ITH Poker Forum

[Bullajami]

Been semi-chronicling my re-entry to serious online poker by my questions in the limit section. I have started with some easily identifiable leaks in my pre-flop game and have also had some negative variance from out of the gate.

Interestingly I had a very good session earlier today and I found something odd - that I was reacting much more strongly to the good session than I was to my bad sessions. In my bad sessions I am able to focus on the play of the hand. After a 2 or 4 outter gets me I can take a deep breath and tell myself I had pot equity and the fish just got lucky. It happens. I can keep this up for 2 hours or so. If the beats don't stop coming after 2 hours I need to log off and find something relaxing to do.

Today, though, I was up from right out of the gate. On all 3 tables I was playing. I hit two draws and got paid. Aces held up. Raising the donk bet isolated the donk. Things were just working like I wanted for the first 20 minutes. Then I started to get anxious. I started to think, "I should log out....I should log out and bank this win..." I kept playing through that for an hour, but it got to be too great. I was winning and started to play with scared money. I had to log out - despite the fact that the tables were still pretty good and providing opportunity.

My question then is this: How do I convert knowing I am being too results oriented into crushing that little voice inside my head that tells me to abandon good poker opportunities at a table because I have already won a little? How do I get my big logical cerebrum in charge of the tiny afraid lizard brain in my head?

[the_hawk]

Despite my occasional venturings into VRR (of which surely more soon) I seem to be increasingly able to let the 2-outers and runner-runners pass with barely a puff of the cheeks. It's perhaps easier to do this 8-10 tabling but even then, if you want to dwell on the horrific beats, you still can...

As regards results orientation and booking a win - I don't think you'll ever get rid of results orientation (I haven't) - the trick is to try and make it long-term results orientation rather than short term (if that's not an oxymoron ). Set yourself targets in terms of volume rather than anything else.

In any case, I would argue that stopping to book a win is probably one of the least harmful psychological afflictions in poker. Of course you are leaving some EV on the table but nonetheless, if you feel you don't want to play any more, then stopping is a pretty good idea. It is unlikely that you will play your best and quite possible that you'll give it back.

I am interested in what makes the mental clock reset after stopping, so that you can sit down at the next session and start all over again, which presumably you can. I also wonder how long the mental clock takes to reset. If it is a sufficiently short period, then taking a time-out for a few minutes and then returning to the table might be a solution. It might simply be a case of ending a session and starting a new one afresh immediately (perhaps on different tables, perhaps not - table quality arguably doesn't vary THAT much). I actually do the latter quite often - it's not necessarily great for volume to be stopping and starting too much, as getting 10 tables up and running can take perhaps 10-15 minutes or so - but I think it helps my mental state. It certainly breaks-up the periods of intense concentration, which can only help.

One further practical suggestion on sites that allow it is to use auto-rebuy back to your initial buyin and to do this on a very tight tolerance (for example, buyin for 25BBs and auto top-up whenever you drop even a BB or two below it). I should point out that I don't actually do this - I generally buyin for 30BB and auto-rebuy if I ever lose 10BB on any given table. As such I usually notice my auto-rebuys but you could eliminate this by having a tighter limit for topping-up. Of course, this won't help much for table sessions when you start winning right out of the gate, but the majority of the time you will be a few BB down on any given table at some stage. Nonetheless this, combined with not looking at your PT or HEM mid-session (something I also fail at ) will soon make you rather confused as to where exactly you are within the session - or at least introduce some doubt - which can only be a good thing.

[Piemaster]

Are you playing for high stakes (relative to what you used to play), about the same or lower?

It will be interesting to see what happens over the longer term. As you have only recently started playing again, it may just be that you wanted to lock in a win just to prove to yourself that you could still win. Once the 'novelty of winning' has worn off you may find it much easier to stick around.

[Bullajami]

Playing substantially lower than when I was a regular at the tables. The money to be won or lost is inconsequential to my personal finances. Its all about still being good enough to beat the tables for a decent rate.

[the_hawk]

Playing substantially lower than when I was a regular at the tables. The money to be won or lost is inconsequential to my personal finances. Its all about still being good enough to beat the tables for a decent rate.

In some perverse way that probably makes fear of losing (if not the need to lock in a win) perhaps worse. I too am playing at much lower stakes than previously, having meandered along at a low level of BR for the past year or so and doing little better than break-even. The thinking is very much "if I can't beat that then I might as well give up".

[Bullajami]

The thinking is very much "if I can't beat that then I might as well give up".

My thinking is more along the lines of "if I can beat that, then I'll look at other poker games that may be easier to beat." I think FRLH at $1/2 right now is quite tough. SSHE, written mostly for games where 6-8 players see the flop, has to be interpreted somewhat differently for the tables where its 3-4 seeing the flop. Fewer action junkies to batter, more thinking players. Just a couple of mistakes per 100 hands costs you all your profit. And you won't get it back with one or two flopped monsters.

I am satisfied, for the moment, that my play is both good enough to win and improving. I am reading voraciously - in part because the internet is so slow and unreliable here (and I work 12-14 hours per day) there are only a few hours per day I can play when my low volume sites have adequate traffic. I have re-read quite a few threads on here. (Most of the FRLH pearls are 3+ years old.) Hope to have all the rust picked out of my game (and maybe even improve it over my heyday) before I get home in a few weeks and my playing volume can increase.

Just under 5,000 hands is barely out of the gate, at this point. This old poker bull knows that much, so it'll be months before the results have any reliability.