Starting to learn MTT
Hi everyone,
I’m a player who has always seen poker more as a passion than something to seriously focus on. I’m primarily a chess player. When it comes to poker, I’ve never studied or analyzed anything in depth, I’ve just played because I enjoyed it.
A couple of years ago, I even played a live €1.100 PokerStars tournament and finished roughly in the top 150 out of 4.400 participants.
Now, though, I’d like to start taking it more seriously and begin studying MTTs. I might have jumped the gun a bit by impulsively purchasing Patrick Leonard’s “Pads on Pads” course. While it’s full of valuable content, I realize that I’ve never used a solver before and don’t really understand how they work.
Patrick uses solvers in the course as if the viewer is already familiar with them, but for me, it’s all completely new and quite overwhelming.
Is there a course or resource that can help me quickly get up to speed with how to read and use these charts?
2 Replies
There are some analytical video on YouTube. Many of them using GTO solver as a helping tool. By watching some of the videos and practicing using solver yourself, you will be there very soon.
As a former professional online mtt, and spin grinder and winning player overall I would give you the following advice:
1. Only play online small stakes tournaments, with a 200 buyin bankroll management to get some volume in and to get better fast.
- Why just small? Mtts need a lot of volume and experience to generate a solid ROI that is significant, and to know you you beat the games. You don't want to blow your money right away, by playing too high.
2. Only play 4 tables at a time, and focus on making good decisions, instead of recklessly adding tables due to impatience.
3. Fokus on good sleep, nutrition and a good life balance, because mtts are draining. Also prepare food, and drinks because nothing is more tilting than
making food while the tables in the background constantly beeping.
4. Use the Pokerstrategy.com ICM trainer to practice, and also use the Raise your Edge GTO trainer daily.
5. Stop focusing too much on solver outputs except preflop sims. Instead focus more on exploitive plays. Solvers are for players that play almost perfectly, not for micro and mid stakes.
Though you should know the preflop sims! Preflop gives you a solid stable security to adjust from.
6. Don't buy courses! As a beginner you will be totally fine with the Raise Your Edge content that is for free. RYE and Upswing poker are the training sites that I would recommend.
7. Mix online and live poker! Play live tournaments, because you will have to do that anyway because....
to my opinion as a winning player, online poker very, very likely fixed / rigged, and it is very unlikely that you will be a winner in the longrun.
It is more likely that you will win in the beginning, even though you make bad decisions, but then lose the money, no matter how good you play, due to
downswings that will be activated by the rooms algorithm.
Is there evidence that the rooms are rigged?
No
is it likely that they rigg.
Yes
...At least to someone that has no agenda and uses his brain and knowledge about human behaviors and greed.
You can ask chat gpt about the likelihood and the opportunities rooms have, about algorithms and how RNGs really work, and how easy it would be
to fix games, and how hard it would be for a government to really find out, because the overall randomness has nothing to do with certain setups that can be created to increase rake/fee by balancing equities, and follow your intuition.
That being said, there are good coaches out there like bencb, and Mike Brady but I disagree with their take on how online poker works.
Live poker is the way to go.
GL
