| If you have Arachnophobia look away.... |
[Jun. 13th, 2009|01:52 pm] |
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I've been wondering about potential avatars in my prop bet...
For those unaware I've got a little bet on with AdriennesRevenge on DC for us to get some hands in this month.
Jess's goal is 100 total hours play.
My goal is 3850 VPPs which will keep me on track for Supernova and see that I hit the 3rd insta-cash bonus this month.
While this may seem a little unbalanced don't forget I do work full time as well so overall it seemed a decent go and the whole point really was for us to have an incentive to get our play in.
If either of us fail the other gets to change our avatar so I was contemplating some for Jess last night...
So far she's come up with "TAGs Rule LAGs drool" and various other ones based on my supposed Looseness so now it's time for a warning shot from my end :)
Any of the following may be considered....
HU 4 Roll Spider's always been a favourite of mine and Ribbo and I think this would be a fun addition....of course I know Jess kinda like cats too so we've also got these options...
Of course there are all just preliminaries I could choose to be more or less nice depending on my mood at the time, and if I keep running the way I am at the moment Jess may be getting something from Night of the Living Dead...no it wasn't pretty.
But still can't complain overall.
Assuming I stablise and don't go on some kind of hideous 20 session downswing like I did before I've had the idea of being a little more aggressive with my bankroll.
Since I have a monthly nut of 0 due to the fact I actually work for a living this means I can be a little more frugal. Now Kelly Criterion would state that bascailly a 1BB/100 winner with a Standard Devisation of 18BB/100 should maintain a bankroll of about 250BB for the limit he plays, moving up or down based on where he/she is which provides the best balance of moving up whiel attempting to negate risk of ruin.
I'm not quite ready to embrace that but if I were to say move up when i have 350BB for a new level and down when I only have 200BB that'd be more than enough for controlled shot and I think that's how I may approach it from now.
This leaves he currently "rolled" for 2/4 but i want to talk to BBB first and also get some hands in this month before I do so, assuming all goes well I'll be reporting from 2/4 by this time next week.
Take Care Guys
Boomer |
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| I'm lazy..... |
[May. 28th, 2009|04:57 pm] |
Wowzers....*dusts down blog*
I barely even know where to begin here, it's been almost 2 months since I let loose. Well I'm going to be starting a poker-related blog on Deucescracked soon and leave this one for mainly personal whining and occasional updates....BUT there's big news for this month...
I got put at risk of redundancy at work....and survived by the skin of my teeth. None of that agin plzkthx. What a horrible time of my life that was, didn't know what to think or say and still have a case of rather epic survivor's guilt. What am I supposed to do? Celebrate? That'd be like celebrating a car wreck. Either way I'm glad it's over and fortunately it looks like everyone affected is going to be ok, one way or another. Big Changes though.
Anyway with that out of the way how about good things. Well after facing near calamity I decided it was time to do a little moving on. Obviously my mother and I are kinda stuck with each other at the moment since we both own half the house and the housing market is currently to use a thoroughly British phrase "On its arse" so we decided to make the best of a rather non-optimal situation and we're currently splitting the house in 2. Me top half, her bottom half.
In my half one room with be the boring ol' bedroom, the upstairs study is currently being converted into a full on home cinema and entertainment room with Projector (awesome btw), PC, XBox 360 (not yet here but Stars should oblidge in a couple of months), 5.1 surround (shipped today) and, more than likely, the heads of any neighbours who complain...it's Boomer's turn now...MWAHAHAHA!!! And the smaller room will be filled up with various DVD series etc I've collected over the years.
Obviously this required a bit of a move round and a lot of upheaval but we've managed the hard parts now so it should be pretty plain sailing from here on in.
Also starteed back playing a bit of golf since I'm an unfit sod who needs the exercise. Had first round for a while last week and after a, frankly, tragic start ended up either par'ing or bogey'ing 10 holes in a row before the light finally got us.
So what else? The car's still awesome, my Ipod and Phone BOTH broke at the same time and are currently in the process of being replaced (I'm good with technology accoridng to BBB....it's all lies and rigeramole....no I don't know how to spell it either)
In Poker musing Pokerstars made the controversial move to bascially hand Supernova on a plate to most grinders from the UK this month. Of course 2+2 blew up LIKE a supernova at the news but it was immensly gratifying to be rewarded for one's awesome accent for once.
I've also moved back up to 1/2 at the behest of half my Skype buddy list and so far it's gone ok but I've got a huge grind ahead at the weekend and it could all goes tits up soon enough. For full results I'll be doing a video blog as I think that's a little more interesting than a standard garph of DOOM.
Until then have fun and I'll try to remember to blog more in the future.
And Congrats to Pygmyhero and Lysistrata as well *Party Time*!!!!!!
Take Care, Boomer |
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| Slow Habit PLO Book – Initial Draft Review |
[Apr. 12th, 2009|07:42 pm] |
Out of the blue 2 weeks ago I was contacted by Slow Habit on Deucescracked and asked if I would like to review his new eBook regarding PLO. Knowing that Slow Habit was co-author of the NLHE eBook “Let there be Range” along with Cole South and having a more than passive interest in PLO I jumped at the opportunity.
The book and more information including a blog will be available at http://www.dailyvariance.com
There is also more info on the "Let there be Range" book there as well so it's worth checking out.
Now I’m always going to be a little bit more critical of an eBook that I will of any other form of poker education and that’s for one very simple reason. EBooks are incredibly expensive in comparison to standard learning methods.
Taking “Let there be Range” as an example the cost of the book is $1800.
For that $1800 you could have:
1)Between 4.5 and 6 years membership at any of the top coaching sites (Cardrunners, Stox, DC, Bluefire etc)
2)A Bankroll, or close enough, for 100NL, or at least a very deep roll for 50NL.
3)2-3 personal sessions from a top NL coach (Just from DeucesCracked, FWF, Vannessa Selbst, DJ Sensei and Flawless Victory come to mind)
Having said that though, from everyone who’s read it (My guess being mostly 400NL+ players) that book is worth the cost.
Slow Habit’s PLO book is coming in at a much more affordable to the small stakes player cost of around $350 which looks quite attractive when you consider:
1)The level of the author
2)The fact that PLO is an under-developed and under-represented game on most poker coaching sites
3)There isn’t anything like it out there at the moment, Jeff Hwang’s book non-withstanding which, depending on who you talk to, is either very good or distinctly average.
However the standard remains that in order to justify the cost, especially to a player who may be forking out multiple buyins to buy this book, it’s going to have to cause a few epiphanies before it gets a full sign off.
So, with that said, let’s get on with it.
The reasoning behind this book appears to be, or at least claimed, that PLO is, and has remained, an under-developed game due to those who hold the knowledge about the game being eager not to repeat the “mistakes” that were made with Holdem wherein thanks to the overwhelming fountain of information available on the subject Holdem games are now reaching a point where only the true elite can hope to make a living from the game. The games from the 2003-4 years at Party Poker where anyone with even the remotest clue could sit down at a 5/T or even a 10/20 table and grind out a decent profit are well and truly gone and it’s something the poker world will have to live with.
Whether that claim is true or not is open for debate but it’s certainly plausible that those who make a killing playing the game and don’t want to see it develop the same way Holdem did into a game where the smallest of edges are worked around. It is not to say there aren’t resources out there but the ratio of NLHE videos to PLO videos on coaching sites I would put at somewhere between 8 and 10-1. Maybe even higher. This is a gap that Slow Habit is looking to fill with his eBook and I sat down looking forward to be enlightened, or at least to understand more about a game which has almost 100 times the starting hands of everyone’s favourite 2 card grind.
The books starts quoting Mike McDermott’s famous phrase from the film about even Pros not playing NLHE because they can’t handle the swings. Safe to say he hasn’t heard of PLO…..or LHE……or Razz….or Tournaments. But most of all PLO.
The author is keen to point out that due to the very nature of the game of PLO, i.e. the players involved are dealt 4 cards, there are very few cut and dry drawing dead situations in PLO which, in line with the aggression which is, on occasion, shown in the games especially online that PLO invites swings that no NLHE player will be used to. Gone are the potential 80/20 preflop all-in situations replaced by 60/40’s at best and usually more like 55/45’s. Gone are the flops where you can stack off with any set and know that you’re in good shape, replaced by the knowledge than your current nuts, top set, may very well be an underdog due to the size of your opponent’s Wrap and Flush Draw. Gone is the ability to 4 and even 5-bet bluff opponents off hands preflop, replaced by the fact that by 4-betting you’re often committed no matter your holding. Welcome to PLO, let the swings begin.
Now whereas videos are in the entertainment business as much as the information business books pretty much solely reside in the information business and this is reflected in the style of the book.
There is maths and lots of it. Graphs, statistics, equity calculations, it’s all there. However as opposed to the dullness which can result from a lump of maths being thrown at you it’s presented in a very compelling way through example hands that Slow Habit has played allowing himself to explain core concepts, such as calling 4-betting and 3-betting, by using a combination of maths, which show the underlying “truth” behind the hand and hand examples which show how to entwine the maths with a good thought process to arrive at the correct conclusion.
This was brought to life very early in the book for me. PLO has long been heralded as “a game of the nuts” however one of the first few examples, on calling pre-flop 4-bets in position, showed how calling 4567ds and even 5567ds, and stacking off 100bb deep when shoved into on a K72r board vs AAxx was a profitable maneuver. Now obviously this is a bit of an extreme example since it’s almost impossible to narrow someone’s range down this tightly but it did demonstrate how playing via “Cliché” and supposition is dangerous and there is a lot more to the game than “Uh I don’t have the nuts”.
Omaha can be an extremely frightening game for those who are not familiar with the concepts but the book does an excellent job of not just hand-holding the reader through pre-flop, flop, turn and river but also showing the reader common situations they will find themselves in and also shows common mistakes which the author is aware that player migrating from Holdem are likely to make.
One of the things which is hammered constantly into the reader is that, as important as position is in Holdem it is even more so in PLO. Slow Habit even goes are far to say that it is almost impossible to win money off a decent aggressive player who has position on you when you have marginal hands in the long term in PLO because it’s just that big of an advantage, describing the situation as “neither fun nor profitable”. Now almost any poker player who’s got any familiarity with poker concept knows the power of the button but in PLO it may as well be made of solid gold and, again, clear concise and good examples are used showing how difficult decisions can be, especially if your opponent is capable of making moves.
PLO appears, throughout the book to share some concepts with Holdem with playability post-flop often outstripping Pre-flop equity in how you’d like to play the hand with double-suited wrap hands often being more desirable than Big Pairs with good supporting cards simply based on their post-flop playability. A similar situation in Holdem I suppose would be that vs a tight player you’d much rather have a hand like 98s when facing a raise than a Hand like KTo. If the money is going in pre-flop you want KTo every time but if you’re going to get a significant amount of money in post-flop, or desire the ability to push your opponent off a better hand post-flop, you want the additional playability a suited connector provides. On a side note, watch episode 8 of Passing the Torch on DC for examples of why this concept is a good thing, I make a bit of a boo boo early on in this regard in my opinion. In the 4567 example it is shown that although calling 4567ds and 5567ds is easily profitable when your opponent 4-bets 100BB deep calling with a hand like KKT9ss is more than likely breakeven to losing because you can’t stack off as easily as you won’t flop the 31% equity you need as often.
One of the most common situations I see in PLO and indeed Slow Habit mentions is the subject of C-Betting and getting it in. There are many situations in PLO where players make bad stackoffs on the flop, usually because “ZOMG I have a wrap”. This is usually in a situation where there is a flush draw on the board and they don’t’ realise how big of a dog they are to a hand like a Pair and a nut Flush Draw, for reference it’s about 2-1 which is a pretty big dog on the flop for PLO. It’s also common for Holdem players to think any set is the nuts and gleefully try and get it in, without realising that any hand coming with them is going to be either flipping a coin with them (FD + Wrap) or crushing them (Higher Set). This topic is covered nicely in Slow Habit’s section on Flop play, him adding that in a lot of situations, especially with position, it’s often advantageous to wait for the turn to decide what your best move is and not just to stack off on the flop because the flop looks good.
This theme is continued in the turn section, especially out of position. This is where Slow Habit shines with hand examples again by showing how it may be more advantageous to check the turn OOP to either illicit a semi-bluff or help keep the pot that bit smaller when you're out of position. In the turn section there is also mention of how donk-betting can be a powerful strategy especially vs those who'll bet the flop in position in order to buy a free card on the turn.
What appears to lie at the centre of Slow Habit's work in planning ahead for the hand. If 60% of the deck is going to be a scare card for you on the river then potting the turn may not be a good idea, even though you may currently have the best hand. Maybe checking is a better line. How about check-call vs Check Raise OOP? It's all covered. Things change rapidly in PLO and you have to be ready to change with them and plan for them. A simple early street strategy won't give you the crushing winrate you'll desire and this is what holds a lot of players back in PLO.
So overall what did I think?
The version I saw required a bit of work on preflop play. Yes it's very simple in a way but there are topics which could have been covered further such as limping, and dealing with limpers, which is something that comes up both in FR games and at the slightly lower limits. I understand this is being worked on and I think this will be an excellent addition.
You get the feeling this book is definitely aimed at NL players who have been successful at say NL100-200 and now want to apply their trade elsewhere. This isn't a hinderence at all, in fact it helps graduate you from one discipline to the other but I'd say you're going to need a pretty solid ground in NL if you're going to get the best from the book.
I am not by any means an expert but I know enough that I wasn't overwhelmed by the book and what I was able to pick up was excellent and Slow Habit communicates very effectively. I'd say that anyone looking into playing PLO100 and above would do exceedingly well to read this book.
Yes it's going to cost you 4 buyins or so but you'll make that back believe me and if you combine it with a decent coaching site membership you're probably paying 7-8 buyins over the course of a year for something which could make you easily 10's of buyins.
I know that I may dabble at the low limit PLO tables having just read it a couple of times....could very well be fun. Just make sure you're bankrolled.
Cheers, Boomer |
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| What Really Matters…. |
[Apr. 8th, 2009|12:53 pm] |
Well yesterday was a happy day and a sad one all in one go.
It was the day I took my last drive in my beloved Alfa Romeo 147.
There is a reason that people buy Alfa Romeos. It’s not for the reliability. It’s not for the fuel consumption. It’s not for the onboard equipment. It’s not for the service quality. You buy one of these, because you WANT one.
No car for the same price includes anywhere close to the level of passion, style and soul that these cars produce.
[147 picture to come when I get my Sim Card connected]
Now through its lifetime this 14ft marvel has been everything to me. I’ve experienced the joy of flying over Woodhead in it, the happiness of driving through the Cheshire fields on a glorious summer day with a big open road and no-one else on it, the terror of almost maxing it very early on in it’s life, the shame of breaking down when it was 6 weeks old with a Clutch retaining ring fault and holding up most of the North of England on the M6, the pain of humongous service bills caused by exuberant driving style and standard Italian frailty. I’ve ferried 3 people over 800 miles in one memorable day, I’ve despaired as petrol prices went spiralling, I’ve been grateful to it for, on more than one occasion in my belief, saving my life.
As Jeremy Clarkson said about Alfas on Top Gear:
“If these had been any other cars we this would just have been another drive. But it wasn’t. These cars had turned it into an adventure. Laughter, mayhem, thrills, mishaps, friendships. We had reached Petrol-Head Heaven and as we’ve said many times before, the only way to get there…is in an Alfa Romeo”.
I’ve fully cleaned it and it will stay on the drive for a few days until it’s picked up and I will be enormously sad to see it go. However, I will also be joyous in the knowledge of what is replacing it.
[Mito Picture coming]
Yup, it’s another Alfa Romeo. The 147’s offspring, the Mito. 155 Veloce in fact. And it looks like this one is going to start right off where its predecessor left off. So far it got stuck in Dover for 3 weeks and insurance companies scrambling trying to insure it in time and the joy of the first drive. What a joy it was, it’s smooth and civilised in low revs and Normal mode but an absolute roaring animal in high revs and Dynamic mode. The Blue & Me Voice Activated system is something I wasn’t prepared for on a £16,500 car and it’s even got the Alfa personality already with the Passenger Seat Belt indicator having a stutter when I first got the car and there being an interior light for nothing other than bathing the interior of the cabin in red ambience when it’s dark, totally useless, yet utterly wonderful. In all the time up to the point I picked up the car I was worried that the technological improvements and what is supposedly better reliability would interfere with what means most. The car’s soul. But it doesn’t. The Mito may not have the poise and balance of a high end Mini with which it’s competing (although I’d love to see the 1.6 Mini try to keep up on a track with it in Dynamic Mode) but it doesn’t matter. It took me 2 miles to fall in love and I think that’s all that needs saying. The Mito is a good car without a doubt…but even better than that. It’s most certainly, without fail a fabulous glorious real 100% heart-winning true to the name…Alfa Romeo. |
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| Bluefire Poker - Thoughts and Review |
[Mar. 29th, 2009|04:12 pm] |
Bluefire Poker is the latest in a long line of poker coaching sites joining such illustrious names as Deucescracked, Stoxpoker, Cardrunners, LeggoPoker, PokerXFactor, Baby’s First Holdem Site…..oh wait that one’s not been done yet…HEY stop thinking you’re going to start “Baby’s First Holdem’ Site”…it’s mine now!!
In this review I'm not going to concentrate on any particular series or video, although I will be pointing out the all-stars, but I'm more going to try and give an overview of what I think of the site and whether it will appeal to those thinking about joining it.
Anyway, Bluefire Poker is the brain-child of Phil “Jman28/OMGClayAiken” Galfond, most well-known for blowing Rail Heaven to pieces last year and taking home over $7 million in winnings, being a WSOP PLO Bracelet winner and being the only player excluded from durrr’s recent $1 million dollar challenge.
His idea is that most poker coaching sites out there have a circle of pros, usually high stakes players, who do one or two videos a month to attract the crowds and the remainder of the time the other pros/coaches are “mediocre” at best designed to fill the space when the high stakes guys can’t be bothered, whereas Bluefire would contain Jman and other hand picked pros who crush all aspects of the game. While not willing to bash anyone in particular I have certainly seen this tendency in the past so I would say if this were 2007 Phil would have a very good point. In 2009 I feel some sites have very much improved in this area and they are the ones who currently lead the voting on 2+2 any time there’s a “Which Site should I join” Poll. Not every coach has to be a 200/400 regular and, in fact, in some cases that can be a hindrance when dealing with micro and small games…as long as the coach is competent and good enough to get his/her point across, whether they are crushing nosebleeds isn’t really high on the agenda. However if you can get both….that’s a winner in anyone’s book.
Anyway, my exposure to Bluefire first came through a joint venture by Bluefire and the site I’m most attached to (or at least the one where I forum post, video post and video watch the most), Deucescracked. The joint project involved Emil “whitelime” Patel and Phil Galfond producing a PLO series together and in the spirit of greater co-operation there was a challenge to earn a Bluefire membership for a month and DC kindly parachuted me into Bluefire for a month on the condition that I wrote about my experiences.
First impressions were sceptical. The poker training market is already heavily saturated as mentioned above and many of Bluefire’s competitors have been here longer and have a heavier fan base. Of course guys playing 400NL+ will just go “meh it’s Phil Galfond and his hand selected pros” at the extra $30 a month and more than likely add Bluefire to their portfolio of sites they’ve joined but as for guys who play, say, 50NL and have to make a choice between one or two sites then Bluefire’s going to have to make a hell of an impact to break through, even with Jman’s presence and a cast of top pros.
Of course one of the ways to break in is to make a really loud noise to get everyone’s attention and then retain that attention with a quality product and in that regard Bluefire went off like Krakatoa thanks to the PLO series between Jman and Whitelime on Deucescracked and it was worth winning the month’s membership just to see the final 2 episodes from both perspectives.
Bluefire’s philosophy, incidentally the name of a series Jman is producing on the site, is that “Give a man a fish, he eats for a day, teach a man to fish he eats for his whole life”. I have to say it’s a bold attempt. They acknowledge that their video “volume” is going to be lower than the more established sites. It’s not unusual to see Stox et al pump out well over 10 vids a week and Bluefire at the moment are on a schedule of 5 a week. However their aim is for those 5 episodes a week to surpass the 10+ you may get elsewhere and in the field of NL Holdem’ they’ve certainly got a chance.
Their cast of coaches is certainly impressive and if they can deliver on the promised “Philosophy” of poker then they have a chance of overhauling the other sites since Bluefire currently has a full focus on NLHE and PLO, which is something I’ll come on to later.
As far as price goes Bluefire are pretty much in line with all the other sites being $100 sign-up fee and $30 a month with discounts available for longer contracts. DC are the only site I know so far with no sign up fee and you can’t blame a site for having a signup fee and, to be honest, there will more than likely be ways around it like winning a competition or being able to purchase a membership with VIP points somewhere or through Rakeback….whatever. So it’s not something to complain about, although it isn’t going to help them grab the lower end of the market (i.e. 25-50NL players etc) especially when they do not have a large library but I doubt it will hinder them that much.
A good start came from them though and that is that there is no DRM on their videos. Hallelujah. DRM is a pain in the arse and, let’s be honest about this, if people want to get around it they will and it can be a HUGE hindrance to the standard paying customer, as I have found to my cost with Cardrunners and Stoxpoker when their DRM servers have gone down leaving me to do nothing but stream the video which, on capped or slow bandwidth, can be a little inconvenient and at one point streaming wasn’t an option which left me completely hanging having paid for the video I was trying to watch.
Another up side is the custom built replayer which Bluefire use during their videos. It's smooth and allows the narrator to “play” the hand as if he were playing live, even going so far as to completely duplicate Full Tilt's noises and motions, which being in control as to what cards drop and are in player's hands. It's an excellent tool which allows them to produce “Replayer” style vids but give the illusion of Live Play which is sometimes just enough to grab someone's attention to get your point across. It's a tough ask but keeping your customer entertained is sometimes the difference between success and failure no matter how good your product is.
Moving onto the content;
In the time I’ve been there I’ve seen Don Nyguen, aka SoCalQuest, coaching the Small Stakes games from the ground up (25NL up) over the course of a long series of videos, called Beating the Microstakes, all of which were extremely well detailed and well presented helping players who are brand new to the game. These videos move well from aspect to aspect of the Small Stakes game and help to develop the player watching.
Martin Giggy provides a humourous and attention-grabbing set of videos, including one where he raises almost every hand and attempts to outplay his opponents post-flop. He has a very interesting outlook on the game and his delivery is very light-hearted yet doesn’t get in the way of the presentation, which can be a problem for a lot of coaches when they try to be funny. Martin's style is extremely aggressive and contrasts well to the other styles available on the site, emphasising Bluefire's motto that there is no best style to play the game but rather a series of thoughts are applicable which will allow you to become your own player and develop in a way which someone saying “do this, do that” will not let you develop.
It's similar in a way to what Danzasmack said on a video for Deucescracked.
“I can show you what I think is the right thing in a certain situation but if all you do is rely on me showing you the way there is no way you will ever be better then me.”
An interesting series that has recently begun and one that I want to see more of definitely is a series by Jason Senti, also known as PBJaxx, called “Two Views” which focuses on looking at both sides of a particular hand being played, which puts a focus on the reciprocality, read Elements of Poker if you aren’t sure what that is, which can be gained in certain situations along with the ability to try and exploit people trying to exploit you and looks to be a series which could be very good in the long term. The content in the first episode is spectacular with the very first hand shown showing a fantastic thought process to go through and really shows the ability of being able to out-think those who are trying to either run you over or exploit some part of your game. One warning about the series, which is in fact mentioned in the intro, is that a lot of the content is extremely high level and, in fact, not recommended for play against people who cannot read hands. Versus those opponents you are better off with a solid ABC style exploiting game taking advantage of their weaknesses as they're not on a sufficient level for you to have to get yourself involved in a levelling war. I really hope there is another one of these videos in the pipeline as this one video was a total eye-opener and if Bluefire can keep the content for this particular series at this level then the sky is truly the limit.
Ryan Fee (Fees) and Niman Kenkre (Samoleus) also both produce more standard play videos but also both high quality. Fee concentrating so far on the HU aspect of the game with a couple of HU videos, one of which he plays against PBJaxx and Kenkre's biggest video so far being a 4-part 1kNL session which he goes through in extremely high detail and very informative. Kenkre also has a Q&A session video as a reward to those who signed up. It will be great to see these two strut there stuff as the site develops, maybe with their own series which will help establish there character on the site.
And then there's the Big Cheese himself, Phil Galfond. Now everyone is aware of how good this guy is at poker. You don't beat the best in the world for $7 million in a year without being seriously talented and his name alone will be enough to bring in the legions, in fact in some reviews I have seen just the fact that Phil's involved in the website immediately elevates Bluefire to an automatic 8/10 score. But as I have said, you need to be more than a good player to be an effective poker coach and there have been plenty that have tried and failed. However the good news, especially for the rail, is that as good as Phil is as playing poker, he may be even better at teaching it. His Philosophy series, of which I have only seen the first 2 videos, but that's all that's out at the moment, is designed to try and trigger thought processes which Phil feels may be lacking in the current low-midstakes player. It is done through the use of cleverly designed hand histories in the Bluefire Replayer and Phil's delivery is very strong and, unlike some, doesn't feel rushed or have extreme pauses or use of short-speak to fill in the gaps. You want to listen because of who's talking but when you do listen you find a huge depth of information and ability being displayed and I'd recommend watching the theory videos a couple of times to make sure you get max value. Or download them, since there's no DRM. Phil also does the obligatory High stakes videos which appease the railbirds and also allow us into the mind of an extremely elite player and his outlook on beating the biggest games the internet has to offer. Phil is also Bluefire's dedicated PLO coach with the co-operative series with Deucescracked on PLO being the market leader now in PLO videos.
However it isn’t all a bed of roses for Bluefire despite the glowing report so far and there are a few things I feel they’d need to improve on, just from my perspective.
The first is the website itself. While fairly easy to navigate and the forums are well maintained I have found myself constantly getting web page errors while trying to download the videos which can be extremely frustrating. Maybe the code needs tightening up a bit, I don’t know I’m not a computer buff but all I can say in layman’s terms is that it’s irritating.
The second is that the content, as great as it is, is currently limited to NL and the PLO series ran concurrently with DC. Poker Coaching sites nowadays are under increasing pressure to broaden their horizons including games like Razz, Triple Draw and even Badugi along with FR, 6-max and HU variants of the standard games and simply offering 2 games at the moment, one of which may only get a couple of videos a month, is a bit of a strain and not likely to get the wider community involved.
However what must be remembered is that Deucescracked started off as an exclusively FL Holdem site and has developed, admittedly through a merger, into a Green and Black Colossus in the Poker Coaching world over the past 2 years so the blueprint is there for Bluefire Poker, however their goal of “Quality over Quantity” if adhered to too stringently could be an Achilles heel which may cripple their growth. However if they get in a couple of very high quality coaches in the other games such as FLHE or HORSE etc then Bluefire will have the quality and volume to bury some of the competition out there. Plus, let's face it, most would pay $30 a month just to see 4-6 vids from Phil Galfond never mind anything else.
In conclusion, while the site is currently light on library and has occasional gremlins it is worthwhile to recognise that the site is still new and there is plenty of time for it to evolve and it could be very exciting, seeing what is going to develop.
Good Luck to them for the future. |
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| YAY!! |
[Mar. 24th, 2009|05:59 pm] |
My new mouse and headset are being shipped!!
I shall celebrate when they get there by having such a MASSIVE losing session on Stars...oh wait that's not right....errrrm.
And btw, where the fuck's my car???
It's been in Dover now for twice as long as it took to get there from fucking Milan....or Turin....wherever it was built, it's one of them anyway. There better not have been a body in the boot...blood's murder to clean out |
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| Lousy Busto Mouse |
[Mar. 18th, 2009|06:51 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  cynical | ] |
Well it looks like my mouse has decided to pack it in :(
It's now gone into "No-Sell or Double-Click or Left-Click = Middle Click" mode....very annoying and not-condusive to multi-tabling. So new mouse ordered from dabs...I think 6 buttons is excessive but hey it'll be I can click a mouse to do shit in L4D when I get back on it :)
been poorly sick the past week so lost all track of being able to hit my hand volume goals although I think I may go back to 3-tabling at least as an experiment. Star's software is good enough for me to do it, I do get a time bank just in case and also I think it may help my focus, wierdly enough.
4-tabling's still some way off though. Although should the need to play 30,000 hands a month suddenly appear I'm sure I can teach myself....not that I'm worried or anything...No sir.
Went on the range earlier, it seemed Mr. Byrne liked the R7 CGB-Max as he blasted it almost out of the driving range after just a couple of swings with it...sure made me feel rubbish.
DC Microlimit meeting tomorrow, be good to chat to the guys (and gal) again. Been too long and I need a lift.
Laters guys |
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| Weird |
[Mar. 17th, 2009|07:24 am] |
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| A couple of days off |
[Mar. 6th, 2009|07:45 pm] |
I've taken the last day or two off poker for the simple reason that I've been feeling pretty awful recently and I really haven't been in the mood. Yes it's set me back a little but I can easily play 500-1000 hands or so over the weekend to get me back on track.
So far the month's started off fairly well with me up 100BB from the last down slump but complacency is something I'm not going to let happen while the specter of that downswing still hovers fresh in memory.
What I will say is that I find the players on Stars a hell of a lot more readable and predictable than the players on IPoker. Now this is NOT me saying that they are worse and, in fact, it may be an indictation they are playing slightly more "correctly". I would say that on Stars I've found at least as many if not more guys trying to play correctly than there were on Ipoker but this doesn't tell the whole story.
The thing is that over the past year or two one of the areas I've tried to improve a lot is hand-reading and weak TAGs are one of the easiest class of players to read, becasue I used to play in that mode and a lot of material has been released on how that style plays so now anyone who's familiar with the slightly looser TAG style has an edge over these guys becasue they can simply exploit the narrower ranges they're up agaisnt if they play correctly (big ask).
This came up in my most recent vid release where on at least 2 occasions I was able to put a Tight player on the exact (or close enough) hand he had and play accordingly with virtually no risk. (I did the same in the parallel vid). It's not rocket science. And as for how bad they are at trying to adapt when you bring a 32/23 or whatever game to the table...yeesh. I've got some hands I'll post up which will demonstrate soon.
However these aren't the guys I'm LOOKING to always play against but I find now the tables tend to be maybe a couple of fish, a couple of predictable TAGS and A N Other, whereas on Ipoker a lot of the time it was 1 fish, 1 lunatic, 1 middle LAG (like 40/15-20), 2 RB Grinders. Both good tables but one is much higher variance than the other and Ipoker's rake doesn't help either.
So overall I'm liking it on Stars. This weekend after a nice long sleep I'm going to get as many hands in as I can Saturday and then play Sunday "morning" then go and play some golf with the old man and finally pick up that TaylorMade R7 CGB Max driver I bought recently.....I like it imo. It was so good even I was hitting drives in teh same area off the launch monitor pretty consistently...let's hope. Only got 1 more card left to submit before I can officially say I'm crap and get my handicap :)
Sorry BBB, yes sir, I'll play hands sir :) |
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