Quote:
Originally Posted by poke4fun
If a TAG can successfully increase the EV of fringe hands that are -EV or EV neutral, is it theoretically possible to lower the variance of the TAG by adding those hands?
If that TAG is able to do so with enough hands given his improved read and poker knowledge, and cross into the threshold of LAG, isn't it theoretically possible for the LAG to have lower variance than the TAG?
This is exactly what Ive done over the past 1800-2000 hours. Ive slowly but surely added in more and more starting hands into my raising range and from earlier positions. My original goal was to try to break even on those fringe hands which would get me more overall action on my premiums.
As I got better post flop (and you will be forced to get better if you play more hands and put yourself in more marginal situations), these fringe hands weren't just break even for me. They became profitable hands which increased my win rate dramatically but didnt raise my overall variance (measured by StnDev and also by just looking at session by session results in real time).
Then I started adding in a strategy 3 betting lite with hands like AJ / J9s / A4s / 87s / KT ect. Again, my goal was to break even on those hands by 3 betting people I knew folded a lot to 3 bets in general or when they have sizing tells that were pretty obvious. This "strategy" has also proven to be +EV overall including profit from taking it down preflop as well as any profit/loss coming post flop....and again, it gives me more action on my premiums when I 3 bet.
Ive done a few more similar things but all together they led to me passing into LAG zone. I win a lot more money without showdown now. I play a lot more small-medium pots. I win or lose $25-$150 a lot more times per day than I used to and overall, I'm winning more of these pots (and for more total money) than I'm losing. That leads to more intra-day variance in my stack size but its like the stock market. My stack bounces up and down in small amounts throughout the day but most often trends up as I win more than I lose in these small to medium pots.
Result is higher win rate and lower or maybe equal variance. It has absolutely led to less and smaller down swings which I'm sure is a result of a higher win rate.
So there's my non mathematical anecdotal evidence that variance for a LAG is lower or at least lower if you wanted to do some sort of Win Rate / Variance calculation.