There was nothing amazing about today's grind spot, and that's what felt good about it. Re-reading MGOP for the umpteemth time, the concept of the inchworm really started to make sense to me.
What this theory says, when applied to poker, is that our mind has a certain range of abilities, and before learning more advanced topics we need to first solidify the basic ones. Failure to really understand the simpler elements in poker approach and strategy means that learning more advanced topics is simply impossible, because our brain implodes.
I've probably always been guilty of this. Lately for example I've invented all sorts of advanced strategies for big pots, though never committed them to paper to really test and understand them. The goal is to reach the level of unconscious competence, and I haven't done that. Not only that, I've also not fully understood my game-plan for the simpler, high frequency spots. So, raising the button, flopping 2nd pair on a wet board VS the BB and having to think about whether to cbet or not means my mental 'range' is too wide, leading to over-stretching myself, leading then to implosions and eventual poker exhaustion.
Once a base subject, such as PF for example, is learned very well, then we can progress to some basic postflop stuff. Once that's really learned to UC, we can start to come up with more advanced strategies, and so on and so on.
Throughout my poker career, I've been convinced that certain abilities have been learned to the level of UC, only to find that a few months later that I've forgotten everything I once knew. Thus the cycle of boom and bust is perpetuated. Right now I'm bust, and I want it to be the last time.
So back to today...... I just went back to the basics of playing solid poker. My initial instinct on playing fairly well, if unspectacularly, was to say to myself 'ok, time to work on the more advanced stuff'. But of course inchworm makes clear that doing that without really getting down a very basic approach to 6max poker will result in eventual meltdown.
I have a massive list of topics to get through, but for now I'm just going to write about the title of this blog, 'a basic method of playing poker'.
There's two aspects to this, the technical side and the implementation side.
Implementation- what do I mean by implementation? Basically, it's the steps that precede me choosing a button to click! The most important thing about implementation is that it is based, ultimately, on instinct. What I mean by instinct is not to disregard the technical aspects of the hand, quite the opposite- but instead that I make sure that having taken in all the necessary technical details of the hand I then relax and trust my unconscious competence (blink, whatever you want to call it) to come up with the correct answer. Whatever answer it gives, I click that button. If it's saying make an enormous call, or a huge fold, or a spazzy bluff, then so be it- there is no other ultimate decider of what is right or wrong than what my UC is telling me to do.
Sometimes the decision will be tough, and so my instinct will give me no clear answer either way. At such points I'll tank a little, take in more information, until eventually the instinct will choose which side of the fence to sit on. Being in touch with it requires real clarity of thought, and mindfulness to be aware of when tilt is clouding its judgement. But as soon as I look at the technical details, relax, an answer always comes.
Training whatever part of the brain responsible for coming up with that answer is something done outside of playing, through blogs like this one incorporating appropriate CREV sims and HHs. We should not be inventing new strategies and over thinking while playing!
Basic Technical Details- there's infinite poker situations, so listing every appropriate technical detail is impossible, but there are always a few very important things to consider. As a foundation for almost every spot, we need to carry out the following steps to gather information, and then allow instinct to process it. In order:
- Handread opponent- his current range. This is relatively simple preflop, but gets exponentially harder street by street. On the flop we have to look back at the PF action, take in things like raise size and players behind, 3bet and cold call numbers, and just roughly approximate the width of his range. Turn, we get to utilise whatever he did on the flop, so whether he bet or not, his sizing if he did, in conjunction with the PSR and the board texture. River, same as with turn. All we have to do is transition this range street by street, so by the river we have a really decent handle of his cards.
- Handread opponent- his continuing range if we were to make an aggressive action. Here we're just whittling down the range we worked out in 1). Is he forced to fold too much or too little?
- Handread ourself if we are considering continuing- this simply ensures that whatever line we may take will be credible.
- Plan ahead- take the above information and plan for future streets. This can take many forms depending on the type of spot. For example, we might be in the BB facing a minraise holding Q7s preflop. Planning ahead, we are going to flat but not be overly concerned with defending too much on flops as our PF defend is predicated on amazing pot odds- allowing us to under-defend flops with our junkier hands. In a different spot, if we are making an aggressive action, it means planning for a re-aggressive action and also checking out the PSR, and roughly planning our next-street move on various flops/ turns/ rivers. Planning ahead also means factoring in bad rivers, failed bluffs, potential coolers, etc- which is an amazing tool for mental game.
Here's an example of the four steps in action. Preflop, I take in the pot odds, the fact we are closing the action, the postflop PSR, and instinctively it's an obvious preflop flat probably regardless of their ranges. On the flop, the orginal 3bettor's range contains 32 combos of AK and AQ, various Axs bluffs, some other bluffs, then QQ+. In terms of his continuing range, he'll continue any middle pair+, but basically is folding very often indeed to a lead. If we lead and he calls, we'll shut down except on a turn giving us the nuts or an ace which puts real pressure on his QQ KK. The cold caller probably has AKo and AQs, but also TT and 99. I think to a lead he'll call TT and 99 to a flop lead but fold turn.
Hand-reading ourself, we have 9 sets and probably only 4 combos of T9s as our only bluff. Our lead is therefore credible for value.
Planning ahead then, if we lead the flop, then with the PSR and dryness of the board we'll be able to call a small raise to then fold turn (unlikely, but needs planning for before we lead). If called, we're betting every turn VS the cold caller to fold out TT and 99, but only nuts, ace and probably K turns VS the BTN.
Lets consider CC instead........ well planning ahead we have no real way of winning the pot on a turn X. It probably makes a bit of money, though not as much as leading.
So, all this hand takes is relaxing, thinking through the hand in the manner above, and my instinct was pretty clear that leading was the best option. The most amazing thing about planning ahead is that it's a complete tilt buster- there's no card that can fall or action from our opponent that we haven't already planned for, and tilt mostly comes from unrealistic expectations.
The above seems complex, but I've made it sound more difficult than it is. All I'm really trying to get down are a few simple steps that we can apply in all spots. Once this method is fully understood and learned to UC, I can use that foundation to start really exploring ways to destroy the 2015 reg.
Future topics- board coverage, bluffing into strong ranges, PSR manipulation, the effects of leverage, adjusting to our opponents' level, sizing and inflection points.
The four steps as currently applied lead me to playing fairly passively (though that's a relative statement, obviously I'm still pretty aggro, just not wayyyyyyyyyy outta line aggro), which tells me that the hyper aggro style I want to get to simply isn't learned to UC at the moment. That's fine, this style will win some money for now. If applied properly and consistently, I'd hazard a guess at around 2bb at 500nl - this style is really all about avoiding big mistakes and tilt by only implementing strategies that we know very very well.
Cliffs- hand-read the opponent with skills, make a plan, get in tune with your instinct, trust it, click the button :-)
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