Just a quick question - a poker buddy and I were considering swapping percentages of each other at 2/5. I understand that swapping percentages obviously means that when one of us loses the other person covers part of it and when one of us wins the other person gets a cut, thus leading to reduced variance.

However, since neither of us has ever bothered doing it, I was wondering if anybody had any experience in swapping percentages with another player before, and what percentage tends be ideal (if it helps at all in determining it, we both lean more towards a LAG style and thus have slightly bigger swings than most).

Don't do it unless both of you will never play in the same game.

I don't see anything wrong with it.

stop betting on someone else and bet on yourself.

If you are referring to my post... if not, nm...

The problem comes in two forms. The first is where you play differently versus the partner, i.e. implied or implicit collusion. The second, even if you somehow were to avoid the first problem, if anyone gets word of the agreement, the two of you will look dirty to the rest of the players, which hurts you and the game as a whole.

This would be at a fairly large cardroom so its unlikely we'd be seated together plus we hate playing against each other lately since we're so ruthless-competitive rivals when playing together (which is partially how the idea of swapping percentages arised). We already agreed if we did end up seated at the same table we just wouldn't do it during that session and just play ball (and possibly rebate the other away from the table if we end up getting it in against each other, which might technically be just a more roundabout way of collusion but whatever). Overall with these guidelines I really don't see it as collusion, just a mutual investment.

Anyway, back to my real question of about which percentage amount would be ideal, or more specifically how having a bigger or smaller percentage would affect things.

Yeah, me and Ivey did this for a while. Then he got tired of it cause I suck, lol. w/e, sounds fine, but stop if it changes your play for the worse. Could help if it makes you play more responsibly, ie. cuts down on spew, but it could hurt if it causes you to play too carefully. Or it might not make a difference, in which case it should still be good for both your collective variences.

I've done something like this with my boss......not because he is a good player....but because he is my boss. We went down to a 2-day conference for work @ Trump Marina...and he knows I always play @ Borgata.

So he asked if we could do some type of partnership....and I came up with.....we would swap 20% of each others wins only. So if he lost $2,000....all I had to give him was 20% of anything I won.....and vice-versa. If we both won....the bigger winner would have to give the other guy 20% of the difference. If we both lost.... no money exchanges. I played 2/5 and he played 10-20 limit. He lost about $700 and I won $425.....so I had to gave him $85.

seriously? Dont you play at casino az? its fairly commin at the bigger games there, no?

There will be problems some how, some way. I dont care if you guys think you are exact copies of each other in the way you play, there will be problems. I guess if this is a short term thing, then w/e... but if you're doing this for long term its no good. I thought about doing this once, but seeked out some advice before doing so. You would be suprised at how open and easy to reach poker pro's are (and I'm talking some big names).... What I am saying is go ask them how it works (facebook, myspace, w/e). Your best answers are there.

Yep, and one of the reasons I play there very little these days. I got sick and tired of feeling (right or wrong) like I was playing against a team of players. I got sick and tired to the "us versus them" feel.

Now I only play the smaller stakes there, and only a couple times a month if that. I mostly play at a local club now or go to LV.

Don't swap percentages unless you
a) don't play at the same table together
b) if you are seated together, immediately inform everyone at said table that you have percentages of each other
c) never softplay each other

if you don't follow these 3 guidelines, you're cheating, plain and simple.

I have done this before it seems that it really depends on your moral compass, we never played in the same game and we were both winning players in our respective games but it helped to reduce the variance and it made for smaller wins and losses but we felt like we were taking something home every time we went.

I have never had exact percentages other then the biggest winner buying McDonalds a few nights with a mate. But obv a big difference between big % and 2 or 3 BB's...

Only once has someone had a % stake in me, over a shortish time, around 5 sessions, and I ran pretty bad... While I would like to think this hasnt soured the relationship between myself and him, as he understands things such as variance and the fact I ran fairly bad in AI equity, it still sucks to have to hand over that money for him...

Personally I wouldnt do it given you are effectively the same, while somewhat reducing variance, arguements are sure to arise if you see him play a hand bad etc...