Fear and Loathing at the Micros

I haven't played cash in a few months right now but my recommendations for 2NL are:

- Play Tight and positionally, Tighter than you think you have to, the tighter you play the easier your postflop will be for now.
- Value bet, when you hit TPTK+ you should be nearly potting it on every street.
- Respect the Baluga Theorem!!!!

Try and find a study group/poker buddy so someone can point out your mistakes. Maybe take a break from playing and rewatch some videos.

From the sounds of it you aren't ranging players the right way and you can't see the equity. Whatever is blocking this is something unique to you. I would suspect its ego but it could be something else but I highly doubt it. Ego is always at the root

I'm back at 2nl having been playing 10NL in December, becuase I realised I have literally no postflop ability, and all of my profit was coming from dead money on the flop, or the standard all in preflop set > overpair chance setups. That really starts to suck when you can't find enough 40/10 fish to pay you off with 2nd pair anymore.

My advice would be stop looking at your stack and graph - look at your decisions in showdown hands and your understanding of their ranges, especially on the Turn.

Drill it into yourself to always ask before any action: What's his range? What hands call that I beat? Do I want to take the dead money now or try and get more value on a later street?

Don't worry about your winrate yet, your goal should be to try and get into their heads and get comfortable owning their sould postflop.

When dealing with the 48/12's a preflop range assesment of "Wide" and a flop range assessment of "Pretty wide" is probably good enough by the way. As long as you are betting for value against a calling range that is "Very optimistic".

I hear a lot about play tight, bet for value, don't pay off. And it's certainly very important to learn patience and discipline.

But at some point you're going to need to learn to read hands. And the games's a lot more fun when you cam understand an opponents range and abuse it.

that last response is awesome and very true. I can admit my post flop skills need a ton of work.

At 2NL tho the players are sooo bad that like the OP said even with the nuts sometimes they call and check all the way to the river.

I am having very swingy sessions myself but am still managing to stay ahead. Play tight, use position, and definitely try to work on putting people on hands because at the higher levels thats a skill thats MANDATORY. Some may disagree but be very careful with cbets at 2NL they can cause chip spewage dont double barrel someone who will call you down with bottom pair hes not folding and your just spewing chips. cant bluff calling stations. cbet cautiously and dont spew chips. I also only 3bet very strong hands due to people at 2NL being so unwilling to fold. That majority of your profit from 3betting is taking down pots preflop. At 2NL the donks arent folding a lot of the time.

Play basic and nitty and be patient.

oh yeah also never again jump up to chase losses you got lucky this time but usually that ends VERY bad. stay disciplined instead when you have a losing session try to determine why. dont just jump up out of frusration or your gonna end up broke. BR management 101

Thanks so much for all the awesome comments - especially from Ron & Scott. With tonight's session I will:

1. Play a little tighter
2. c-bet in the right spots or against the right opponents, but less often then I was
3. Polarized my 3 betting range to QQ+ AKs, AK and 99-JJ IP only
4. Leave my ego on my mouse mat

OK feeling good about this session tonight :)

Also gonna play without a HUD tonight and work on ranges and pot odds... see what happens.

Bit fed up of looking at 55/4 3 bet pre and then show up with KK or AA....

Any thoughts?...