Tilt
Huh? What is tilt? Every
serious poker player has experienced tilt in their poker career
before, but only the best players learn to suppress it and deal with
it so it doesn't affect their game. Tilt is when you let your
emotions get in the way of playing smart poker and it can ruin your
stack at tables because of stupid moves. Tilt often happens after
losing to a bad beat, having an unlucky streak of cards, or just
losing in general. Luck is apart of the game we all have our ups and
downs, but remember the downs more often than the ups. For example
if you just lost your whole stack 3 times in a row with AA preflop
each time...well that's horrible luck! You know you played it right
and the odds were in your favor but somehow you lost all 3
times...this would piss anyone off. Result is you get angry and
figure if you play one of those shitty hands that just beat you, you
would win with it. WRONG! Your dropping your skill level for no
reason. Worst of all you will play like a fish, people will sense
you're pist-off and just profit off of your bad streak. Avoiding
tilt can save you thousands and your whole bankroll. It takes months
to built a reputable bankroll, but just one night of a uncontrolled
tilt and you can lose it all. I recommend everyone to read the rest
of this on how to prevent tilt, and dealing with it.
Avoiding Tilt #1- Well the
first way to deal with tilt is once you get that angry feeling after
a few bad beats, stop playing for awhile. It depends on the person
for how long they should take a break for. I say at least a 2 hour
break if you are on tilt, if not more. By stop playing you let
yourself avoid careless mistakes and obvious 'tells' that you would
be giving off at your tables. A very common mistake when people go
on tilt is they think they would be happy just to "break even" since
they are obviously down. With this mind set they want to risk more
money in order to try to double up quickly and to leave once they've
"got their money back". ONE: you
will most likely lose the money your risking to double up because
you are angry and not playing correctly.
TWO: It is NOT your money anymore! Take a break and get
it back LATER when you can play straight again. It takes a good
player to realize when to stop...remember this.
Avoiding Tilt #2- Recently
from playing online I've figured out another way to avoid going on
tilt altogether when receiving bad beats and bad luck streaks at
tables. I regularly play 6-8 tables at a time now (I could play more
but this is my comfort zone), but anyone playing 4 or more tables
have probably seen the same results as me. Results being that even
though I'm getting a bad beat at one table, I'm still concentrating
on multiple other tables at the same time. So although I got sucked
out, I am still playing smart at all my tables because my
concentration is divided to all these different tables. I lost bad
at one table, looking for decent hands on 3-4 other tables and in
the middle of an intense hand at another table or 2. Point is that I
am playing so efficiently like a robot, that emotions don't really
have time to kick in because my mind is racing on about many other
situations at my other tables. Hopefully I'll still end up on top
because my game play did not change, I just did not take the bad
loss to heart because it is not my sole table I am playing at. I
hope you all understand what I am trying to say and if you
multi-table a lot like me, you should know what I am talking about
from experience. I only recommend this way if you are experienced at
playing multiple tables, because it is something you need to learn
how to do through experience.
Avoiding Tilt #3-
Discipline yourself!!! If you realize you have a problem with going
on tilt you need to program yourself on how to play. By program I
mean set yourself a maximum amount of money you can lose (I'd say no
more than 2-3 buy-ins of what you play) or WIN in a session of
playing. Once you hit one of these numbers just STOP, plain out
stop. I don't care if you are hot and on a roll or if you are sure
you can make your money back in one more rotation. Discipline is
discipline and you have plenty of time to play later! Do not let
your emotions get mixed up in this, you will regret it.
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