I've changed my mind about what to do with my PokerStars FPPs. Originally I was going to play in FPP satellite tournaments and unregister from the seats to get W$ and then use the W$ to play in other tournaments to get regular bankroll.
I realized quickly that I wasn't enjoying it and it was too convoluted, too much of a grind, too much work, too many steps. I don't play tournaments much anymore so it just didn't catch my interest.
And one day I was up very early to take my son to 6 AM hockey practice. I realized I could use a travel coffee mug. Then I thought about the FPP store and checked if there was anything there. It turns out there is an FPP travel mug.
Ahh, that's what I wanted. Unfortunately I had spent my FPPs a bit below the 1250 FPP price. It seemed to take a while to earn the 10 FPP I needed at $0.25/$0.50 LHE but I did get there after a while and I made the order this week. My FPPs are now down to near zero but that's alright. I hadn't done anything useful with them anyway in all the time I've been on Stars so I'm pleased at this small reward for the time I've played there generating rake and fees.
The FPP store purchasing experience was very smooth and well designed. They sent me a confirmation e-mail for tracking and I'm looking forward to the arrival of the mug in around a month. I don't really have any visible poker gear around. Some people know I play for real money but I don't draw attention to it or really bring it up. So this will be a small departure. That said, I'll probably just be using the mug for those early morning hockey practices so I don't plan to be flashing it around.
I'm still hoping to play some live poker at the local casino this year. I could use a card protector. They had some nice ones I liked at the FPP store for around 800 FPPs so maybe as I rebuild my FPPs I might aim for that.
Thursday, February 05, 2009
Friday, January 02, 2009
The Psychology of Poker
I just finished reading The Psychology of Poker. I've wanted to read this title for a long time.
It was a pretty good book. Perhaps I didn't get as much out of it as I thought I would. I wasn't sure what to expect really. There was more self analysis than I thought. But it was worthwhile going through. There was a lot of emphasis on live play and limit hold'em. That was fine.
My personal finances are in much better shape these days than in the last many years. That may pave the way to make some new investments in my poker hobby. I want to give live poker a shot. There's a poker room at the local casino with a $1/$2 NLHE game the last time I checked. Possibly in the next 6 months I'll be able to do it.
I had wanted to read Psychology of Poker before I start playing live. I should also reread Theory of Poker. Based on the live games available I should probably read an NL cash book as well.
It was a pretty good book. Perhaps I didn't get as much out of it as I thought I would. I wasn't sure what to expect really. There was more self analysis than I thought. But it was worthwhile going through. There was a lot of emphasis on live play and limit hold'em. That was fine.
My personal finances are in much better shape these days than in the last many years. That may pave the way to make some new investments in my poker hobby. I want to give live poker a shot. There's a poker room at the local casino with a $1/$2 NLHE game the last time I checked. Possibly in the next 6 months I'll be able to do it.
I had wanted to read Psychology of Poker before I start playing live. I should also reread Theory of Poker. Based on the live games available I should probably read an NL cash book as well.
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
2009 poker goals
So 2008 is coming to an end. This is a good time to think about my present and future in poker.
I've come to somewhat grudgingly realize something. Since it hasn't happened yet, I'm unlikely to "make it" in poker and be a real big winner. When I started out in real money nearly three years ago I had this dream that someday I could make like an extra $300-$400 a month playing online poker.
Alas it hasn't happened. I've never won enough to be able to make a withdrawal. Still I'm not too upset about it. This past year I set a new high in bankroll. Although the year ended on a downswing I hope to win it back and set a new high water mark in bankroll in 2009. I'm still playing on my original deposit on PokerStars.
So that's a good accomplishment. I get to play a game I enjoy for free. If that's as good as it gets then that's really not that bad.
So, goals for 2009. These were my 2008 goals. I don't have many goals for this year really. This time next year there's a good chance I'll still be doing what I'm doing now. $0.25/$0.50 limit. $10 NL. $2 MTT. $5.50 2 table sng.
I would like to reach the next level in one or more of the games I play now, to reach $0.50/$1 LHE, $25 NL, $4.40 or $5 MTT or $11 sng. But if I don't then well I don't I guess. As long as I don't go backwards or bust then I'll be happy.
One thing I'd like to do is to work off the UltimateBet bonus. So far I have $90 to go after clearing only $10 so far. I find I enjoy UB at times, and the games are better [unfortunately not the software] since the merger with the AP player base on the Cereus network.
Also I'd like to take a shot at live poker. There's a casino in town and they have $1/$2 NL last time I checked a couple of months ago. I've got one more credit card to pay off, and when I'm credit card free I'd like to save up and take a shot at live NL. Maybe by then they will start to spread a small LHE game again $5/$10 or lower.
I've come to somewhat grudgingly realize something. Since it hasn't happened yet, I'm unlikely to "make it" in poker and be a real big winner. When I started out in real money nearly three years ago I had this dream that someday I could make like an extra $300-$400 a month playing online poker.
Alas it hasn't happened. I've never won enough to be able to make a withdrawal. Still I'm not too upset about it. This past year I set a new high in bankroll. Although the year ended on a downswing I hope to win it back and set a new high water mark in bankroll in 2009. I'm still playing on my original deposit on PokerStars.
So that's a good accomplishment. I get to play a game I enjoy for free. If that's as good as it gets then that's really not that bad.
So, goals for 2009. These were my 2008 goals. I don't have many goals for this year really. This time next year there's a good chance I'll still be doing what I'm doing now. $0.25/$0.50 limit. $10 NL. $2 MTT. $5.50 2 table sng.
I would like to reach the next level in one or more of the games I play now, to reach $0.50/$1 LHE, $25 NL, $4.40 or $5 MTT or $11 sng. But if I don't then well I don't I guess. As long as I don't go backwards or bust then I'll be happy.
One thing I'd like to do is to work off the UltimateBet bonus. So far I have $90 to go after clearing only $10 so far. I find I enjoy UB at times, and the games are better [unfortunately not the software] since the merger with the AP player base on the Cereus network.
Also I'd like to take a shot at live poker. There's a casino in town and they have $1/$2 NL last time I checked a couple of months ago. I've got one more credit card to pay off, and when I'm credit card free I'd like to save up and take a shot at live NL. Maybe by then they will start to spread a small LHE game again $5/$10 or lower.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Spending some PokerStars FPPs
There was an article on 2+2 a little while ago discussing "rakeback" at PokerStars. Of course Stars has no rakeback (which is probably a good thing, notice the other hugely successful site PartyPoker doesn't have it either).
The 2+2 article went on about the Stars FPP program as an alternative to rakeback which also rewards the biggest players who generate the most rake (i.e. revenue for Stars) at the site. They mentioned about the freeroll FPP tournaments that can be used to convert your playing points into cash.
I'm a small time player and I only have around 1,400 FPP points. Still I looked to see if there were any tournaments I could use to convert my FPPs into bankroll. Historically there's been a 10 FPP tournament but that was a joke because you had to sit there for hours to make a tiny amount of money, not a very efficient use of playing time.
There is a tournament available to bronze star though (I think every real money player is bronze star) that looks interesting. For 70 FPP you can win a shot at the $80K, $11 rebuy tournament. There's a seat for every 700 FPP in play. So 1/10th of the entrants will win a seat.
The seat is worth $11, and with one seat per 10 players the EV of each player is about $1.10. Since it costs 70 FPP for an EV of $1.10 that makes a payout of around 1.6 cents per FPP. That's better than nothing I suppose and I haven't done anything to date with the FPP I've accumulated.
I played in one of these satellites tonight and I can say that the EV should be more than $1.10 for any kind of a sensible player. The standard of play was pretty bad (as you would expect for a tournament with an effective buy in of $1.10), so a basic style will be profitable long term. Lots of vpip 40+, vpip 80, donators there.
Unfortunately tonight I got knocked out around the halfway point. I shoved $1300 from the BB with AQ at the $50/$100 level over about 5 limpers. Middle position fish who limped with K3s calls after a pause for half his stack. A King on the turn and I'm out. No worries, play like that is what makes this tournament worth more than $1.10. I want him to call with K3s even though I'll lose some of the time.
With a little over 1400 FPP I have enough for about 20 shots at this satellite tournament. I hope I can cash at least twice for a value of $22 (T$ after I unregister from the $11R tournament). Plus it's a little change in pace. After running well and hitting a new high in bankroll I've been misfiring in both LHE and SnG so I could use a break from a downswing.
The 2+2 article went on about the Stars FPP program as an alternative to rakeback which also rewards the biggest players who generate the most rake (i.e. revenue for Stars) at the site. They mentioned about the freeroll FPP tournaments that can be used to convert your playing points into cash.
I'm a small time player and I only have around 1,400 FPP points. Still I looked to see if there were any tournaments I could use to convert my FPPs into bankroll. Historically there's been a 10 FPP tournament but that was a joke because you had to sit there for hours to make a tiny amount of money, not a very efficient use of playing time.
There is a tournament available to bronze star though (I think every real money player is bronze star) that looks interesting. For 70 FPP you can win a shot at the $80K, $11 rebuy tournament. There's a seat for every 700 FPP in play. So 1/10th of the entrants will win a seat.
The seat is worth $11, and with one seat per 10 players the EV of each player is about $1.10. Since it costs 70 FPP for an EV of $1.10 that makes a payout of around 1.6 cents per FPP. That's better than nothing I suppose and I haven't done anything to date with the FPP I've accumulated.
I played in one of these satellites tonight and I can say that the EV should be more than $1.10 for any kind of a sensible player. The standard of play was pretty bad (as you would expect for a tournament with an effective buy in of $1.10), so a basic style will be profitable long term. Lots of vpip 40+, vpip 80, donators there.
Unfortunately tonight I got knocked out around the halfway point. I shoved $1300 from the BB with AQ at the $50/$100 level over about 5 limpers. Middle position fish who limped with K3s calls after a pause for half his stack. A King on the turn and I'm out. No worries, play like that is what makes this tournament worth more than $1.10. I want him to call with K3s even though I'll lose some of the time.
With a little over 1400 FPP I have enough for about 20 shots at this satellite tournament. I hope I can cash at least twice for a value of $22 (T$ after I unregister from the $11R tournament). Plus it's a little change in pace. After running well and hitting a new high in bankroll I've been misfiring in both LHE and SnG so I could use a break from a downswing.
Saturday, October 18, 2008
here's $5, player
Some good things happening over at UltimateBet lately. First, I just received my first bonus payment after reaching 100 player points. $5 added to my account. That was nice. I could get used to that. For some reason there something very satisfying about getting the free $5.
$95 to go on the 200% initial sign on bonus. At $0.25/$0.50 LHE it seems to clear at an OK rate. So if I can just play break even at the tables I can make profit from the bonus. I'm around break even so far, and the $0.25/$0.50 LHE seems a pretty beatable game. There seem to be enough bad players there that it should be possible to play break even at least - hopefully.
Also UB told me I've been increased to "Player" status. Which is kind of funny because I don't play a lot of hands and because of bankroll only single table UB. So it's not too hard to become a Player on UB. Now Player does have a nice benefit. As a Player or better, you can use your playing points at a penny each to enter tournaments. Right now with a little over 100 points I could cash them out to enter a $1 tournament. That's a pretty good way to cash out your points for something really useful. I'm going to hang onto mine and plan to use them for a $5.50 tournament when I get to that level. It's nice I get to double use my points both for clearing bonus, then to use them again as cash equivalent tournament entry fees.
$95 to go on the 200% initial sign on bonus. At $0.25/$0.50 LHE it seems to clear at an OK rate. So if I can just play break even at the tables I can make profit from the bonus. I'm around break even so far, and the $0.25/$0.50 LHE seems a pretty beatable game. There seem to be enough bad players there that it should be possible to play break even at least - hopefully.
Also UB told me I've been increased to "Player" status. Which is kind of funny because I don't play a lot of hands and because of bankroll only single table UB. So it's not too hard to become a Player on UB. Now Player does have a nice benefit. As a Player or better, you can use your playing points at a penny each to enter tournaments. Right now with a little over 100 points I could cash them out to enter a $1 tournament. That's a pretty good way to cash out your points for something really useful. I'm going to hang onto mine and plan to use them for a $5.50 tournament when I get to that level. It's nice I get to double use my points both for clearing bonus, then to use them again as cash equivalent tournament entry fees.
Saturday, October 11, 2008
Bought hold'em manager
I've bought hold'em manager. I was using PokerTracker3 trial. I found with PT3 it was dragging down my system performance. I upgraded my RAM from 750 Mb to 1.5 Gb but it didn't seem to help a whole lot.
So I tried the HEM 15 day trial. It seems to work better on my PC. Also it has the HUD for UltimateBet working today. PT3 just promises it for some unspecified future date [they've already slipped the original target UB date]. Plus as a micro stakes player I can get a low stakes version of HEM for $55. That's a bit cheaper than PT3.
The HUD seems fine on HEM. It does what I want. The post game analysis is a bit better and more polished on PT3, so I hope HEM can catch up. A small change that would be an immediate benefit would be to show the current active filter name in HEM, I wish they had that.
So another small investment in my poker hobby I guess. I find I enjoy having a HUD and it does seem to help a bit with multi tabling. Maybe I could use some help. I've been getting knocked backward at $0.25/$0.50 LHE on both Stars and UB. Still I'm feeling upbeat. I may not be playing especially well. I could beat it in the past so I hope to be running better soon. On UB my bankroll for $0.25/$0.50 LHE is down to around 70BB so I hope to get moving upward before I go bust there.
So I tried the HEM 15 day trial. It seems to work better on my PC. Also it has the HUD for UltimateBet working today. PT3 just promises it for some unspecified future date [they've already slipped the original target UB date]. Plus as a micro stakes player I can get a low stakes version of HEM for $55. That's a bit cheaper than PT3.
The HUD seems fine on HEM. It does what I want. The post game analysis is a bit better and more polished on PT3, so I hope HEM can catch up. A small change that would be an immediate benefit would be to show the current active filter name in HEM, I wish they had that.
So another small investment in my poker hobby I guess. I find I enjoy having a HUD and it does seem to help a bit with multi tabling. Maybe I could use some help. I've been getting knocked backward at $0.25/$0.50 LHE on both Stars and UB. Still I'm feeling upbeat. I may not be playing especially well. I could beat it in the past so I hope to be running better soon. On UB my bankroll for $0.25/$0.50 LHE is down to around 70BB so I hope to get moving upward before I go bust there.
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