Good game selection can add hugely to your profit margins, but practising it effectively means not only picking good tables when you first log on but also managing your play during your session. Just because a table is looking tasty when you sit down does not mean it’s still a good game after a couple of personnel changes.
Don’t let your first impressions about a table cloud your judgement. Stats in the lobby and secondary clues about your opponents may indicate it’s a good table to get involved in but these indications can be misleading. For example, if there is a lot of three-betting (reraising preflop) and aggression after the flop, you may be facing some tough opponents and you may have more difficulty finding good spots. It may be that the lobby showed this was a loose table with large average pots, but this may have been due to an unusual run of big hands or a couple of competent loose-aggressive players that you’d rather not be facing. Conversely, if you see a lot of preflop limping or cold-calling of raises and passive play after the flop this table may be all your Christmases come at once.
Getting in the hot (or cold) seat
The seat that becomes available at a table will have a huge effect on whether this is a positive expectation spot for you or not. If there’s a huge fish at a given table and you are lucky enough to get a seat to his immediate left you can raise his limps and reraise his raises to isolate him and have him dancing to your positional tune for the rest of the hand. However, if there are two good aggressive players between you and him you’ll rarely get the opportunity to contest pots, as they’ll have the same idea as you. This will make this table much less profitable (unless you take your game to the next level and start four-betting them light!).
It’s vital to be honest about how good your spot is and to remember that games constantly evolve. What may have been a great table at the start of a session can switch if the donators are replaced by competent regulars. You should also be aware that the tables you elected not to play are also changing. At any point a bad player may sit down on a couple of tables or win a big pot and have a huge stack that’s just waiting to be swiped. Check the lobby intermittently to make sure you’re not missing opportunities to increase your profit.
Read Part II