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Poker Video: Limit Hold'Em by PygmyHero (Micro/Small Stakes)

This is something I'm going to cover in a future episode where I hit some miscellaneous topics. For now I'll just say that I think it's much easier to realize what your image is and use it rather than to deliberately craft some other image.

Also, I agree with allstarrt - really, is anyone having trouble getting paid off in live games?

I think its just a personality thing too. I have been playing live poker since I was 19 and I've always been talkative at the table (which is really weird because I am quite shy in most other social settings). I think I just am confident at the poker table because I know I am a good player, and so that lets me relax and say whatever ridiculous stuff comes out of my mouth. I keep it friendly and never try to discuss actual poker stuff, but I can't shut up at the table.

Here are a few notes I thought of when watching:

Participating or buying out of time pots is just like chopping - you should always do it or never do it. I think you underestimated the effect for a tight player, you should almost NEVER pay time - think about the pot odds preflop

Suck my 3 time pots paid in AC DD. $65 in rake...mmmm funny.

Time Link to 00:00:46

Pygmy, love the intro ... I really appreciate that you were willing to share actual video and audio of yourself in them.

i pronounce it allstarrrrrt, i dislike your way of saying it. =P

I never knew his SN even had two r's in it.

Pygmy, love the intro ... I really appreciate that you were willing to share actual video and audio of yourself in them.

You know how we do.

I never knew his SN even had two r's in it.

I didn't either until I added him on Skype and failed due to misspelling.

First of all, really excited to see a live series!

Wow, how weird to play with a 3$ chip or even a 5$ chip in a 3/6 game. Talk about killing action. There's a reason why a 20/40 game isn't than much tougher than a 10/20 game live ;-)

There's also a reason why the LA cardrooms switched from $10/20 to $9/18, although I hear they've since gone to $8/16.

Apparently CT is really stupid that way. I cut my teeth on the $2/4 limit at Foxwoods. Yep, yellow $2 chips. Fortunately, it was $2/4, for crying out loud, so the game still played loose.

I've never played at Mohegan but it sounds like they're adopting FW's bad habits. I would go so far as to say that you should buy in in white yourself for $3/6, except that will attract a lot of even more -EV attention.

I think it's probably worth noting that as long as the casino returns 100% of the BBJ to the players, it can be neutral EV or even +EV depending on how you approach it.

Right -- typically it's more a problem because of variance than because of lost equity. People treat it as rake, but really it isn't because they might win a jackpot. But it would take several lifetimes for variance on the big jackpots to even out, so it's obviously tremendously high-variance.

It's not 100% ROI though, because (1) if you win the BBJ, unless you're a jackass, you're going to tip the dealer. Since you already tipped on all the pots that dropped the money going into the jackpot, in essence some dealer's also getting 3-5% (or whatever you tip) of your jackpot drop.

(2)At least in Tunica, I think they use that drop for a lot of things. It's called the "promotional pool", but even so I think the promotions they have in mind are things like freerolls, money-added tournaments, etc. But if you can't be around for those promotions, then you're subsidizing the people who can be. I suppose that could be a net win or net loss for you, depending on which of those extra events you play.

Time Link to 00:39:16

This point about objects of the game is so so so very important!

I was lucky that the first poker book I read was Gary Carson's Complete Book of Hold'em, and he stresses this point. Some people play bad cards because it's fun to draw out on good hands. Some people play as few hands as possible because they're there as a cheap way to get free coffee or drinks and spend their retirement in a climate-controlled environment.

Motivations differ greatly, and understanding your opponents' motivations the more you can adapt your strategy to achieve your goal.

well it is unethical from him to kill his own card he could have called a miss deal or got the extra card

The dealer botched this hand completely.

The standard procedure is: When one of the first two cards off the deck is exposed, it's a misdeal. The dealer stops pitching cards, brings in the cards, shuffles, and the hand starts again with the same button.

Pygmy is correct: It shouldn't depend on the honesty of BB to declare a misdeal here. The dealer should announce the misdeal as soon as he realizes the card was exposed. Of course, a misdeal could mean one fewer hand in the down, which could mean less in tips, so the dealer may have intentionally kept pitching.

It's hard to blame Pygmy, being new to B&M poker at the time of the anecdote, for not speaking up. He thought a replacement card was coming; by the time he realized it wasn't, action may have started. As it happened the woman shot an angle and got caught, so I don't have a lot of sympathy for her. I do have a little sympathy for MP2 playing at an informational disadvantage; hopefully it didn't change much in this hand.

But the correct reaction IMO is to immediately say, "That card flashed!" hopefully before the dealer even pitches you a single card, certainly before you've looked at your own hand. Now it's not dependent on the honesty of BB or the dealer.

Time Link to 00:10:12

I played at the Peppermill in Reno a few weeks ago, and the dealers kept returning pots to their respective winners with half dollar coins among other chips. I still tipped a full dollar when I won a pot, but I thought this was weird since I've never seen this before, and it looked like a lot of players were just tipping 50 cents.

Re: BBJ
One other point that's probably worth mentioning is that a person could view it as -EV in terms of the reporting requirements. The casino will give you a 1099G and having that show up on your tax return and just generally attracting attention to your gambling income may be undesirable.

The dealer botched this hand completely.

The standard procedure is: When one of the first two cards off the deck is exposed, it's a misdeal. The dealer stops pitching cards, brings in the cards, shuffles, and the hand starts again with the same button.

Pygmy is correct: It shouldn't depend on the honesty of BB to declare a misdeal here. The dealer should announce the misdeal as soon as he realizes the card was exposed. Of course, a misdeal could mean one fewer hand in the down, which could mean less in tips, so the dealer may have intentionally kept pitching.

It's hard to blame Pygmy, being new to B&M poker at the time of the anecdote, for not speaking up. He thought a replacement card was coming; by the time he realized it wasn't, action may have started. As it happened the woman shot an angle and got caught, so I don't have a lot of sympathy for her. I do have a little sympathy for MP2 playing at an informational disadvantage; hopefully it didn't change much in this hand.

But the correct reaction IMO is to immediately say, "That card flashed!" hopefully before the dealer even pitches you a single card, certainly before you've looked at your own hand. Now it's not dependent on the honesty of BB or the dealer.

Absolutely. I agree 100% with everything you said here.

I played at the Peppermill in Reno a few weeks ago, and the dealers kept returning pots to their respective winners with half dollar coins among other chips. I still tipped a full dollar when I won a pot, but I thought this was weird since I've never seen this before, and it looked like a lot of players were just tipping 50 cents.

Weird. Maybe they're just accustomed to a ton of the regulars chucking them a dollar chip and asking it to get chopped, so they do it to save time.

Finally I got to watch this! Good stuff, thanks. Never heard of some of this lol.

I have a question how to deal with friends a the table. Given there are so few tables runnig and so many DC members in town I guess there's a good chance I run into this dilemma. How do u deal with that?

What I don't want is to get into some high variance, fancy play battle that potentially can cost a ton. On the other hand it feels incorrect to "stay out of the way". Should I make clear to the other players at the table that we are friends so that they can take it into account? Try to get seats far from eachother?

What if my friend starts to tilt and spew money. Is it then customary to say somehing to try and "save" him, or should I just mind my own business (personally I would be grateful if someone said: "yo suhi, take a break", but my ego is not that big ).

"Friend" is also a relative term since many players I don't know much about beside their DC SN.