 Getting In The Right Game
I have two different girlfriends that I go to casinos with and I would like to tell you a little about the difference in them.
The first person, I will call her Mary, has played online for about 3 years. Mary usually played limit on cash tables and no limit in tournaments. In her cash tables she would make a couple of dollars here and a couple of dollars there. However, in the no limit tournaments she was building strength and starting to get into the money positions and was feeling very good about that.
Now, the first time she came with me to a brick and mortar casino she decided to play limit. Well her first time she won about $20.00 and felt ecstatic about it but the next couple of times she went she lost money. I asked her why she was playing limit poker when her best playing was done in tournaments that were no limit. Her answer was that she felt more comfortable because she didn’t think she could lose as much playing limit poker.
She has now gone to Las Vegas twice and played in no limit tournaments and failed to make the money so she is sure that she couldn’t possibly play no limit cash tables because she would lose too much. I explained to her that with $1-$2 no limit tables that she only had to play $3.00 per orbit and that if she found that she was “never” getting a hand to play that she would not be losing anything near was she had been losing at the $3-$6 limit tables and would be getting a better chance to win much, much more because limit at that level seems to be better called no fold’em hold’em. Mary could not see the logic in that and continues to this day to play limit cash tables at brick and mortar casinos.
The other person, we will call Alice, came with me to the casino, again her first time at a brick and mortar, after playing online for less than six months and playing home games for about the same length of time all of her experience being in limit hold’em. She had never played cash games online except for play money and had about a million or more in her “play money” bank account online. I asked her what she was going to play at the casino and she too said “limit” hold’em. I asked her why she wouldn’t play no limit since that was what she played in online tournaments. Her answer was the same as Mary’s answer, “because I’m not comfortable in putting in $20.00 for one hand of poker and I’m cheap and a penny pincher when it comes to spending her money.
So her first time she played $2-$5 limit hold’em and won $74.00 and thought she was on top of the world. However, the next two times she played she lost and I kept telling her to play no limit. I also suggested to her that she take her million dollars of play money and go to the no limit cash tables and try her luck and to try different types of playing, tight, loose, a combination of both and to try betting different hands in different ways and in different positions. That is raise 4 times big blind when holding an ace-king suited. She said she didn’t feel comfortable doing that and I suggested that the purpose of having so much play money was to use it to learn. Her answer was but I play to win. I kept at her about it and she finally took my advice.
The next time that we went to a brick and mortar casino she started out at a limit table and started losing right away. Alice then decided to try no limit hold’em and found that she could win a lot by doing the things she had tried what worked for her online with her “play” money. She has never looked back and when we went to Las Vegas the first night she was there she played from about 11:00 p.m. to 7:00 a.m. and came back to the room with $500.00 more than what she started with.
So you can see that playing no limit at the lower limits can be much more rewarding than playing no fold’em hold’em.
My advice to everyone that is just starting to play is to Stick To What You Know. If you play “only” limit online and in B&Ms then that is what you know the most about. If you play no limit online “do not” go to a B&M and play limit because it is played totally different to no limit play. You need to understand limit in order to be good at it. Just the same as you need to understand no limit in order to win at it as well.
So there you go. I hope I have helped you to understand how to choose the game you should be playing and how to play it smart. | 
