What is roughly the amount of money someone should expect to put into play at a live low limit cash table? Buy in for $200 at a $1/2 NL? More or less?

More. In theory if you want to make money of poker you should be covering all players that you have an edge on. And if you are an understanding player then you should have an edge on most of all 1/2 live field

Is it unrelated to how many times the big blind? Is it just to have more than 1/2+ incase people go all in? Does the amount of 3xBB raises or anything like that factor into the buy in?

Is $400 a better number at $1/2? More?

Look if everyone has 200 then it makes no difference whether you put 300 or 3000 on the table. If you have 500 and fish doubles from 350 to 700 , you should be adding chips to the table. You must always cover fish unless it is harmful for your bankroll to lose your stack, then it's a completely different question.
I think playing for more than 5% of your roll as effective stack in live games usually makes you money scared.

I recommend putting 500 unless there are fish who sit deeper, then put more to cover them.
This way you will get more familiar with deepstack play, this will help you a lot in future.

Like everything in poker, it depends. It depends on where your edge comes from. It depends on how deep the other players are. It depends on how the game dynamics are.

General rule of thumb is that you can make more money if you cover everyone that you're better than, but this depends on you being good at playing deep.

If you are a rather straightforward player and uncomfortable deep, 100BBs is good for most levels, allowing you most of the full range of ABC plays and some of the D creativity. However, 1/2 opens tend to be so large that 100BBs is often effectively playing short-medium stacked, given the SPRs that result. In games where $15 opens are the norm, you can buy-in for $400 and still not really be deep stacked in terms of play.

If you are not very skilled, but you are very patient and disciplined, it can be better to play with a short stack strategy, which is very simple and will never make you rich, but is hard to counter and most good players won't bother much (aside from not giving you action) since they are focused on more lucrative targets. However, if you like to see a lot of flops, or to get creative, this is not the buy-in for you.

So, it depends.

Disagree with "will not make you rich" line. If you play this short-medium stack strategy good, if there is enough fish in the field and field is big enough so that you do not start getting exploited, you can easily make 25$/h in weak 1/2 games. Put in 150-200hr monthly and you are printing. In half a year you will be grinding 2/5.

You think its easy to make 12+BBs/hr short-stacking $1/2, and yet you advocate playing as deep as possible, which implies that you think this would make considerably more. i think perhaps you are looking at the world with rose-colored glasses.

If you're talking about the 100BB stack that I said in some games will be on the cusp of short-medium, that is not what I was saying won't make you rich. the separate para was for actual short stacks (say 20-40BBs) playing a classic short-stack strategy.

That said, this is not a winrate thread, it's a buy-in thread. Please take winrate discussion to its official thread.

Yes I think you can make even more than 12BB/hr in fishy 1/2 fields by covering table at all times. Never said it is easy though. You need to play well which requires years of practice and study. No need to get offensive.
And all things I said are within buyin discussion Mr manager

Just because they are related does not mean that it's not a derail. Take winrate discussion to the winrates thread.

Also don't give blanket advice to someone that "requires years of practice and study" to implement effectively when you have no idea if that person has the tools to implement it. At least warn them that your advice only applies in certain conditions.

I dont see how you can shortstack live games because as soon as you double up you're no longer short stacked and cant just table hop to go south.

This is key. Deep play strategy is different from full stack which is different from shortstack. Even vs total fish you may struggle with a deep stack not recognizing spots appropriate to call off or raise with.

At a minimum you should be proficient with fullstack strategy since thats where the majority of your opponents will be and there is tons of profitability to be had here. This is poker 101. Master this and then you can worry about deep stack.

If you have to ask this question then definitely no more than $200.

Like Dream Catcher said. And stick with playing in position, i.e., Button & 3 seats to the right of the Button.


"It is not he who is in position that wins the most money, it is he who is in position most often." - Tommy Angelo Reciprocality

While you're gaining experience, I highly recommend studying all the COTMs here: https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/1...ussion-812501/

^

this

LOL at telling a newb to buy in for 250bb+.

The $1-$2 games I play mostly have a $300 max buy in so I buy in for $300.

I like having chips in front of me.

Umm I think you said it was easy sir