I just want to become better

Was thinking about it a bit, sorry for wall of text!

There are 1 000 guys that can give you better advice and know poker more, I started plaing poker after 10+ years break just for fun, I play on different site (iPoker) and my sample size is crazy small, but I think I was having similair issues like you when I played years back during my studies.

As already stated, I play on iPoker, so I cant comment player pool on GG, but I doubt that there are playing some advanced players on NL2 etc (cant comment about bots etc). You have to think about what opponents you are playing on NL2 stakes. Most of the time those are recreational players trying to have some fun, complete poker newbies, pseudo advanced players who saw nosebleeds cash game on youtube as its only source for study etc. Did you ever organize live home game with your real life friends that barely knows poker rules? Alot players on NL2 level is on similair level or not far away from it. Do you think its good idea to double barell, 3bet light, open wide in lp and cbet wide, float often such players? Do you think they are analyzing your hud stats (most of them do not know that you can use HUD), trying to play back on you? In my opinion only thing they care is about their cards, most of the time in poker you are card dead, recreational players are bored, and they finaly get QJo in UTG and hit middle pair, finally! no one can bluff them off. Player I described shall be you major chip gainer on NL2. Sure topic is way more complex, my examples are bit exaggerated, but you get the point.

Try to think if complete ABC poker (in fact play your hands complete face up, they dont care) isnt appropriete here. I bet if you see my NL2 session you would be surprised how simple I play, maybe you will call it stupid. Your most aggresive bluff shall look like this: open 3bb with KQs on btn, 1 call, flop is A37 rainbow, you cbet half pot and villain call - you are done with the hand, do not invest single chip more, you lost 3bb open + 3bb cbet = 6bb thats okay, but do not spent more chips by fancy play, your goal is to hit set, straight, flush and play for 100bb stack.

Did you open that KQs and it comes wet connected flop? You do not need to cbet, your lost 3bb and are done with the hand. Did you open and now you are in multiway pot, do not cbet, your lost 3bb and thats it. Is it exploitable and stupid play? Definitelly. Does your villain observe and trying to adjust? Most time they do not care.

You have marginal hand on BB and loose btn trying to steal, but you know that he wont fold to 3bet and cbet, just fold preflop, you lost 1bb, thats okay, but do not spew 30bb trying to bluff in 3B pot OOP! Wait for hand with better equity and valuebet him! Do not fall in illusion that he is observing you and will do some herofold if he hit something on board. Just wait for value and catch him.

You have marginal hand in co, btn 3bets you, just fold it, do not throw away chips in 3b spot OOP. Believe me 99% players on NL2 wont adjust and start you 3bet light.

You are on btn and 3 calling stations sitting in big blind? Do not open marginal hand, fold pf, do not steal vs someone who do not want to fold. Do not spew chips without equity, wait for value hand.

Your biggest lost by pure bluffing shall be around 6bb, not more. 3bet really tight and just for value. Try to create some complete ABC face-up nitty strategy, start from there and start SLOWLY(!!) adding some advance stuff only to players you have sample and when you know what you are doing (there wont be much players where you will collect decent sample on NL2). Play as ABC as you will think that this stupid strategy everyone have to see - but in reality they do not care. It will be boring, no tought decisions. Just stay patient.

Advice 1): do not spent chips without equity. Every chip saved is counting. Take it as challenge.

Second thing to focus I would recommend is stack size and pot control. Saw your red numbers when getting deeper stack. In general in 100bb poker, top pair top kicker, overpair hands are medium hands and you should potcontrol them. Take it as challenge to start folding this when facing villain aggresion, most of the time NL2 player field is passive, if they show agression, you are most of the time behind with such holdings, check "Baluga theorem". Again you will feel that they are playing on you, but most of the time they dont.

Yes you can valuebet 3 streets with AK on A high board versus fish on dry board, but pay atention when the show agression.

In 100bb poker, you in general trying to get set, straight, flush and play for stacks. Setmine with 88 and take money from guy with AA or AK, KQ, KT, K8, K3 on K83 board, thats where value come from. Otherwise it is texas foldem. Yes it takes time until you flop set, yes its boring, just stay patinent and do not spew smaller pots with bluffing, trying to calldown marginal holdings etc during waiting for value hand.

Advice 2): potcontrol with medium holdings, especialy when they show aggresion

I am interested what others think about it, sure maybe I am wrong, but this helped me when I was also about b/e when I started. I was spewing off huge amout of chips in order to follow general advices like (play loose in lp, cbet often etc...) Sure it is too general and it cant be sumarized in 1 post, I am writing this to at least point you to some direction and see it maybe from different perspective? Do no overcomplicate it on NL2 stake. It seems like you are better player than me, studying etc but this stuff does not work on NL2. You will use advanced stuff on higher stakes. I do not doubt you will reach them soon.

Thats my view, interested to see how others beat NL2 field. As I said, there is milion better poker players around, take it just like inspiration where to look.

Thank you very much for your advice. It reminds me of how I used to play long ago, and might be the best thing to do for now.
I will try to go back to the basics and keep you updated with my feedback.
Thank you again for taking the time to answer and give me advices.

Seth

Hello guys !

Just a small update to say that I had a few days off in order to focus and be in the right mindset. I will update you with my schedule and plans during the day.
See you soon in NL2 😀

Nice post!

1) As for this question you seem to not only be doing a lot to improve but also have a very regimented schedule. This is really great esp if you’re someone this works really well for. I personally tend to need a more loose schedule/routine but I do have a routine/exercise program I maintain I’m just a bit more open about when I execute on any specific thing bc that works better for me but you’re certainly doing very well to maintain this

2) I have to admit this answer is kinda weird to me bc you’re playing cash rather than tourneys…so the only trophy you will ever get is either $$ itself or to be seen sitting at a certain stakes game. That’s really the only trophy that exists in the cash game world. I’d be curious to hear you further elaborate on this as I don’t really understand your goal exactly

For the second part, even though I am retired, my income is more or less similar with my expenses. Hence, if I aim to travel and have some buyins to play tournaments, it would be thanks to cash game's income.
With cash game I rarely swing more than 10 buy-ins, but in MTTs I feel like I can lose 40+ buyins in a few days on a bad run.
This is why I aim to at least be winning in cash game and use it to finance my MTTs later on

It's time for an update.
Following my recent run, I have been thinking about what I could improve and how, and I came to a few conclusions.
The first of them being that the reason my morale was down is probably not the fact that I run a bit bad recently, but mainly the fact that there are a lot of big pots where I don't know what to do. I lose big pots and don't know if I play right or wrong in these situations so I think it's a matter that I want to resolve.
The second part is that my wife will live in about a month so I want to spend some time with her before dedicating myself 24/7 to Poker (not that I don't have friends but most of them are poker related anyway).
What I have done is that I have focused on learning, and play a bit less than before for now. Considering the playing part, I play on an asian APP in NL10, the benefit being that it's full of fishes and I have never seen a field so soft (since I am in Asia and you have to speak chinese to be there). The problem is that you can't really play on a lot of tables so the hourly is maybe 200h max, which makes me a bit sad.
It gives me an easy winrate and I really play ABC, I have been running pretty bad but very hard to lose vs this field anyway.
It still doesn't solve the problem over time since I will mostly have to go back to a 'popular' software later on that won't be as easy as this one.

Anyway :

If you rarely go into 10 buy-in holes at 6-max, your standard deviation per 100 hands must be very low, which might indicate being a bit too afraid to put more chips into the middle in bigger pots. Not saying that's a correct statistical conclusion based on these samples, but I do think soft pools can/should be very swingy short term if you're trying to squeeze max EV out of them.

That's possible.
At the same time, I wouldn't see myself going 3 barrell all-in with air against soft players, or rarely I guess

Yeah sure, I meant more like going thinner more often than theory, which I think you should get away with in a pool where people don't for an example raise river as bluffs or thin much at all but still station with weird garbage.

When it comes to bluffing, you can usually get people to overfold in lines where ranges are still wide, like BXB or XBB instead of some B75-B125-jam, where they aren't.

You get the point, just wanted to share some ideas you might find worth looking into.

GL mate!

Thank's a lot, those BXB and XBB ranges are great.
I noticed several patterns that are relatively EV+ too, but for the BXB I feel like I tend to get called a lot when checking turn for some reasons (or just the sample was like this and it's different overal)

Every line in which you think you're getting more calls than theory, the proper exploit is to go even more linear, meaning more thin value.

I want to emphasize I'm not a nosebleed crusher, so take my advice with a grain of salt, but I'm pretty sure that I'm not very off here.

Thank you very much, it surely is amazing to think about it under this angle.

By the way everybody, I have a coach that I work with and will do CFP with over time. He is in my opinion the best person I could work with, and I am impatient to work with him.
I will keep you updated

Hello everybody !
As my wife will leave the country soon, I spend more time with her than usual, and play less, which will continue until August 31st, her date of departure.
At the same time, I focus on theory and especially exploitive Poker. I had the chance to play on the 12th and 14th, about 6k hands total and feel more confident in what I do, I think that it's because for a majority of spots, I know what to do compared to before since I saw them a little bit with my coach, so I don't mine losing the hands or not, and for other spots, such as when to bluff or check to protect my range and stuff, I just feel that I have a better reflection.
I don't think that the sample is relevant so I wont post any graph, I might do at the end of the month if I play 30-50k+ by then, but I am not looking for a great WR anyway yet.

I feel like for a while I was between Mount Stupid and Valley of Despair lol I hope I can finally go to the slope of enlightenment.

Also, I flopped the nuts, what could go wrong ? (not like he got any value for it)

Hello everybody,

I haven't posted in a while because as you know my wife is leaving soon so I spend time with her + I have Covid

However, I might be "not breakeven" now. Will keep the secret and send some graphs and recap at the end of the month 😀

I respect cash game players. However I would love for them to come and play MTTs where men with balls of steel play.

Good Luck.

I play live MTTs, I won some too. However, I like the postflop complexity of cash game more than the complexity of ICM.
And I don't like flips that much because I feel like I am lucky if I win it, and that I am unlucky if I lose it. Either way I would be unsatisfied, while in cash game I just follow the EV line regardless so a flip doesn't make my EV line move at all

On my first post you can see this horrible breakeven graph

After working on my game and stuff, I improved it a little bit

Definitly feeling better than a month ago when I hit an all time low. 90% of it is RNC

I will just update from time to time now, I am improving fast so I don't mind.
I play NL5 now, planning to get to NL10 next month. So not stuck in NL2 anymore. Had a very bad run, but with RB was breakeven still so it's fine