular site. For most places other than PokerStars, that is generally found through Rakeback. The idea behind rakeback is a great one; the player gets back a percentage of that pesky rake to account for the money leaving the table not in players’ accounts. Here’s the catch: in order to take advantage of rakeback, you have to do the following:

• Know that Rakeback exists
• Know that Rakeback exists BEFORE you sign up at a site that offers its affiliates the opportunity.

It is the second bullet that tends to get most people. Most casual, recreational players sign up for a site and play for a while before they’re serious enough to know what rakeback even is, let alone if the site they are playing on has it, or where to find an affiliate with a rakeback program. By the time they do, they have already signed up at their favorite site and have been playing and they are doomed. This type of system weeds out most folks from the benefits and leaves them cold and wondering what to do.

Enter the PokerStars VIP Rewards program. PokerStars bypasses the need for rewards to come through an affiliate. Anyone that signs up is entered in the program, generates points from their play, and uses those points to gain rewards. What confused me about the PokerStars system is in its means to counter the direct benefits of Rakeback. After playing on PokerStars for six months, I still did not see why serious players were playing on PokerStars without rakeback. Since I will be depositing my bankroll this month to move up to 25NL, I decided that it was necessary I find out if PokerStars was still the right place for me, so I started doing some research.

What I found made me understand the process whole lot more. You see, PokerStars has the option in their VIP Rewards program to use your Frequent Player Points to ‘buy’ cash bonuses. You spend the FPPs, then have to earn enough VPPs to clear the bonus. This system is similar to the deposit bonuses many sites have. Where the complexity begins is in the cash bonus amount. Each VIP level gets access to a better cash payout, with higher VPP requirements. Thus, when you reach the upper tiers of the VIP program, you are getting bonus options in the thousands rather than the tens or hundreds. When you do the math to compare the amount received in Rakeback and compare that to the amount of rake needed to clear the VPPs for your cash bonus, the system can clearly outstep the Rakeback programs by a very large margin depending upon what your VIP level is.

Then why is the title of this ‘So Long, PokerStars?’

It’s all in the details. In order for the PokerStars VIP Rewards program to outpace Rakeback, you need to be playing higher stakes and in the higher levels of the VIP program. To compare, the 27% rakeback FullTilt offers would not be out-stripped in 25NL until reaching PlatinumStar VIP, which is level 4 and requires quite a bit of rake going into the system. From my research, it seems that you really cannot outpace the 27% from FullTilt as a regular unless you are rolled for 50NL or higher, and that’s putting in a lot of hours a day to accomplish that.

Since I am playing 25NL and not at a point where I can really put in more than four hours a day to poker, it seems to me that the obvious choice is to say goodbye for now to PokerStars and setup shop at FullTilt. While I bide my time waiting on my tax refund (which is fueling my move up to 25NL), I have been playing 5NL Rush and turning a nice profit.

If you have any insights on the VIP program, rakeback, or just an opinion on why I am wrong, leave a comment. I welcome anyone who has more experience on the debate, and think this is a topic that new people can really benefit from getting more on.

I have played poker on and off for chips for a long time. So long ago, in fact, I can’t really remember when I started playing poker. I remember playing video poker on those crappy handhelds as a child, getting my first poker chip set, holding a weekly poker night in high school, but none of it was ever for money. It may have something to do with not having any, though. Anyway, about eight months ago a friend of mine sent me $5 on PokerStars to get me to play poker for money with him. I was a bit hesitant at first, because the idea of playing cards for money was foreign, and I did not want to lose my friend’s money. So I decided to do the first “logical” thing and that was to ignore it for about a month and play for play chips on FullTilt, so that I’d be “ready” to play with that $5.

After that month I decided I was ready to take on the online poker world and started playing $1.20 STT SNGs on PokerStars. I managed to play 23 SNGs before losing the $5. I was pretty excited about the results, so I deposited $20 and started playing more. Eventually after playing for a while I tried 0.01/0.02 cash games and promptly lost my bankroll. So I redeposited and went back to SNGs, eventually getting my bankroll high enough to handle the 5.50s.

In February I decided to give cash games another shot. I knew cash games have got a better profit potential, and I attributed my previous cash bombing to being inexperienced. So I hopped back into 0.01/0.02 and over the course of a week didn’t have a single profitable session. I just could not get any traction in any session, and my first reaction was that I was just a bad cash game player. Playing an SNG is very different from playing at a ring game; a lot of plays in an SNG would never be taken in cash because an SNG is all about increasing equity and climbing the payout structures. There is almost no reason to open limp pocket tens on the button in a cash game, but the same cannot be said about a Sit-N-Go. As a result, some plays do not translate well into cash games, and I attributed that to why I was playing so badly.

However, one day I decided that my bankroll was already in bad shape and that I was going to have to either have a very hot run or I was going to go too low to be properly rolled for anything, so I took a gamble at a single 25NL 6max table. All of a sudden, things clicked. Lines that I would take would actually hold up. Players were not floating two streets, hitting their flushes, and getting it in. I realized that while my game needed a lot of work, it was not simply because I was a bad cash game player, I was just playing stakes that did not have any idea how to play.

It was then that I decided to set aside my SNG and MTT play and take a serious stab at MSNL and eventually SSNL. In March I will be redepositing a healthy bankroll for the express purpose of becoming an MSNL Grinder. In the time between now and deposit time, I will be watching many DeucesCracked MSNL/SSNL videos and lurking the DC forums in order to be as prepared as possible. I have already cleaned through a few series and have my next video queued up.

This list is a few months out of date, however there are still plenty of gems to be found in there for those starting out. So far I have watched Baby Steps, From the Ground Up, and Real Life Micro NL-Grinder: Unlimited Texas Hold ‘Em and they’ve laid a fairly solid framework from which I will be building up. I still have about a month to go until I will be able to deposit to start the MSNL Grind, so I am taking this time to study and analyze so I have solid understanding of what I will be doing before I jump in.

One thing that has struck me while doing this is looking at the sheer volume of notes I have been taking. In high school and college, notes were not really my thing. I looked at the problem or theory, worked it out in my head, and moved on. However, the sheer amount of information that has to be absorbed, the context of hands and the aspects to consider, and all the facets of the game and metagame have forced me to switch gears to take extensive notes. I am starting to wonder how many pages my poker notebook will end up being by the time I sit back down at 25NL at the rate that I am going. As any professional player will tell you, you are never done learning poker, and I have a long, long way to go. No matter how much I study with DC vids, hand histories of others, and discussions on the forums, nothing will compare to when I sit down at the tables. I am sure I will make mistakes as everyone does. I just hope I spot and work to correct my larger leaks before they get too costly.

I still owe my friend that $5 after all.

For those of you who have either stumbled upon this corner of the Internet by accident or were linked to a source of bad literary works by coworkers, let me introduce myself. My name is Cadwallion/Cadmind, but you can call me Cad. I am a Game Developer turned Web Developer, and as the DC subscription and corresponding blog might suggest, I am also a poker player. I am going to assume if you are reading this, you are also a poker player. If I am mistaken in this regard, please email me to explain why you are reading a poker blog hosted by a poker training site and I would love to hear the story.

Before I started playing poker online I had another game that I played pretty extensively. It was called World of Warcraft—some of you may have heard of it. I had played for many years and one of the things that I did to keep myself continuously interested in the game was become part of a community by the name of WoW Radio, where I ran the website and held a weekly podcast by the name of WoW Things Considered. It let me have a place to express my thoughts on something I was spending a lot of time being involved in, and it let me think and discuss what was going on in the game.

Since leaving WoW Radio last year, I have not had the opportunity to get that outlet, and unfortunately for me I do not have local friends who share the same level of dedication in poker as I do. It was with these things in mind that I decided the best way to keep myself focused in poker and have a place to spew out my thoughts and opinions on what is going on with my game is to blog about it. Perhaps one day I will do a podcast about poker, but for now the blog will serve as my canvas to give updates on my journey, spew thoughts on the stakes, and hopefully impart something to others through my experiences. Perhaps something for those who are interested in moving to MSNL/SSNL, or those who are just interested in what it takes to get into the grind and why someone would want to be part of it. Or maybe this will just be a giant space of crap and bad beats that will result in a redeposit by the end of the month. Either way, the experience will certainly be interesting.