Pregame Routine

dzikijohnny · Pregame Routine

Any of you guys finding that you are making bad mistakes at the beginning of a session? I am. Anyone have a good pregame routine?

For me the pregame right now is that I look over my very detailed outline I have made of the course and review strategies vs the player types. I even have this open to be able to review during a game. Mostly to remind myself not to bluff calling stations. Mad

I have filtered HEM hands for ones I really played badly and review them in pop. I also am starting to write my own poker book based on a great 2+2 post. So I will go over a couple of chapters of it.

PSA/PoohBah: Your Poker Bible http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com...-poohbah-your-poker-bible-213100/
What do you guys do?

BetMagicMoney

there was a thread awhile ago about this, i can't find it, but the cliffs were that a pre game dump is very +EV

_red_dog

pregame dump FTW, also banging one out also helps.

dzikijohnny

None of that sick stuff. I wanted this thread to be serious.

forced

couple valid points imo....

Borg7

close all the doors, turn the music off, make sure you're focused and register

Wannawin

check baby is asleep, milk and dummy close by, wine glass full, register to the first available game...

if you have no time issues, then a few things that could be done.

Review the main game losing hands from the day before.
review a whole game
play with some ranges on sngwizard - and quick session on quiz mode for end game practise.
set a session objective to really focus on - eg bet sizes v board texture. number of bets per hands strength + those seen by your opponent etc etc
press ups (@ least 100)
what ever gives you focus really

aggsyb

My pregame routine usually consisits of sitting a couple of $100 games. I will then play the rest of my session in the $100 games.

hjbear

dzikijohnny

Wannawin...can you talk more about Sngwiz. I have it but, not sure how to use it for hu. I only used it for 9man.

dzikijohnny

Bob Dancer writes about Video Poker and I find many of his articles to be very useful. Here is one that applies to this topic.

http://www.casinogaming.com/columnists/dancer/2010/1020.html

Priming Your Play

I am currently reading "Blink" by Malcolm Gladwell. It discusses being able to think without thinking, about choices that seem to be made in an instant --- in the blink of an eye --- that actually aren't as simple as they seem. I read a variety of books looking for an edge at video poker. In this book I think I found one I can share with you.

I should warn at the outset that I'm extrapolating from an experiment that had nothing to do with video poker. It was done by psychologists, and I've only had four classes in that subject in my life. Still, if I'm correct in my interpretation it's a fairly easy way to improve our results. And if I'm wrong, it's likely I've done no harm. Those are odds I like.

Two Dutch researchers, Ap Dijksterhuis and Ad van Knipperberg, performed an experiment where they asked two groups of people 40 tough Trivial Pursuit questions. Before the first group tried to answer the questions, they were asked to think about what it would mean to be a professor and told to spend five minutes writing down everything that came to mind. They then tried to answer the Trivial Pursuit questions and scored 55.6% on the test.

Before the second group tried to answer the same Trivial Pursuit questions, they were asked to think about being soccer hooligans for five minutes. (Perhaps the Dutch students who were being tested were more familiar with soccer hooligans than I am.) At any rate, this second group scored 42.6% on the Trivial Pursuit test.

This is a very significant difference in results. The groups were identical to each, except the first group was in a "smart" frame of mind, a la being a professor, and the second group was in a "rowdy" frame of mind.

So how does this relate to video poker?

If we practice advanced plays immediately before we go and play, we will be in a serious frame of mind when we actually reach the casino. For me this means practicing penalty card situations and close plays, although I don't think this is a critical part of the phenomenon. As I understand it, this effect comes from getting your mind in the "serious video poker player" mode, which for most players means reviewing the strategy they usually use. (The extra knowledge that comes from knowing penalty cards is something different altogether.)

If you're like me, at least occasionally when I practice I come across an obscure hand that I didn't quite remember. And at least some of the time, hands I became extra sure of go ahead and occur in this particular session. Knowing this might happen gives me extra confidence.

If you show up without having practiced recently you are in a very different frame of mind. You may be fairly confident that you know the strategy to this particular game, but not nearly as confident as you would be if you'd practiced the difficult hands.

I've regularly argued that additional practice is a good thing. Now I'm using some research by some Dutch psychologists I'd never heard of before (and probably you haven't either) to bolster what I've believed all along. Does that make my argument more persuasive? I can't answer that for you. But for me this is something new.

What I learned from reading this book is a new reason for studying. I previously considered the primary reason for studying is the accumulation of knowledge. Clearly in video poker, the accumulation of knowledge about how to play the hands is a good thing. (You may argue the price to obtain this knowledge is higher than the knowledge is worth, but there's no denying the knowledge is valuable.) The Trivial Pursuit experiment suggests that studying the tough hands just before playing changes your unconscious mind-set in a beneficial way. And this benefit is in addition to the accumulation of knowledge.

To be sure, this is merely a theory. Hypothesizing that the Trivial Pursuit experiment would yield similar results when applied to video poker is currently unproven --- and likely not going to be tested in the near future.

With this uncertainty in mind, consider the possible gains if the theory is correct (both in actual knowledge and in mind-set) versus the possible losses if the theory is wrong (you've wasted a bit of time.) To me there's no contest. The possible (probable?) gain clearly outweighs the possible loss.

Of course, I enjoy studying video poker so the possible loss on the deal is essentially zero. (There is always an opportunity cost --- which is how much I could have earned doing something else rather than studying. Economists always assume that since you're giving up money-making opportunities, you're giving up something tangible. I don't believe it is additive. It's possible that spending time studying --- or watching a football game --- actually stimulates the mind and allows for more asset accumulation in the long run.) Even if I don't extract any extra gain from the improved mind-set, I've spent a pleasant hour or so reviewing the tricky hands. Who knows? I might even get an article out of it!

Wannawin

TheHUSNGDude

.I was told to read "Blink" a few years back and couldn't put it down....read again about 10 months ago....lots of angles you can use to apply to poker as well as life stuff.

ottocat01

Blink is an awesome book. I will insta-buy anything by Malcolm Gladwell. If you haven't read the Tipping Point go buy it.

Regarding warmups, I think the biggest thing is to review the basics. The more elementary the better. Then relax and play.

YATHINNK

I don't have a pregame routine. I said in another thread that I think it's better to sit down and play.

If you spend a while on a routine then you can end up making the whole session mechanical which you totally don't want.

Plus you're wasting time you could spend fitting an extra game in.

The extra points you may get by doing something pregame definitely won't outweigh the money you'd lose by not just sitting down and playing.

z1s6arn

When I warm up on theory HH or things I need to work on or a video that new or revised knowledge always comes through in the game. Pregame routine is absolutely essential for me to get me in the right mentality to play at my best. If I don't warm up before every day I know I will pay for it in the long term and my rate of learning will decrease dramatically compared to someone who is constantly adding little facts or ideas or improvement or plugging personal leaks. For those that are in this in the long term this extra effort over three years will make the difference between an average player to a Borg or Broker.

This is just a personal opinion and an opinion only.

Jasonsc