Washington State has increased the maximum rake fro $3 to $4.

I play 4/8 Holdem in Renton, WA. There is now going to be $4 taken from pots $40 or higher and $3 taken for the jackpot promotions. This combined with a normal dealer tip of $1 makes the total drop $8.

I think this makes the game unbeatable.

My question to this forum is "Can this 4/8 game with this rake be beaten?"

I am a recreational player but I want to have half a chance of booking a win.

You "have a chance" if the rake has a $10 drop.

From the O8 forum:
Find the LHE thread referred to above and you'll likely find a detailed discussion of this issue.

$4 is still not a terrible rake. If they're giving all the promo money back the game should still be beatable, but you may have to wait for the extreme long run to get your share of the promos.

What?? $4+$3 (when over 5 bet pot) seems bearable at 4/8?

FW charges $5 for a 20/40 hk and time in 40 or above in mix.

Have to admit I’m fully ignorant to the exact math when including the promo long term and what the avg rake per hand would be in slthus structure, but in the highest raked (not time) lhe games, where games are usually rake up until st least 20/40, I’ve never paid $7 for a single hand, including the SoCal and Bellagio games.

Your point about the long term is key as that promo money is a huge variable. And waiting for the extreme long run/zgrinder mentality doesn’t suit most rev players profile, so it’s just becomes more of a gamble than a regular 4/8 if looking to be fav to be winnner overall

But even after saying all that, I’d still play this game. I’ve yet to leave aclive game bc the rake was too much so I’d still play it and hope for the best w the promo. Gl op but maybe play 8/16 or 6/12 if possible

Long term? Probably not, or at least not for much. Depends on how easy it is to get the $3 promo money back. If it is paid out in rakeback, sure. If it is in $500K, hard-to-hit BBJP. Nope.
Sure as KS said, randomly you can win sessions.

Not counting the BBJP drop? All LA area cardrooms are dropping $6+$1 BBJP at $8/$16. Even worse, Commerce takes the BBJP drop even if there's no flop (yet another reason not to play there).

I have more details about the increased rake.

There must be 7 players dealt in the hand and then the rake is maxed out at $4 @ $40. While most hands include a full table of active players, this at least reduces the rake if there are only 6 players dealt to.

Have to admit I'm ignorant to the 8/16 drops. I'd heard something about Commerce (all the LA rooms?) raising rake two years ago iirc. I'm not a local and only make it out about 1 week/yr since early '15. I played 20 and 40 lhe in '15 and they gave free food at the tables. Went to Vegas in Dec and didn't make it in '16. '17 just played mix, 2 short session of 40 lhe (no free food) and '18 played mix for 2 days and mtt for 3 days and a day off to leave the city. In '17 it "looked" like 60 was the best option, but it only went off 1-2x over the week w a long list.

As a rec, I don't pay too much attention to rake unless it seems crazy low or crazy hi, but when I used to play a little more live lhe, the standard (based on FW) seemed to be $5 cap at 20/40. I'd like to try the Bike for a couple reasons this year and I'm hoping the $45 Commerce owes me will pay for the two meals I owe somebody.

People always complain about the rake on Stars, but for me, the hardest thing was beating the other players. The rake seemed fine. At 5/T-30/60, I was literally the 5th best player at every table at the end of '15 for 5 mos when I was travelling. DonJuan was one of the best players in the pool it seemed like but was no fun seeing paymytrips and VolkovDimitri playing 5/T or 10/20. Didn't take me long to realize I would never beat those games so I stuck to draw or mix when the games were good and would play Bovada lhe.

OP you'll have good chance to win, esp when the games are short = less rake and more hands/hr and (prob) bigger skill advantage at 6m than the pool. You will definitely have fun imo.

I beat $4/$8 for around 1.5 BB/HR for years when they were taking $3+$2 and I was tipping like an idiot (because I worked in the industry), so I'd imagine it is still beatable with $4+$3 and $1 tips.

FWIW, since I moved up permanently, my win rate in $4/$8 is $0.88/hr over 317 hours in the last 3.5 years. Seems like it could be problematic, but really that is just a two month sample size and it's not like I haven't had 60 day stretches of breaking even or losing at the stakes I play in now.

Going back even further, I'm at $3.62/hr over my last 880.5 hours of $4/$8 LHE over a 4.5 year period. Also, not very good, but still "beatable." That's as far as my data goes back. Unfortunately, I lost all my data from the bulk of my $4/$8 days when I dropped my phone in the Yakima river (I'm a Washington state player also). I probably had over 5000 hours logged at that point.

I think the $4/$8 limit should be used as a springboard to the next thing, so whether or not the game is beatable isn't the most important factor. Getting experience while not losing lots of money should be the top priority. You play this game while you have a full-time job and hope you can build/save enough money to move up to the next level.

I literally started my current playing career with about $600 at the $4/$8 level and played most of my hours at that limit for a good four years.

+1 on the sentiment that winrate at this limit isn’t very important and best used to get experience before moving up (if he has those aspirations). Though it can be tough to reconcile “I’m break even at 4/8” with “so it’s time to move up to 8/16”.

I’m def a lifetime loser. At 4/8 limit live poker. But I was like the kid who peed his pants in an Adam Sandler movie when I read posts by players I perceived as successful, who noted the difficulty of beating rake in low stakes live lhe and recommended frequent shot taking/aggro “brm” when there isn’t much at stake