Project PLO

At my local casino there's a development the last few months. They introduced pot limit Omaha.

First it was $1/$1 PLO. A few weeks later it changed to $2/$5 PLO. PLO runs 8 handed. Interestingly PLO has basically displaced the $2/$5 no limit game that ran forever. $2/$5 NL seldom runs now while there's virtually always a $2/$5 PLO game.

While I still play $1/$2 NL I do still have this crazy dream to play $2/$5 someday. Well it looks like $2/$5 means $2/$5 PLO. Well this is a twist.

It took some getting used to but now I'm pretty much on board with it. I'm doing some reading (more on that later) and figured I'm ready to play some online. I've decided to start at the bottom of the heap, $0.01/$0.02 full ring. The plan is to play 500 hands at each level and move up when at any profit. I hope to reach $0.10/$0.25 PLO but we'll see. One level at a time. I got up to $25 NL back before the Americans left and the games weren't as good after that.

I'm not too worried about the micro stakes and taking it seriously. I just think of it as $1/$2 or 1/2 if you will.

From the first session this was the first interesting hand PLO hand I played. Buying in short while I get my bearings.

PokerStars Pot-Limit Omaha, $0.02 BB (9 handed) - PokerStars Converter Tool from http://www.flopturnriver.com

Button ($4.94)
SB ($4.24)
BB ($1.82)
UTG ($19.42)
UTG+1 ($4.33)
MP1 ($18.73)
Hero (MP2) ($0.69)
MP3 ($13.23)
CO ($5)

Preflop: Hero is MP2 with 8s, Ad, Ac, 4h
2 folds, MP1 bets $0.07, Hero raises to $0.24, MP3 calls $0.24, 4 folds, MP1 calls $0.17

Flop: ($0.75) Qs, 7s, 8d (3 players)
MP1 checks, Hero bets $0.45 (All-In), MP3 calls $0.45, 1 fold

Turn: ($1.65) 5s (2 players, 1 all-in)

River: ($1.65) 9d (2 players, 1 all-in)

Total pot: $1.65 | Rake: $0.06

Results:
Hero had 8s, Ad, Ac, 4h (one pair, Aces).
MP3 had 5c, 10d, 9s, 5d (three of a kind, fives).
Outcome: MP3 won $1.59

oh well. Over on propokertools I looked it up I was 63% preflop and 53% on the flop vs MP3. MP1 was a donk who raised pretty much every hand.

Didn't win a hand that first session. Next session I did win my first Omaha hand.

PokerStars Pot-Limit Omaha, $0.02 BB (9 handed) - PokerStars Converter Tool from http://www.flopturnriver.com

SB ($1.76)
BB ($5)
UTG ($2.08)
UTG+1 ($1.08)
MP1 ($12.31)
MP2 ($2.17)
Hero (MP3) ($0.80)
CO ($1.98)
Button ($1.28)

Preflop: Hero is MP3 with Kd, 6c, 2h, Kh
1 fold, UTG+1 (poster) checks, MP1 calls $0.02, 1 fold, Hero (poster) bets $0.11, 2 folds, SB calls $0.10, 1 fold, UTG+1 (poster) calls $0.09, 1 fold

Flop: ($0.37) 6s, 6d, Jc (3 players)
SB checks, UTG+1 checks, Hero bets $0.36, SB calls $0.36, 1 fold

Turn: ($1.09) 5c (2 players)
SB checks, Hero bets $0.33 (All-In), SB calls $0.33

River: ($1.75) 7s (2 players, 1 all-in)

Total pot: $1.75 | Rake: $0.06

Results:
SB had 9h, Jd, Qd, 7d (two pair, Jacks and sevens).
Hero had Kd, 6c, 2h, Kh (three of a kind, sixes).
Outcome: Hero won $1.69

In this case I was 85% on the flop and turn. Only 59% preflop. I don't know what the other guy was thinking. Chasing TP in Omaha often isn't a wise strategy. That was a break catching trips. Sometimes the side cards can also work for you.

play and study time

 A few months ago I bought two new poker books online. After a few weeks I noticed a distinct lack of progress in reading them.

I find it's very hard to read in the evening after work. by the time I get home I'm tired from work and there are always a hundred things to do at the apartment. so even when I attempt poker reading I've found it hard to focus and effectively cover much ground. worthwhile poker books aren't easy reading. they require a lot of thought and concentration. I buy poker books for information and concepts that I don't already know, or have not fully articulated and grasped.

so what to do? after a while an idea came to me. read during break time at work. this has turned out pretty well. at lunch time now for the last few weeks I've gone to my car to cover a few pages a day of the first book. I find during the day I'm much fresher and more alert and able to really think about what I'm reading. also it's a well defined time and place for poker reading with no distraction. finally I'm making steady progress and looking forward to finishing this book.

speaking of play time. I realized recently I haven't played a hand online in several months. ouch. Life happens I guess and poker will always be an enjoyable hobby that I can only spend what time is available for it on. online play just got dropped on the floor. but it is on my radar screen to resurface online, perhaps in some new form.

on the live scene. I still enjoy playing $1/$2 NL at the local card room. for a few months I attempted an experiment of playing on Thursdays pretty much every week, then on Friday/Saturdays when possible. that experiment ended unsuccessfully. the Thursday game has more regulars and is tougher than the weekend game and I lost money playing in it. so back to playing the softer Friday/Saturday live scene which I realized suits me fine. I play around 2-3 times a month now live.

there are more interesting things going on in poker for me just around the corner that I'm really excited about. I'm looking forward to posting these developments here.

rake increase

Back in January there was an increase in rake at the local casino. It's now max $5, up from $4. Rake comes out at every $10 increment so now pots are rake free at the $50 mark instead of $40.

I got thinking about how this would affect the $1/$2 game. I estimate around 25 hands an hour are dealt. Of these say half of pots are $50 or more. So it's around another $12 an hour the house is taking off the table. ouch.

In terms of win rate. A tight player might win around 2 hands an hour on average. Of these maybe 1 would be $50+. So it might seem to cost $1 an hour in winrate.

However there is another effect and you lose money even on the hands you fold. There are a number of recreational players who buy in for say $60 or so. They are in a number of pots, up and down. If they bust they may reload once. If they build a large stack they may cash out. Once in a while a player will be able to stack one of these recreational players. Suppose you stack rec for his last $41 in some hand. That's nice to make $41. However by then rec may have won 2-3 bigger hands that would have been $5 raked. So his stack should have been around $44 when he busted. The house has taken money off the table that you otherwise would have won.

I'll estimate this effect costs regulars around $0.50 an hour. So together the rake increase would reduce expectation in $1/$2 by around $1.50 an hour. yikes.

--

I got thinking of an alternate calculation. The house is taking an extra $12 an hour off the table. At a 10 player game suppose the house gave each player $1.20 at the beginning of an hour. What happens after an hour? In an average hour winning players make money and losing players lose money. So a winning player may make say 15 cents off the $1.20 and losing players would turn the $1.20 into perhaps $1.00. So the profitable player would expect to have around $1.20 + $0.15 = $1.35. Which is another way to calculate the effect of the rake increase on winrate. This is fairly close to the amount calculated above.

It demonstrates that break even and winning players are more affected. Which makes sense. Recreational players tend to just play until they bust. So the effect on them is generally that they bust a bit sooner and regulars earn less profit on them busting out.

Hold'em Poker for Advanced Players

I read another poker book recently. It was Hold'em Poker for Advanced Players. True to its title it was advanced. I found it actually a bit lighter than Sklansky's Theory of Poker. I was a bit surprised when I read it. I didn't realize it was a limit hold'em book. TOP is about all forms of poker and for whatever reason I thought HEPFAP also was.

I always knew LHE was tricky and after this book I have a new appreciation for how hard it can be. I'm not sure how much I'll use the material. At my local card room there's seldom a limit game. There's $1/$2 and $2/$5 no limit and increasing PLO - note to self. I've been thinking I should better align my live and online play.

I've got some more poker reading to do this year. In addition HEPFAP made me realize the importance of rereading. Going over stuff I've read before. Going over my own game plan and strategies so I have them down pat at live game speed.

live and online bankroll

I've been thinking about bankroll a bit lately. I was thinking of joining another site. I still like PokerStars but was thinking of branching out. Alas PlayNow isn't yet open outside BC so I'll have to wait a bit to see if that will evolve for the better.

In any case it got me thinking there's no good reason to have all of my online bankroll at Stars. Especially after what happened back in April.

So I joined the 7%. I made a withdraw from PokerStars. It was a modest withdraw. It was mainly to confirm the mechanics of how these work and to confirm that I can get to my funds. The transaction was processed extremely promptly by PokerStars and everything went through in Canada no problem. So well done Stars. It gives me a lot of confidence going forward.

So that was encouraging. When the money arrived I put it into my bank account that has my live bankroll. I will keep live and online br separate. I did transfer an amount equal to the wd from the live side to the online side. I plan to remove most of my Stars bankroll in the coming months, just leaving enough for the levels I play with enough to withstand a typical downswing. I still plan to play on Stars, in fact probably more with the "matching" contributions from the live bankroll side.

The nice thing about getting online bankroll into my own bank account is I can use the same backing money on multiple sites. For example suppose I want to play $10 MTT on PokerStars and PartyPoker. If I use a 1% guideline that would suggest having $1000 on both sites. However the common backing bankroll can be used on both sites. For example with $1000 in my online bankroll in my own bank account. I could have just $100 on Stars and Party and be properly rolled to play $10 MTT on both sites.

Getting Started in Hold'em

I recently read another poker book. It was Getting Started in Hold'em by Ed Miller. It was pretty good.

At 200 pages with no equations it was an easier read than most 2+2 books. Which is what you would expect from a book targeting starting players. The content was good. Miller covers the key points while providing a good jumping off point to the more advanced 2+2 texts. Like many 2+2 titles the theme was more around live play which is fine with me. The section on limit hold'em was good. Also the collection of short essays in the miscellaneous topics at the end was a good read for pretty much any level of player.

So why would I read a starters book today after playing for a few years with at least break even success. Well there was a specific section in this book that I wanted to read. That was the part about short stack no limit. Miller describes this strategy well. So now I know a bit more about it. I thought it would be useful to know, it does fit into my plans around live play.

I've got a number of poker books lined up that I want to read. I'll be starting a new 2+2 title shortly.