Speed Poker Grinding

Posted 8 years agoEdited 8 years ago

Starting this thread to track my progression grinding speed poker.

I have been playing online poker on and off for about 5 years. Thinking I was better than everyone else and getting destroyed even at 2NL for most of it.

Many times I decided to quit poker all together on the basis that it must be luck rather than skill, however I keep coming back thinking that if others have made it playing online poker then it must be possible.

I have used Hold em Manager for a while but only recently really understood many of the stats, just in time for the PokerStars ban Speechless

Over the last year or so I have been pretty much a break even player playing 2NL and 5NL on stars on anything from 1 to 4 tables at once.

The recent discovery of Poker Snowie has really helped my game. I find I only have a small amount of time to play. (e.g. 15-30 min sessions, hence the choice of speed poker)

I play a small session then I analyse what I have done with PokerSnowie and I am now seeing imporovement.

I have shown a good profit over the last 3,500 hands on Stars.

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I am going to try William Hill soon as I try to conquer 5NL.

I will post updates and any tricky spots I find myself in and I thank you all in advance for any advice! Smile
msilvo

Last Post 7 years ago by

msilvo

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Posted 8 years ago
Hey welcome to the forum and thanks for making a journey! Where did you find us?

William Hill sounds like a perfect home for any grinder and will for sure make you some money especially with the rewards.

A lot of people have spoke about snowie and if it is good/relevant for micro stakes players....how do you feel about this?
Posted 8 years ago*
Hi Jon thanks for replying.

I came across the site watching your video on 5NL Zoom Poker on Youtube, the content on here is great!

I find that Snowie is really useful for me as it teaches the basics well and you can clearly see where you may have gone wrong.

I hope that although I play the micros it will stand me in good stead for a number of levels should I move up.

I have made good progress and the ratings that Snowie gives me have been gradually improving from Beginner/Intermediate to Expert/World Class now.

For those unfamiliar with Snowie the results page you get after an import is shown below

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It is clear to see how you have played on average and how many large errors (Blunders) you have made

You can then go into further detail and review all of the decisions you made and any errors.

A typical analysis is shown below

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One thing in particular that I find useful is when I have a bad session.

This happened during this week and I lost nearly 3 buy ins. Two were bad beats where I had 80%EV but I always wonder if I get myself into these situations through bad play on earlier streets etc.

This time I was able to look at Snowie and it gave me a rating of 6 which is considered World Class. This made it far easier for me to forget about the bad session in the knowledge that I am playing well.

I will be posting some more results shortly when I have played another few thousand hands and am hoping to turn a recent downswing around Smile
Posted 8 years ago
good luck with everything man!

I also play speed poker because of the limited time I have.

I'm gonna check pokersnowie out, it looks interesting.
Posted 8 years ago
Nice review there buddy and it deffs looks like you are using it properly and understand how it all works.

I feel that is maybe where people say it isnt for micro grinders as it may be running before you can walk type thing. But for someone like yourself who sees the big picture and has worked up to it then there is no doubt its a huge positive.
Posted 8 years ago
Checking in after next 3500 hands.

Very up and down on William Hill at 5NL. You can see from the graph below how things are going.

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Currenly about 1.5 buy-ins down (Graph is in $ not Euros) which isn't so bad considering I have been on the bad side of variance.

The grid below shows my profit/loss with all the hands and I am losing heavily with AA KK and QQ!

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However Snowie says I am still playing well so its all good Yes


As I have used my Will Hill account within the last 6 months I have been unable to re-tag and get rake-back, so I have decided to switch to Stan James on Micro-gaming.

The two welcome bonuses with the 30% rake-back should really help me progress.

I really like the software and started out playing 4NL Blaze.

However for some reason Blaze Hand Histories are a bit of a problem. Only winning hands are saved!

Although this makes for a brilliant looking graph it is not really suitable for analysis and improving my game.

Therefore I have decided to start playing regular speed tables for the time being.

I appreciate the title of this thread is now a bit misleading but the welcome bonuses are too good to miss out on.

I will post my progress when I have played 15K hands in total.
Posted 8 years ago
Stan James is a good choice as like you say the deposit bonus, rb and our races just payyyyyyyyyyyyy basically.

What's your plans for the last few days of the year?
Posted 8 years ago
Do you not still have to rake a certain amount on Stan James anymore?? I'm sure it was like $200 per week at one point to qualify for RB??
Posted 8 years ago
I am at work today and tomorrow so not much poker will be played unless I get some time in the evenings.

I have decided to stop playing on Stan James for the time being.

I did manage to get hand histories for Blaze poker working but the traffic for Blaze is fairly low, I ended up 3 handed or even heads up most of the time on a 6 max table. I struggled to adjust to this as I am so used to playing 6 handed now.

When I did try to move to the regular stakes tables I struggled again. Unless I was playing many more tables than I am comfortable with I could not make any headway in rake races or with the bonuses until I am playing higher stakes.

I did like the software on Stan James and I will return once I have moved up a few more stakes.

I do intend to go back to William Hill but I am going to leave it 6 months so I can re tag my account.

For now I am back on Pokerstars playing 5NL and I am running good so far.

I will post updates shortly
Posted 8 years ago
If you wouldn't mind pointing me in the right direction for importing blaze hand histories to PT4 that would be much appreciated? Smile
Posted 8 years ago
Jef147: If you wouldn't mind pointing me in the right direction for importing blaze hand histories to PT4 that would be much appreciated? :)


Yeh ditto on this please - afaik it is completely impossible to sort it so this is big news if so.
Posted 8 years ago*
Sorry guys on closer inspection it looks like I haven't got it working completely.

I had a losing session which obviously included losing hands as well as winning hands and therefore it looked like hands were importing correctly. See below.

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However on closer inspection it looks like the losing hands are limited to just the ones that went to showdown.

So I am still missing losing hands before showdown. If I find out anymore I will post the info.

Posted 8 years ago
Only just seen this thread. Looks like we'll both be looking to beat 4NL/5NL in 2016 so I'll be following closely. I'm especially interested in your use of snowie, I tried it out for the free trial and found it really useful. I hear nothing but negatives about it's use at the micros so it will be good to see some of the analysis you do with it. Good luck in 2016! Smile
Posted 8 years ago
Quick update on progress.

Things have been going well, using Snowie I have been able to plug several leaks in my game. My current graph is below.

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Current BR is at $212.01 and I am going to get to $240 and that gives me (40 x $5NL + 4 x $10NL shots)

An error of mine that Snowie has been consistently highlighting is that I call too much from the blinds with hands such as KJo, KTo, QJs and QTs.

This is something I need to work on as they are some of my largest losing hands at 5NL.

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So far Snowie has been a good investment for me Yes
Posted 8 years ago
Nice work!
Posted 8 years ago
Damn that is one perfect looking graph. #jealous

Posted 8 years ago
Update on progress.

Unfortunately the perfect looking graph is no longer that perfect.

I am on a bit of a downswing currently and had a big losing weekend last weekend of about 7 buy ins.

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Apart from one very bad call for an entire buy in I made when tilted I dont think ive been playing too bad, Snowie still had me playing at an Advanced level throughout the losing sessions.

I have got into some difficult spots and felt I had to fold hence the quickly dropping red line.

Im not too concerned and I am looking forward to the challenge of grinding the bankroll back up so I can have some 10NL shots soon.

Posted 8 years ago
Interesting. Normally when i see someones red line suffer like this i think "i bet they are playing more tables or when tired". Is that the case or just not at all?

The graph is still perfect - your winning. This is something most cannot do in 2016 so don't let it get you down. Keep grinding!
Posted 8 years ago
I think you may be on to something with tiredness.

I have almost not played this week as I have been tired constantly.

Still enjoying grinding and I am feeling optimistic about starting an upswing again soon!
Posted 8 years ago*
Quick update.

Things have been going better since the last post and I have managed to make up around $20, on top of that I have cashed in 1000 starscoin for $10 so my bankroll is back up to a healthy $207.67.

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I was wondering if anyone had suggestions for a different site to try. A lot of the deals on here look great but as I dont rake that much I am concerned that some sites may be unsuitable. As Jef mentioned earlier in this thread I may need to rake $200 a week to qualify for RB on Stan James?

Are there any sites that will pay rakeback for players regardless of the volume they play? I paid nearly $30 rake on stars over 10k hands and this took me about a month. I know this is small and I won't be competing in rake races any time soon but getting an extra $9 would be great Smile

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.