PolarBeard
21 points
Hi Paul! I believe that you said that parts 3, 4 etc. would come only if you feel that there is a demand for it... FWIW, I am waiting (hoping) for those like a kid who waits for midnight on the 24th of december! :-)
Jan. 11, 2016 | 7:02 a.m.
Hey Paul! Thanks for the Spin and Go series. I registered for the Essential plan today and "Learning a new game' part 1 and 2 are the first two videos that I get to watch more than 2 minutes :)
I thought I'd give you some feedback from my recreational-micro-stakes-break-even point of view...
I feel that I can learn a lot from your thought process when it comes to building GTO ranges. I downloaded HoldemRessources calculator and it seems to be a very interesting tool for testing different ranges... That being said, it is not free... it is a 2 weeks trial (I believe that you say that it is free in part 1)
Having played a few hundreds of Spin and Go's, I feel that, from a strictly theoretical point of view, your video is quite valuable, but from a practical point of view, I wonder if you take in account some aspects that are specific to the Spin and go format:
At buyins of $5 or lower, the player pool is extremely bad and therefore, an exploitative strategy is probably more optimal than a GTO strategy.
For an example, when the spin gives a 2x, very VERY often, one of the 2 other players will shove all in with any 2 on the first hand.
Limping is a strategy that you did not take in account while it seems to be a powerful tool to counter the light shoves and the agro-maniacs that you will encounter a ton in this format. Some successful players at the highest limits (Courtiebee) do use it quite a bit.
I do not understand the game toy building. I get confused when you take 10 minutes to build a raise-fold-shove strategy when, from my experience, limp and calling account for a very large amount of the action, and that I can not build a "usable" range without taking theses two in account.
In the practical part of your course, you talk about balancing your ranges ("sometimes I call, sometimes I raise, etc.) but from my experience, at lower stakes, you will seldom see the same player twice, so I am not too sure about the interest of balancing instead of going for the most +EV line vs the specific player...
All in all, I loved the videos and I look forward to the next ones. I realize that this course is about "Learning a new game" and not "how to beat Spin and Go's". English is not my first language, so I hope that I make a little bit of sense!
Thanks in advance!
Nov. 27, 2015 | 5:18 a.m.
RIO is probably, for for it's members, a "poker church"; and Phil Galfond is the high priest. Your list of poker players who are better than Phil is a joke on it's own; but I refuse to take this route. Many members enjoy this place and it actually has a reputation for being the best training site out there. I am all for free speech and all but if you truely believe what you said concerning PG's poker abilities, I think you would do yourself and RIO members a favor not to post here. Just my opinion.
April 11, 2014 | 6:27 p.m.
April 11, 2014 | 8:46 a.m.
Phil playing on PS @ 25/50 ante deep. Good to see he is back on the saddle! (Edit: and zoom 50/100 )
trondeez, I couldn't agree more. I see Isildur as someone who likes to boost the pot preflop (to a point that he will deny action to good players who won't 3X pre) and then will bet draws on the flop- bet draws ott - and shove rivers. This obv. destroys any player when he runs good and actually hits; but also explains the systematics downswings after his big wins. I usually don't voice myself much about it; because I don't like to be flammed and I understand why his fans love him (readiness to put it all on the line/agression/playing everyone/self made/very high bluff frequency, etc; but I am not part of the ones who think he is a genius. I would definitly have him as beeing -EV for a long term stake.
March 20, 2014 | 6:25 a.m.
Hey Phil,
First, I would like to say that I have alot of empathy for you; which is a bit weird as I don't know you personally, yet this session took away from me any desire to fire up my poker clients in the last few days.
After reading your aftermath post, I would like to share some of my thoughts. I know you are smart and have good connexions in the poker world, so while this mignt not be anything you haven't tought about, maybe it will get you to reconsider options that you did not deem to be for you before:
1. Selling action: Both of us know that this is overall -EV (I am confident that your PLO NLHE skills are superior to patpandas / not sosmartstans, and I believe that you are right up there with the Canoes, the yIkes and the (flying?) Saucers). Yet, this would let you acheive two things: reduce the swings and let you do what you love: fight the best players in the world at the highest stakes (aka conquer the world). FWIW, even degens such as Isildur sell action according to this post2. Having a stop loss. Again, obv. -EV if you have an edge against the whole range of villains playing you, but as you correctly mentionned, when you are stucked big, it's hard to be on your a game (and it feels worst after losing more). Honestly, a 5BI stop loss would be my feel good option, especially at theses stakes (BTW, to put the stakes you are playing at in perspective, I have teached french as a first language in highschools for 15 years, got in debt for the 6 years I was at University, and the gross amount i got payed for theoses 21 years was less than the 2 biggest pots in your HU game).
3. Completely seperating your liferoll from your bankroll. Put asside an amount that will make you feel secure for the rest of your life (I guess it depends on your actual lifestyle, I personally would have more than enough with 1 mil), Invest it, put it under your pillow, do whatever you want, as long as you make yourself a true commitement to not use it for Poker :) Only use for poker the money that poker brings to you. Perhaps look into a sponsorship, profits from your tutorial videos, heck, if the shit hits the fan, I am sure some would give you their left nut and an arm to get some coaching from you :)
Alright, so that is about it Phil. I wish you good luck and I hope everything goes well for you!
A fan of your game and videos!
March 18, 2014 | 3:52 p.m.
Hey guys!
I have been a PG fan from pretty much the day I was introduced to online poker (2010), and would most certainly love to at least have a basic membership.
Actually, for those who are less a fan than me or arrived later, I am quite sure that you will enjoy his old school/less known stuff:
http://www.philgalfond.com (so sad it has been dead for almost two years:( )
http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/19/high-stakes-pl-nl/well-jman28-revisisted-88525
http://www.bluff.com/magazine/g-bucks-conceptualizing-money-matters-9017Nway, I could post alot more super-duper-fun-stuff about Phil, but my point is that I am (I would imagine that most of you guys are as well) passionate about the game of poker. This and the fact that I am someone for who honesty, hard work, desire to help other humans, intelligence and respect of other persons are some of the principles that are the most important for me, makes it that Phil Galfond is probaly the poker player that I have appreciated the most since I first was introduced to online poker.
Just in case PG reads this; I do not want you to get your head large to a point that you get unable to go out of your house (head inflating from my compliments in a manner that it get's larger than your main entrance door), I feel important to mention that I also like players such as Gus Hansen, Alexander Millar and Daniel Negreanu. Obv. some of them hit the things that I appreciate a little bit less hard (ie.: Gus vs Phil for (at least poker) intelligence); but most certainly are superior to you in other spheres of competence (ie. DN's marketing and social abilities).
All that being said, I am not proud of myself, but my real life situation makes it that I can easily pay for a basic membership from my Pokerstars account (after 3 years of reading and loving online poker, I am at a point that I can beat nano/micro stakes pretty consistantly). Unfortunatly, I am certainly not able to get a credit card or Paypal at this point of my life.
So, after all this being said ( and sorry for my poor English that I used in the process);
I would like to ask the persons in charge of management on this website to consider online pokersites transfers as a valid payment method for their members.
I do realise that this request might not be received positively: it would be a untraditionnal payment method (I don't know that your competitors (DC, CR, ect.) have ever accepted this method) and I understand that it could raise concerns towards automation and relyability of the payments; but I think that this could actually be quite + EV for you guys:
It would open markets (online poker players with $ online but with pure air irl)
It would make me happy (having access to Phil's training video once a month to fall asleep on while listening. weeeeee!)
I beleive that the automation process could perhaps be figured out (ie.: I had to unlock my sharkscope details, and it inovlved the fact of me sitting at X table on FT and sending like 0.03$ to wathever bot was there, 0.03$ that was sent back right away).
Thanks for taking the time to read this post!
PolarBeard
Hi Phil! I am a rec player, I have played micros on PS for 7 years; but less and less since Amaya's takeover. I was marginally beating the lowest stakes (over several 100k hands) and just happy to reclaim a t-shirt here and there or to withdraw a 50$ after depositing 20$. I live in Quebec, Canada, and I work full time as a french teacher. Anyway, I just wanted to say that I am looking forward to a RIO poker site and that I would be more than happy to help shall you need people to beta test the software or to participate in the french translation of it.
Bonne chance!
Feb. 24, 2018 | 6:39 a.m.