HUD at Sealswithclubs works now on Headsup Tables!

Just a friendly reminder, that the HUD with Freepokerdatabase now works with HU tables!!

http://sourceforge.net/projects/fpdb/

Daily Update [1]: Recap Okt-Nov

Hi guys,

The last two months where kind of crazy. I don't know if you follow the bitcoin markets, but the price of one bitcoin went from 150$ to a high of 1200$ in those two months. That was pretty huge as I has heavily invested in this asset. So basically I had my best month ever in October and it wasn't even due to my poker playing...

Anyways, I am still playing HU bumhunting by playing on a total of 5 sites: Stars, Winning, Ipoker, Seals and a small one. I haven't played much in this time, but the results are quite okaish.

Stars, Ipoker, Winning, SiteX:

Sealswithclubs:

Aside from playing poker I am currently still attending my Master courses at the university. It is kinda stressful doing both at the same time, but I think that keeps me sane!!!

PS: I will try to update now more regularly!

Regards

Epic Graph. 1 Million USD in 1 Million Hands

This beautiful graph was posted by "ITSOVER9000" on 2+2.

The one million hands were played in 2 years on limits NL1000 to NL10000 on 6max tables.

"""""""""""

Originally Posted by Ruslanas

Very impressive!

How may tables? What's You're routine? Do You study or do anything other than Poker? Poker study routine?

""""""""

Originally Posted by ITSOVER9000

6-12 tables depending on the action. Routine is waking up around 11, usually grinding one session around 12-5. If im in the mood or stuck big i may play another session after dinner but mostly don't bother. Play 5-7 days a week.

Finished my degree in 2010 so been "full time" since then, although probably don't play many more hours than when i was studying.

My poker study routine involves looking at some stats in HEM2 from time to time and figuring out the mistakes my opponents are making and how i can exploit them while also trying to minimize my own exploitable tendencies. Used to be in a couple of study groups but they were never overly serious and invariably broke up. Do talk a bit of strategy with a couple of strong players every now and then but nothing indepth involving CREV or anything.

One can just salute this player!!!!

SOURCE: http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/54/poker-beats-brags-variance/x-nlhe-dead-1378114/

The Story of a degenerate Gambler, who wagered over 300 million USD playing online dice.

The average mid 20 year-old kid has never had more than 10.000$ to his name. But this is not about an average kid.

Today I'm gonna tell you about guy that won nearly 2.000.000$ playing online dice. How could he do this?

First off, this whole story plays in the world of bitcoins. A bitcoin is a digital currency that is independent from any state/government. It's decentralized. In 2009/2010 bitcoins were worth cents and less, but became widely known in the course of time. Today a bitcoin is worth between 130$ and 140$.
This guy, let's call him by his online nick: Nakowa, came to bitcoins early on and never sold them. So basically he turned an investment of a couple hundred dollars into a couple of millions. But how can a person be responsible with such amounts of money, if he did never work for this money at all? How could he be responsible? I think he can't. That's also why this story is interesting. The "luck" that he made the right investment in the right time, doesn't end here.

One day Nakowa decided to try his luck and deposited 1000BTC (130.000$) on a site called just-dice. This site alows you to set you own payout and win%. So you can basically choose how much to risk , win and the frequency of it. The house edge is 1% and the bankroll of the site is composed of investor deposits (everyone can invest). When he first came to the site, there were 50.000BTC invested (6,700,000$) with a maximum payoff at 1% (500BTC). So this guy tested his luck and quickly won about 9000 Bitcoins (1.2 Million$). The investors at the site quickly cried and said that he must be cheating and that the maximum payoff was to high at 1%.

While Nakowa continued his quest to kill the bank, some investors convinced the site owner to change the maximum payoff to 0,25%. When this changed to the lower amount, the guy had already won 16000 BTC (~2Million USD). He basically turned his 130000$ into 2,2mil$.

Now a Week later, the guy has still not stopped betting and lost 700000$ back.

While playing he wagered about 2,500.000 BTC. Thats about 337.500.000USD that he bet!!!!! Thats so sick, that is more than a small stock exchange. Thats also the reason this betting site, is now the biggest BTC betting site there is (amount wagered).

That is a screenshot of his bets. His style was to bet at 2x Payout at 49,5% frequency. He altered his betsize in a random pattern (half/quater/eight). His maxbet on this screenshot is 172BTC thats about 20.000$!!!!!!!

This screenshot shows the amount invested, the %profit, the number of total bets, the amount wagered and the absolute site profit. All numbers are BTC.

 The last graph shows his profit chart and the colors represent the standarddeviation and the likelyhood in %. (green sd from 1 to -1) (yellow sd from -1 to -2) (red sd -2 to -3)

I'll keep you posted, and i hope he loses all back, because I am and was invested and lost a small sum to this investment atm!!!

Regards

http://bitcoin.org/en/
http://bitcoinity.org/markets/mtgox/USD
https://just-dice.com/

Finally a functioning HUD at SealsWithClubs!

Finally the day has come that a good HUD is working on sealswithclubs!

The software is called Free Poker Database, FPBD, and it is a free community project, that started years ago. The program itself is lightweight with as little features as possible, so that it does not get bloated. It works on every Windows/Mac/Linux system and uses very little resources.

Wiki Page: http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/fpdb/index.php?title=Main_Page
Download Page: http://sourceforge.net/projects/fpdb/
Windows Install Instruction: http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/fpdb/index.php?title=Install_in_Windows

Features: 
-Works on multiple sites, including SealsWithClubs
-HUD for every player
-many stats
-many options to configure
-stats analysis tab
-create graph
-allinEV
-many more

HUD in action 1: normal

HUD in action 2: with general popup

HUD in action 3: with specific popup. (you can manoveur through all stats easily)

Profit graphs with many filter options:

To further increase your Expected value, take a look at my sealswithclubs rakeback deal:

http://easymoneygame.blogspot.com/2013/09/new-offer-for-players-on-sealswithclubs.html

Playing Poker using Bitcoins @ SealsWithClubs NEW

Four months ago I posted about a pokersite where you can play using only Bitcoins. No Banking, No Bullshit.

http://easymoneygame.blogspot.co.at/2013/04/playing-poker-using-bitcoins.html?utm_source=BP_recent&utm-medium=gadget&utm_campaign=bp_recent

Today, I am gonna post Updates regarding this site!

JACKPOT: Recently they introduced a Straight+Royal Flush Jackpot for all NLHE tables. So if you hit a straight flush you get the following payout:
Jackpot * Bigblindsize in % * 10%
E.g. 10000c * 10% * 10% = 100 Chips Payout for Straighflush on a 5/10 table with 10000 Jackpotsize
Royal flush has the following payout:
Jackpot * Bigblidsize in %
E.g 10000c * 4% = 400 Chips Payout for a Royalflush on a 2/4 table with 10000 Jackpotsize

 New VIP system Payouts:





Also a new lowest Cashgame Level got introduced: 0,25/0,5!

My sign up offer:
http://easymoneygame.blogspot.com/2013/09/new-offer-for-players-on-sealswithclubs.html


Regards,
JonathanS

New Offer for Players on SealsWithClubs!

Some months ago I ran a promotion on Seals, where I gave away  free money. It was obviously a huge success, atleast for you guys :D

Now my new offer for Sealswithclubs:
As there is no deposit bonus, I can offer:
Up to 10000 Krill: For every 1000 Krill you produce, you will get 5 Sealschips into your account.
Over 10000 Krill: For every 2500 Krill you produce, you will get 15 Sealschips into your account.

Totally free and automatically. Just sign up with my link after the 01.Sep.2013 and receive your free chips! For the rest of your tracked life!! This is ONTOP of the VIP system payouts and rakeback!

https://sealswithclubs.eu/aff.php?aff=337

Apparently you can still make 20bb/100 with online poker!

Hi guys,

the only thing i can say about month May is, that it went splendid. I invested quite some time into improving my game, especially my Headsup and ultrashorthanded game. The most headsup content i got, was from watching DCs WiltOnTilt videos. I particularly focused on improving my handreading skill on the later streets (turn and river). Atm i would say i play better than i ever did!!!

The increased skill also effected my preflop game. I am now way more dynamic compared to the static approach i used to use ( opening 85% of the button with a minraise). My exploitive strategy begins at the first money put into the pot and ends when i win the pot :p

The second thing i improved greatly this month was my mindset. I was very aware of my state of mind, and when it turned to the tilt side and i feared my edge could diminish, i instantly quit the session. This sounds very easy in theory, but once most people start tilting they dont realice this until it is way too late. I am safe to say, i played way than 1%  of all my 40k hands this month on tilt! That must be a record for me :D

Stats from Americas Cardroom:
8788 Hands, Limits: NL100 to NL400
$bb/100: 7,29
evbb/100: 19,78
790$ rake

 

Stats from Europe Networks:

28751 Hands, Limits NL50 to NL2000

$bb/100: 20,5

evbb/100: 21,1

6755$ rake

 

Stats from Bitcoin Poker:

about 10000 hands, Limits 5/10 to 20/40 (1Bitcoins = 1000 chips = 130$~)

won about 25 Bitcoins (3000$) but i am for sure way under ev :D

So long,

JonathanSnow

0.01 Bitcoins for Free for signing up @ Sealswithclubs (Bitcoin Poker)

 [THIS OFFER IS NO LONGER RELEVANT USE THIS PROMO INSTEAD: http://easymoneygame.blogspot.com/2013/09/new-offer-for-players-on-sealswithclubs.html ]

 

 

Hi guys,

I am starting a little promo for Sealswithclubs (here is my earlier blogentry about it: http://easymoneygame.blogspot.co.at/2013/04/playing-poker-using-bitcoins.html ).

Everyone that signs up using this Link: https://sealswithclubs.eu/aff.php?aff=337 will receive 10 Chips from me usually instant but at most 24hours. Thats about 0,01 Bitcoins totally for free.

The first 5 people already received their signup Bonus!!!!

Warm regards,
JonathanSnow

Playing Poker using Bitcoins @ SealsWithClubs

Hello guys,

Today i will present you a pokersite i fell in Love with:

Why is this site so special? Well, you can play online poker without any government or payment provider breathing down your neck. That means, that all players cann play there: Germans, Americans, Spanish players, Italians, and all the others that can't play due to government regulations.

What is Bitcoin, and why is it superior?

Simply, Bitcoin is internet money. It is a peer-to-peer decentralized crypto-currency.  There is no central issuer of bitcoins, instead a distributed algorithm runs the entire system.  Bitcoin is a giant world-wide network of computers working in unison. Bitcoin is both a payment processor and a currency. Volunteers called miners are paid to use computing power work to maintain a database of every bitcoin transaction known as the blockchain.  As of this writing on 4/23/2013 there are 11,071,750 bitcoins in existence at a current exchange rate of $145 per bitcoin. The blockchain.info stats page has many other Bitcoin metrics you may interested in, such as the current market capitalization or the total stored value in bitcoin, expressed in other currencies. (currently there is about $1.5B USD stored in the bitcoin system) In short, the internet has berthed a functioning government-less currency. More info on them --> 


How much do they charge in rake? 
New Lower Rake as of 4/9/13: No Limit and Pot Limit games rake 2.5% of the total pot size with a 0.01 BTC (10 chip) maximum. Limit games with a big blind less than 0.1 BTC have 2.5% rake and a 2BB cap. Limit games with a big blind of 0.1 BTC or more have 1% rake and a 0.007 BTC (7 chip) maximum. No rake is collected on hands that do not make it to the flop. The Table Starter and Krill rakeback system and our other promotions make the rake on SealsWithClubs extremely low vs. the industry standard.

Features of the Software:

• Multitabling
• Autorebuy
• Resizing
• Desctop and mobile Client
• Browserbased playing
• Many different games for ex: NlHe,PLO, FLHE,PLO/8 ect
• Many different SNGs
• Many Tournaments

Hourly Turbo Freerolls on the :00′s


Every hour on the hour is a 3-winner turbo tournament with a 50 chip prizepool. This is great for trying out the software before you deposit.

The “Big BTC” 40 BTC Guaranteed 6pm Every Sunday

The “Big BTC” is held every Sunday at 6pm EST and is the biggest bitcoin poker tournament of the week. The buyin is 1 BTC (1000 SC) and we guarantee a prize pool of at least 40 BTC (40,000 SC). Seals will increase this prize pool as their site grows.

VIP Program explained:

Krill Explanation


Find Krill every time you are dealt in to a raked hand. Each player dealt in to a raked hand will receive Krill based on the following calculation: √(rake) rounded up. The more Krill you collect, the higher Wave you achieve and thus higher rakeback % (see below). Krill is updated regularly. Krill is cumulative and never resets. Krill rakeback is paid weekly. Your rakeback is calculated at the highest wave achieved since the last krill rakeback payment. Prizes and other promotions may be removed from your MGR before calculating rakeback. The fixed krill prizes of 35, 50 and 100 chips are one time payments. The krill promotion is subject to change.

Krill Waves:

Wave 15	20,000,000 krill	50 % rake back	GrandMasterSeal
Wave 14	10,000,000 krill	48 % rake back
Wave 13	5,000,000 krill	45 % rake back	Sage Seal
Wave 12	2,000,000 krill	42 % rake back
Wave 11	1,000,000 krill	38 % rake back
Wave 10	500,000 krill	33 % rake back	Shrewd Seal
Wave 9	200,000 krill	27 % rake back
Wave 8	100,000 krill	19 % rake back	Cunning Seal
Wave 7	50,000 krill	11 % rake back
Wave 6	20,000 krill	5 % rake back
Wave 5	10,000 krill	2 % rake back	Tricky Seal
Wave 4	5,000 krill	tba
Wave 3	2,500 krill	100 chips	Daring Seal
Wave 2	1,250 krill	50 chips
Wave 1	500 krill	35 chips	FlounderingSeal

At 500 krill you become eligible for the 500 chip freeroll that runs every 50 hours.
At 5000 krill you become eligible for the 2000 chip freeroll that runs every 140 hours.
At 50000 krill you become eligible for the 10000 chip freeroll that runs every 530 hours.
  

And last but not least a Killer Feature:

Table Starter Rakeback

Help us start games and keep them going and we’ll help you with 50% rakeback. Two and three handed play at 9max tables of all cash games qualify, and your 50% “Table Starter” rakeback is paid weekly each Monday. The number of players sitting at the table doesn’t matter, only players dealt cards are considered. BONUS “THANK YOU” TO 6max CASH PLAYERS: all 6max tables are eligible for table starter rakeback as of Nov 19th 2012.

 BONUS OFFER:  If you sign up using my LINK you receive free Chips, if you play.

Guide to get 2 audiobooks for free and legal [The Mental game of poker and Phil Gordon's Little Green Book]

Hi guys,

I found out this usefull little trick to get this 2 wonderful Audiobooks totally for free, and not with some kind of torrent illegal shit, but with amazon!

Step 1: 

Visit this amazon.com page:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/audible/signup/display.html/ref=sa_menu_aud_mem

Step 2:

Click this button:

Step 3:

Use your standard amazon.com Account to login.

Step 4:

Now you should have 2 tokes in your audible.com account.

Step 5:

Choose 2 Audiobooks of your choice and use your Tokens to buy them. I recommend the following two:

 

Step 6:

After you have downloaded the books to your computer, you can now cancel all memberships.

Have fun with those two great books :)

Regards

[Pokertool] InsuredPlay: Bad Beat Insurance

What is a "Bad Beat Insurance"?

With such an insurance, whenever you are allin BEFORE the River, you get paid your equity share of the pot.

Sample Hand:

KK is all-in 80% equity on the flop to win the $100 pot
AQ calls and KK gets automatically insured for $20
Ace drops on the river and KK loses the hand
KK gets $100 in his account on InsuredPlay


 So what exactly happened here: We pushed allin on the Flop and got called by AQ. We have 80% Equity, which means we should statistically win 80 out of 100 such situations. Now that we insured the hand, only 2 things can happen.

Sit1: We win the pot. +100$ from the pot, but the inusrance premium is 20$ so we get 80$ effective.
Sit2: We lose the pot we get +100$ from insuredplay but the insurance premium is 20$ so 80$ effective.
(Sit3: may be a splitpot but it still ends with 80$ effective)

Why would someone use this insurance? 

Reasons for this might be:

• Lower variance, meaning lower effective swings. This leads to a looser bankrollmanagement. 
• Many people have trouble coping with suckouts, with Insuredplay you kinda get what you earned ;)
• Some people think pokersites might be rigged of they run bad all their life! haha

Reasons against the Insurance:

• You don't participate on your upswings (stupid reason tbh)
• The costs

Does it make sence for me to use this feature?

Do you play on another site than pokerstars?  ----> NO because it's the only supported site.
Do you play cap games? ----> NO because the fees are way to high to have any +EV anymore.
Do you play deep games or Omaha? --> yes definately, because the swings in allinEV are extremely sick, so with this you can lower the variance for a relatively low fee.

Fees

Fees are always a small percentage of the pot. The amount of fee you pay on InsuredPlay depends on the number of insured hands you played in the last 30 days.

Fee Level	Fee Percentage	Number of insured hands required
1	1.49%	0-50
2	0.99%	50-100
3	0.75%	100-200
4	0.49%	200-300
5	0.25%	300+

Supported Games

• No Limit Texas Hold’em
• Pot Limit Texas Hold’em
• No Limit Limit Omaha
• Pot Limit Limit Omaha

! Zoom Poker is supported! Capped No Limit games are supported

Crushing the limits all day long!

Hi guys,

just a quick heads up. I am playing much less poker, but atm I am running VERY VEERY good. Mostly heads up play tough.

Regards,
and good luck at the tables.

My 10th Royal Flush

Hello fellow Pokerplayers :)

Today I was grinding 12-16 tables as usual when suddenly:

My tenth Royal Flush:

(I play so low because I need some VPPs to keep my status on Americas Cardroom and there is a points race, where it doesn't really matter what stake you play, so that's why)
Todays graph:

Have a nice week guys!!!!

Finally, A Long-Awaited Upswing!

Happy new Year!!!!

After my well deserved Christmas break I started grinding again. There only was one problem: Lack of traffic. NL200+ on European daytime is nearly dead... So i decided while waiting for fish to join my 6max and HU tables to play some Turbo and Hyperturbo Sngs. I basically never played them seriously but now I tried to really beat them and also made some content:


http://www.husng.com/content/husngcom-presents-free-mersenneary-heads-up-poker-ebook

I started at the limit 22$ with turbo sngs and am now playing 22-55$ hypers and turbos. And i finally got my well-deserved upswing: 22$-55$  61 buyins up (Hyper: 500, Turbo 1500)

Regards,

JonathanSnow

Canceled Poker-tournament beat

As always background music: Yesterday i played the 50k guaranteed from the "Beast" promo (americascardroom). It's a 55$ tourney with a pretty good structure, 250bb start + slow blind increase. I ran pretty good and was the whole tournament in the top 25 chip stacks (1000 entrys). After five hours i noticed that the blinds did not increase anymore but i thought maybe it's just a temporary bug and nothing to worry about.

Suddenly a message appeared that the tourney is suspended for good and everyone will get minpayout + 79cents per 100 chips in the stack. WTF MAN. At this moment I was top 10 in chips with 3 times the average. Instead of the shot for $10k+ I got only ~$700. This sucked big time, because the field was incredibly soft and chipchops are very bad for bigstacks...

Everyone at the table flamed for a good half hour because everyone was pissed :D 

This month I only played on 5 days because on the 20th Dezember I got a big test at the university, but I cannot complain!!!!! $2000 without rakeback in 12k hands.

Best of luck at the tables,
Jonathan Snow

Americas Cardroom review

After playing there for 2 months now I will write a short review:

I was referred to this site by a good buddy of mine and he told me back then, that this site is full of very big whales, mostly US-players. So I checked out the ratings pokerscout ect. and looked at the promos the site offered.
At the first sight it really looked perfect but today i know that there are some downsides.

Positive:

• Vip system
• many fish
• cashouts arrive on time
• good support
• beast promo

Neutral:

• Pokertracker 4 works
• Software is okay
• good traffic on peak times

Negative:

• no Holdem Manager supported
• no preferred seating
• outside the peak hours the traffic NL200+ sucks
• cannot change screennames
• high BBJ contribution

Overall I have to rate it 6/10. The weak players make up many of the downsides but things like no preferred seating (that is PT4 and ACR's fault) suck biiiig time. I will continue to play there because i think you can grind out a good hourly but it is way from perfect!


Regards and good luck at the tables,
 Jonathan Snow


Screenshot of pokerroom with PT4 Hud:

How to make $5000+ every month as a mediocre player!

Some nice background-music while reading:

Poker is a game in which your score is money. In nearly every game, your score gets better as you evolve as a player. So, it sounds easy—get better to receive a better score and more money. Here comes the problem: poker isn't like that. The money part makes it so unlike every other game. It has more in common with competitive daytrading than with most community games like Risk or Monopoly or even other card games.

In other games, a player who constantly beats the high scores is considered best, but in poker we have two kinds of best. The skill component in which a player can be the best or in the money-making component. While there is definitely a correlation between a highly skilled poker player and his money-making ability, those two things don't always go hand-in-hand.In this blog post, I will show you why. ;)

I consider myself a mediocre player; not really bad, but also far from being very good or the best. My poker playing skill is good enough to beat the games, but I am certain that I don't have an edge against any of the regulars at my limits. Still, I manage to grind out a quite good winrate and, consequently, a good hourly. How do I manage to do that, and how can someone who is determined do it, too?

First of all, I am not saying that you shouldn't study poker, review your sessions, and analyze some hands in the poker forums—but that alone won't make you a winner in any game or get you a good hourly. In fact, I know many good poker players who are far better than me, but don't manage to match my hourly even though they are trying.


JonSnow's 5 Key Phrases:

• Money management
• Site management
• Self-evaluation
• Stakes management
• Mindset management

Every one of these things is crucially important!


How can you win in the long run if:

• your money managment is so bad that you sometimes go broke?
• the site you are playing on has no traffic, not much rakeback, terrible software, or or has too many skilled regulars?
• play limits above your skill level?
• you play tilted, tired, or drunk?
• you can't choose the right games because you over- or under-value your skill?

I strongly believe that if you can't manage all of them, then you will fail, even though you are a skilled player.

I will now show you a small framework that will maximize the money you can make with the poker skills that you have today.


Equipment:

Poker is a game of small edges, so playing only two or three tables will kill your hourly. So, we will need at least one 24" monitor. I prefer two of them, so you can have your tracker, skype, and FF on the second screen.

We need a tracking program to use a HUD on the tables and keep track of our sessions. A program like this also allows us to review hands extremely fast. There are two up-to-date programs on the market: PokerTracker 4 and HoldemManager2. I can't really say which one is better, because (as of this writing) both are buggy and use too much CPU power and RAM. PT4 supports more sites—especially the American friendly ones ;)
Because we will play 8-16 tables, we need enough RAM for the software and tracker; 6-8GB RAM should be fine, 4 GB is too little.The rest of the computer doesn't really matter.Just make sure you can plug in two monitors and consider using a SSD disk to boost the performance of the tracker.


To recap, here's what you need:

• 24" Monitor, preferably two of them
• 6-8 GB RAM
• Windows XP or better
• SSD (optional)
• Poker tracker software (PT4, HM2)

Note: Mac is really bad at supporting poker sites and poker-related software. So, if you want to save yourself some pains in the ass, go Windows ;)

Now that your poker computer is ready, find a site suited for you. Most of the readers here will be from the US, so I will list only US friendly poker rooms (but those are sometimes also the best ones for non-US players :P )


AmericasCardroom or True Poker (Winningnetwork):[I also play there]

• Great software; you can play unlimited tables
• PT3 and PT4 is supported (No HM2)
• Awesome rakeback (with some volume you will receive 60% and more—and it's dealt rake)
• SO MANY FISH! :)
• Good traffic on cash games and some very nice 50k guar. on the weekend
• Nice promotions
• Bad beat jackpot
• Cash-outs clear within 48 hours (huge plus)

LockPoker (Revolution):

• Lock Poker has extremely good promotions.
• With the RB(dealt method) and promos, you can easily earn 70% or me if you're a grinder.
• Software is ok
• Ok traffic
• Be very careful with lockpoker for now, because many players are waiting for ages to receive their cash-outs. I assume they have some liquidity problems. CAREFUL!

CarbonPoker (Merge):

• Ok software
• Good rakeback (35% flat + Promos and races)
• Many fish
• Warning: Cash-outs are currently very slow. This can be a bad sign
• Little traffic :(

And last: Bodog and Chico. DO NOT PLAY THERE; if you read the forums, you will see that those sites not only are very, very slowly processing cash-outs, there are also posts about getting scammed by the site, having to deal with frozen accounts, etc.

Hint: The ref links will provide the best rakeback for those site, but be aware that Lock and Carbon are experiencing very slow cashouts at this moment!

Americas Cardroom (VIP System) ((This one is better if you produce more than 200$ Rake a month))
Americas Cardroom (Flat Rakeback)
True Poker (Flat Rakeback)
Lock Poker (VIP System)
Carbon Poker (Flat Rakeback)

I can really vouch for WinningNetwork, especially Americas Cardroom, because I trust them with my own funds. I can't recommend PokerStars or Full Tilt Poker for players below 400NL, because the average skill level of players on these sites is way higher than any other site on the net (ok, maybe ipoker is worse :P ). Your hourly will never be as high as on the other sites, because you can play higher with the same skill. :)

Now that we have the right setup and the poker site of our choice, we can move on to money management. In this matter, there are so many opinions floating around the forums, so I will just tell you what I think is best for me. I am a person that can only play my A game, or let's say B game, if I don't have to worry about a bad session ruining my bankroll. That's why i always keep at least 50 buy-ins for the games I play, ready on the site, or on an online wallet (mb,net). The only exception to this rule is when you find a game with a huge whale; you can join him with just 25 stacks.

So, what stakes do we play now? The highest stakes that our money management rule tells us we're rolled for? NO! Please, for God's sake, don't do that! As a winning player, you would always end up playing stakes you can't beat. You will just win money at lower limits, move up, then lose it to the better players and the cycle continues.

Here comes the self-evaluation! You will need the ability to evaluate your own skill compared to other regulars on a limit. It's not necessary to know how much bb/100 you are losing on average to a reg, but you most definitely must know if you lose or not. You can't learn this skill in one day, but you have to work on it. Eventually, you will know when and how much you will lose against regulars, and how big of a fish you need at the table so that the game is still profitable for you.

It is not a rare occasion that I play a 6-max $5/$10 game with four players who are better than me and a whale. I will play this game because I have position on this guy and his losses make up for the 2-3bb/100 I stand tolose to the regs.

In conclusion, if we only play games with fish, we don't have to seat-select so hardcore But we have to be very, very careful in selecting tables on limits higher than our usual!

Now that we covered the first four points, we have to look at the last one and maybe the second most important after game selection: Mindset management. If you have read the Dusty “Leatherass” Schmidt book "Treat your Poker like a Business," you will now read some approaches that really differ from his. He thinks it is the best to never deviate from the normal number of tables and limits. I, on the other hand, think that you most definitely should. Most players don't have a constant level of health (feeling good, etc.), but have a bad day every other day, or they feel tired. If you try to force yourself to play the same length of session, the same amount of tables, and the same stakes, I can tell you for sure that you will perform horribly.

I know that this is not the standard approach, but what I do is something I call "confidence grinding.” If we don't have a good day and don't feel like we can play our A-game, and I know everyone knows what i am talking about, we should just move down in stakes. Our winrate is higher but the hourly will go down. But at least it will stay positive—playing your normal stakes won't ensure that! We will win with a higher chance and at least our All-in EV will be very good. This way, we can start the next session with a confidence boost. I also move down in stakes if I don't run good for a longer period of time. I do this to renew my confidence, and then I start attacking those stakes again with new motivation.

If we stick to this approach, we can maximize our money won and avoid tilt induced by the feeling of getting owned because of low confidence.

CliffsNotes for the TL;DR Department:

• Skill alone won't make you money
• You need good equipment
• Select a good poker room to grind on (I grind on Americas Cardroom)
• Practice conservative money managment (50+ buy-ins)
• Don't play limits just because you are rolled for them
• Evaluate your skill and play only where you have an edge
• Don't play your normal limits if you don't feel like you can play your A-game
• Do all of the above to maximize the money you can make with the skill you already have.

I wish you good luck at the tables.
- JonathanSnow

Perceived Value in Poker

Hello poker-playing Redditors!

In this blog entry, I wanna talk about an issue I have spent many hours thinking about.. I just couldn't wrap my head around it: the fact is, poker is just one big session.

The questions I asked myself included:

- Why do people tilt when they drop more stacks than usual?
- Why is it that money won is perceived as less valuable than money lost?
- Why is it so hard for people to stop a session if they are down?
- Why do people feel like they "lost" money if they at one point in the session were up some stacks and then stopped the session breakeven?
- Why in God's name is it that so many people quit sessions just because they won a certain amount of money in a short time?

While some questions may have seemingly logical answers, I wasn't satisfied with the answers the forums and literature gave me. This bugged me until I learned about the "Prospect-Value Theory" while studying finance at University.

"The Prospect theory [...] helps explain how loss aversion, and an inability to ignore sunk costs, leads people to take actions that are not in their best interest. The sting of losing money, for example, often leads financial investors to pull money out of the stock market unwisely when prices dip."
Belsky and Gilovich (1999)

Just a heads up: sunk costs are past costs (losses) that can't be recovered. Let's take for example the concept of paying blinds, we are forced to pay them and after posting them, this money does NOT belong to us anymore, therefore they are sunk costs There is nothing you can do about sunk costs, so logically it would be wise to ignore them.
But here comes the catch: people are unable to ignore them. They always put those costs into their calculations. For example, people who invest in a stock that dropped in value since they bought it are more likely to hold on to that paper, just because they don't want to sell it and incur a loss. So they keep the stock and hope that it will rise above their reference point. Even if the expected value of keeping the stock is negative and the person knows that, his irrationality drives him to keep it―just because he values the chance of breaking even or better worth the likely loss.

What implications does this have for poker? I think you can define tilt as a situation where you take a certain action that you would not have taken if you thought rationally. For now, let's ignore the reasons for tilt. If tilt is not acting rationally, than clearly tilt equals irrationality. We should know better, but we don't listen to our self. Why is that?

Let's analyze the tilt induced by losing stacks in multiple bad beat situations in a short time. Jared Tendler (the mental coach and writer of the great book The Mental Game of Poker) thinks bad beat induced tilt occurs because we try to think rationally, but a part in our brain remembers every bad beat and suck-out and adds those situations to a stack of negative emotions. Because let's be honest: no one likes to lose money, especially to a donkey ;) . This stack of emotions will grow until tilt breaks out and, whether we're conscious of it or not, it blurs our clear thinking.. While I really like this way of thinking about bad beat induced tilt, I think there is more to it, mentally.

What does this prospect value theorem say about poker? The reference point of the theory marks a point we choose for ourselves. Values over this point have a different utility to us than the values lower than our reference point.

"Losses hurt more than gains satisfy; most empirical estimates conclude that losses are about twice as painful as gains are pleasurable." Hastie and Dawes (2001)

Let's assume this is right. We can conclude that while winnings above the reference point are perceived as half the "pleasure,” losses are perceived with full "pain."  This graphic displays this wonderfully:

 

What could be a reference point for a poker player? For example, if a player goes all-in preflop with Aces and his opponent flips over AKs, then we know that he has about 88% equity. We know he should lose about one time out of ten. But still, we set a reference point at winning the whole stack. The player expects to double up. In our minds, we claim the whole pot to ourselves.

Let's try to look on the math side of things.

Stacks: 100NL, with 100BB effective stacks

Reference point:              $200 (+$100)

Expected Value:               $175  (+$75) (200*0,875)

"Felt value real" :                  (If win:  Money won $100. If lost: Money lost $100) --> win counts half, loss full. Therefore: (100/2)*0,88+(-100)*0,12 = $32

"Felt value prospect theory": (If win, perceived:  Money won $0. If lost: Money lost $200) --> win counts half, loss full. Therefore: (0/2)*0,88+(-200)*0,12  = $-24

How can we interpret this? If we don't set a certain reference point, we would value this hand at + $32 , even though we just shipped all-in with AA. That's sick, but you can see how the higher perceived loss kicks in. In the second calculation, we set a reference point at $200. We expected to win. So if we do win, it doesn't add any happiness value—it just "is." On the other hand, if we lose, it has a huge impact. Even tough we only lose 12% of the time, this accounts for $24 lost.

It is obviously not such a big impact in real poker playing, because we don't recall every hand separately in our brain. But, we unconsciously set a reference point every time we look at our graph or our cashier. This value is what we have. We want more, not less!

So, basically, we can now say:
- Winning is good
- Losing is bad. Twice as bad.
- We unconsciously set reference points at marks that we have (if winning) or marks that we had (losing)
- We shouldn't do that if we want to become happy with poker

If we want to get better as players, we have to improve our mindset. As we just saw, this could be theoretically easy, but our mind tries very hard to make us unhappy! A solution to this is to accept certain realities of the game. And Prospect Theory is undoubtedly one of those realities.

I can only speak for myself, but after I saw the theory, the math behind it, and the implications it made, I thought about it, and then I tried to accept it. I really think this improved me as a player.

A big thanks to "www.reddit.com/user/CaptainLinger" for proofreading my blog post!!!!

Warm regards and good luck at the tables,
Jonathan Snow