Ace Filled Dreams-A Poker Blog

A family emergency...

2009-03-22T15:35:00.001-07:00

Sorry about the lack of updates but I have not had much time to play poker. You see about 12 days ago I woke up for work and my wife and I noticed my answering machine blinking. For anyone who lives away from their family you know this is seldom a good thing.

Unfortunately it was quite possibly the worst news we could have gotten. My wifes grandmother(whom she was very close) had passed away unexpectedly. That phone call set off a very amazing and chaotic chain of events that ended with me and my whole family traveling for 30 hours from Okinawa to Indianapolis Indiana.

We have made it through the hardest part of the trip and decided to go ahead and stay in the United States for 30 days. I am playing off and on but nothing serious. I have thought about a couple non-pokery posts that should be hitting the inter-web shortly.

well thats all for now...

Ace...

Oh the agony...

2009-03-11T19:36:00.001-07:00

Well after starting my day/night off pretty well last I ended up blanking 15 games in a row at levels between $3-$6. I ended my night after about two hours in when I decided that either the Stars RNG, or the poker gods were angry with me.

I am actually convinced the poker gods wrath was brought down upon me because during my session I looked up at the TV and there was a show depicting Dwarves(little people) playing basketball. I am sorry to say I giggled a little. This was obviously unforgivable to the poker gods as runner runner was the theme of the night.

Anyways I noticed that another blogger Donkey Thrasherhas been going through the same thing. So I guess its not the poker gods after all, but is in fact one of three options the ~~pokerstars doomswitch~~ random number generator has went haywire(unlikely), or I actually suck at this game(possible), last of all is just variance kicking me in the balls.

Whatever it was/is I was left longing for something that would make me laugh(no, not dwarves playing basketball... I learned my lesson). I did however find The Shower Project. I for one found it very amusing.

Hopefully I can dig myself out of the hole I dug last night, and come out to day back into the black/green.

Pressing Forward

2009-03-10T23:12:00.001-07:00

Well I broke even play a billion hands of LHE, and I broke even playing 150ish games of 18 man SnG's. So I was in a bit of a WTF do I do now kind of mood when I got to talking to EY and he sent me a video made by "lipofund" or something like that. Anyway the guy was talking about playing multi table SnG and explains a lot about the shove shove shove style of play that seems to be right for these. I know the guy made a ton of money playing this way so
he must be doing something right.

I decided after that I was going to make a decent effort at giving this style a try. So far I have played 77 games in total. playing just about anything turbo $12 and under. However, the $12 games are really just me taking a shot and going for a quick boost. My actual BR is right above $500 so as you can see below I am concentrating on the $3.25 and playing $6.50, and the $12's sporadically.

Playing this style is tough and I am having issues figuring out if a spot is correct to shove or not. I have ended up looking quite silly a few times already. I am seeing though that when I do make it to the FT I am usually there with a decent stack. I have suffered a massive amount of very painful bad beats the last couple of days, but I guess it probably comes with the territory.

I did cut down the amount of tables I am playing right now until i get more used to playing these in this style. I am also working on getting used to playing continual instead of in sets. I honestly prefer sets, but would have to play something like 20ish tables to be able to come close to volume I want to end up getting in.

All in all I like playing this style especially as I get more used to it and pass up situations that I would have taken just a couple of days ago. I also need to be careful not to turn down the aggression to much as I have noticed that I have been getting ran over the last few final tables. I think part of it has to do with the bad beats that I suffered over the last few days, but I am not sure.

Well thats all for now ttyl...

Second Guessed

2009-03-06T00:55:00.001-08:00

Well I kind of half quit playing LHE, and I am not sure how much if any LHE I am going to play. The problem is if I quit playing entirely I am basically giving up on making supernova this year. However, if I do continue playing ½ LHE enough to make supernova I ~~give up having a life~~ lose a lot of the enjoyment I have gotten in the past by playing poker.
Now I played 7500 hands of LHE and I pretty much broke even. I think in the end I was up $11 total. However, that was not what caused me to second guess what form, or how much I would play that particular form of poker. What caused to rethink my ultimate goals for this year poker is the enjoyment factor. I was not enjoying playing, and after about two days I went and played stupid games above my bankroll just to feel some excitement or fun with poker. In the end that is bad for me and I want to enjoy the time I play online poker, and if I can’t really there is no point.
So I plan on playing some LHE, but just recreationally, and I plan to concentrate on SnG/Mtt’s the latter I will only play when I have a good chunk of time to play. The SnG I am going to playing mainly 18 man games and currently I have been 9 tabling in sets. I would like to get to the point where I am 12 tabling continually, but I will have to get better first.

My rule basically is going to be that I will play anything I have 50-100 buy-ins for if I drop below 50 buy-ins I will move down to the previous level if I get to a 100 buy ins for the next level I will have to reevaluate my level of play and the level of play of my opponents at the next level and make a decision. For example I have read the difference in the level of play for the $6.50 and the $16.00 is quite dramatic and I might actually wait until I have 150-200 buy ins before I would even attempt to move up.

Currently I am playing the $6.50 18 manners, and don’t have a whole lot to report. I have only played 28 so far, and that just is not enough for me to talk about yet. I plan playing at least a hundred (72 more) by Saturday night in the states so I can try to get on the large orbit leader board on stars.

A pretty fun day...

2009-02-28T04:18:00.001-08:00

Well I woke up this morning with every intention of grinding out LHE hands until I had cleared the required number of hands for GoldStar VIP status. That is until my wife ~~threatened castration if we did not go somewhere~~ politely asked if we could go see something on this island that we had not seen yet.

After weighing my options I decided that my wife was right and the family could use some time away from the house. So off we went to see a giant hole in the ground. Actually it is a 1km long cave that ended up being really really cool. I had a lot of fun and did not even once think about poker while were out and about.

Below are some of the pictures we took from the cave.

The cave was actually part of a cultural park that we went through and had a good time.

After that we stumbled on a snake show that had the highly poisonous Habu, and King Cobra Snakes.

I even held one the vicious beasts...

The Test is over on to life and poker...

2009-02-26T19:30:00.001-08:00

Well I took my promotion test this last Tuesday, and to be honest I am not sure how I did. I figure if I get 1/4th of the questions that I determined ~~"I had absolutely no fucking idea what the answer was"~~ "I might get wrong". I will then probably make it. However if I did not get the 1/4th right then I will probably be testing for promotion again next year. So wish me luck and watch as I bite my fingernails until June when they release the results.

On to a quick life update. As most my readers know I am in the U.S. Air Force and am currently stationed in Japan. I applied to remain in Japan for an additional 4 years and had laid the odds at about 50/50 for it to be approved. Well we all know how I run at coin flips so my application to stay was denied.

Since it was denied 2009 is a year of complete uncertainty for me. First I will be waiting to see what overseas bases if any will have available for my career field( last cycle had one slot and about 1,000,000,000,000 applicants Good luck me - At least is is not a coin flip). Anyways that happens in may and if there slots that I want to compete for I will turn my preferences in Mid-May and will find out Mid June if I get to go to another overseas location. We are really rooting for Europe, but do not know have any idea if will be possible to get.

After that they will be announcing in late June whether or not I made the cut for promotion. Then in July If I did not get selected to go to an overseas base then I will be looking at the available assignments for in the Continental United States. I will then put my preferences in the system and will find out in August if I will be getting any of my preferences or if the Air Force is just going stick me where they want to stick me.

So anyway a lot of unknowns and a lot of decisions for me to make in the coming year regarding real life.

On to poker although I am just going to skim the surface for now as I will put in a end of month review in a couple days. With my test over and having some more free time I am going ot be grinding out LHE for awhile I am going to attempt to make it to goldstar by the 28th. We will see if I can do it, or if I fail miserably. Either way as long as I dont lose my roll I will be happy in the end.

Dooms Test Day is fast approaching

2009-02-17T00:54:00.001-08:00

Well I am now six days away from my promotion test. I am extremely nervous as life and quite possibly the worst case of man flu in the history of man kind has prevented me from studying as much as I like. So I am hoping to plan the next 6 days and however many hours cracking the books and reviewing things I do know I can only hope that i can do well enough to make my promotion this year.

Unfortunately I would say it is a coin flip at best... And we all know how well I run when it comes to coin flips.

Been spending any spare time I have working on getting ready for my last serious attempt at playing online poker.

The first thing I had to figure out was what my goal for 2009 was.

I decided to shoot for volume and Supernova status on Poker Stars. Overall if I make it to Supernova and make a small profit I will chalk up 2009 as successful.

Secondly, I had to decide what form/discipline of poker I would be focusing on.

I initially had thought I could multi-table 9-16 18 man SnG's at a time and try to grind out a small profit and VPP's. Unfortunately I quickly figured out that if I am to practice good Bankroll Management I would not be able to play enough games to even come close to getting supernova. Also I really think if I am going to play poker seriously through my life I do need to learn how to play ring games.

I decided to go ahead and play Limit Hold Em which I had stated in an earlier post. I know that I will have to multi-table probably 4-6 tables at first with an ultimate goal of playing 8-10 tables.

Third, Playing time

Considering that I work full time in the Air Force I don't have a ton of play time. That means I need to maximize the time I do have and play as efficiently as possible. I looked into AutoHotKey scripts and found several that I really liked. If your interested in using AutoHotKey I suggest you go over to www.overcards.com and check out their extensive library of AutoHotKey Scripts.

Anyways I was researching some things, and managed to find a program that put all the scripts in one convenient location so I spent he $25 and purchased table ninja. The main reason is the annoyance of reopening and taking seats sitting out on the next BB ect...

I also created my very own AutoHotKey Script that manages to open pokerstars, poker office, an AutoHotKey script that manages my table positions and sizes to ensure they are all stacked in the upper left corner and so various other items that i want opened while playing. For example my profit graph from the current session from poker office and the re-sizes and arranges everything exactly how I want it to be positioned.

As lazy as it sounds It will be nice to sit down DBL Click and then start play playing. I am hoping to be able to play 10 hours a week minimum.

Fourth, Improve and Learn

I know one of my biggest problems is I don't really spend the time improving my game like I should. So I was looking around the net and found a good site with some decent articles, and a forum to boot dedicated to limit hold em solely. So I am going to read the articles and after every session post my three biggest losing hands and my three biggest winning hands to be torn apart and such. I am also going to make a real effort at becoming a part of the community to learn some more. If your interested go to www.lowlimitholdem.com

Well this post has gotten long enough, and I have studying to do. Anyways I am excited over the possibilities of the next year. If this does not work out I wont quit playing online poker but I wont play seriously.

A fun weekend, and played some poker too!!!

2009-02-08T03:26:00.001-08:00

With my promotion test approaching at breakneck speed, and me studying to the point of exhaustion. It was not surprising for the test to be overtaking my thoughts. I thought about when I slept, showered, shaved, well you get the point.

I really was starting to worry i was going to end up looking like this.

Anyway, as the weekend drew near I decided I was going to take a break and enjoy myself.

So I started the fun Friday Night with a "camp fire" in my back yard and a few of my neighbors coming over to hang out. I ended up having a few drinks.

I then went and ~~bribed~~ purchased my wife a new cabinet for our dining room.

After shopping with the family, I decided to play some poker. I sat down and started playing some 18 man SnG. I managed to fit in 33 $3.40 games. Held onto a hefty ROI of 70% as well. Which I know I was running good, but with some of the beats I endured I have to admit I have a lot more respect for people that play SnG for a living as without a doubt they are the most brutal form of poke rin the case of variance.

I am still going to play limit like I said in the previous posts, but I am also going to play 18 man SnG's as well. The rules I am going to go by is 200 buy-ins and i will move up and if I drop down to 100 buy-ins at the level i am playing.

Nose to the grindstone, and looking into the future...

2009-01-26T02:29:00.001-08:00

Normally when you see any variation of the word "grind" in a poker blog it is talking about the monotonous playing of certain type of poker. I only wish LOL!... As I stated in the previous post my foremost thought and most important goal for 2009 is getting selected for promotion. Now I realize that most or possibly none of my ~~hundreds~~ ~~dozens~~ ten or so readers want to learn the method the United States Air Force chooses who it promotes. So I won't bore you with the painfully boring details.

So what have I been doing to achieve my first and foremost goal? Well on the week days I have been ~~staring aimlessly into space~~ trying to study 2-3 hours per night, and up to 9 hours on the weekends. I have taken a couple days off, but for the most part I have really been hitting the books and hope to make up for the average 27 point deficit I am going to start out with when I take my test on Feb 24th at 0800 in the morning.

For those that are ~~obsessed~~ curious enough to want to know I have set up a countdown on the right side of my blog.
This countdown displays 2 things.
1.)How much time I have left to cram as much ~~useless~~ insightful Air Force knowledge into my brain.
2.)How much time I have left until I can begin pursuing my poker goals for 2009.

Speaking of my poker goals for 2009. I would like to make the ~~surprise~~ rather expected announcement that I will be changing the format of poker I will be playing.

I am currently working out all the numbers but I think I am going to be playing LHE which will take a little getting used to again, but when I was playing it before I enjoyed it quite a lot. Also, you can earn a very decent amount of FPP's on stars. Which will assist me in my attempt to make "Supernova" status this year. I am going to play completely within the scope of good bankroll management.

So until 24 Feb I will be playing probably zero or close to zero online poker. Once I have taken my test ~~I will immediately go home and drink about 20 shots of vodka and pass out~~ I will probably star reading about basic/intermediate LHE advice, and play a table or two to get ym bearings and set up my computer exactly how I want it for playing pokes.

On March 1st I will begin multi-tabling LHE. I will ease into it a bit playing 3-4 at first and then 5-6 and eventually 7-8 tables at a time. My goal is to play about 12-15 hours a week on a normal or semi-predictable schedule. I plan to download and purchase a copy of of Hold 'Em Manager for this as well.

I will also only be playing games that I have 250BB-500BB for. I will move up to the next level when I hit 500bb for it, and move down to the previous level when I hit 250BB for the current level.

Well that's all for now.

I would like to thank everyone leaving me comments and those of you that have registered over at Tilted Dreams. I know I have not been there much lately and that traffic is very slow, but I will be back in March and hopefully the masses will follow.

I will also try to get time to add some new bloggers to my blog roll as well.

Reviewing 2008 and looking into 2009

2008-12-30T14:27:00.001-08:00

Well 2008 has been an up and down year for me on the poker front, but has been an continually upswing of a year on the life front. Which means I can't really complain. I seemed to have found the correct balance between life and poker.

I was thinking about my play and like many other bloggers I feel like my play and my bankroll have remained stagnant this year. I cut out alot of my play time, but also cut most if not all of my study time to learn the game. I am not sure what I am going to change about this aspect over 2009. I know that I am going to set aside a certain amount of time to look at my stats and such and see where I might be able to improve.

As for 2009 goals and plans... I am going to let the world know my life, and poker goals for 2009.

Since I now put life before poker I will start with those.

Get selected for promotion-
This one is especially important for me. Last year I felt like I did not have much of a chance, and decided not to study very hard for my "Promotion Fitness Exam". However, I did not expect the feeling of complete and utter disappointment in myself when the results came out and I had not made the cut.

So the first 6-10 weeks of 2009 is going to be focused on studying for this test. I am putting together a plan and a schedule. I have also decided to hang up FAIL posters to remind me ho wit feels to FAIL at getting promoted.

Lose 30 pounds-
~~Since I am a fat overeating bastard~~For some reason I managed to put on an extra 30 pounds this year. I have decided that I want to live a healthier life for myself and my family. Add to that the added mental benefit of being healthier and more active, and its a no brainer for me to change my lifestyle.

Next is my poker goals...

Achieve Supernova-
Seems like a cliche but I want to achieve supernova status on pokerstars this year. As stated above though the focus will not be on this until after the first 8-10 weeks. So during that time I plan on playing just enough to maintain my Silver Star Status and then after I take my promotion exam I can look into how many VPPs I have to earn each month after that to achieve SuperNova by the end of the year.

Make a Profit-
Seems pretty simple, but I t can be difficult. I plan on playing and using a similiar idea to Yorkshire Puddings 2009 plan. This means I plan to focus primarily on HU SnG to grind out a profit and earn FPP's. HU SnG's can fit into my life a lot easier then other forms of poker. Not only that but competition is one of the reasons I love poker, and you dont get more competitive the 1 vs 1.

Well hope everyon had a Merry Christmas, and has a drunken New year... See you across the felt....

Attacking the blogger?

2008-12-27T18:04:00.001-08:00

The other day I was reading Yorkshire Puddings blog. The post titled Preparing for 2009 really laid out a plan for PUD to move forward after having a very stationary year. I thought the post was well written, well thought out, and also a very honest reflection on himself as a player. I remember thinking at the time that it was a true showing what poker blogging is all about, and was a real mark for why people read our blogs.

I also was really intrigued with the math behind building a bankroll with HUSnG. So I wake this morning a couple days after the first post and PUD has posted again Keyboard Warriors The fact someone would personally attack a poker blogger like that is very disturbing. I mean what kind of person takes the time to tell you "Your insignificant, and you will never amount to anything."

Anyways I think most bloggers know that we are just a speck in the world of poker. Although I will make the statement that PUD is very optimistic with his expectations of 2009. I cant find any reason that he should be faulted, let alone berated for it.

So like the picture states PUD, Everyone Seize the moment...

HOLY WBCOOP ME BATMAN!!!

2008-12-19T18:18:00.001-08:00

That's right I made into the ME of the WBCOOP today playing the 8-Game qualifier earlier today. I started with very little expectations it was 7am on Saturday Morning here, and I really only knew the rules of a few of the 8 games.

RAZZ, Limit STUD, Stud High Low were my money makers while PLO, NLHE, and 2-7 triple draw were the games that kept costing me money. I ended up going out in 50th.

I really did enjoy the game though and might actually try some more mixed tourneys in the future.

I just had to add this it seems that I am listed number one for a poker search term on google.

but I am not as excited as you might think... What is the term you ask well see for yourself

poker "running bad"

In a weird mood.......

2008-12-10T02:42:00.001-08:00

With the official launch of Tilted Dreams I am in a bit of a strange mood. I am very excited as something that I have worked very hard on has come to fruition, but at the same time i can't share this excitement with a lot of the people that I consider friends on the internet.

Although I would like to thank those that have commented via MSN, and E-mail about the design and such. I am hoping within a few weeks to really get some good content going over there. My traffic should pick substantially since I just got plugged by Mark over on his blog.

I also should start getting some traffic from Fantasy Sports Live which I think will be the next big thing in the US. So I am happy to have Tilted Dreams to be considered the Home forum for them.

If you get a chance go visit them at the link below

Introducing.... Tilted Dreams.com

2008-12-08T14:26:00.001-08:00

About 6 months ago I quit as moderator of a forum that I had really enjoyed. I had a disagreement with the direction the forum was taking. Basically it went all businessy and such. So I figured I am relatively smart, and I have a small amount of disposable income so I paid the fees for three years worth of hosting and setup my own forum.

SO I am very happy to announce the launch of WWW.TILTEDDREAMS.COM a forum designed for the sole purpose of being a friendly place to go hang out with people of like interests. I still have a little work to do on the site, but for the most part it is operational and I would really like to see some friendly faces over there.

I will be adding a blogs section so please link up to TiltedDreams.com if oyu have a blog.

A big big week....

2008-12-04T04:45:00.001-08:00

Well i know its been a while since i posted a poker post, but grinding limit hold 'em all day long is boring and even more boring to write about. so i had managed to grind into a little profit and decided to try my hand at the $12 45 man/ $12 180 man SnG's on stars i am happy to say i have won several of the 45 man ones and one of the 180 manners(shown above) for a healthy profit of $1100....

WBCOOP TIME!!!!

2008-12-03T18:04:00.001-08:00

I am very excited about this years WBCOOP last years was fun but kind of watered down with people that don't really keep blogs. Looks like they will be a bit more stringent this year...

I have registered to play in the PokerStars World Blogger Championship of Online Poker!

This PokerStars tournament is a No Limit Texas Hold’em event exclusive to Bloggers.

Registration code: 096849

Life gets in the way sometimes....

2008-11-10T16:28:00.001-08:00

There our times in life where you have every intention of doing something a certain way. Then life gets in the way and refuses to budge.

That what has been going on with me lately. After starting off strong in volume at least my play time dwindled to almost nothing for the last two weeks of october and the first week of November.

I spent 1 week getting ready for my mom to visit me here in Japan, and since it had been 2 years or more since I had seen her we wanted everything to be just right. THe we had my mother here for two weeks and we were running around crazy doing all sorts of stuff. Then the last week was spent basically recovering from the visit.

Anyways last night was the first time I have really been able to put in a good session and managed to fit in 500 hands of 1/2 LHE. Bringing my total hands played to 5,747 hands 63BB which averages out to a win rate of 1.2BB/100. I was hoping for a win rate of 2.0, but I am definately finding leaks in my game that should increase my win rate.

Another decision I made is to open an account over at Two plus Two. Obviously the reasons for not joining for so long was because of the immature flaming gthat goes on, but now that I am playing Limit Hold 'Em I am having trouble finding another forum that I can discuss hands with at.

We will see how it goes from here but so far I have enjoyed playing LHE with the occasion tourney mixe din for fun.

Limit Hold Em Experiment - Week 1

2008-10-10T16:29:00.001-07:00

Well it was a bit of a roller coaster the first four days. I want to make sure I do regular updates of my progress so it is best I go ahead and cut the first week short and from here ono out this is when I will do my update. Also I had a few people comment about how hard it is to make a profit at the smaller limits. I have to agree to some extent. The unpredictable nature of your opponents at low levels of online Limit Hold Em certainly make it harder to determine when your opponent is holding a true hand.

However, this goes back to my last post. If you are "playing the person" are you really playing ABC poker. I don't think so. Again I think people our trying to "BEAT THE GAME", but at the lower levels all you have to do is "play the game". If I have AA and the flop brings an A but also makes a possible straight I am going to proceed with caution. I will bet but if I am played back at, and I am not 95% certain my hand is good I am going to check/call the rest the way keeping the pot small. It is easy enough to build a big pot at this level that the little money you may leave on the table can be made up for.

I recently started to reread HDouble's Blog. On it he had a quote from Bill Chen that kinda of opened my eyes a bit.

"When we sit down at a table, every hour we're essentially doing a coin toss for a rack of chips. Now if you're a skilled player you may have an overlay of half a stack (assuming 100 chips in a rack and 20 in a stack). So if you're a skilled $3-6 player, it's like flipping a coin and getting $120 if you win and losing $100 if you lose or if you're a 15-30 player it's $600 if you win, $500 if you lose. Now this is a pretty huge edge when compared to blackjack on a per-hand basis but we shouldn't be too surprised at all if we get on a bad streak and lose $3000. How easy is it to flip tails 6 times a row? It's bound to happen if you flip coins all the time -- now 10 or 15 in a row is a little unlucky but nothing too phenomenal."

This is when I started coming up with my ABC strategy to poker. I will try to make a full post on exactly what that ABC strategy is in the near future, but I am still working on it for now.

Sorry for the long winded post I guess I will give my first update.

I have so far played 1160 hands of .50/1.00 - 1.00/2.00 LH. My profit over the first three days of the experiment was 51BB but I slid 32 BB the last day of play after a session which saw my KK lose twice, and 3 times my over pair was beat when a small pp flopped a set, and 2 set over set situations. I pressed on and eventually started to tilt off my stacks. I went through the hand history and noticed I had actually just given away 20BB. I also notice a huge leak in my game which cost me 19BB over the three days. Seems I was playing AQs to the river even if I was unimproved. Not sure why I did that but I will watch out for that in the future. I ended up in the green for 16.1BB so I am averaging 1.6BB/100 hands so far.

Anyways here is my graph for the first week.

My Limit Hold Em Experiment

2008-10-08T02:05:00.001-07:00

As stated in my previous post, I am working on a basic Limit Hold ‘Em Strategy that will make money over the long run to build my roll. Part of the reason for this experiment is to try to instill a solid foundation of play for myself to work off of.

The basic strategy is to play ABC poker and play a lot of volume.

I actually started the Limit Hold ‘Em and sat down to play ABC poker last week. I quickly learned I really truly don’t know what ABC poker is. Furthermore, I don’t think that a lot of people that post on forums or blogs really truly know what it is either. We get so wrapped up into the strategy, and the outplaying of each other that we look beyond the basics before we ever really know them. I would compare it to a little kid learning how to play baseball for the first time.

What does every little kid try to do the first time the step up to the plate?

Well they try to hit a home run of course.

Now coaches and parents alike immediately start to teach them that they have to first learn how to hit the ball consistently before they can consistently hit a home run.

Our lives are full of walk before you run metaphors that could be used here. Learning to drive is another one. Most kids don’t start driving a Cadillac. So why would you start by playing the Cadillac of Poker?(NL Hold ‘Em). Yet this is what the majority of us do, and we struggle through playing 5NL, 10NL, 25NL trying to build that bankroll like so many of our favorite players.

If get past the hype of some of these players that have rocketed to the highest of all stakes in short amounts of time. Most of them were playing 5/10-25/50 LH before they started playing no limit. They walked before they ran, they cut their teeth in a more consistent game.

All these thoughts is what has led me to make the switch to Limit Hold ‘Em. I know I have what it takes to be a decent player. I also have three horrible traits that make me a perfect candidate to become a degenerate gambler that sells my body for buy ins.

Those three traits are.-

I am easily affected by tilt.

I don’t have the patience to stay within my roll

I don’t have the discipline to always pass up –EV situations.

I really do think that this experiment will help me with all the above, and that the ultimate goal of playing 250k hands of limit will really give me a good foundation to be a better player later on.

Enough about the end of this experiment let’s talk about the beginnings of it. The first part of my Limit Hold ‘Em Experiment is.

Goal: Play 25,000 hands .50/1.00 and 1.00/2.00

In doing this I am going to move up when I hit 300BB for the next level and move down when I have only 200BB for the current level.

Since Limit Hold ‘Em is a game of small edges I will not donate any BB by coming into a game in the middle of an orbit. I will always wait until the BB comes back around. I will also to the best of my ability play through an entire orbit before getting up off the table.

Those two are habits that I see people doing quite often and I think very detrimental to your win rate in the long run. I will post my progress weekly on this blog and over at Raise the River in there “Other Games Forum” I really hope to get as much input on my play and my journey as I go.

I guess that’s it for now. I will be back Fri for sure to post my first week of statistics for this here experiment. Hopefully I will return to give random posts before then as well.

I had to come back...

2008-10-07T04:53:00.001-07:00

It might not be as substantial of an occurrence as the second coming of Christ, but I just could not stay away from poker and my blog for the entire six months of me preparing for my promotion test.

Anyways I am not playing all the time but playing consistently enough that I decided to give my self a little direction. I decided I wanted to try to build a decent roll and after a little experimentation I have decided on Limit hold Em for now.

You can check on my basic strategy over at Raise the River where I have posted a starting hands chart for other members to critique. The plan is to play at least 25k hands at either .50/1.00 LH or 1.00/2.00 LH to test out my starting hands requirements. The main reason fo the chart is because I feel the part of my game lacking the most is discipline to let go med and marginal hands.

Anyways I decided that since I have a direction and an attainable goal of VOLUME instead of a $$$ amount I thought I would come back here, and keep people up on my progress.

So the next post I will make will be the actual "guidelines" for the experiment which I am hoping goes well enough to take beyond 25k hands, but we will see.

A couple other things on my plate...
Go thru BlogRoll and take out inactives like me
Finish the "My Poker Library" section
Post at least one hand per session to the RtR forum for its members to critique.
Get back on Melted Felts Blogroll.... <--- Hint Hint MARK...

-Out to Lunch-

2008-08-10T02:22:00.001-07:00

Ok I thought about this for a awhile and have decided that poke ris taking up too much of my time and with my promotion test coming up in 6 months and so many things I could be doing on this tropical island other then sit in front of a computer screen for hours on end I have decided to take an extended break from online poker for 6 months.

I have uninstalled all the poker programs off of all my PC's so I wont be tempted to play. I am going to spend the next 6 months working on a few side projects and study for my promotion test. Once I take my promotion test I am going to reevaluate whether or not I want poker to be a part of my life. If I dont I am out a little money and have a collection of poker books for no reason.

Sorry for those of you that actually read this humble space but I need to do this for me. I felt like I let my family down when I did not study and make my next rank the first try. If it had not been for poker I am sure I would have made it. Hopefully I will want to come back in 6 months as I really do love this game, but right now it is best for me just to pick my chips up for a little while.

Slow start...

2008-08-06T02:46:00.001-07:00

I have only finished 7 of my set of 30 Tier one game son Full Tilt so far. I blame the software update as Full Tilt chose to restart their server during my prime playing time. I have gotten 4 tickets so far with 2 7ths(bubble) and 1 6th place finish they ended in me playing a 35 min HU SnG for a ticket where I finally lost when the guy expertly played flopped quads to steal the life away from me....

The games are indeed soft, but the struggle at the bubble is fierce. My eighth one just finished and again I wen tout in seventh. This time I was crippled when my AK was no match for the short stacked SB's J5o.

Brian over at talk poker to me did a really good write up from when he attempted this same type of thing. He sent me the links and I read through them and was quite interested. Especially the part about how the variance matter so much more the higher up you go. I still think that this should work out to be profitable, but if it does not at least I tried. If you want to check it out go to his blog, and scroll down until you see my name is blue. A surefire must read in my opinion.

Oh, as mentioned earlier the new software for Full Tilt was a great addition that includes a fancy customizable slider bar. Well wish me luck I am in game 9 as we speak. As long as I get a ticket in one of the next two games I will be right on track for my predicted cash rate a third of the way in.

Which way do I go...

2008-08-03T19:18:00.001-07:00

Well to those that e-mailed/messaged me about my last post thank you…

Now moving on to bigger and better things. Well at least that is the goal. I have spent a lot of time thinking about where I am as a player and where I really want to be. I decided that I was or have not been regularly at the level I want to be. I came to the conclusion that I want to really make a go at the MTT’s on Full Tilt and mainly the $26 and above.

Now that’s great that I know where I want to be, but can I do it? I am not a delusional person so I know that my current bankroll would by no stretch of the imagination be able to withstand even a slight downswing at my requested level of play. That means I have three options available to me. I can:

1. I can say screw it and take a crack at it anyway.

To be honest I really considered this. The money I currently have online is not life crippling money. I could easily in a paycheck or two redeposit and go at it from a different angle if I did not succeed. The problem is I would be going against everything I learned about bankroll management, and even would probably not be playing my best as the money would mean SOOO much to my bank roll.

2. Grind out micro MTTs until properly rolled.

Not really an option TBH. The variance in the lower levels is so high, and I honestly believe the bad habits that I would invariably pick up would just hinder my chances even more.

3. Formulate a plan that can let me build a decent roll in 6 months time.

Why 6 months? Well as usual I have more than just one reason.

First, I don’t want to be unrealistic and think I can make the roll required to play at the medium MTT level exclusively in a short period of time.

Secondly, six months from now I will be testing for promotion and want to put forth some real effort at making it this year. Last year I did not even try and was kicking myself when the scores came out. If I make it this year I am still well ahead of the power curve and then only have to make one more rank to be able to apply for the job that I ultimately want to finish out my career.

I chose option C and started working on coming up with a viable plan to make some real money in the next 6 months. I started looking hard at the token satellite tournaments on Full Tilt Poker and decided to base my plan around these tournaments.

Ok then here is my plan. I am going to set aside $261 of my roll which I won’t lie is a HUGE chunk of my entire roll. With that money I am going to play 30 $8.70 18 man satellite tournaments for a $26 token. Now once I have managed to do that I am going take the tokens I win and play the $26 satellites for a $75 token. After that I will play $75 satellites for $216 tickets which I will unregister from for T$.

Hopefully after my first set like this I have managed to cash in 2 of the $75 satellites. If I manage to accomplish this the rest of my plan will go into effect.

First off I will sell 1/4th of my T$ for safe keeping and then play however many of the $8.70 Satellites I am able for the amount of T$ I have left. I then plan to save back 1/5 of the tokens I win and play $26 satellites with the other 4/5. So if I managed to win 20 tokens I would keep 4 tokens back. And play 16 $75 satellites, and then do the same for the $75 satellite tokens. The idea is I can put some tokens back when I run into a dry spell I will still have some tokens left over to try to make a recovery.

The other consideration is if I place 6th as the 6 place finisher gets about a 2/3 buy in profit. The plan is if I place 6th in an $8.70 satellite I will take the $14 and play a $13.75 HU sat for a $26 token. If I place 6th in the others the prize will just be added to my bankroll. As with any other crazy idea I have had I will keep all of you posted with my progress.

StUpId JuStICe

2008-08-01T04:55:00.001-07:00

Well the title actually means two things to me. On one side I am talking about the United States attempt at prohibiting online gambling. First it seems ludacris to me that I am overseas in a position to fight for my country, and the lawmakers that won’t even send/allow their own children to fight are saying I can’t log on to my favorite poker site and play a $10 Sit and Go. It is idiotic we are grown up adults that happen to enjoy playing poker via pixelated cards.

That makes me think of some more things that congress is protecting us military members from. How about Playboy and Penthouse magazines? That’s right. I am not kidding ,they actually have a committee trying to determine whether it is appropriate to sell these products in stores on military bases. How great is it that I can spend all day learning how to not die in combat and if I want to go home and relax while reading a Playboy and playing some poker, no can do.

Sorry for the rant, but I am in a position that I am fighting for the freedoms that America represents, and all I see is a bunch of lawmakers that are out of touch with the common man, and are frankly to busy trying to protect the average American from themselves to protect our rights.

Sure some people are going to go overboard playing online poker. I have seen it personally, but when that person could no longer play on line they went on to find some other way to lose their money. To me this fight is more than just about online poker. It is about the rights that we have as Americans, that I choose to fight for, only for them to be whittled away by right wing conservative assholes. So if you’re an American that enjoys online poker DO SOMETHING about your rights being taken away. Join the PPA-Write your Congressman and Senators and try to make them understand that as an American you want them, to defend your rights, not take them away. Let our families and friends worry about protecting us from ourselves. The government should worry about protecting us from our enemies, from the members of society that may harm us. The government needs to fix education and health care. I mean, my autistic son barely gets the help he needs because the budget barely covers what schools need. That does not stop the government from wasting time and spending millions of dollars deciding what we can and can’t do behind closed doors. No online poker. If we let that happen next will be a $0.25 charge automatically added to your taxes every time you say a curse word over the phone line, or type it into a chat box or email… Wait I better shut up or the right wing conservative assholes might slide that into a completely unrelated bill. Just like they did with the UIGEA.

Changes are happening...

2008-07-29T04:27:00.001-07:00

It’s very easy to notice my blog is undergoing a change, and it is not that far of a stretch to say I am undergoing a change as well, both as a blogger and as a player. I recently purchased a ton of poker books and have added those and the ones I previously owned to a new section on the right side of my page. The section is called “My Poker Library”. In that section I plan to have the image and title to be a link that takes you to Amazon.com ,where you can purchase the book. This would send me a whopping 5% of your purchase. I will also be making posts as I read the book. I plan to talk about how what I am reading relates to me as a player etc… In the end I will make a review of the book and once I have read all these books, and re read for the sake of the review the ones I own previously, I should actually have a nice little collection of essays and reviews for my visitors to peruse.

I hope adding this higher quality of content will help drive readers to my site. I am actually very happy with the developments in the last week. I have been very focused on my play and this blog and really have some good ideas for the future of both. I actually have the first post about chapter 2 of the poker mindset already finished, but want to at the very least finish the “My Poker Library” section completely.

So I guess all of you will have to wait a little while longer. I am not planning to play tonight as I have tons of household tasks and such to do. However, I am hoping afterwards I will get a little bit of time to work on this humble corner of cyberspace.

For anyone that does come and read and has a blog and has linked to my old blogger address http://acefilleddreams.blogspot.com please update your blog roll and links when you get a chance. Also, If you have a blog and I have not linked up to you please drop me a line and I will take care of it. I have had the unfortunate incident of wondering blindly around the inter-web and stumble across a blogger has taken the time to link up to this humble little corner, and I don’t have them linked up.