Dennis´ Poker Blog

[P0kerM0nk]

Just out of interest, how much and what do you study @Dennis_ ? Not that I can help as no idea where the best sources are for sng's.

[FreedoM]

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@WuDu wrote:

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As long as you're not living in gypsy country in rural Romania where you're king of the hill with 200 Euro income per year.

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@WuDu  🤣 You actually need like 3.5k-4k (min wage) to survive in rural Romania and god forbid you get sick or something (danger zone), for a comfortable/chill living you need 6.5k-7.5k (maybe king of the hill) over this you can actually save money which definitely qualifies you as king of the hill. 🤣

@Dennis_ You need to think about this long term, poker is hard now and who knows how it will look in the future. At least in those random jobs you still get medical/pension, etc. You don't want to end up digging a hole for yourself and once your inside wonder how i got here. You know we do get old. Also life is what you make out of it, if you switch the fact you hate the job in your head with the fact that it must be done or see it as a step/level/wall to get over/trough to reach a better place you will not have such a hard time. I don't know where i heard this "You need to see yourself in your mind as a PRO not only in Poker but also in Life" so what does the PRO You deal with a Problem. For this you need full honesty with yourself. 

[Dennis__]

thanks everyone for the advice

@WuDu I would say that I expect my ROI to be higher than 5%, firstly because I have been doing a lot better than that on similar stakes in the past and secondly because there are enough crazy people overbet jamming with bottom pair and things like that.

@P0kerM0nk To be honest I have bearly been studying at all recently. I have marked a few hands for review with ICMIZER though.

As for long term plans, I have developed a great interest in languages and could see myself doing something in that direction. Maybe as an interpreter? Or maybe in the tourism industry? Just some ideas I had.

[Dennis__]

good session today despite a terrible start. I forget exactly where I started but I think I won 40€ again.

bankroll: 322€

bonuspoints: 1140

cashgameticket: 8.51€ with 125 flops to go

 

hand of the day:

Villain limps and I check back. He then overbets every street and I call him down

[WuDu]

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@Dennis__ wrote:

 

As for long term plans, I have developed a great interest in languages and could see myself doing something in that direction. Maybe as an interpreter? Or maybe in the tourism industry? Just some ideas I had.

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Interest in foreign languages? Check!

Working in exotic places? Check!

Working with people from all over the world? Check!

Interesting activities in a natural environment? Check!

Getting fit along the way? Check!

No boring office job? Check!

Lots of action? Check!

:Thumbsup:

[Dennis__]

absolute con session. Started so great but couldn't win anything the the last hour. Lost 2€ total.

[LeVsKaRa]

Hey @Dennis__ !

Why don't you try not looking at your results daily? Maybe this could help you to stay more focused on the right plays/decisions, don't know if bad results affect you. After all in the long run it doesn't matter if you had a small loss/profit on day X, or if you won/lost your first 2-3 games on day Y, but it seems to have an impact on you (for example you wrote in a post this month, that you ended your session early on after few bad games). 

[Groggy]

It seems like after your swingy run higher you have the mentality of trying to not lose which is going to cost you a lot of money long term. Day to day results are irrelevant if you're rolled for the games you're playing. You need to open yourself up to getting smashed every now and again in the short term to make more long term. A 5% roi at 4s is the same profit per game as 2% at 10s and 0.8% at 25s. At best 4's should be games you can autopilot on the side for ev while focusing on the bigger games. You're investing in your edge long term when you grind SnG's, so why bother about short term.

[Dennis__]

Sorry for being so ghastly but please - if one more person mentions or even indicates that I put too much emphasis on my daily results I will quit this blog. I know that they basically don't matter. This is meant to be a diary, it's the only way of somewhat tracking my results. And yes I have different emotions on winning days than I have on losing days.

Ok, sorry for being rude but this has to be said.

 

@LeVsKaRa I have tried that, but I don't like it. One of the problems is that I am still aware of when I am getting wrecked, and not knowing how big the loss is bothers me more than knowing how much exactly has gone. I also don't like the surprise you get when finally looking at the roll. I prefer knowing what is going on.

 

@Groggy I'm afraid I couldn't quite understand what you mean with your first sentence. What do you mean with `trying not to lose´?

 

here is the issue I have with this short term/long term talk: I know fully well that one session on it's own doesn't matter. But eventually the short term should turn into the long term and in my experience things have barely ever gotten any better. Up to date I still don't have a winning history at 25s. I was just performing horribly right up to the point of surrender. That is the reason why I get a bit upset when I run so poorly on these baby stakes.

 

And yes, I had another losing session. -13€ after getting a fiver for rakeback.

[WuDu]

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@Dennis__ wrote:

@Groggy I'm afraid I couldn't quite understand what you mean with your first sentence. What do you mean with `trying not to lose´?

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Trying "not to lose" instead of "trying to win", basically playing too careful and risk averse due to the fear of losing more money than you already have.

 

[Groggy]

You've gone from one extreme to the other. Mass tabling every 25, 50 and 100 that would run for the promotion, to just grinding the €4  stake. I played with you a lot over the promotion, you're better than playing €4  as your max stake and you know it. Playing €4 as your max stake feels to me more like an attempt to limit how bad a losing session can be as opposed to an earnest attempt at grinding out profit. I would be very surprised if your current strategy would net you the most profit over time as opposed to grinding at least 10's and probably 25's as well. You won €5500 (excluding rakeback) over a 20k sample on party last year, at average stake €12.50 and stated you felt you ran very badly to only win that. I believe Party SnG's are significantly more shallow, so your edge should be larger on unibet. You say you don't have a winning history at 25's on here yet. I think you can attribute that to a combination of bad luck and mass tabling high volume during the SnG promo.

 

[Dennis__]

thanks @Groggy and @WuDu for the clarification.

Ok, first of all here is how I even ended up on 4s: 20s and 50s got really reggy on party towards the end of last year and I decided to move down to 5s and 10s. I did quite well in the beginning but then hit a losing month. I got really annoyed everytime I played and barely got any volume in, thereby failing to do well on the leaderboard. Because of that I decided to play here again, to get rid of the pressure of the leaderboard and to be able to quit sessions without ruining the rakeback. But obviously I haven't done very well here either. You say I am good enough for higher stakes, that is very encouraging but moving up will still have to wait until better results and after the court hearing. I don't personally think I am afraid of losing, at least not anymore than I would have been on the higher stakes.

 

[GR1ZZL3R]

It sounds to me as though you are a winning player, maybe just going through a bad patch as we all tend to do at times. Also it sounds like you may be in limbo with the background noise taking too much of your attention, are you in neutral hanging about to see what happens? Whatever the case I hope it turns out well and you can put it behind you and go onwards and upwards again. 👍 "Form's temporary, class is permanent." 😃

[Dennis__]

I tend to listen to the radio while playing. Doubt it takes too much attention away as I have been doing it all along but maybe.

As for today, lost 16€ at the SNG tables. No better at the cash tables. I had my first allin today since folding away about 250 BBs and lost it, sigh. It was nice to get the ticket to 3x it's value at the beginning but it's down to only 4€ now and still over 100 flops to go.:sad:

[Dennis__]

this was how my session went today

seriously though, this is getting ridiculous. I decided to quit my session after busting my first 8 games in silly fashion. First TT < AA, then AA < 77, then straight < set on the turn (he rivered the boat). Lost every other pair vs pair hand after that as well as most other allins. -40€ in the end. That is 10 stacks lost in a single hour. I don't think I even played 20 games.

 

This is worsening by the minute. All in all I am down between 100€ and 200€ in the past 2 months, albeit playing mainly 4€/5$ games and never higher than 10$ games. This is just so utterly ridiculous. I don't have any words for it.

[Dennis__]

Just blow this. Today's session started even worse than yesterday. Busted the first 10 games. First AK vs QQ and no hit. Then AA vs KK and K on the flop. Then I lose two stacks vs Aces...

Did what I always do and quit. The last couple games went a bit better so the loss is "only" 15€. Seriously though, I am running so unethically bad that it almost feels like a fraud. I am not going to play at all the next few days, there is no point in it if I always get annoyed and have to quit.

[FreedoM]

Don't let adversity get you down, keep grinding and stay out of your own head. 

https://www.youtube.com/c/AdamCarmichaelchannel

^ I think it's a mental problem and maybe one of the videos will give you an idea on how to fix it.

[Dennis__]

Thanks @FreedoM 

I decided to give it another go today because I really just want to grind out this downswing. Well, things started going wrong like every time. First big hand I 3bet with ATo and get called. I flop top two on a hhh board and the money goes in. BUST

then I get QQ vs KK and AK and bust again. Then the incredible happened and I lost 4 better pair vs pair spots in a row. What are the odds? To top it up I lost two worse pair vs pair spots after that. That is a total of 7 pair vs pair spots lost to begin the session. 

I was already playing my games down but convinced myself to finish a proper 3 hour session, filled the tables back up and endured the torture. The rest of the session was very rugged, many very tilting spots but there were some nicer hands in between as well.

I rejammed the 66 to a minraise with 30BB effective stacks. Villain finds the herocall and the rest is history. The 99 vs 88 was just a normal preflop allin.

 

Despite all this mysery I mysteriously managed to make a profit. 50€ to be precise, which is my biggest win in a day so far which is sad.

[fest_student]

Good luck Dennis! Keep up the good work. Hard work will pay off sooner or later

[Dennis__]

aged a decade today.

It's just totally unbelievable. I lose as a default. Doesn't matter if I have the live cards or the pair, the bigger or the smaller pair, the draw or the made hand, I lose in any case.

Lost exactly what I won yesterday. That's a negative record. Yay.

I am losing my ❤️♥️❤️ mind over this. I have been losing at ❤️♥️❤️ 4s for what feels like forever. I can't even take breaks to get over it because every time I return it just continues.

I mean, seriously, am I the least lucky player in the SNG pool or what is this?

At least I have been crushing these stakes in the past, an indicator that I should be doing fine. But if it doesn't turn around soon I am going to lose it completely. Please Unibet, stop screwing me over, this isn't funny

[WuDu]

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@Dennis__ wrote:

aged a decade today.

It's just totally unbelievable. I lose as a default. Doesn't matter if I have the live cards or the pair, the bigger or the smaller pair, the draw or the made hand, I lose in any case.

Lost exactly what I won yesterday. That's a negative record. Yay.

I am losing my ❤️♥️❤️ mind over this. I have been losing at ❤️♥️❤️ 4s for what feels like forever. I can't even take breaks to get over it because every time I return it just continues.

I mean, seriously, am I the least lucky player in the SNG pool or what is this?

At least I have been crushing these stakes in the past, an indicator that I should be doing fine. But if it doesn't turn around soon I am going to lose it completely. Please Unibet, stop screwing me over, this isn't funny

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@Dennis__ 

You sound more and more @Brocky-esque and we all know how he ended up!

You should definitely take a break. Maybe play some other forms of poker like HU e.g. From my own experience at the SNG4 level, if you cannot win over a 4 week sample size, in your case probably containing a few 1000 games, then there's something fundamentally wrong with your style! Maybe you're not good enough, maybe you picked up bad habits, maybe you play too many games, maybe you get distracted by outside influences etc. The only way to fix these fundamental issues is going back to the drawing board and assess your situation.

For instance, I had a phase here in early 2019 when I didn't really win much at the SNG4s. The opponents weren't playing well and I wasn't really challenged, however the results weren't there. I found out that my play was negatively affected by me watching TV during some sessions. I stopped doing that and my ROI went back up. Your ROI is a very dynamic stat describing your past performance, it's not something like a rating in Fifa.   

[Dennis__]

@WuDu there are a number of things to say. First of all I disagree partially with what was said in that video. I think it completely ignores the effect of variance. Just a quick example: Imagine you are simultaneously the best poker player in the world and the least lucky one. The wisest thing to do would be to continue playing in the exact same way even though that has only bagged you losses in the past. I will agree with you however that extended periods of bad results (in poker as well as in life in general) raise the likelihood that there is something from outside that prevents success and changes in one's attitude should be strongly considered. I made a small change today by cutting down to 10 tables. 

 

Anyway, to today's results. I won 55€ and 600 Bonuspoints, a new record once again. Can't really complain about today specifically but here are some rants anyway:

1st hand: Villain's only postflop betsize was the overbetjam, so the call is obvious.

2nd hand: I jam for 11bb and get called.

[Groggy]

If you intend to play Unibet SnG's a lot, it would be worth polishing your deeper stack ranges. For example ATo, 3betting sb vs hijack is not ever going to be a thing here at equilbirium.

When I looked at my friend's upswing poker ranges before for 100bb, ATo was a low frequency 3bet small blind vs button, 20% I think it was. Assuming I haven't completely misremembered then that would mean it would be played 0% small blind vs cut off, making 3betting it small blind vs hijack quite a large preflop mistake. If you are off here by 2 positions, from what is low frequency anyway then It is likely you are making a lot of other large preflop mistakes without realising. Error's like that are going to stack up if your ranges are off and it'll negatively impact your win rate and also increase the variance. From memory when we went for the SnG promo, your game was significantly better shallower than it was deep. I was guessing a lot on ICM as I've never studied it, so you would have had an edge over me in ICM spots. But I did super well over the promotional period and you had a disappointing time. I think a lot of my win rate over the field was from deeper stacked play,  exploits against the pool and from heads up. 

I am sure you are running bad, but really you should be decimating these games, and be profitable even when running bad, over any kind of semi reasonable sample.

[Dennis__]

you might be right @Groggy Any suggestions on how to polish up my preflop ranges?

today's session was awful like always. Lost 13€, could have been a lot more if I hadn't at least gotten lucky with my flips at the very end. This isn't leading anywhere so I will probably take @WuDu 's advice and take a break until after the court hearing.

I recorded half an hour's worth of playing today and sent it to a buddy for some feedback. We'll see what we'll get back there.

If anyone else would be willing to sacrifice half an hour of their time to have a look at my play I would be very grateful for that. PM me if interested.

 

I also requested my results. As of 17.03. I have played 1.283 SNGs and made 112€. That is about 2% ROI, however this has certainly worsened a bit by now.

It could very well still be enormous bad luck but I dare not conclude that before I haven't got a few outside opinions first.

[WuDu]

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@Dennis__ wrote:

 

I recorded half an hour's worth of playing today and sent it to a buddy for some feedback. We'll see what we'll get back there.

If anyone else would be willing to sacrifice half an hour of their time to have a look at my play I would be very grateful for that. PM me if interested.

 

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Why so complicated?  Upload it to youtube and imbed it here. You're changing your alias anyway.