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NewbSaibot United States. Dec 24 2013 04:26. Posts 4946

Last blog I talked about my epiphany that sets and flushes make you lots of money. I've been developing my own little system for playing Bovada Zone poker (their version of anonymous zoom) since I get a thrill out of all the hands I can play. I did well, grinded my $100 deposit up to about $700 playing NL25 and NL50 with a few donk shots at NL200 thrown in to round out at $1000. Part of my "system" (lol) involved only buying in for 50BB's to limit my exposure to variance. I know I know shorter stacks are supposed to increase variance, but I dont adapt my hand range to my stack size at 50BB's. I play it like 100BB's, so I dont really find myself in any variance heavy spots as a result of my stack size itself.

Anyway after examining my HEM stats I noticed I was missing tons of value with all those big drawing hands I cant play effectively for 50BB's.... OR WAS I? <surprised hamster>

Turns out I sorted my results wrong. I was only looking at "hands at showdown". Well no shit if 3 streets of betting take place flushes and sets are going to dominate the rankings. But not every hand you win goes to showdown. In fact I have one of those silly reverse profit graphs with positive redline and negative blue line. Most of my actual money is being derived from cbets, and lots of which end with me having some kind of pair.

So whats my point? These fish at bovada microstakes are so unconscionably bad that I feel I am forced to introduce this "variance limiter" by buying in shorter. They've already put the variance through the roof playing 40% vpip minimum, so if you buy in fullstacked well you might as well be buying in short because you're going to be getting a lot of money in the pot every time you have a hand. They make the most absurd nonsense plays that I just have no choice but to stack off repeatedly with a wide range of hands. "Whats that? You limp called utg and the flop is J95? You should totally check call there and then open ship the turn when an offsuit 3 hits. Good thing I'm playing 50BB's and can call with QJ now. Ah there it is, you have pocket 8's. Good shove" What happens here is I can make these calls much easier with a shorter stack, and the suckout odds are reduced for those times when they catch their miracles. I really dont find myself in a lot of draw heavy scenarios where I want a big stack. No, instead I am constantly battling it out for pairs, and I need to be able to see these hands to showdown since the fish dont adjust to your stacksize at all. They float without intent to bet, they chase draws on action killing boards, or against cards that hurt them if they hit, they turn every hand with showdown value into a bluff by raising where nothing worse could ever call. The whole thing is just pure chaos.

Now here comes the fun part; a big part of my strategy involves preying upon their emotions. What do I mean by that? Well fish are very emotional creatures at the table. A big part of what they do all involves their gut feeling. "I felt that ace coming on the river.... i was due for a flush... 7's have been hitting all night so I had to call". Every single thought process of theirs begins with some sort of emotional response to whats happening at that precise moment. So what I try to do is wrangle them together to get the desired result. A fish will never look at your cbet size and make some sort of decision upon the odds of whether or not it's worth it to call. They simply see a bet and if it scares them they fold, if it doesnt they call. For instance; most of my cbets are FULL POT. Thats right, I cbet basically 100% with any two cards for full pot, even on the most hideous of boards with no equity at all. Why? Because if they DONT have anything it will generally freeze them to the point that they go away entirely. I lose far too many pots "pricing fish in" with 3/4 pot bet to call down with K8s holding no draw or anything at all only to win with an 8 on the turn. I sometimes think fish are practically offended when you bet anything less than pot. It's like they call out of spite. Thats great and all for when you have a hand, ergo I value bet half pot every time. In these circumstances I find myself getting called on the flop and turn quite often only for the fish to finally give up on the river. Another advantage to bluffing full pot is you basically put someone in a push/fold position against your stack size. If I bet pot and someone jams, I can safely fold pretty much anything that doesnt smash. There's just no room left for them to bluff back at me. I still see tons of dumb bullshit where they had like pocket 6's so their shove was ridiculous, but technically they did have the best hand and I avoid getting felted. (Remember I can see all of this since Bovada lets you downloads everyone's holecards)

Anyway to wrap all this up, since the day I started playing full stacked again I've been on an instant downswing. I finally decided to go back to "what works" and immediately I am back up again. Fuck these stupid fucking donkeys and their call station strategies. You will NOT be winning 100BB a pop from me with your constant suckouts anymore. You want to play some dumb bullshit with a rigged RNG? 50BB's is all you get slut.

notes: No I dont believe in a rigged RNG. Yes I know everyone says play fullstacked. No I am not really whining about bad beats. All I know right now is when I buy in for 50BB's things get a lot easier, and I'm actually making money playing this way.

0 votes

bye now

Last edit: 24/12/2013 04:27

Trav94 Canada. Dec 24 2013 04:38. Posts 1787

Obviously do what works. Too many "regs" have set standards, that if they think everyone doesnt adhere to, it means you're terrible.

I can't see this working if you're playing vs mostly regs. I assume there are tons more fish on bovada then stars, and your logic for playing like this sounds like it would work, and so far so good I guess.

Last edit: 24/12/2013 04:42