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hokiegreg's picture
How to Improve Non-Strategy Skills (multitabling, volume, ...fill in the blank)

Cross-posted from Anjo280's thread. I think it's an important topic and I want to make sure you all read this. Good question, Anjo. 2. Multitabling makes me paranoidyeah its basically the same as the HUD. I want to be 2 tabling 100s+ one day but i can´t keep the gameflows seperate in my mind.If i get 3bet on the left table and a second later the right table will 3bet me i get the subconcious  feeling of being runover and having to play back which makes me do things i would never consider when i´m 1 tabling.That is an overdramatisation of my point but it just a matter of time untill i stop playing my A-game if i'm playing more than one table. I have recently seen 1 or 2 of Hokies videos where he talks about exactly that problem but i´m not sure how to fix it on my own. It's a skill to be able to recognize your weaknesses, as you seem to be able to do quite well.It is important to be aware of and respect that almost everything in poker is a skill: volume, tilt control, multitabling, focus, quality of studying, organization, discipline...so many non-strategy skills.To become more skilled at something, you obviously have to practice it and improve gradually. I think many players have the wrong idea about how to improve in these non-strategy areas: basically, "suck it up and try harder." It's not that simple. We are all different, some of us are great at volume but bad at focus; others are great at tilt control, but don't really know how to study properly. So obviously, if your focus is your biggest strength and your multitabling ability is your biggest weakness, it is unfair to yourself to hold your weakness to the same standard as your strength. Everyone is more naturally talented in certain areas. So how do you improve your skill in these areas (I'm going to just knock out all these topics at once, bc it's all the same!):You learn gradually.Think about it like you are in the gym lifting weights. If your goal is to be able to benchpress 130kg, but currently you can oly benchpress 80kg - it is completely impossible for you to just "suck it up" and benchpress 130kg. Adding a table when you aren't prepared to, doubling your volume, never tilting, focusing 100% of the time, etc: they are all equally impossible for us to expect ourselves to be able to do immediately. You might not physically injure yourself like you would trying to benchpress 130kg, but you will almost certainly mentally or financially hurt yourself (burnout and have to take a bunch of off days, tilt, lose a ton of money, autpilot). So how do we improve? The same way we would go from benching 80kg to 130kg! Gradually. The realistic way to increase your benchpress would be to slowly work your way up - 85kg, 90kg, etc etc etc. After a while, you are able to bench 130kg. Volume, multitabling, etc are all very similar. If you want to add a 2nd table:Once you are feeling good in your session, add a 2nd table. Continue with 2 tables until you find yourself beginning to struggle mentally. Allow yourself to struggle for a while, challenge yourself to improve, if you find yourself struggling too much then stop. Drop back to 1 table and finish your session. Afterwards, take some notes and analyze how you reacted when you began struggling 2 tabling: how long were you able to 2 table?, what caused you to lose focus?, etc. You are basically creating a mental game sample size to analyze your ability to 2 table. Find the point where you begin to struggle. Maybe that is on average about 40 minutes into 2 tabling. Stick with that point (just as you would if you are struggling benching 90kg). Continue to analyze and work on improving. Build more mental muscle and you will get stronger. Increase your 2 tabling sessions another 15 minutes, see how that goes, analyze/reevaluate. Continue that process and you will eventually find yourself 2 tabling throughout your entire session without any real problems.I hope the weightlifting analogy works for you, it does for me. You could use a bunch of different physical challenges (running, etc) and I think it gets the point across the same way :)Do you see how this approach would apply for improving your volume? For improving the length of your sessions where you can focus on a high level?Hokie

hokiegreg's picture
bump in case noone has read

bumpin case noone has read this.

chadders0's picture
another fun way... move down

another fun way... move down to 1/10 of normal stakes, 6 table for 20 mins, move back to regular stakes and 2 table and it seems ez

 

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Andres_A's picture
weightlifting FTW

weightlifting FTW