The Tech Nightmare Continues

It seems fitting now that many years ago I got kicked out of MENSA.  (I stopped paying dues because the local meetings were disbanded due to lack of interest.)  I'm clearly not smart enough to solve all of the technical problems that have been blowing up everything that I try to accomplish.

I really want to be able to write about poker, and to play poker.  I am months behind on my plan. My goal for the end of this year was to start with $40 and grind a bankroll of at least $1,000 on Juicy Stakes Poker.  I was hoping to then withdraw some of that money so that I could add a second poker site and/or play some live tournaments.  That goal has been put off, probably for several months.  I wanted to have multiple options and now I have none.

There isn't much more that I can say, except to show you what I just sent to the twoplustwo.com poker forums, Holdem Manager Support thread:


I have a big problem. I play on two online sites and I have problems playing on either of them.

I'm not playing on Juicy Stakes Poker because I'm waiting for an update from Holdem Manager that will allow me to use a HUD on that. That's the smaller of the two problems as I should be able to play with no problem eventually.

The big problem is that I also want to play on Americas Cardroom, and that's a mess, partly because of an emergency support session (I think that that's the right term) where the support  person fixed nothing and made it even more confusing.

When I open Holdem Manager, in the upper left corner it shows my site as Cake Poker (Juicy Stakes Poker) but I can't change it. HM2 shows that I am tracking both sites, but I can't change the display to show that I'm playing on Juicy Stakes Poker.

I played a test freeroll on Americas Cardroom yesterday and the HUD worked, but the HM2 display still showed that I was playing on Cake Poker, so I don't really know where those hands are stored.

When the support person was trying to fix that, he also did a lot of other things while I watched on Teamviewer. There was very little communication and he did things that I didn't ask or want him to do. I didn't question any of it because I didn't know what to ask.

He added a new database called Newbase and he was moving other database icons around. He changed the statistics that I was using and, I guess, he put in the stats that he thought were more important that the ones I chose. For example, he deleted my 3-bet stats and gave me an aggression factor stat, which I have never used. He was jumping all over the page moving and changing things and I had no idea what was going on. I can fix the stats but it's certainly annoying that he changed them.

He was not able to do anything about which site HM2 showed as active, but at least I got my $60 back. I have tried to do it myself. I googled "site-setup" and could not find any videos that showed how to set up two sites. The HM2 site setup video shows only one site as well.

It seems that both sites are tracking, but I'm not sure where the hands are winding up, or how reliable my HUD numbers are. Many years ago I tracked two sites and I don't remember any problems like this. I have no idea what is different, or what I might be doing wrong.

I don't really understand the relationship between the poker sites, databases and HUDs. If there is somewhere I could go to do some reading on how it all works together then maybe I could fix it. I have no clue what I'm doing and I have no idea which hands from which site(s) are supposed to go to "Newbase."

Any advice or help is appreciated.

More Bad News from Holdem Manager Support

Still another holdup with Holdem Manager support getting me back on Juicy Stakes Poker.  In fact, I was notified that nothing has been done yet.  Here is that communication, starting with post #49702 on the Holdem Manager Support thread.*

Me:  Because of a Juicy Stakes Poker update, I've been waiting for the HM2 update that will allow me to use a HUD on that site. Today I opened JSP and they have a new update. Does that affect my situation?

Holdem Manager Support:  An update from them isn't likely to fix anything for you. I just downloaded the update and tested and the HUD still doesn't work (hands do import). I left a note on HM-8966 but never got a reply so I just pinged the QA/Testing Manager directly to ask him to try and get this in front of a developer for our next beta update.

Another player:  So the issue for Intertops** still hasn't been fixed? Are they even aware of the issue?

Holdem Manager Support:  It is something we need to fix on our end in HM2. They made a change in their software that broke our HUD on the Horizon network sites. Unfortunately most sites don't let us know in advance before they make these types of changes so we have to react after the fact. I bumped the issue again with our QA/Testing Manager so hopefully he can find room in the developer's schedules to get it looked at soon finally.

So, nothing has been done. I haven't been able to play on Juicy Stakes Poker for several months, and I'm not the only player out in the wilderness, wondering when everything is going to be working again.

As always, your comments and questions are welcome (see box below.)

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*https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/167/commercial-software/holdem-manager-support-1535/index1989.html#post54401515

**Intertops is the parent company of Juicy Stakes Poker

IRS Daily Tournament Record

I'm still waiting to be able to play online poker again.  Holdem Manager has not yet matched their code to the recent Juicy Stakes Poker update, so I can't use my HUD (see previous post) and I'm not going to play without it.  I did get one small victory.  I had not been able to print my IRS daily tournament spreadsheets (see below), but I finally worked out that glitch yesterday.

Almost all income is taxable in the United States,* including income from playing a game, whether that game is professional baseball, a Scrabble tournament or poker.  Poker is my job, which for income tax purposes makes me the owner of a Schedule C business.  I have to provide information about my business income and losses.

For poker players there are other complications that I won't go into here, but the bottom line is that I want to be bulletproof if the IRS has any questions.  I use sheets like the one below, with each of the six large boxes showing all of the information for one tournament.  I have these records online as well, but the IRS loves documentation, so I'm prepared to hit them with a lot of paper which shows my numbers for every one of the hundreds of tournaments that I play in a year.  It's not a lot of work for me, I just fill it in after every tournament.

As always, your questions and comments are welcome (see box at the bottom of the page.)

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*The only exceptions that I am aware of are income from tax-free municipal bonds and military pay earned in a combat zone.

Date			Date			Date
Poker site			Poker site			Poker site
Tour. Number			Tour. Number			Tour. Number
Start			Start			Start
End			End			End
Hours			Hours			Hours
Finish place			Finish place			Finish place
Players			Players			Players
Buy-in			Buy-in			Buy-in
Rebuys			Rebuys			Rebuys
Add-ons			Add-ons			Add-ons
Re-entries			Re-entries			Re-entries
Cash			Cash			Cash
Bounties			Bounties			Bounties
Bonus			Bonus			Bonus
PROFIT/LOSS			PROFIT/LOSS			PROFIT/LOSS
Rake			Rake			Rake
FPPs			FPPs			FPPs
Date			Date			Date
Poker site			Poker site			Poker site
Tour. Number			Tour. Number			Tour. Number
Start			Start			Start
End			End			End
Hours			Hours			Hours
Finish place			Finish place			Finish place
Players			Players			Players
Buy-in			Buy-in			Buy-in
Rebuys			Rebuys			Rebuys
Add-ons			Add-ons			Add-ons
Re-entries			Re-entries			Re-entries
Cash			Cash			Cash
Bounties			Bounties			Bounties
Bonus			Bonus			Bonus
PROFIT/LOSS			PROFIT/LOSS			PROFIT/LOSS
Rake			Rake			Rake
FPPs			FPPs			FPPs

A Tech Nightmare

In the last three months, where poker is concerned, everything that could go wrong did go wrong.  I should have posted earlier, but every time that I though about posting, something new went wrong.  Other than playing a few hands as a test, I haven't played for more than three months.  When I did play I had to pay to register for the tournament--meaning that even if I only played one test hand I still lost my buy-in.

I have not been handling this well.  I didn't get my work hours in. I could have spent that free time studying, but it was hard to make myself put in the study time when I was beginning to wonder if, or when, I would recover from all of the technical problems.  I have ADD, which tends to make me disorganized and distractible, especially when I don't have something on which I can focus.

I still don't have everything straightened out.  I should have been more diligent about keeping everyone current with what's been going on, but there are a limited number of ways to say "it's still not working."

What I can do is explain what's been going on.  I'll give you the short version first, then I'll give you some detail.

The Short Version:

During the time that I wasn't posting, the internet was way too slow, I had problems with the printer, the HUD (heads-up display) stopped working for Juicy Stakes Poker and we ordered a laptop that didn't work.  Those are just some of the issues.  It's been a bad three months.


The Long Version:

1. The Internet.  I ran Internet Speed Tests where download speeds were often under 20 Mbps (megabits per second.)  Comcast promises in their advertising that their internet download speed will be at least 100 Mbps.   To give a practical example of how slow the internet was, I could sometimes type a ten-word sentence, sit back in my chair and wait for the letters to appear on the screen.  A complete freeze lasting 30 seconds is still not uncommon, especially after midnight.

This is a big deal because in online poker hands are timed.  I have a certain number of seconds to act.  When that time is done, if I haven't played my hand is automatically folded.  It doesn't matter that I have the best hand if I'm not able to play it.

I communicated with Comcast several times by phone or online and once in person at the local office.  No one was helpful.

Two Comcast techs were sent out on different days but neither of them could fix the problems. The second one figured out the problem, sort of.  There was a hidden network, which usually means that someone nearby is using the same frequency and messing with my connection. He said that the competing network was so strong that it would have to be in our house--but it wasn't.  He took every electronic device that we have, one by one, and eliminated all of them as the problem.

He finally got my wife's hard-wired desktop (provided by her employer) up to speed, but he was unable to get the desktop on which I play poker (wireless connection) up to speed.  A few days later he came back and spent an hour setting up an ethernet connectionfor my desktop and working on other things.  The speeds for my poker desktop were much better for about a week, then the lagging and freezing started again.  Poker is not affected in the same way as other computer tasks as there is no browser involved, so I think that now that I'm hard-wired (Ethernet), even though the speeds still aren't great they should be good enough to play poker.


2. The Printer.

I don't need to use a printer when I'm playing, but I do need to download and print something from a poker coaching site from time to time and that wasn't working.  Also, my wife works at home and we share the same printer, which she uses quite often for her work.  That problem took several days to solve.


3. The Laptop.

The new laptop is now my wife's personal computer, which I use on occasion.  I don't play poker on it, but that could happen, for example, if we lost power while I was in a tournament.  Should that happen I could take the laptop someplace that had wi-fi and I would only miss a few hands.

We ordered the new laptop and it arrived promptly.  It didn't work after I followed all of the Windows 10 set-up directions.  I tried everything that I could think of.  The next day I took it to our local computer shop.  The guy took the laptop, was back in less than five minutes and said that there wasn't enough disk space for the computer to function.  It turns out that it comes with 33 megabytes of memory, but 32 of them were used for Windows downloads during set up

We returned the laptop and bought a different one.  It took a couple days and some reading to set it up correctly, but the new laptop works pretty well now.


4.  The Biggest Problem--The HUD Doesn't work.

The final, but worst, problem left to solve is the HUD (heads-up display.)  Online pros almost always use a HUD, which gives them access to all kinds of statistics on their play and on the play of their opponents.  If your opponent is using a HUD  and you're not, you're bringing a knife to a gunfight.  I won't do that.  I'm careful with my poker bankroll and I don't play when I'm at an obvious disadvantage.

To see the difference between using or not using a HUD, check the two poker videos below.  Even if you have no idea what's going on, watching each videos for 30 seconds makew it easy to see that players using a HUD have access to much more information.

Poker table without a HUD:  https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=online+poker+tournament&&view=detail&mid=EBF4318C74D4408D85FBEBF4318C74D4408D85FB&&FORM=VRDGAR

Poker table using a HUD:  https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=poker+tournament+with+hud&&view=detail&mid=E926AB5E53BDB60FB3DFE926AB5E53BDB60FB3DF&&FORM=VRDGAR


Things get complicated pretty quickly if one little things goes wrong, because there are so many moving parts.  When I play poker online three main programs are working together:

1.  The poker site, which displays the virtual table and other information on the monitor.
2. The HUD, the display that overlays the table and displays a wide variety of statistics.
3. The database that stores the history of my play and that of my opponents.

There is a reason that there is a poker forum support thread for addressing those issues, and there is a reason that there almost 50,000 posts in that thread.*  It's hard to keep up with all of the moving parts.  If I was a rich poker player I would hire a full-time or on-call tech guy to solve those problems for me.

I decided to try one more thing before I gave up.  I paid someone in Holdem Manager Emergency Support $60 for one hour to look at how I had everything set up, using Teamviewer.  He couldn't fix anything, but I got the $60 back.

After trying for an hour to fix the HUD and some smaller problems, the paid support guy told me that the problem was an update by the poker site (Juicy Stakes Poker) which confused Holdem Manager's tracking.  I went back to the Holdem Manager support thread.  They said that I would have to wait to use the HUD until Holdem Manager could bring out an update that adjusted their code to the Juicy Stakes Poker changes.

That could take a few days or a month. I know of no other options, but at least I know that at some point Holdem Manager will fix the problem.  I need to climb out of my funk, get back to studying every day and see what happens.  At least I know that at some point it is fixable.

I will do my best to let you know what's going on, even if it's  less-than-exciting news about how much time I spent that day studying flash cards.

As always, your questions and comments are welcome (see box below.)

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*https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/167/commercial-software/holdem-manager-support-1535/?highlight=

  

The Master Plan, Part 1 of 2--How Poker Works

I realize that a lot of my readers, including my new readers from Eye Care One in Muskegon, might be puzzled by some of my blog posts.  It must seem odd that I've been playing for quite a few years, but now I'm writing about the low-level tournaments that I play.  After all, I play a lot of  $1 tournaments.

To explain that, which I will do in part 2, I first have to explain how poker tournaments work, and how difficult it is to make a profit.  In part two I will explain what I've been doing since 1/1/2017 to increase my profits.  I will explain how I turned $40 into $900 while investing nothing on top of the starting $40.  That process is called "building a bankroll."

It's hard to make money playing poker.  A small number of players make a living at it. A very few become the millionaires that you see on televised poker shows.  Most players, including some touring pros, make little or nothing.

I've only played online lately, but I hope to get back to playing some live poker soon.  In either case, it works the same way.  I will use a $10 tournament as an example, but the numbers work the same way whether it's a $1 or $1,000 tournament.

Usually about 15% of the field will cash, so for a $10 tournament with 100 entrants, 85 players won't cash.  In fact, since each player has to pay a 10% fee to enter the tournament, most will actually lose $11, the $10 entry fee (which goes into the prize pool) plus the 10% rake that goes to the poker room or online site.  For online tournaments, this would be listed as a "$10 + $1" tournament.

The good news for the top 15 finishers is that 100 players each put $10 into the $1,000 prize pool for the remaining players to divide up.

  

This is the bad news:  It pays to finish near the top, but if you just sneak into the last cashing spot, you haven't accomplished much.  There is a poker saying that goes like this:

Most of the money is at the final table.  Most of the money at the final table is in the top three spots.

First place usually wins 20-25% of the prize pool, so let's say that first place cashes for $240 and second place gets $115.  The amounts go down quickly from there.  If you finish 15th you might win something like $12, barely enough to cover what it cost to enter the tournament.  Congratulations, you played for five hours, your profit was $1 and you made 20¢ per hour!

The point here is that it's hard to make money playing poker.  If you think that you can win because "I can read people" or "I read a poker book" or "I watch poker on TV all the time" it's not going to happen.

If you want to make real money playing poker, you have to understand the math.  Poker is a math based game:  expected value, combinatorics, game theory, optimal vs. exploitive play, and more.  You have to put in the hours, both studying and playing.

Phil Ivey, considered by many to be the best player in the world, won a high school math competition.  One player studies computer vs. computer poker tournaments to better understand Game Theory Optimal situations. 

You have to keep good records.  If you live in the United States, the IRS might want to see those records.   You can't "wing it."  You need to have a plan.  Part two will explain my plan.

As always, I welcome your comments or  questions (see box below.)  This is a "there are no dumb questions" space. 

Internet Problems

Playing online poker should be an easy thing to do.  I sit down to play, and if I'm good enough, I make a profit over a statistically significant sample size.  I wish that it was that simple.

Americas Cardroom is a disaster, as mentioned in earlier posts.  That knocks out one of my two options for playing online.  This month we had a big problem with our internet services.  It's been a problem for a while, especially when I'm playing or trying to study online around 0230.  Everything was so slow that I would type a few words, then wait for the letters to appear on the screen.

Until a few days ago poker had not been affected, but not only was poker affected, it was so bad that I would be unable to play for five or ten minutes at a time.  Every player knows what to do in a tournament when someone loses a connection or stops playing--you play faster.

When someone stops playing (in poker it's called "sitting out") players still have to post the blinds and antes once each orbit.  The faster that everyone plays, the more quickly you can grind down the stack of a player who is sitting out.  Other players get those chips, building their stacks while yours is shrinking.  That happened to me when the internet went down for several minutes at a time.  It cost me a couple tournaments and I skipped a few.

I talked to the people at Comcast, and things have been fine for a couple days.  It seems to be just a touch slow as I'm typing this, but maybe I'm paranoid.

I played last night, I didn't cash, and that one hurt.  I was playing a tournament that paid 12 players and I went out in 13th place.  It's never fun to be close to the money and miss, but that was especially true this time, because I was in the first place for a while.  Well, on to the next tournament.