Posted Mon Oct 31, 2005 9:38 am GMT by Pokerfarian
Guys,
I'll spare you the long story, but my regular weekly game has transformed for a cash game ($75 minimum buy in with a $10 max bet) to a $20 buy in for $100 in chips, top 4 chip leaders get paid.
To make some of the players happy, we maintain the $10 limit for the first half of the game, even though it is not money. The second half is No Limit.
The net result is that the first half of the game is effectively a low limit "No Fold 'em" game, with everybody hanging on to everything and drawing to anything.
You cannot get everyone to fold, unless there is a miracle, so bluffing and aggression are costly moves.
Very frustaiting to me to have my trips out drawn by a runner/runner flush, when I know I could have made him fold for cash or LARGE bet, or to have my aces cracked by the off suited 5/10 who was "curious" what the flop would look like.
This kind of poker is not my strong suit, and I don't want it to be. I play on-line and in live games, and this kind of play would cost me a fortune at a 3/6 table.
My first thought is to just fold nearly everything, and wait until the No Limit portion of the game to make a move.
Or, to only play premiums, always raising the max pre flop (still seemed like eveybody stayed in, but maybe that is just my perception).
Any advice on how I could/should play this section of the night AND maintain my skill set for "real" poker?
Thanks,
Bob
PS Yes, the reason for the change is "significant losses" by the same people who want this to be a No Fold 'em luck fest. A cynical person might say that they are removing the skilled players advantage, but I am forced to be much more gracious and accomodating.
I will admit that I have a little contempt for the No Fold 'em game, and I appologize if I have offended anyone.
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Posted Mon Oct 31, 2005 9:47 am GMT by zinn0
| Pokerfarian wrote: | | only play premiums, always raising the max pre flop |
that's the best advice I can give you.
Posted Mon Oct 31, 2005 9:47 am GMT by Dave B
I have played a little split limit in casinos. Blind 1/2, bet or raise from $2 to $10.
In my limited experience at these games, I think you should limp often if you can see a flop cheap and try and play pure pot odds post flop. 5-7 in a hand, bet the heck out of your nut draws. AK and the like are not worth much, still bet the heck out of AA KK, but realize that unless you hit a set, it is just a pair.
Posted Mon Oct 31, 2005 9:53 am GMT by Muck
That all sounds kind of strange. Normally I’d say don’t bother and just play somewhere else, but I’m guessing it’s easy pickings so worth the hassle.
What exactly is the deal with the betting limits? It’s a tourney, with a $20 buy-in, top 4 places get paid correct? You start with $100 worth of chips, it’s NL but the largest bet you can make is $10. How do you workout the half way point when it changes to full NL?
Posted Mon Oct 31, 2005 10:26 am GMT by Pokerfarian
Yea...I wish I could tell you how this all makes sense from a poker standpoint, but I cannot.
The basic idea behind the change was to remove the threat of significant losses from the game, but the current set up makes no sense to me.
This is your typical weekly game among friends, and we have been playing together for years--there is no walking away.
At the half way point, the $10 limit is removed, and it becomes no limit for the rest of the night.
To me, its like a gameshow where the points in the last round make the previous rounds pointless.
I just need to be able to play the first half without killing anyone, screaming or reinforcing bad poker skills.
Posted Wed Nov 16, 2005 3:15 pm GMT by mapes
I think that if you are not successful at the game than you should not play it, and wait for the NL section. I will say this if you learn to play the Limit game it will improve you NL game.
I have play alot of limit and preffer it over NL remember that Holdem is a seven card game not 3 or 4. Limit is a total different strategy and you may want to read up on it.
I have played the split limit games very often. I believe that you are playing the 1-10 scale i guess. If you like NL than you should bet the maximum at all times that way you will no where you stand. This is assuming that most of the time people are betting like 1 to 3 dollars. You basically should play the game as a 10 minumum hand. Use position to your advantage.
Posted Wed Nov 16, 2005 3:19 pm GMT by snoogins47
To get better at poker, you might want to stop arbitrarily deciding that your favorite form of poker is the only 'real' way to play. You also might want to rethink the 'eliminating the skilled players edge' thing, considering that it's patently false.
Posted Wed Nov 16, 2005 7:49 pm GMT by supafrey
| snoogins47 wrote: | | To get better at poker, you might want to stop arbitrarily deciding that your favorite form of poker is the only 'real' way to play. You also might want to rethink the 'eliminating the skilled players edge' thing, considering that it's patently false. |
explain the second part to me. I thought that there are certain moves that DO eliminate skill edges..
Posted Fri Nov 18, 2005 2:53 pm GMT by Pokerfarian
Guys,
My comments were not meant as a knock on limit poker. I prefer to play $3/$6 limit hold em to almost any other game.
I did not mean that limit poker requires less skill than no limit. I actually believe the opposite to some extent, but that is another post.
I do believe that if the stakes are meaningless, the skill level required to win will decrease.
What I was pointing out was that the removal of money from poker reduces the skills needed.
Play for pennies and everyone will see every river, and the skill set needed is reduced to nothing.
This $20 buy in for $100 in chips reduces the value of the $10 bet to $2 in actual money.
That is reduced even further by paying only the top 4 chip leaders-if you finish in 5th, they are worth nothing!
Poker has to have an element of risk. The greater the risk, the greater the skills needed (in theory, but not in practice!). This limit version of this game is virtually risk free to us financially, and everyone calls with anything, at least initially.
What is the skill I need to work on when everyone calls and draws at virtually everything?
thanks
Posted Fri Nov 18, 2005 3:01 pm GMT by tame_deuces
I think the point people are making is that in your initial post you made it sound like the game was hard to beat because everyone stays in with everything. When the simple hard facts of life is that such games should in all respects be easier to beat.
Yes, maybe at higher preset limits more people play from a more 'preset' rule than in a no foldem game. So generally you will have a easier time 1.) Reading hands and 2.) Making bluffs.
In no fold em game you just have to return to basics, make hands and valuebet the hell out of them and say 'well played' if anyone sucks out on you.
Posted Fri Nov 18, 2005 3:18 pm GMT by Pokerfarian
OK
Last week, I had A/K suited. I bet $10 2 callers
The flop was A 7 4 rainbow-I bet $10-2 callers
Turn was 10 I bet $10; same 2 callers
River was a 3 I bet $10, 1 fold; 1 raises $10
I just call (I know what is going to happen by now).
He shows trip threes.
This guy would have made those calls if the $10 bet was worth $10 in real money? If I had gone all in on the flop for all his chips? Heck, no and I hope to God you all know that too :D
But since he was way up in chips, and each $10 bet was at best only $2, then why not just play them?
This is what I mean by No Fold em!
If he had done this in our old $10=$10 game, I would have choked out my best, "nice hand" and thanked my lucky stars that I get to play with this guy every week--I want a new Harley, and that kind of play would get it for me most ricky tick.
So I'll ask: Specifically, how is it easier to for a skilled player to beat a group of people who will call any bet , draw at anything, at any time?
Beating one, no problem. Beating a whole school of them, not so easy. One of them will suck out more often than not.
Here is a great story along those lines. My girlfrend and her friends are just learning to play poker. One of the girls is already quite good, and beats them every time, bragging for days after. I told my girlfriend that there is a funny thing the other girls could do that would teach her a lesson. Every time the skilled player bet; everybody calls everytime all the way to the river no matter what.
It worked perfectly. She was able to beat most of the girls most of the hands, but somebody almost always sucked out and won with some ridiculous hand that they should have folded at the start!
Posted Fri Nov 18, 2005 4:10 pm GMT by suitedaces84
| tame_deuces wrote: | | Yes, maybe at higher preset limits more people play from a more 'preset' rule than in a no foldem game. So generally you will have a easier time 1.) Reading hands hands |
I don't think this is completely true. Yes, you will run into a lot of squirly hands at lower stakes, however the play is much more honest. A check raise almost always means "I have a monster" so, in that sense, it's much easier to read. In HU raised pots there will be a lot of BS. And determining whether an oppoent is full of it or not is very difficult.
Posted Fri Nov 18, 2005 4:12 pm GMT by twofotisx
First off if your talking about free money tables, then yes there is no reason to fold. I compare free money tables to fake casino programs. Your always going to take that shot for all of your money when you first start out just catch a lead. And then if you miss you restart.
I'm not taking credit for this I just forget who's it is..
"Watching play money tables to get better at real money tables is like watching bowling to get better at soccer."
Also the girl that was constantly beating them was probably doing so because she could constantly overbet the pot and take it down. Now trying to bluff where she has no draws would get her killed. It'd be like going all in on every hand. You just have to pick your good hands and jam the pot. Sure sometimes you'll get beaten out, but in the long run you'll profit.
Posted Fri Nov 18, 2005 4:28 pm GMT by tame_deuces
| suitedaces84 wrote: | | tame_deuces wrote: | | Yes, maybe at higher preset limits more people play from a more 'preset' rule than in a no foldem game. So generally you will have a easier time 1.) Reading hands hands |
I don't think this is completely true. Yes, you will run into a lot of squirly hands at lower stakes, however the play is much more honest. A check raise almost always means "I have a monster" so, in that sense, it's much easier to read. In HU raised pots there will be a lot of BS. And determining whether an oppoent is full of it or not is very difficult. |
Yeah, I generalized far too much. Sorry. 
I didn't mean to imply that people on higher limits are like open books. Ofcourse, as the players get more serious and the book players more common the number of tricky players grow. But still, you got your fair share of chapter 1 'Sklanskyists' (or something) with their tables strapped to the side of their screen (I'm sure they exist) too.
Posted Sat Nov 19, 2005 10:30 am GMT by snoogins47
| Pokerfarian wrote: | So I'll ask: Specifically, how is it easier to for a skilled player to beat a group of people who will call any bet , draw at anything, at any time?
Beating one, no problem. Beating a whole school of them, not so easy. One of them will suck out more often than not. |
Often, the money is going to the best hand, and the best DRAW. Drawing hands go way up in value in the huge multiway call-fests.
In truth though, the 'proper' play at a really loose game isn't light-years away from at a tighter game, it's just shifted. Hardly anybody folds, so do everything you can to exploit the fact that they always call, and tone down the bets/raises that require significant amounts of fold equity to be profitable. Value, value, value, value, value.
Posted Sat Nov 19, 2005 12:12 pm GMT by supafrey
Hrmsm... would it be enough to say "Take our word for it" pokerfarian, and try to figure out why/how to beat it on your own?
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