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Message: [QUOTE="zachvac, post: 721776, member: 26306"] You sound extremely similar to myself. I just hate that it took the massive cooler to get me to realize what was going on. Heaters and coolers aside, I was losing too many big pots and winning too many small pots. While I'm still in the camp of playing sets and other monsters very aggressively (well there are some reads involved, ie when I expect someone to cbet ATC I don't want to bet and have bad hands fold, I'll check and take the one bet with a check-raise if he missed and get his stack in if he hit), and I don't even think most of this is image-based. I don't think the people at 25nl overall (there are a few decent regulars) are observant enough for that. But even if every hand is against a new set of players every time, the point I was trying to make was that if I play a set a certain way and it doesn't see showdown, I need to know that I could have played complete crap that way and still won without showdown. They can't see your hole cards (for the most part) so if the people in general are playing scared, make them pay for that by giving you the pots where you both miss as well. Come over the top more, 3-bet more, double barrell more with draws and such strong hands but not monsters. I'm not advocating 4-betting a flop where you have 2 unders, but when people are scared to put all their money against you when you have a set, they're also scared when you have the flush draw, or when you have middle pair. Obviously aggressive does not equal crazy maniac, but aggression also helps get a read on an opponent a lot easier. In just the half hour or so I played last night after coming to this realization, I was starting to make some great reads. It's a lot easier to put someone on a hand based on how he reacts to your aggression than how he reacts to your weakness. I'm also planning on loosening up a lot preflop. I had resolved just to play the absolute premiums, AA-JJ, AK, AQ, AJ and ATs in position, throwing in KQ once in a while with position as well. I limped a few suited connectors, and I always limped with smaller pocket pairs looking to flop a set. But based on the times I'm just picking up the blinds or taking the pot with a cbet I think I can go down to even the TJ or JQ type hands. I think I was trying to minimize postflop poker because that's the hard part. It's easy to just pick hands and basically formulize your approach and that's what I think I did. So I'm going to loosen up a bit, get much more aggressive postflop, and hope to turn this around. I may have to scale down on the number of tables, and perhaps that was my big problem. It's easy to 12-table when you have a formulaic approach. But poker is not just about an algorithm and I'm going to work on going beyond playing like that. We'll see how it goes, I'm just about to walk back to my room and probably play a few hours. I'll probably record it, I looked for a mic I could use but all I found was a $35 headset. Seems like a great time to try to give some commentary on my play, but I guess it just wasn't meant to be. I'm not paying $35 for a mic, especially when I already have some at home and don't really plan on using it other than commenting on poker sessions. Oh well, I'll keep y'all updated. [/QUOTE]

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