Beware The Ides Of March Update

Hi Ed,

in your last post about online poker I accused you of being unhonest to us readers to promote stoxpoker with your unbelievable good stats. Now, I have to apologize. Maybe it was really some sort of “beginner’s” luck ;) Keep on posting on your online career. I love that stuff, people posting their charts and financial fortunes!

Hey!
When I used to play limit, I’d built my bankroll up the limits with help of online bonuses from the lowest microstakes up to $1/$2. There were times I only was able to keep playing for I had the bonus money. That was driving me crazy. But it was beautiful in the end to have enough to play at $2/$4 (enough money and probably enough skill in relation to my opponents) (anyway at that point I quit )
I remember staring at a limit table once, when I was just starting, and you know - $25 pots which was just a load of money to me… to win it just at one time… I was staring at that with amazement, not really thinking that in relatively short time I would be playing in such games.
What I miss is the comfort of playing at stakes which are significant but yet easily affordable.
Pawel

BTW Ed - maybe you wish to hide your profile name from the stats in the article?

nice one ed

what a drop and downfall you had at the start eh …but you stuck it out and came through at the end which is the most important thing…pat on the back*

so what you planning on doing just keep moving up and up? or are you comfortable and happy at a certain level?

Hi Ed,

I’d like to hear more about your experiences regarding multitabling. Reading that you are “6- and 7-tabling the $200NL” makes me wonder how you (or anybody else) can manage to follow the action properly.

Can you give us any advice? I.e. what you focus on; what you do NOT focus on; if you use notes (if so during play or off-line?); if you regularly analyze your opponents afterwards; if you use a HUD (which one and especially which stats); how long your sessions are; whether you take breaks; if/why you decide to leave a table early;… I could go on and on, but I leave it up to you to post what you think is important!

Thanks for sharing your experiences with us!
Greyzy

Oh,

and here’s a corresponding video to your headline: http://youtube.com/watch?v=1kG_CSfZNMk

Brings back the memories of the early 80’s when I was young…

Interesting but meaningless sample size.. post something after 200k please then we see how things look :p

Greyzy>”Reading that you are “6- and 7-tabling the $200NL” makes me wonder how you (or anybody else) can manage to follow the action properly.”

Simple. He does the exact same thing that people who 12-table are doing, only he just does less of it.

JJS,
I have always valued your posts, but this one was just…

… gorgeous!!!! Thanks to you I now know how to become a millionaire: just do the exact same thing as Bill Gates, only that I need to do less of it!

How much did you follow your own advice while doing all of this? i.e. Did you strictly adhere to your (excellent) no-limit starting hands series of posts you did earlier? Or did you do what i do and start limping in with funny hands like 68o in mid position cos they have a weird habit of taking pots (i casually play NL5)

Dear Ed,

Have you been playing a short stack strategy during this experiment? Also, do you adapt your strategy for multi-tabling so that it is easier to execute?

Hi Ed,

Perhaps I’m reading this wrong, but it seems like you’re walking along the edge of a cliff with your online bankroll here. You stated that you started off with $500 and 4-tabling $50NL. I know you’re a strong player but, as you learned in your 200NL sessions, Lady Luck can be quite vengeful at times. For that reason, I have a hard time with the idea that you’re buying into no-limit games for 1/10th of your bankroll. I know you can reload if you want, but I think the spirit of your experiment relies on you doing this without making any deposits, right?

Anyway, from your first chart it looks like you made about $1100 playing 50NL, but then you’re taking your $1600 bankroll and sitting 200NL? Maybe I’m too much of a nit but, if I’m reading this right, it seems like you’re living awfully dangerously here.

–TFGoose

Ed, First let me say that your entire website is as awesome as your books. I read “Getting Started in Hold’Em” in 2005 and “Small Stakes” in 2006 and I give them a lot of credit for helping me improve.

Now, more specifically to this topic: I myself was a live player, first in home games, then casinos, almost exclusively for my first 3 poker playing years (04-07). I first started playing online around Dec. 06, HATED it, and quit after a couple of months. Someone else convinced me to give it a try a few months later, and I warmed up to it. Don’t know why the change.

Like someone else posted earlier, I attempt to simulate the “live experience” as much as possible by only playing one table at a time. I know this is hurting my “winrate”, but I play more for fun than anything else. Also, like you, I am in the middle of a growing an “organic” bankroll experimentally. I started playing PS on the very smallest microlimits (I’m talking .02/.04 here!). My starting BR at end of Nov. was $12 and I’ve since improved it to almost $50 (I’m now playing at .05/.10). I think there’s something liberating out of being able to move up stakes and build a BR out of only winnings.

Anyway, just some kudos from a faithful reader. Keep it up!

Ed,

Thanks for the reply. I can certainly understand the need to maintain interest. I just wanted to make sure I didn’t have a seriously misguided view of what levels to play as a function of bankroll size. I’m really just starting my foray into the realm of cash games (I’m primarily a SNG and MTT player), and happen to be doing so with a starting bankroll of $500, so this article was particularly interesting to me. I’m a winning tournament player, but anyone I talk to tells me cash games are soooo much more sustainable and that I need to jump on board.

The main difference in my thought process is that tournaments afford you the opportunity to use a relatively small buy-in for a chance at a large payout. Once you put up that buy-in, the pressure is off. You can’t lose any more than that, so you just try to make +EV decisions and hope your luck holds out to the final table.

In cash games though, in order to make any kind of profit that means something to you, you pretty much have to risk an amount of money that ALSO means something to you. Case in point, I can play a $10 180-man SNG on Stars, and potentially win $520 for a few hours work. However, a few hours work on a $10NL cash game table would, at best, net me only 10 or 20 bucks in profit. To get a return of a few hundred dollars, I have to play $50 or $100NL cash games. The problem is, if I have a bad cash session at that level, I lose a hundred bucks or more. Whereas if I bust out of the tournament, I lose $10.

Granted, I know that there are going to be plenty of occasions where I win or lose “in-between amounts” at both tournaments and cash games. But the point is, the risk vs. reward comparison for the amount of time invested in each leaves me feeling more comfortable with tournaments. And yet, everyone says cash games are where the money is…

Sigh, anyway, this is the vice in which I find myself.

–TFGoose

When do we get another update on your internet results Ed?