Dealing With Burnout Part 3: Switching to No Limit Hold’em
6/7/2006 7:36:06 PM
Finally, we get to the good stuff! Part 1 was all about recognizing burnout so you can do something about it, and Part 2 was “first aid” for an ailing game.
Part 3 is the NL ‘Phoenix,’ rising from the ashes of my emotionally bankrupt fixed limit game. Make no mistake, this worked for me. I’m back to enjoying poker and turning a nice profit at the same time.
Let’s get started.
First, let’s go over a few general considerations. We’re done with band-aids and psychology…
Now we’re going to use a method that I’ve tested thoroughly to build a winning strategy at your new game. Here’s the real secret:
You’ll be sitting in a game watching others play well (and badly, in some cases) and you’ll be eking out a small profit right away.
The method I present here is definitely not the most profitable way to play NL Hold’em, and by the end of the article, you’ll see why. This is a way to get familiar with a new game, so it probably isn’t the same method that a world-class player would use (since a pro wouldn’t be learning the game).
Related to this is the fact that as you learn a new game you should be striving to keep your variance as low as possible.
On a per-hand basis, NL poker is a high-variance animal, because you can wipe out your whole stack. I have chosen to ‘play it safe’ whenever possible by minimizing my possible losses.
As you learn a new game you should expect to get beat for a while (I call it paying tuition).
My method makes sure that the pendulum swings farther toward the ‘profit side’ of the arc than to the ‘loss side.’
For the purpose of learning a NL Hold’em cash game strategy, I advocate following the short stack system outlined in Getting Started in Hold’em (Miller) but with a number of adjustments.
You should have already read it, so you know what I’m talking about; if you aren’t reading the books I suggested in Part 2, you can expect to lose your money pretty fast.
This article won’t replace the books; it just organizes some complex concepts so we can accomplish our main objective: winning.
Miller was the first to put this system into a book, but he was by no means the first to use it.
The system requires you to buy in for a small portion of the maximum allowed, play very tightly (discard all but the strongest hands), and bet so aggressively that your whole stack is in play no later than the flop.
It sounds nuts, right? Well, it’s an elegant system that seems simple, but is actually very complex.
Believe me it works well. I’m going to provide one example and really discuss it thoroughly to illustrate how good this system really is.
If you think about it, NL Hold’em is a difficult game because your stack is at risk…primarily in the later betting rounds.
The pot’s bigger, the bets are bigger, the possible return if you catch your hand is bigger, and the penalty for a bad decision is bigger, too. You can safely assume your opponents are better than you are, so you’ll make more mistakes than they do, and the mistakes have the potential to cost you more.
Expert NL players love to play hands that can turn into monsters.
They play suited connectors hoping to make nut straights or flushes, or small pairs hoping to hit a set.
They get into the pot cheaply and then take your stack occasionally.
It’s risky to play against them because you don’t know whether the flop helps them.
How do you reduce the risk (and the variance)? You do it by simplifying the game. Miller advocates playing only big hands, for example, big pairs like KK, and making a substantial raise with them.
Like this:
You are in the cutoff seat with KK. The game is NL $25, where most of the players have between $20 and $30 at the table. You bought into the game with $6, and have paid blinds so you have $5.65 in your stack.
You may feel like a Munchkin among all those large stacks, but at least you can’t lose more than your small stack.
Two players limp in and the action reaches you. The system calls for a big raise so you bet $1.50.
The hand can play out in a number of different ways, so let’s look at all of them.
First, everybody may fold and you can collect 3.5 big blinds without having to fight a battle.
Why would people fold? They don’t know you have kings, but they do know that you like your hand a whole lot.
Let’s assume that the small blind had junk, and was folding no matter what. The big blind had a small pocket pair (44) and the limpers were holding speculative hands that could turn into monsters.
One had A-9 suited (looking for a flush) and the other had J-T suited (looking for a straight or flush).
The big blind folded for two reasons. First, there was no way be sure that one of the limpers wouldn’t re-raise and a small pair couldn’t stand that kind of pressure.
The other reason is that assuming a set of 4s would win the hand, the odds against a pair improving are about 8 to 1, which means that in order for the call to be profitable I would have to have $8 in my stack for each $1 required to call.
Since the most I could possibly lose if my KK gets chased down was $5.65 (my whole stack), the call can’t be correct.
The other players face the same problem; the math is different, but the unprofitable nature of the situation is the same.
They should fold their hands, but what happens if they don’t? What if they all call your raise? The pot will amount to $6.15 and you’ll only have $3.15 left to bet on the flop.
When I need to simulate a problem like this, I rely on a tool called Poker Stove. Use Google to find it and get a copy for yourself. Here are Poker Stove’s results of calculating your chances for victory in that situation:
1,086,008 games 0.032 secs 33,937,750 games/sec
Board:
Dead:
equity (%) win (%) tie (%)
Hand 1: 41.3711 % 41.33% 00.04% { KcKs } [Our Hero]
Hand 2: 17.2783 % 17.23% 00.04% { 4d4h } [Big Blind]
Hand 3: 23.8357 % 23.79% 00.04% { Ac9c } [Limper #1]
Hand 4: 17.5150 % 17.47% 00.04% { JhTh } [Limper #2]
This is a worst-case scenario, you have a 41% chance to win, you’re a clear favorite over any of the other hands individually, and as long as an ace doesn’t fall on the flop you should push the rest of your chips into the middle regardless of what anyone else does.
You might get beat but you have a chance to quadruple your stack.
I’d take that gamble every time it was presented to me.
All your money was wagered before you reached the late rounds.
The rest of them can battle it out, bluffing, semi-bluffing, and threatening each other, and make as large a side pot as they wish.
Your kings will stand a good chance to collect the main pot. Every time your opponents call your big raise, they are making a mistake unless they also have a very strong hand.
If they are playing speculative hands, they’ll never find a profitable opportunity to use them against you. Occasionally the opposition will beat you because you both have big hands and the hand resolves itself as a coin-flip. That’s fine, too, because you’re almost never a big underdog, and as long as your stack is small, you can’t lose a lot of money.
There will be times when one of your opponents will come to the conclusion that since your stack is small they can afford to play back against you.
But that’s a huge mistake unless they are slow playing a monster.
Expect to get clobbered if that’s the case.
That’s why you play a small stack in the first place, so your lessons are less painful.
Make a note about the player, reload, and get back into the game. If the others are paying attention, they’ll learn that when you raise you have a big hand. You may win all of your money back without having to show down a hand.
It’s imperative to learn how to play when there is a raise before the action gets to you, and to learn how to deal with a re-raise from a limper, or from someone who acts after you. Miller’s book will get you started, and your experience at the tables will continue your education.
Here’s a one-sentence capsule for each case.
Against a raise, play only the strongest hands and shove your stack in. Against a re-raise, play only the strongest hands and shove your stack in.
One of the beauties of playing a short stack is that your decisions are easy ones.
Fold or go all-in.
If you’ve been paying attention during the game, you’ll be able to guess what kinds of hands your opponent(s) have so the correct choice shouldn’t be too difficult to imagine.
If you never catch a big hand, the session is going to be pretty boring for you unless you use the time wisely. Watch the game; you’re there to learn, and the best way to do this is to watch the other players battle it out.
Pay your blinds and keep folding; put a couple of dollars back into your stack whenever it dips below 15-20 big blinds. When you finally catch something worth playing, be aggressive…but be satisfied if all you do is pick up a few limped bets or the blinds.
As you gain experience, you can try limping along rather than raising your powerhouse hands (to encourage more action). Your secret weapon will be the all-in bomb you’ll drop regardless of the flop (or you can flop the big set and really have some fun). If that sounds more dangerous than raising your big hands, it’s because it is.
As long as your stack is small, it won’t hurt too much when you get beat. Just reload and get back into the game.
Where I differ from the strict small stack strategy is in what happens after you successfully double or triple up. The ‘book’ says that you should leave the table, pocket your profits, and buy back in somewhere else for the small stack amount you’re most comfortable with.
If you do this, you’ll never really learn to play under conditions when your stack is as big as everyone else’s. Your profits will be limited to the size of your stack, after all, so in the long run you’ll want to play with a stack big enough to make a substantial profit.
When you have played enough sessions to satisfy yourself that the small stack system will eventually result in you having a normal-size stack, instead of leaving, why not just stay and play.
The important thing to remember is that if you started with a stack that was 25% the maximum buy-in, and have built it up to a 90% stack, the most you can lose at the table is the 25% that you started with.
Once you are playing with a normal stack, you’ll be using the techniques that you read about in the other books from the list I gave in Part 2. If you haven’t read them (and learned from them), you can expect that you’ll be back down to having the small stack pretty quickly.
The other players will now have the implied odds to chase you if you continue to play as if you had the short stack.
You’ll learn the wisdom of a statement that appears somewhere in every good book about NL Hold’em: “Never back top pair with your whole stack.” It’s true.
The statistics indicate that you’ll need to be able to beat a one pair hand (even if it’s aces) in order to make a profit at NL…so obviously you don’t want to be the guy holding top pair with a good kicker in a multi-way NL pot.
Your Kings won’t hold up nearly as often once your stack is big enough so that your opponents are correct to call your raises with their speculative hands.
Keep reading and keep practicing at the tables.
You’ll make at least a small profit by playing with a short stack, and you’ll only be risking your winnings when you have a normal stack (if you start out short).
It’s a great way to learn because your possible losses are minimized. Played perfectly, small stacks are boring, but keep at it. You’re in school now to learn how to beat a new game.
It was fun for me, and I’ll bet you will enjoy it, too. I used the same basic strategy when starting to play NL as well as when I moved up in stakes.
The “experts” say that it doesn’t work above the limit at which players are aware of what you’re doing. It hasn’t happened yet, but I’m beginning to think that the experts may be wrong.
Finally, get used to being hated. Good players despise playing against short stacks because they can’t use their weapons (hand reading skill, psychology, bluffs, semi-bluffs, etc.) against you. They like to prey on weak players who will limp, and your aggressive style will be blasting the weak players out of hands, leaving the good player with no odds to call.
Sometimes good players will get pretty vocal about you, your heritage, sexual preference, lack of courage, and anything else they can think of to make you leave the game.
They will try for revenge, especially if you are comfortable with staying around and playing after you’ve built a normal stack (which I advocate).
Remember that you are a target at that point; play smart and you stand a good chance of making a big score from a tilting opponent.
What’s better than that?
It might take a couple of thousand hands for you to get comfortable, but then you’ll notice that your bankroll has increased (you may be surprised by how much), the plays that your opponents are using make sense, and you’ll be comfortable shoving your chips into the center of the table.
Sure, you’ll get stacked plenty of times, but it will always be for a small amount. And you’ll double up more often than you’ll lose because of the strength of your starting hands.
I’ve gained two other benefits from my short stack system experiment.
First, I’ve been away from fixed limit games long enough so that I’m beginning to look forward to playing that game again…something I’m not sure I would have thought possible a couple of months ago.
And learning to play the short stacks has also taught me the way to defeat other short stack players.
I’ve presented a lot of material in parts 1-3, and I appreciate that you worked your way through it. Burnout is a serious problem, and it’s ended more than one poker career. If you burned out, don’t quit. Find a way to turn it around as I did. Take my ideas as a starting point, adapt them, and make them your own…
And then get back to loving the game we play.