Some random thoughts on iPoker

I’ve been playing a  lot on iPoker of late. I’ve had a Titan account for about a year now, but I’ve never really spent much time there until recently. However, I’ve decided to build the old bankroll with some bonuswhoring, and these days, that means playing on lots of iPoker skins. And I have some THOUGHTS on the software. Random THOUGHTS. In no particular order…

1. The site has the most censorious chatbox I’ve ever seen. “Moron” is verboten. I think “Idiot” might be too. On the other hand, I’ve just seen a player sit down on my table called “CuntOfSpades”. Bit odd.

2. iPoker uses rubbish avatars. Oh, look, I can be a cowboy! Or a businessman! Or a mobster! What fun. Now, obviously, anyone with sense is going to disable these ridiculous gewgaws immediately, but other people will still be able to see them, even if you can’t. So make sure you set your avatar to the “slutty woman in low-cut dress” setting. I’ve lost count of the number of times that some knuckle-dragging moron has cackhandedly tried to bluff me off a pot and then  called me a bitch when I’ve checkraised them. Poker-transvestitism can be very profitable.

3. The hand history browser is just plain weird; halfway between a graphical interface and a text one, but with none of the benefits of either. Hell, Betfair might only be able to open a Notepad document, as if it were 1988 or something, but at least you can copy the damn text out of Notepad. POP FACT! iPoker is the third largest poker network in the world behind Stars and Tilt. And yet they can’t even manage a functional hand history browser. And that’s not all…

4. Table resizing. You can’t do it. Srsly. You can have your tables at a standard size, or you can opt for a minimised view. Now, this isn’t that uncommon; Cryptologic used to work in a similar fashion, for instance. What makes iPoker special is that switching from full size tables to the minimised view causes the software to have a seizure, especially is you have more than one table open. It’s particularly catastrophic if you’ve been playing for a while, as the software feels the need to reload the entire contents of the chat box before it will et you play again, for reasons that are completely unfathomable. You may as well go and put the kettle on while it tries to sort itself out.Again, given the size of the network, this is inexcusable.

5. Otherwise… it’s a half-decent poker network. There are a lot of bad players out ther (hello, William Hill!), the Omaha tables are usually pretty busy (Stud, not so much), and they have good tournaments with a reasonably friendly blind structure. And if you’re bonuswhoring, there are a ton of skins with a ton of decent bonuses to chase.

Oh, and it’s rigged, obviously. I know this because someone told me so.

Scare card

Here’s a fun little quandary for you.

———————————————-

http://www.holdemmanager.net
PL Omaha $0.20(BB)

SB ($19.73)
BB ($9.94)
UTG ($42.11)
Dermoth ($15.36)
CO ($11.98)
Button ($28.29)

Let’s get the introductions out of the way first; the BB is quite loose passive, and the cutoff is VERY loose passive; I haven’t seen him raise in 60 hands, and he plays 60% of his hands. (Yes, I am using tracking software again). As for me, I’m a little bit tilty after losing a 90/10 race a few hands ago.

SB posts (SB) $0.10
BB posts (BB) $0.20

Dealt to Dermoth 4h 7c Ad Ac
fold,
Dermoth calls $0.20

I have a bad habit of limping Aces in Omaha.  This is partly because I’ve been playing a lot of full ring PLO, where preflop raising isn’t much better than setting fire to your money. However, I’ve moved to 6max games in the last few days, and I’m a lot busier preflop in the short-handed game, but I still limp a lot of aces for disguise, and the opportunity to reraise shortstacks. No-one’s short enough here to justify that angle, though. I should have raised.

CO raises to $0.90
fold, fold,
BB calls $0.70

So, a raise from the loose-passive player (who I’ve never seen raise preflop before), followed by a call from the other LAP.  The pot’s now big enough for me to 3bet and get all the chips in on the flop. Thing is, I’m almost positive the Cutoff has aces as well, and the chances are they’re better than mine. Nonetheless, I decide to pot it back at them and worry about my side cards on the flop (if nothing else, we can divvy up the BB’s money)…

Dermoth raises to $3.70
CO calls $2.80
BB calls $2.80

FLOP ($11.20) Ah 8c 4s

OK, so the Cutoff doesn’t have aces.  I’m pretty sure about that, now. The problem here is that my 3bet preflop has effectively turned my hand face-up; there’s no way I can earn any more money by betting here. So, let the checking begin!

check, check, check,

TURN ($11.20) Ah 8c 4s 8d
BB bets $0.20

Owoosay… lol? I couldn’t have dealt this any better myself, and, err, what’s with the minbet? It has to be a spectacularly pathetic blocking bet with an 8 in his hand, surely?  No point raising here, I just call and hope that he fills up on the river.

Dermoth calls $0.20
CO calls $0.20

RIVER ($11.80) Ah 8c 4s 8d 8s
BB bets $6.04 (AI)

Oh, fuck off! And the hand history doesn’t reflect the incredible speed with which all the remaining chips went in the middle; with two players still to act, it’s a hell of a bluff. On the other hand, I have the second nuts, I’m getting almost 3/1, and… he’s blatantly got the case eight. Or KK? He could have KK. The minbet on the turn  is deranged, but maybe… ah, fuck it, I call.

Dermoth calls $6.04
CO calls $6.04

Oh, fuck off! But there’s no time to digest this disastrous news before the showdown…

Dermoth shows 4h 7c Ad Ac
(Flop 76.1%, Turn 100.0%)

CO shows Kh 3h Jd Ks
(Flop 5.9%, Turn 0.0%)

So the Cutoff has KK! They can’t both have them, can they?

BB shows 7s Qs 6d As
(Flop 18.1%, Turn 0.0%)

!!!

Dermoth wins $28.92, and is very, very surprised…

———————————————-

The moral of the story; don’t play Omaha if you don’t know the rules. It had never even occurred to me that he could be shoving a Hold’em Boat. Although I would have been sick to my stomach if I had pulled out a hero fold there (and I very nearly did), the pain would have been lessened by the thought of the Big Blind trying to work out why he lost to KK. As it stands, he’s probably bemoaning his terrible luck… that lesson will whave to wait for another day.

Omaha is hard. But endlessly entertaining.

Pokertube Review! Aurrrt-zee Millions Cash Game 2009

Man, it’s been a while since I basked in the reflected glory of Pokertube. Possibly because there hasn’t been that much quality poker telly to write about of late?

UNTIL NOW, that is. I direct your attention to the magnificent Aurrrrt-zee Millions Cash Game 2009, probably the best bit of poker-watchy you’ll see in a long time. There are links at the bottom of the post, but first! Some words.

Americans can’t say “Aussie”. (Or “Craig”. Or “bloody wanker”). They can say “Ozzy”, as in Osbourne, but seem to be incapable of making the exact same sounds when spelled slightly differently.  Barry Tompkins, (who plays Presenting Man on the show), is particularly bad at saying Aussie, which I mentioned in passing when I reviewed the first Aussie Millions , back in 2007.This hasn’t changed.

I also mentioned Michael Konik’s obsession with the word “prohibitive”. This has changed, because Konik has been replaced by Bart Hanson, who does an extremely good job of calling the action, but is obsessed with the word “bluffcatcher”, to the point where I started to think he was subliminally advertising some ghastly product of that name. As if that wasn’t enough, the sensation of being subtly reprogrammed to buy BLUFFCATCHER products is heightened by a truly bizarre addition to the AM format – background music. Weird, wobbly, vaguely hippyish ambient background music, of the sort you’d expect to hear in a Scientology Org while they wave an e-meter around and size up your wallet. Then there’s the sound effects; every card the dealer turns over sets off a whooshy burst of white  noise , and every bet triggers the “mobile phone receiving a text message” alert. It’s disorientating; your eyes see poker, while your ears hear “Channel Five daytime quiz show”.

Happily, the poker itself is fantastic. There are two shows; the first is a full ring game, featuring the likes of Durrrr, Antonius, Laak, the excellent Niki Jedlicka and the truly awful Andrew Robl, and some Australian guy (mercifully not the one with the sodding crocodile), and the second episode is a heads up match between Durrrr and Antonius, who are clearly deeply in love with each other. (Get a room, guys! Oh, you did). And the stacks are DEEP; the minimum buy-in for the ring game is $200,000 (they don’t specify whether those are USD or AUD, I suspect the former), but Durrrr and Antonius decide to bring seven figure sums with them. I forget exactly how much Antonius is playing, but it’s something like $2,000,000. They sit down for the heads up match with $1,000,000 and $1,500,000 respectively.

Better yet, it’s a mixed  game; NLHE and (joy!) PLO. I’m delighted to see Omaha being played on the telly, and it doesn’t disappoint here; there’s one hand in particular which has to be seen to be believed, and several other merely fascinating hands. There’s also some spectacularly inept commentary from Tompkins in the heads up match, which… well, I’ll not spoiler it for you. Links below, and I’ll post some thoughts in the comments.

Watch it. It’s superb.

Episode 1 Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Episode 2 Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Another PLO hand – being “brave” with top two pair

Yep, it’s another fascinating PLO hand history!

Actually, this one isn’t distance-quotes-fascinating in the same way that the last one was distance-quotes-fascinating. I’m mostly posting it up here because I’m either quite proud of the play I made,  or I just made a really rash move and got lucky. Only one way to find out!

Happily, I’ve worked out a way of getting at the text of iPoker’s hand histories, allowing me more time to DISSEMINATE ESSENTIAL INFORMATION (*). To wit -

It’s a $10 game, and I’ve been on the table for about ninety minutes. At one point, I was up to about $25, but some recent loose play has seen my stack dwindle down to $18 and change. I am on the button. The table is mostly made up of shortstackers, all of whom are terrible. On my right, I have a solid player with $20, and on my immediate left I have a..a well, he’s hard to pigeonhole. He joined the table with a short buy-in, played like a maniac, rebought a couple of times, eventually spun himself up to about $20, at which point he calmed right down and started playing solid TAG poker. However, he’s just been viciously sucked out on a couple of hands earlier, and is clearly tilting.

——————————————————————————————————–

Poker Ocean Burnley (No DP) 0.05/0.10, hand converted by the iPoker Converter at Talking-Poker
Visit Hand HQ to purchase hand histories from a range of sites, game types and levels.

saw flop | saw showdown

Button dermoth ($18.39)
SB ($13.78)
BB ($2.86)
UTG ($5.90)
UTG+1 ($1.45)
MP ($2.60)
CO-1 ($1.80)
CO ($19.90)

Preflop: dermoth is on the Button with 8 T 6 K
UTG calls 0.10, 1 fold, MP calls 0.10, 2 folds, dermoth calls 0.10, SB raises to 0.60, 1 fold, UTG calls 0.50, MP calls 0.50, dermoth calls 0.50.

Pretty standard to limp in with this on the button, and the call is mandatory; I’m getting 4-1 on my money.

Flop (2.50) 4 T K
SB bets 1.25, UTG calls 1.25, 1 fold, dermoth calls 1.25.

So, I flop top two pair on a fairly safe board. The SB bets half the pot, and with a caller coming round, I’m getting 4-1 on the call again. How many times have I lost money playing top two pair against a preflop raiser this way? LOADS. And I’ve only been playing PLO in earnest for a week or so…

Turn (6.25) 3
SB bets 6.25,

And not only does he bet the pot, he bets it like he was playing whack-a-mole. The turn card pops up and before you can blink, BANG, in goes the money. My thought process went pretty much like this – “Srsly? The three of diamonds? I’m supposed to believe that’s helped you in some way? None of this makes sense to me… I’m all-in”.

1 fold, dermoth raises to 16.54, SB moves all-in for 5.68.

And he calls, and for the record, looking back at it with the benefit of hindsight, I HATE my shove. As mentioned before, the old “I have top two pair, so he can’t have a set of kings or tens” just does not apply in Omaha. In Hold’em, when that happens, you take your lumps and complain about running bad. In Omaha… it’s standard.I also can’t rule out something like AA33, QQ33, JJ33… and pretty much everything else in his range has redraws against my rather weak hand. In hindsight, I think I should have folded. However…

River (34.72) Q

dermoth shows 8 T 6 K
SB shows 5 3 A A

dermoth wins 34.72 with Two pair, Kings and Tens with a Queen for a kicker

——————————————————————————————————–

…I’m glad I didn’t.  BUT. If I were to put him on Aces with no redraws – which would be one explanation for his panicky pot bet when the second flush draw arrives on the turn – I’d have been fading an ace, three, or four, and would have been a 62% favourite. OTOH, I could have been up against a big, big draw: AQJx with the spade draw, say. Against a hand like that I’m  exactly 50/50.  Throw in a wheel draw and I’m an underdog. Throw in a second flush draw and I’m… eww.

And that’s assuming I have the best made hand on the turn. I could always have been drawing dead to a set of Kings, or merely  miles and miles and miles behind to a lower set. But fortunately, I was just up against a flush draw + a gutshot wheel draw + superior two pair draws, and I was a WHOPPING 57% favourite to win the hand.

That’s sorted that out, then; it was a  textbook small favourite/ massive underdog ERROR, which ended up netting me quite a nice pot. I AM A FISH.

Omaha is hard.

My least favourite PLO spot

OK, my least favourite PLO spot is flopping top set versus two undersets and getting one-outed. I don’t like that at all, but it’s hard to do anything about it. This hand history illustrates a far more complicated situation.

(I say hand history – this happened on iPoker, which, for some inexplicable reason, doesn’t do histories in text format, so I’m going to have to describe the action, rather than copy paste it…)

It’s a $20 full ring game, 10c/20c blinds. I have $29.33, my opponent in the hand has me covered by a couple of dollars. I’m dealt QQ73 rainbow in second position, and limp in. There are two limpers behind me, the SB folds, and the BB checks.  And up pops my nightmare flop – AQJ rainbow.

Middle set against three opponents, on that board… it’s horrible. There’s a strong chance I’m behind to the broadway straight already, and I’m not exactly chuffed if I improve to a full house, as it’s not going to be the nut full, and I know from bitter experience how weak Queens full can be in a multiway pot with an ace on board. If I don’t see the case queen on the turn, I’m going to be uncomfortable.

So I check. So does everybody else.

The turn brings an offsuit nine. T8 just joined AA (which I’m not too worried about) and KT in the list of hands that beat me. All things considered, though, it’s a pretty good card, which does minimal damage to my holding. Time to find out where I am! So I bet the pot, and get one caller.

The caller is on the spewy  side, and not known for slowplaying. I’ve just seen him dust off twenty dollars with bottom set, and find it hard to believe that he’d check the nut straight on the flop and then coldcall with it on the turn. So now, I’m scared of one thing, and one thing only – T8.

The river brings a five. Should I bet out? Probably. Do I? No. I check/call, or at least I would have done, had he bet. Instead, he checks behind with AJ for two pair, and I win a tiny pot.

So, on the face of it, not a momentous hand. I flopped a set, mislaid my balls, and won two dollar. I mention it here for two reasons; firstly,  it’s a nice illustration of the perils of Omaha, and secondly, I’m trying to work out if there’s any way I could have played it better. Maybe I should pot the flop? But I’m first of four players to act and could easily be dead to one card in the deck, and I’m trying to play smallball at this limit, particularly when out of position. So I think I like the check.

The pot bet on the turn is fine. It’s a fairly innocuous card which only improves one specific holding. (This is often enough to kill you in Omaha, of course). If I get reraised and call, I have a whole new set of problems on the river. If I fill up, do I check/call or bet/fold? Check/call, I think; a donkbet on a paired board is unlikely to be called by a straight, and I may end up folding to a weaker full house. And bet/call is horribly spewy, even if the river is another nine.  And what if I get reraised on the turn and miss the river? I have to check/fold to anything but the weediest value bet.

Of course, I don’t get reraised on the turn, and so to the river, which is where I’m really unsure about my line. There’s $3.14 in the pot… should I bet out?. Against a different player, I could well imagine that they’re playing the broadway straight cautiously; a lot of players will check/call nut straights to the river, and then jam it if it’s still the nuts. Against this opponent, that simply isn’t happening; I just saw him throw twenty dollars in the pot with bottom set on a flushy flop. So, should I put him on two pair and try and value bet the end?

On reflection, I find it hard to believe that he’d just call with T8 on the turn either, and feel I should have bet half the pot. If I’m reraised, I can give the hand up without too much difficulty, but nothing about his line suggests that he has me beat.

Ah well. One thing’s for sure. Omaha is hard when you don’t have the nuts…

Pot Limit Omaha is FUN!

Hey, it’s a bad beat story.

Fortunately, it’s only a $5 game; a little background poker while I do some work. Had this happened at a higher limit I’d have a mouth full of furniture right now…

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PokerStars Pot-Limit Omaha, $0.02 BB (9 handed) – Poker-Stars Converter Tool from FlopTurnRiver.com

saw flop | saw showdown

UTG+1 ($5)

MP1 ($11.39)

MP2 ($2.98)

MP3 ($2.62)

CO ($1)

dermoth (Button) ($4.80)

SB ($5.28)

BB ($3)

UTG ($3.74)

Preflop: dermoth is Button with 6, A, 9, A

UTG calls $0.02, 1 fold, MP1 calls $0.02, MP2 bets $0.08, 2 folds, dermoth raises to $0.31, SB calls $0.30, 3 folds, MP2 calls $0.23

Flop: ($0.99) K, A, J (3 players)

SB bets $0.06, MP2 raises to $0.64, dermoth calls $0.64, SB calls $0.58

Turn: ($2.91) K (3 players)

SB checks, MP2 bets $2.03 (All-In), dermoth calls $2.03, SB raises to $4.08, dermoth calls $1.82 (All-In)

River: ($12.64) 7 (3 players, 2 all-in)

Total pot: $12.64 | Rake: $0.60

Results:

dermoth had 6, A, 9, A (full house, Aces over Kings).

SB had K, 3, 9, K (four of a kind, Kings).

MP2 had J, 6, A, J (full house, Jacks over Kings).

Outcome: SB won $12.04

—————————————————————————

It’s a fascinating hand. The small blind is a very tight player, and wouldn’t coldcall two bets preflop without a strong holding. We played a hand earlier where we both had aces; I raised preflop, he reraised, I threebet, and he flat called, then shoved on the flop which failed to improve his hand. ( I had flopped two pair with my raggy kickers, so called; he made a runner-runner broadway straight, of course).

The  player in MP2 is new to the table, and I have no reads on him.

The small blind bets super weak on the flop, which means he’s definitely hit something; MP2 makes a weakish reraise, which means he’s probably hit something too; and I’m sitting there with top set. I can only assume my opponents both have QT, or one has QT and the other an underset, or possibly one of them has KKQT/JJQT. There’s probably a flush draw out there, too.  I would never, in a million years, assume they both have undersets.

So, I just call. So does the Small Blind. And then he makes quads on the turn, so obviously he checks to the raiser, who instashoves with the worst possible full house.  The call is mandatory, and I want a call behind, so I’m not raising to isolate. When the SB shoves instead… eww. I knew I was behind; he could have been playing AK or KJ, but given his range and the action, it would have to be something very specific like AKQT, or KJQT. And by this point, I’ve worked out that the guy in MP2 has got a full house or quads as well, which means the number of hands the SB plays in that way that I can beat is pretty damn small. But it’s only $1.82 to call, and there’s $10.22 in the pot. Folding is clearly not an option.

Omaha, there. Sick, sick game. But fun.

Something about the Palestine Liberation Organisation, perhaps?

HELLO!

Me no blog so much no more, huh? Well, as per my last post, I’m still crazy busy with actual paid work, which is really eating into my schedule… I’m not known for my work ethic, to put it mildly, and every hour I spend doing productive, useful things has to be offset with two hours of dicking about and killing time. Sadly, I tend to view blogging as being in the “productive, useful things” category, even though it is neither of those things.

Happily, if I’ve got money coming in from other sources, poker becomes one of the “dicking about” activities, so there’s been plenty of time put aside for gambooling. My tournament form’s been pretty damn ropey of late (I won a decent sized tournament on iPoker at the start of the month, but since then, it’s been non-stop nonsense), but I’ve discovered a fun new vice; Pot Limit Omaha cash games. I’m very happy about this, because I’ve been looking for a big bet cash game format I can enjoy for… five years? But I’m also rather annoyed with myself, because… yeah. Exact same reason as before.

Anyway, PLO is a lot of fun, and I should really write more, but I’m hungover to buggery and can barely form sentences, never mind interesting and insightful paragraphs, so it’s going to have to wait. Hopefully not for too long, though.

More soon, I promise!

Today = Win

Long time, no post. Several reasons for this;

1. I’m heinously busy with non-poker work, so I’m not playing all that much, and when I am, I’m feeling guilty about looming deadlines. Finding the time to post on here is tricky, I guess I shouldn’t complain about having too much work on in the current financial climate, but… while it’s nice to have reliable work coming in, I wish I had more time for poker.

2. When I do decide to post, I keep trying to write something about the late Cryptologic network, which closed its poker operations last week. This always ends up with an interminable ramble where I chart the entirety of my poker career over the last five years, and even I’m able to see that no-one wants to read that. (You might, possibly, think you do, but believe me, it’s bloody tedious). So, I’ll get it out of the way here: farewell, Crypto. You will be missed.

3. The WordPress site has gone a bit mental.

4. Other weak excuses (fill these in later)

Anyway, I won a tournament today, which was nice. Nicer still that it was a relatively clean win; my only suckout in the entire 5 hours was when we were down to three players, and I won a 40/60 preflop race against the very-shortstack. Barely a suckout at all, in fact, but that was the worst spot I won from, and it’s always satisfying to take down a tourney without too much help from the dealer.

Nice to win the money too, of course. Anyway, the main thing is, I’ve cleared that Crypotologic-post blockage. More posts soon!

The heelarious world of Ante-up tournaments (now in NLO8 flavour!)

Back on the Ante-Up horsey today, and I managed my first cash (at the fifth attempt). Final table, in fact; I just got bumped out in 7th, running KQQTss into a slowplayed AA33, SAD FACE. I very nearly didn’t play, as I was on the verge of quitting for the night, but when I saw that Stars had added Ante Up MTTs in no-limit Omaha hi/lo, it became clear that I had no choice. Ante-up tourneys in NLO8? New BEST THING EVER!

Yeah, I made the final table at my first attempt, so I’m obviously going to say that, but they really are fantastic. Ante-up is a beautiful structure in bog-standard hold’em, but you still need to hit the occasional flop. In Omaha/8, that’s not so hard to do, and it’s… gorgeous. I was chipped up for most of the tourney, although there was one point where I came perilously close to being knocked out; a turdjuggling flump called my pot sized bet on the flop with a gutshot wheel draw, then called my mahoosive overshove after he completely missed the turn, (and I still had the nuts with top set), but he obviously hit one of his four wheel outs on the river to scoop me. That took me from being among the chip leaders to a perilous shortstack (often a fine line in Ante Ups) which was deeply annoying, as I’d have been all but untouchable if I’d won that pot, but hey. I managed to finaigle my way back into contention with a couple of races, although I never fully recovered, and things took a turn for the worst again around the final table bubble, where I ended up pretty flop-dead, and frequently out of position against a totally unbluffable chipleader, which meant I had to batten down the hatches for a while until the bubble burst. That took about four hours (approx), and by the time it did, I was running on empty. Probably my own fault for being a bit too passive/payout conscious. Oh well.

Anyway, it ended up being a healthy (if not spectacular) payday, but it was also the funniest tournament I’ve ever played. I was in actual, factual fits of laughter for huge portions of it, largely because of a table expert who was slagging off all and sundry for playing “loose”, while he was folding 75% of his hands preflop despite getting odds in excess of (for instance) 500-1 on the limp. And then there were hands like this one (from the eternal final table bubble) -

Seat 3: dermoth (32750 in chips)
Seat 4: Seat 4 (16340 in chips)
Seat 5: Seat 5 (42962 in chips)
Seat 6: Seat 6 (171337 in chips)
Seat 8: Seat 8 (37823 in chips)
Seat 9: Seat 9 (22170 in chips)
dermoth: posts the ante 800
Seat 4: posts the ante 800
Seat 5: posts the ante 800
Seat 6: posts the ante 800
Seat 8: posts the ante 800
Seat 9: posts the ante 800
Seat 9: posts small blind 5
dermoth: posts big blind 5

That’ll be 4810 chips in the pot to begin, then.

*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to dermoth [Ac 9s Ts 8d]
Seat 4: calls 5
Seat 5: calls 5
Seat 6: calls 5
Seat 8: calls 5
Seat 9: checks
dermoth: checks
*** FLOP *** [As Qs 7c]

Not a great flop; top pair and ropey runner runner straight possibilities versus almost guaranteed flush and low draws.

Seat 9: checks
dermoth: checks
Seat 4: checks
Seat 5: checks
Seat 6: checks
Seat 8: checks

Things had got very trappy by this point. Seat 6’s enormous stack and loose betting range, combined with the payout structure (which at this stage offered a 10% payout jump for tenth place, followed by a 33% one for reaching the final table), meant that people were checking a lot of strong holdings on the flop, and check-calling with draws. Anything less than an overpot bet was likely to be called, and my hand certainly didn’t merit that kind of strength.

*** TURN *** [As Qs 7c] [Th]

I make two pair on the turn and pick up a straight draw, but I’m out of position, and all an information bet is likely to tell me is that I’ve got four decent outs and am very, very vulnerable. If I make my straight, I’m not happy; it will either complete a low draw or 700 different broadways, depending on which end hits. Check!

Seat 9: checks
dermoth: checks
Seat 4: checks
Seat 5: checks
Seat 6: checks
Seat 8: checks
*** RIVER *** [As Qs 7c Th] [7h]

Lows and flushes miss, but I’m still losing to AQ, KJ, AA, QQ, TT, and now any hand with a seven in it. So I check and hope for a free showdown.

Seat 9: checks
dermoth: checks
Seat 4: checks
Seat 5: checks
Seat 6: checks
Seat 8: bets 5

No, that’s not a typo. This is the kind of thing that happens in Ante Up tournaments. Seat 8 bets 5 (five) chips into a pot containing 4810 (four thousand, eight hundred and ten) chips. It’s worth remembering that we’ve been in this tournament for three hours at this point, and the original field of 250+ runners is now down to just 11. And one of those eleven survivors – theoretically one of the eleven best players in the tournament – has just made a bet on the end, into five players, offering them odds of 962-1 on their call.

Seat 9: folds
dermoth: calls 5

OK, yes, this looks like an extremely passive response, but I’m not fond of making raises that will only be called by hands that can beat me, which limits my options in this spot to calling, folding, or making a similarly pathetic raise, to, say 275, or something. I’m obviously not folding with odds of 962-1, and I don’t fancy any kind of reraise because a) there are still three players to act behind me, including the chipleader, b) my hand’s pretty weak, and c) how can a minbet possibly be anything other than an attempt to keep the action alive and provoke someone into reraising? So, yeah. Just a call.

Seat 4: calls 5
Seat 5: folds
Seat 6: folds
*** SHOW DOWN ***
Seat 8: shows [6s 9d Ad Kc] (HI: two pair, Aces and Sevens)
dermoth: shows [Ac 9s Ts 8d] (HI: two pair, Aces and Tens)
Seat 4: mucks hand
dermoth collected 4845 from pot
No low hand qualified
*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot 4845 | Rake 0
Board [As Qs 7c Th 7h]
Seat 3: dermoth (big blind) showed [Ac 9s Ts 8d] and won (4845) with HI: two pair, Aces and Tens, and then fell off his chair laughing.
Seat 4: Seat 4 mucked [4d 6c Td Qh]
Seat 5: Seat 5 folded on the River
Seat 6: Seat 6 folded on the River
Seat 8: Seat 8 (button) showed [6s 9d Ad Kc] and lost with HI: two pair, Aces and Sevens
Seat 9: Seat 9 (small blind) folded on the River

I am aware that this kind of funny will only appeal to the nerdiest of poker nerds, but my god, I’ve never seen anything like it in my entire poker career.

Dear PokerStars;
Please run this tournament ever day. Ty,ty.
Moth.

Songs in A&E

My mind is made up, I’m down on my luck, I’ve run out of bullets again

I was on the verge of quitting today. Alright, I wasn’t really, but I was having a good old whinge to the Poker Hof about my miserable luck this afternoon, and I may have mentioned my desire to take up… knitting? Something else, anyway. My bankroll was ruined, and my luck had been abysmal; it’s easy to exaggerate these things, but I have no doubt that it was one of the worst downswings I’ve experienced in five years of playing the game, and probably THE worst. No fun.

You can probably guess where this is going (the screenshot below will give some clue), but after I’d finished off some proper, paid work, I decided to play a 180 man SNG. I ran a bad bluff early on, lost half my stack, said hello to the familiar feelings of inevitable failure, started recalculating my bankroll strategy, and then – BOOM – deck/face conflict. I doubled up on two successive hands, and suddenly had my table covered. Not long after, the cards started coming. And coming. And coming. For about ten minutes, I either had aces or kings, or flopped huge. Usually both. And I was getting paid off. Even when the ridiculous spate of big pocket pairs stopped coming – I think I had three pairs of aces, and kings four times, although I lost with one KK and only took the blinds with another – nobody was interested in looking me up. When they did, things like this tended to happen. (All-in on the flop, I bet out, he pushed…)

Overkill

(I choose to remain anonymous for two reasons: a) I’m slightly paranoid, and feel that if I reveal too much about my game on this blog AND announce my Stars screenname, it may be detrimental – which I know is ridiculous – but more importantly b) I have a really fucking stupid screenname, which I can’t change).

That pot burst the bubble, and it was the last big starting hand that I had, but by that point I had what scientists refer to as “fuck-you chips”, and it really didn’t matter what I was holding any more. Two further hours of nice, controlled aggression later and I had won the thing, and more than doubled my bankroll in the process. Not a moment too soon, frankly. I was due, to put it mildly. In fact, I’m still due, but…

I FEEL BETTER, NOW.