Here's the original Russian video for anyone who's interested.

Brdz1 : Our guest is one of the best poker players, Sergey Nikiforov (MunEz_StaRR). We are very glad to welcome you!

MunEz_StaRR : Hi guys. Thanks for inviting me.

Brdz1 : Tell me how your year went? Especially the beginning and the middle.

MunEz_StaRR : It was a tough year: lots of moving, visited four countries, didn't have much time for poker. I hope I can focus more on the game this year.

Avr0ra : When I used to play less and wasn't very active in poker, I felt mental pressure. you blame yourself for wasting time on something incomprehensible and losing your form. Don't you have this?

MunEz_StaRR : When you study something for many years, you think that you already know everything. And then you drop out for a couple of weeks and feel that you have forgotten everything, and you need time to catch up. Mikita Badziakouski said that a week without a game requires almost a month to get back into shape.

Avr0ra : Another thing. For you and me, poker is a profession. And when you're not doing your job, you feel like you're wasting your time on something incomprehensible.

MunEz_StaRR : I agree. I really don't like dealing with routine work – but life throws it up anyway. You have to sacrifice desires, goals and deal with other tasks.

Brdz1 : How does losing form affect your game? Do you start calling more or bluffing more?

MunEz_StaRR : You start to forget the developments of the last week or month. For example, you are working on some specific situation, 3bet pots SB vs button on a certain structure, and you realized that you need to play like this. The situation does not occur very often, 10 times per session, and in order to consolidate development, you need to play 200 or 500 such hands. During a break, such a sample is not collected and the developments completely disappear from memory.

Brdz1 : Has it ever happened that after a break you return to a game against well-known opponents, and they have already changed their strategy and play completely differently?

MunEz_StaRR : On the contrary, sometimes taking a break is even good. You play with the same people all the time, you collect reads on them, but a few months pass and you may not notice that your adjustments no longer work. But when you take a break and start from scratch, you focus more closely on what your opponents are doing and make better decisions.

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The End of VIP games on GG Network

Avr0ra : The key event in online poker in the last 4 years is the cancellation of VIP games on GG, where professional players were banned. The end of an era.

As far as I know, you didn't really like playing on GG and preferred ACR, but you still followed what was happening. What are your thoughts on this? Were you very upset or the opposite? The action will grow in other rooms.

MunEz_StaRR (laughs): I can't say that I didn't like playing on GG. It just turned out that my bankroll was running out quickly, so there was simply no opportunity to play.

There was a not very good stretch in 2022 – I lost a lot, including on GG, I started 2023 with a small bankroll, it took a long time to recover. I came back in the fall and it was cool – a lot of action, in 2-3 months I played about 30,000 hands in the plus ... In general, I noticed high stakes on GG in 2020, when I was just creating an account, and I immediately became determined to get there. Then this idea was very motivating, but now there is nothing like that. Very sad.

Brdz1 : You had a huge number of hands played on ACR and very good results, so from the outside it seemed like there was absolutely no "GG-dependence", although other regs played there 90% of the time. And now you say that you like playing there!

MunEz_StaRR : I don't know why I didn't come there earlier. Maybe at first there was enough action on ACR, and then it became less... Or I didn't have enough bankroll or confidence in my own abilities for VIP games. It happened the way it happened. Naturally, I had thoughts, plans and even big ambitions to play there.

Avr0ra : High stakes games on GG are an exhibition where a hypothetical Linus sits, holds the table, the top players play with each other, and VIP players come.

In this table we have the results for the last four years. More than a million was won by 11 people. All the players are very famous, no one is random here. Barak has always remained a winner: he performed best in the most expensive games at NL100k and NL200k with a crazy win rate. This list will not change.

MunEz_StaRR: Let's hope that some other leaderboard will appear that will beat this one. Who knows, life is long.

How do you feel about the closure of GG? How would you feel if at the time of closure your activity was connected with highstakes?

Avr0ra : Nothing good, I also played a lot on GG: both on PokerOK and on Natural8. I would have been upset anyway! Almost all VIP traffic, especially Asian, is concentrated there.

I would have felt disappointed. It's hard to say more precisely, I was spoiled in advance about the innovations under NDA, so I couldn't talk about them, but I knew roughly where everything was heading. So for me everything happened more smoothly.

There will probably be some clubs that will let professionals in. But all this is already unfair competition. GG is removing our favorite sports component from poker.

There was already a moment when expensive games completely left PokerStars. You sit, hold the table for two months, and no one sits down to play more than 100 hands. Therefore, PokerStars also has a fixed top winner. I don’t think that anyone will manage to win more in the coming years than Linus or oSpiel888. Only if Stars doesn’t shoot up again.

Avr0ra: These leaderboards have a number of overlaps. For example, Linus is top 1 on Stars and almost first on GG, if you don't take into account Barak's reup in super-expensive games. Is Linus really the best player of all time?

MunEz_StaRR: He is definitely a great player. He started playing high stakes earlier than me, he has been playing for about six years now for sure – and he has earned more than anyone.

Avr0ra: Top on PokerStars from 2018 to 2021, on GG from 2021 to 2024. Over the past 7 years, Linus has performed well everywhere – and in other rooms too. Both on ACR and in the challenge on CoinPoker.

Brdz1 : And for live games, on Triton. Everywhere in general!

Avr0ra : Linus is watching us from everywhere. I remember he had one downstreak when he tried to play Omaha in 2021. But still, 7 years at the top!

Let's get back to the leaderboard on GG. Are there any you didn't expect to see?

MunEz_StaRR: A very provocative question. I think that each person on this list is here deservedly.

Perhaps not all players from this top are in the top 10 in skill, but there are many other metrics for determining success. For example, the mental component: how well you can endure long sessions and still maintain your level of play. Or the ability to choose only profitable games and not play where you are clearly an outsider. For example, I do not have this ability at all – or it is very poorly developed.

I think everyone on this list is great, no questions asked.

Brdz1 : Are these all mandatory skills for high stakes players?

MunEz_StaRR : Yes, if you want to earn money. If there is some other motivation, say, to show who the boss is in the area, this is not necessary.

Brdz1 : I'll ask a question from the community. Do you think it's realistic for another room to compete with GG? After all, there are far more highstakes games there than on all other sites combined.

MunEz_StaRR : I am very far from running any business and I don't know what the processes look like from the inside. But from the outside it seems like they are sawing off the branch they are sitting on. Maybe they are tired of just organizing the game.

Before the changes they were at their peak, and I think they will never reach it again – they will go lower and lower. Apparently, at a certain point, the management decided to earn the maximum right away and not think about what will happen in the next 5-10-20 years.

Brdz1 : There used to be a lot of high stakes play with a pretty big rake, now it's gone. It's not clear where the financial gains are.

MunEz_StaRR : I don't know what data they were relying on. Maybe it's ego related? They decided that they'd rather get nothing than share the profits with a bunch of high rollers. Who knows.

Jayser1337 released a fresh analysis of high-stakes analysis, this time featuring the perspective of MunEZ. No solver, just logic, hardcore combination counting and a bit of intuition.

Read

Poker Room Competition and the Poker Dream

Brdz1 : Is it possible to fight GGPoker, given their huge marketing budgets and huge handicap in terms of development?

MunEz_StaRR: The path they took could potentially lead to the growth of competitors. The question is when? In a year, in 5, in 20 years…

I think it will stay that way at the open tables. NL1K will definitely be the same. I don't know about the fill rate at NL2K, but it seems like there is action. And if there is now, why wouldn't there be in a year? If people don't understand now that most games don't get beat there, that will change in a while.

Brdz1 : I think the key point is the "poker dream" that drives many regs. That you can go from low stakes to the highest. Right now, GG doesn't have that option physically .

MunEz_StaRR : I don't understand why people play there at all if the stakes aren't being beaten.

Avr0ra: In fact, this is a myth that was created by GG haters. All stakes are beaten – this was well demonstrated by bots that are periodically banned. On 2+2, they posted the results of bots that play all stakes with 8BB/100 after rake.

But for an ordinary player, it is much easier to rise from micro stakes on PokerStars. The effective rake on GG is 3 or 2.5 times more than on Stars.

MunEz_StaRR : It turns out that the poker dream is alive even on GG. Another thing is that it has become much more difficult and there are other rooms.

Avr0ra : I played with filters a bit, left only those games where you could play at least a decent number of hands: Nl5k-Nl20k. Wherever you go, Barak is still the champion. The main player of this era.

What is your impression of him? How comfortable is it to play 3-max or 6-max with him?

MunEz_StaRR : An unpleasant opponent, I don't always understand what he's doing. At a high level, most players adjust against each other. And after watching Barack's showdown against Linus, I can't say that I'll be able to use it against him next time in the same hand. It doesn't work!

Although in my understanding his strategy is not the most correct and not the most profitable, he knows how to implement it and is much better oriented.

Avr0ra: It's also interesting to look at the top by number of hands. For example, Manuel Saavedra managed to play half a million hands without high stakes at NL5k and NL20k. And Taisto Janter is quite high.

Someone told me that poker is like Formula 1 – the same faces for years. Oshpiel, Limitless. And in the top by number of hands in general, you can see that Barak is high here too – 270 thousand hands played at these stakes.

Artem, by the way, didn't perform so badly. He did well at high stakes, Manuel Saavedra can make claims against him for the shortfall. Kevin Paquet is also in the top, but he played poorly at NL40k, which I filtered out.

4.6
PokerStars starting out holding online poker games back in 2001 and now the company is worth over 6 billion dollars. They sponsor a slew of tournaments like the European Poker Tour, UK and Ireland Poker Tour, plus a handful of others. Over the years, PokerStars has remained on top of the online poker industry. They’ve expanded to offer fantastic online casino games and sports betting.

Results of 2024

Let's look at just the past year. The two key rooms where the game was played were GG and ACR.

Brdz1 : Old Linus is here with Barack too.

Avr0ra: Yeah, no matter how you twist the filters, you can't twist these two. By the way, even though I kept my finger on the pulse, I didn't really know any of the new era players until 2024.

First of all, Dejan Kaladjurdjevic. He won everything possible, both in cash and in tournaments, caught a crazy upstreak. Also worth mentioning is Chris Nguyen, a young Austrian. It's funny that they are all 26 years old.

Brdz1 : PR0DIGY is also 26.

MunEz_StaRR : Yes, we were playing on CoinPoker once, got to talking in the chat – it turned out that out of six players, three were 26.

Avr0ra: If you look at the top on ACR, DavyJones is in control. Linus is also there. And Chris Nguyen.

Let's separately mention American players who can't play on GG. First of all, Matt Marinelli in 18th place. Who would you single out among American cash players, Sergey?

MunEz_StaRR: Him or SeeLlama. I can't say for sure because I only played a lot with Matt. SeaLlama seemed like a very unpleasant player to me.

Brdz1: Have you ever met oneplusone? I've heard completely different stories about him, that he selects from NL600 and up to...

MunEz_StaRR ( interrupting ): Is it selectite? Or is it called something else? That is the question.

Brdz1: You mean the script? Possibly. I've heard a lot of suspicions about it and Alaska ( AlaskaFreeza ) about using RTA. What do you think about this?

MunEz_StaRR: I'm sure Alaska plays without software, he's a top loser in my database. It's a different story with oneplusone: we've played together a lot, and he has wildly unbalanced stats, a bunch of holes. You hit these holes, he doesn't adjust, you take your EV – and in the results you end up in the red. I don't understand how this happens.

My hunch is that in those situations that aren't so obvious, he outplays you so much that it covers up the more common situations where he gives away EV.

You've played a lot of hands too, and you've probably played with people who you later accused of using something.

Avr0ra : There were a lot of these on ACR.

MunEz_StaRR: So, I played for a month on CoinPoker against very strong opponents and felt like I was playing with people! But when I played with oneplusone – no. I don't agree with this. In some situations he plays very weakly, and in other, more difficult situations, very strong.

Either he did it on purpose to look like a genius, or he was using something and trying to disguise himself as someone who is not really that good at the game to induce the action. But in reality he was losing too much in small spots, and in big spots he had much more EV due to the tips.

Brdz1 : His schedule is amazing.

MunEz_StaRR: I can't directly accuse anyone of anything, I'm just telling you my feelings. There are 40 people you play with for a month and you've never had the feeling that someone is using something. I don't know what to do with this information.

Avr0ra: Well, he's already banned now.

MunEz_StaRR : I had the same feeling with other people who were later banned. Could it just be a coincidence? Theoretically, yes. But I wouldn't be surprised if he used something.

Avr0ra : Remember the player everyone suspected of using RTA on WPN? No one wanted to play him except you. You ended up rolling him out and ending his career.

MunEz_StaRR: Yeah, I saw him making mistakes and unlike oneplusone I didn't feel like I was being outplayed in the expensive spots so I kept playing.

Brdz1: I heard a story about how you wrote in a highstakes conference that you suspected someone of RTA, then played with him a bit and wrote: “Okay, acquitted.”

Avr0ra : Imagine the situation from this guy's perspective: you see that MunEz_StaRR suspects you of RTA – now that's recognition of your level of play! And a couple of days later you read that the suspicions are removed. And he sits and thinks: "What did I play there?"

For me, the most striking story of recent years is RedLine , a former student of fish2013 . He won a lot, then got banned for RTA, and still plays Omaha in some apps. He always played highstakes Hold'em — and now PLO. Suspicious.

Brdz1 : Is the problem with RTA at highstakes even relevant now? There haven't been any high-profile bans of famous players for a long time, you can count them on the fingers of one hand.

MunEz_StaRR: The problem is very relevant, too much money is circulating at such stakes. I don't want to sit down at the table and take risks: to meet people who play unfairly.

Brdz1: It seems like the number of suspicions doesn't match the number of bans.

MunEz_StaRR: When some unknown person comes and starts playing really well, he automatically falls under suspicion. It took me 10 years to learn to play at my level. But how can an unknown person come and start playing well at high stakes? How did he get there? If this happens, naturally I start thinking about unfair play. I don't believe that you can go all this way in a short time.

Avr0ra: There was a case recently where a guy was only peeking in 3bet pots. Everyone who played with him was sure that he was playing unfairly: he was top in 3bet pots, and SRP didn't understand what was going on at all.

But still, such cases are few. Poker is a complex game with many variables. Even if you put a guy from the street with a top RTA at the table, he won't beat Seryoga. In 3-max and 6-max, a strong player can still get an edge.

At high stakes the game is cleaner than at NL200, where the risks of bans and confiscations are not as high. The paradox of online poker is that it is easier for you to blend in with the crowd.

Avr0ra : There is also the issue of paranoia. The dispersion is big, it is easier to find an excuse. Both me and Serega were accused of cheating, although he has a crystal reputation. For example, GiveMeUp, a top player of the past years, was ready to bet money that Sergey played with RTA. That's how much he liked your game at that moment.

SeaLlama and PR0DIGY also suspected. But many American players know them personally, they rented a house together in Vegas, and played from there in parallel. If one of them is a cheater, then the others know it and cover it up.

Brdz1 : Looks like a global conspiracy!

MunEz_StaRR : What is SeaLlama's history, did he play somewhere before ACR?

Avr0ra : He, like lolvoidaments, played on the Ignition network. Then everyone left, the bots are too harsh. They used to be beatable, but then they started banning real players.

The 2+2 user with the nickname jb` successfully fought the bots, with some success, but all good things come to an end.

Read

I was one of the first who actively rewarmed SeaLlama, he was playing NL2K on backing at the time. And I was stunned! I've been playing poker for 14 years and I've been busted on Q-high, say, 1-2 times. And with him, there were several such hands in a week. His game is too exploitative, but I think he plays fair.

MunEz_StaRR: He played absolutely differently than 99% of the field, he opened overbets in a couple of seconds on the bluff catcher. For him, this is normal. Either someone told him, or in his understanding of the game, this is an absolutely normal situation.

Avr0ra : I think he's just a gambler. He behaves the same way in real life.

In Memory of Matthew Berghart

Avr0ra : Last year, a tragic event happened – Matthew Bergart was shot in a shootout. We recorded a separate episode, GipsyTeam published a very touching article, many players spoke well of him. I know that Matthew communicated well with Linus, in general – he was a person from the community.

His death made a strong impression on me. We often crossed paths at the table, played in the same time zone. And it makes you think about life – here we are, playing, and that's it, the person in the lobby will not come.

Linus Loeliger, George Froggatt, and other regulars remember the 30-year-old high roller who tragically died last week in Toronto, Canada.

Read

MunEz_StaRR: Who would have thought that something like this could happen in Toronto to a poker player. And he wasn't one of those who go to some gambling dens, just an ordinary guy who sits at home and plays his favorite game.

Avr0ra: As far as I know, there was a gang showdown, he was at his friend's birthday party, who was in one of these groups. I don't blame him at all – he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

By the way, GG had a warning system for bumhunting: if you pick your game too well, you get a warning. And Matthew was choked very badly, even though he played with everyone. The system was very unfair. Were you warned like that?

MunEz_StaRR: No. I played with everyone, it's just that there weren't many regwars at the high stakes. When I first signed up for GG, there was no Real Name policy. We played 3-max with Stefan and Dax ( Marius Giers – ed. ). Dax didn't even know who I was. Stefan didn't recognize me right away, but I told him later. I remember the rake was about 2bb per 100.

Avr0ra: Overall, the system was very bad. A person who is in the top 4 by hands cannot be a bumhunter.

There are several of his hands that I want to show you and the audience.

Basically, there's no big analysis here, just a 250bb bluff. In a 3bet pot, Matthew bet the flop on a good texture for him, 4-3-2, I think Ignacio usually checks his entire range. Matthew bet, got called. Check-check the turn. On the river, he probably decided to make a thin value bet against hands like AK.

MunEz_StaRR : Doubtful, but okay.

Avr0ra : Doubtful, yes. And, having received a check-raise, turned the hand into a bluff all-in! Although in some sense, if we put all-in here, then maybe you don't need to bet yourself.

MunEz_StaRR: Maybe he bet specifically to get a check-raise and then shove. So he didn't have a plan to just bet and fold to a bet. In my opinion, this is a pretty thin bet. Cool. But what does he represent on the river other than a set of tens and T9s?

Avr0ra: I think he's primarily representing a straight, 56 could be in the range. The kind of hand that you could print on a T-shirt and be proud of. How many bluffs like that have I made in my career, in 15 years of playing? Hand on heart, I think up to five. Brd, how many do you have?

Brdz1: Also up to five. Maybe even up to one (laughs) .

Avr0ra: Since I don't play at the highest level anymore and was afraid to compete in your challenge, I'll be honest: I haven't made a single bluff like that in a 3bet pot in my career.

MunEz_StaRR : In any case, if you win, you're right!

Avr0ra : I'll show you another rebluff against Davy Jones, who was also in the top at Stars. Before the river, the hand was more or less standard – we bet a little on the flop, overbet on the turn. And on the river, Davy Jones tried to represent trips with a donk overbet.

MunEz_StaRR: Do you think it's impossible to get trips here?

Avr0ra: Yes, it is possible. When there is a trips and a bluff, we think that the opponent is unlikely to go to knock out the trips. I think that we are primarily bluffing here, because we do not block the opponent's bluffs.

MunEz_StaRR: Nowadays many people have started playing like this: check-check-donk on a card that suits the range of a player out of position.

Avr0ra : It seems Davey didn't play this hand out quite yet. He should have gone all-in. Let's use deduction. Considering that he didn't press the time bank before folding, it's obvious that it wasn't a nine. It could have been some JT. They almost had full weight to get to the river and donk bet.

MunEz_StaRR: There may be not only JT, but also some average flush draws.

Avr0ra: The more I watch this hand, the more I like the all-in. I wouldn't play it that way.

Anyway, for the sake of history, they showed small beautiful hands from Matthew. You almost didn't play with him?

MunEz_StaRR: We crossed paths a little on GG, he was a very unpleasant opponent. He did a lot of things that simply didn't let you play calmly. He himself may have made some moves that weren't very profitable or positive, but it wasn't easy for you either.

Rising to the High Stakes

MunEz_StaRR : How long does it take for a person to go from zero to NL5k regular?

Brdz1 : Thousands of hours.

Avr0ra : With a top approach, you can rise in 4-5 years. It is clear that you can reach NL200 faster: you choose who to play with, sit only with those who came to have fun... But to play at a level and compete with Sergey – you need at least five years. What do you think?

MunEz_StaRR : There used to be fewer resources. Even when there were solvers, there were no guides on how to use them correctly, there weren't so many training videos – including free ones.

I agree about 5 years, but it's not just a lazy time. It's tough work – you need to have mentors who tell you not what to do, but how to do it. I didn't have any of those at the time.

Avr0ra : Yes, we all learned from OtB_RedBaron.

Fast rises work well in MTT. There are many stories of people reaching the highest stakes in 2-3 years due to dispersion. You see that a person can understand some aspects well, and, for example, fail in others. But at the top level, you cannot sag in some aspect of the game, you will simply be wiped out. This is a story not only about technique, but also about psychology.

Coin Poker World Championship

Avr0ra: Let's smoothly move on to the challenge on Coin. We played for a little over a month – in the end, PR0DIGY won. Sergey, what are your impressions? When you found out about the challenge, did you immediately know that you would play?

MunEz_StaRR: I found out a month before the start, when I was busy with another move and didn't play at all for about two and a half weeks. My form, to put it mildly, wasn't very good. I doubted whether it was worth sitting down at all, but I played three sessions at regular tables and felt faith and energy. I allocated myself 20 buy-ins, which I was ready to lose.

Avr0ra: I was really rooting for you. I saw that you sat down in the morning and played until late at night.

MunEz_StaRR: It only happened once. When the challenge first started, in my time zone the game was from morning to evening, but then it became less and less.

Brdz1 : The origin story of the nickname PR0DIGY is interesting. He said that he took it so that he would have to "live up to expectations" – and won the challenge. What can you tell us about it?

MunEz_StaRR : We haven't played together much because of the different time zones. Where is he now, Britain?

Avr0ra : I think he played from America.

MunEz_StaRR: Yes, when I had morning, he was already finishing the session. We crossed paths for a couple of hours, then he went to sleep. But he plays well: before that we often met at ACR, and I didn't see any bad hands from him. I can't say that his strategy is annoying, but it works.

Brdz1 : Alexey once told me a story about how there were active re-wars with your participation at high stakes. And then everyone named the best players and most likely no one would have put you first, although according to Aurora you were probably the strongest in the world at that time. In this sense, it is very profitable when your strategy is underestimated.

MunEz_StaRR: There are several approaches. In one, you try to beat your opponents every hand. And in the other, you know your opponent's weak points, but don't hit them right away. Conditionally: you know that in this situation your opponent bluffs too often, but you don't want to call him on all bluff catchers, even if it's plus EV. But most likely, your opponent will understand something and next time in a similar hand you won't get EV.

Many players use the first approach, as if to say: "You can't out-bluff me!" I don't like this option. You reveal your advantage and in the future it will not exist.

Old and New School Poker

Avr0ra : You can gather a group of players who recently appeared: PR0DIGY, AbsoluteTopUp, youseffhahmed, SeaLama. And players from my era – LlinusLL0ve, KevinPaque, asianflushie, DavyJones, IgnacioMoron... We lost. The new school did better, largely due to PR0DIGY's victory.

Brdz1 : Did you see the difference between the schools?

MunEz_StaRR: Old school players are more calm. And new school players are hotter and more daring.
The championship was a very interesting experience. In a month I crossed paths with a lot of people, and everyone plays differently! Usually you have 5-6 regular opponents, and here – 40 with different styles. And you need to constantly come up with something. Changing gears is very cool. Competitive thrill.

Avr0ra: Yes, a real world championship. You can even tell by the flags. It's really like the Olympics! And PR0DIGY took the gold medal. I think we should make medals for the next one.

Brdz1 : How do you think the championship could be developed? There have been ideas to hold it in a heads-up format. How interesting would that be for you? For some reason, it always seemed to me that your heart was in that direction.

MunEz_StaRR: It's not interesting at all. The soul may lie, but the skill is clearly not up to the level of those people who will participate in such a thing. I adequately assess my abilities.

I am now addressing all poker rooms that provide the opportunity to play at high stakes. It would be very cool to make such an event on a regular basis. For example, once a year.

Avr0ra: I think they will, because this championship was very successful. But if we do it more often, there will be fewer participants. Once a year, I think, is ideal, otherwise it is too competitive. And we need to somehow pump up the media, budget, prizes. Although PR0DIGY is most likely happier with a watch with engraving than if he was given an extra hundred thousand.

Let's talk about those who played the most hands. For example, about the champion – Kevin Pak, who played almost 72,000.

MunEz_StaRR: I would call Kevin's strategy the most solid. I don't really understand where I could beat him and gain an advantage. He played some super-long sessions, almost 3,000 hands every day. He doesn't play nitty-gritty, the variance is high, so there were streaks.

Avr0ra: It was always hard for me to play with him too. He doesn't pay anything, he can make subtle folds. And you won't be able to sit it out – they'll just take you out.

MunEz_StaRR: He has the right approach to defense, he thinks about every situation.

Avr0ra: In second place, both in terms of the number of hands and the results, is riggedeck.

MunEz_StaRR: We crossed paths a lot before the challenge. He plays a very exploitative style. But I haven't figured out his adjustments yet, and the results against him over the year have been so-so.

He took about 13 buy-ins from me during the entire challenge. Other opponents didn't win even close to that much.

Avr0ra: Who did you win the most from?

MunEz_StaRR: Oddly enough, Linus has about 6 stacks. There were cooler hands, but there were also those where I caught him. And in second place is PR0DIGY, about 4-5 stacks.

Avr0ra: By the way, he is third in the number of hands. Next is Barak – 38,000. He did not give up until the end, by the way, he continued to play for an edge.

MunEz_StaRR: We crossed paths very little in the challenge, we played in different zones. He came when it was already 4 am and I was already finishing. I'm not ready to play against a fresh Barak at the end of the session.

Avr0ra: AbsoluteTopUp has played 35,000 hands. What do you think about him?

MunEz_StaRR: An interesting opponent. As far as I understand, the only American who stayed in the black. I remember him because he brought out a few stacks in small pots. I paid for it in one hand.

Background story: he just sat down, small hand: one-time raised pot, got to the river with him, I bet half the pot and got a 30 pot push. I folded, and since the cards at the table were always shown, I saw a bluff.

After a while, a new hand happens, I block bet on the river, a huge push comes in. The situation is not very suitable for a call, but the previous hand influenced me. Otherwise, I would have folded, but here was too good a bluff catcher, made a call and was beaten.

During the challenge, another observation was made: how huge is the variance in our game! When you see your opponents' cards, it's especially noticeable. Let's say your opponent 3-bets your every second raise, and this happens for half an hour or an hour. Without cards, it may seem like they're trying to beat you, but the challenge showed that your opponent is simply getting hands from their range. They're not trying to out-bluff you, it just happened that way.

Avr0ra: I understand exactly what you're talking about. My most successful regwars were exactly like this: you sit and just play, and the dispatcher does everything itself. Purity noted this in some old video in 2011: sooner or later, either you'll pump someone up or they'll pump you up.

Brdz1: That's what you taught me: completely deny the metagame.

Avr0ra: There are two approaches. You either deny it completely, or, like Batya, go into a leveling war, but then you have to be ready to lose.

MunEz_StaRR : If you know that your opponent underestimates variance and can float, you can use this.

Avr0ra: This is exactly what gets lost during breaks. You feel it worse, to put it simply, when your opponent's ass is on fire.

MunEz_StaRR : This reminds me of the story about riggedeck. 3-4 days before the end of the challenge, he was in first place, and then he dropped a little. I start the session and see him sitting at an incomplete table with Enlight. Then during the day he tried to find action, wrote in Discord and invited everyone to play. It was clear that he was charged. So, I sit down to play and feel that his style has changed: he became more aggressive, tried to rock the game, looked for loose actions that would help him make a leap and return to first place in the rating. Not a very good adjustment, it became noticeable in literally 15 minutes. And in the last days he lost a lot, 10-12 buy-ins.

Avr0ra: asianflushie is still an interesting player. He doesn't play much online, but he is the main boss of offline in Macau. And in the past he was one of the best heads-up players in the world, even Linus didn't want to play with him.

MunEz_StaRR : He surprised me a lot. I didn't think he was that strong. A very unpleasant opponent. If he spent more time playing 6-max, he would have become almost the first in skill. He has a good base, he feels his opponents well.

Avr0ra: Around 2012, when I was playing NL200 on Stars, he recorded a training video for Zoom500, which impressed me a lot. Objectively, he played 6-max poorly, but very unconventionally, strangling with delayed lines. I realized that he is very smart: he does not know the ranges, but finds very precise actions with his mind. He leads the range, has a plan for the hand, etc.

MunEz_StaRR: I'll tell you more about Vitya and Nacho. Vitya is a handsome guy. He played for only a week, came back after the holidays and showed a great result.

Avr0ra: He wrote to me that he sat down without warming up and after a long break.

MunEz_StaRR: Came and showed many how to play poker. I think if it started in early December, the results would have been much better, and who knows where PR0DIGY would be now.

Nacho didn't come to play right away either. I really liked his approach: extremely short sessions, he chose a strategy where he plays with maximum concentration and dedication. He takes breaks to recover.

Brdz1 : Players who play more ACR were better prepared for this challenge than those who are used to playing GG due to the similar rake.

Avr0ra: Seryoga, thank you very much for coming. It turned out really cool!

MunEz_StaRR: Thanks for inviting us!