Been running a tad cold so far this month, and upon sighing to myself and reviewing my HM, I glanced over to the right and noticed what I think is the real thief in this story: Rake



I have paid $2,365 in rake so far this month. That is over 16,400 hands (or 32 hours if you will). I ~6 table~ NL100 and some NL200 mostly on a euro network, so I am probably your very typical SSNL grinder in that regard.

That averages at 15 cents for every hand I get dealt. Looking down at 72o UTG and tossing it costs me 15 cents on average. Or to put it another way, I pay roughly $75/hour. For what exactly? Using their software?

Do you guys feel that this is a reasonable fee? I know the network I'm playing at has worse rake than most, and I'm getting some of it back through being Supernova (I doubt it's more than 10% though). I also play on iPoker, but that network has dug its own grave and there's no games running there anymore because of a failed split and a buggy software.

So I'm thinking to myself, what the hell am I doing paying all this money to some fat schmuck in another country? I mean, if you put that rake on top of my winnings instead, I'd be up almost 3K already. A decent amount of money tbh. I've even started contemplating stuff like deliberately lowering my VPIP to avoid more marginal spots (even with a 5% edge rake will eat you alive). But how fun is that?

I've tried breaking into MSNL a couple of times, but it hasn't really worked out partly because:

1) The games are actually very much harder.
2) Living expenses keep digging into my rolls, and I don't want to gamble with my BRM.

So an offer arrived to me the other day. One of my best friends who's playing 10/20+ offered me to stake some big rolls (I'd be lending the money though, but that cuts the BR issues at least). No percentage, no nothing. I'll just have to pay it back the day I hopefully get myself covered enough.

The plan would be to simply bumhunt 3/6 -> 25/50. At least at those stakes, the f*ing rake isn't 80% of your total winnings. Beating SSNL for enough money to move up and away has become very, very difficult imo. The games are harder, sites are closing down, countries are regulating god knows what and the rake only seems to increase as the online pokerworld sadly seems to head into a monopoly state.


Downsides?

I could run supercold for one thing. It won't be as fun as it is right now. I've taken the hard way from NL10 to where I am today, and it'd feel a bit like cheating. My plan all along was to grind my way up through. I really enjoy playing where I am, with the dynamics and stuff I have with the regs I'm playing with. I mean, it's not like I don't table select, but switching to 100% bumhunting mode would just takes away some of the fun.

TL;DR: Online poker 2012 is hard.

If you are playing 100NL 6Max.

How many hands did you play a month to make SN at Stars last year?

Just curious because I started like 3 months ago at Stars and trying to make it. 56,500 VPP for me to go so I don't think I can but I kind of like being Platinum every month so far. I use that $200 reward thing like every 6 - 7 sessions. So, I don't know how much better SN is.

How much rake do you get back as a SN?

If it's higher than other sites, then why not just play there only, it seems like enough player pool to me. I mean you work so hard to make SN.

Make your own thread if you want to ask YOUR questions! Thanks!

It sucks to read your personal **** in almost all other peoples threads.

You are so mean.

Will you tell me the answer? I'll fold once for you if you do.

OP, what site do you play at?

The rake looks a too much for only 16k hands, it is more then 100bb for 1k hands and your stats dont suggest that you are so loose and aggressive. It has to be some mistake!

I actually quit poker in January this year.I was a 50NL 6 max played and had worked my way up from a $0 bankroll.I mainly quit poker because of these reasons:
1) Games are getting tough day by day leading to more and more variance
2) Very few reputed sites
3) Rake took away a big part of my winnings (considering after rb)
4) Gambling laws in my country too are not clear.So god knows what will be the headlines tomorrow and i dont want to wake up one day to know that the government ****ed up my living.
5) I am still a student and am doing engineering so i ultimately decided that the best course of action for me right now would be to first get a degree and then decide if i want to get back into poker.
6) Poker is actually much more mentally tiring than many other activities out there.

Now all these reasons wont apply to everyone and i actually took a lot of time to take my decision(i did a lot of research but the above points are just what i remember for now).So as for the future of SSNL i think the games are just getting worse day by day.

by saying the games get worse means u dont work hard enough.

Sure, i agree the games are more difficult then before but its still beatable if u put in some effort.

I agree. There is still the ignore function tough

He loves me. I know he loves me.

So uve tried playing the midstakes game with your own $ and havent succeeded because the games are much tougher, but now you feel you could beat up to 25/50 with a loan? Playing at a 10/20 table with 1 semifish that is beeing bumhunted by 5 other regs dosent sound like a profitable plan...

the rake does seem a bit steep.

http://gyazo.com/26754c8666d6dcece106104bd634ac0d

i'm paying ~$3300 for 23k hands this month, but it's mostly HU so i'm playing a ton more hands than you.

if moving up is seemingly impossible simply because of BR considerations, you should look into getting a stake. it's infinitely easier to move up when none of your poker BR needs to go towards expenses.

Yeah. I think your HM isn't tracking rake correctly. I checked a ~16000 hand sample of my own at 100nl on Microgaming and I got this:

ive raked 3.5k in 40k hands at 200nl pretty extreme tbh. But making a thread which has been created many of times wont change anything...

i mean, just get good RB and beat the games at a bigger clip.

i know it's easier said than done, but that's really what you gotta do.