Betstack: The parts of those two posts you highlighted seem completely contradictory to me. How can they both be good?

By saying the best way to decrease variance is to widen the skill gap between us and our opponents, isn't Dgiharris implying that variance is lowest at the the lowest levels? (Where our skill gap is greatest)

Um. With getting it in once with aces your sample size - your going to have a different amount of money than starting stack plus +/- EV everytime. That isn't an example of variance when you magically don't have $163 after getting it in with aces. You don't even have a sample size that can say your even running bad if you lose and have $0.

Decreasing variance in your game can only happen by foregoing +EV opportunities. The more marginal the more you should forego them. There is also a derogatory term for players like this (AKA nits). But playing in an unbalanced way is easily exploited by people simply folding whenever you play back, stealing from you relentlessly in spots where you gotta have balls/gamble to play profitably.

I rarely disagree with dgiharris, but this is the wrong definition of "variance." As others have pointed out, variance is a statistic term that means how much your results swing over time. Many poker players use it in terms of how often I win vs. how often I lose.

In the sense of, "I want to lose less often, " then being better than your opponents is the best way. However, you want to increase your variance if you want to win more money in the statistical sense. The higher the variance you can tolerate, the more money in the long run you're earn (as long as you are skilled at what you do). Very few people understand this and fewer are able to live it.

You have learned well, grasshopper.

The greater the edge, the less the variance. This is just a math fact.

I'm wondering if the OP thinks 2/5 is easier because he has moved up to where they respect his raises.

The variance (as in how much your all in EV differs from your AI money won) should be the same regardless of stakes. The swings should be much bigger at higher levels (in BI and BB terms, not just $) because youre exploiting a smaller skill edge vs your opponents.

That's exactly what variance is. It happens every single hand in poker unless you do an equity chop. Variance isn't a once a week thing. Poker is gambling. Your results vary.

You're supposed to have 163.89 after the hand is over. If you lose you have 163.89 negative variance. If you win you have 36.11 of positive variance. If you do any equity chop where you get 163.89 and he gets 36.11 then you have no variance relative to your EV.

Prove it. I already gave an example above where you're wrong. But here's something really simple.

Game 1:Let's say we flip where a coin where heads is +10 dollars for you and tails is a free-roll. Your average return is 5 dollars.

Game 2:Let's say we flip a coin where a heads is +5 dollars for you and tails is -5 dollars. Your average return is zero dollars.

Obviously the variance of both is exactly the same.

If you flip HHH in game 1 you have 30 dollars; 15 more than expectation.
If you flip HHH in game 2 you have 15 dollars; 15 more than expectation.

Or how about heads you get a million dollars tails you get a billion dollars. Sounds like high variance and high expectation to me.

Looking for a passive game is the biggest way to reduce variance. I have played in an amazing action game;, best there is but its tough to win because every hand goes to the river. Yes its great but theres a ridiculous amount of variance.

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We are tossing apples and oranges at each other in this argument.

On one side we have the mathematical and statistical definition and then on the other side we have the semantic definition by what players commonly mean when they say "variance"

I think you are talking reducing variance over the long term and a lot itt are talking about variance in specific hands. Pretty ******ed things being stated.

Lol at low stakes games having more variance. I'm not even sure if that's not a troll.

+1
This whole thing belonged in bbv a long time ago

No one is disagreeing that variance is simply the difference between results and expectation for whatever sample size. Positive or negative.

The real question is how prepared are we for down swings, emotionally, and financially. OP is under rolled and risking ruin a lot but also could string a few big wins together and start a bankroll, in any case I think the underlying question was more about copping with coolers and losing streaks.

Dude -

it's as simple as this:
you shoved on the flop when you had the best hand
the 89-guy called as a 25% dog
he hit his hand
you still had a redraw but blanked
that's as good as it gets in poker

When you play that hand 4 times and you win 3 of those times.
this time you lost - and you lost your bankroll. It happens everyday... even to the best players on the planet.
Poker is a game where you can make ALL the right decisions and STILL lose.
If it wasn't this way - there would be no bad players.

The problem with this hand was one guy was probably chasing the flush while the other guy was chasing the straight draw - each giving each other "proper odds" to call. Trying to justify why you lost by saying you should have raised the river or had a bigger stack or whatever... is being results oriented.

Just focus on making the right decisions in the moment EVERY time and your bankroll will thrive. Maybe not tomorrow, or next week or next month... but in the long term it will. That's why poker players say playing poker is a marathon not a sprint. The more you play, the more your skill will make you money.

It's also why we say... if there wasn't a river, there'd be no fish.
Without variance, poker would be a game like chess... where only the most skilled players win. Embrace variance. It's your friend.

The OP reminds me of my limit days when some limit player would walk off in a huff after taking a bath with AA vs. a r-r flush draw or something and be muttering "I'm going to play no limit you can't get these idiots off their hands for $4.00."

As posted above that's just flawed logic. As someone else posted, if that's the variance you're talking about OP embrace the hell out of it because that's how money is made in this game.

Errors in play = $$$$

move down in stakes. last night in a 2-3 game I went up $300, then I lost $900, then I won $700, then I lost $500, and so forth, for a +$20 night. If you aren't willing to agress when you think you have FE + PE because you are worried about variance, you cannot be expected to have a win rate near what you are capable of.

Well, i stated it was a math fact. Facts are facts, not suppositions.

In lay terms that everybody knows, the less edge you have, the higher bank needed to play with say a 5% risk of ruin. It is just what it is.

An extremely high overall edge, will need a much smaller bankroll simply because the variance is lower and swings wont break the bank nearly as often.

A very decent 5-10 good player could probably play 1-2 with 10 buyins, where when he plays 5-10 he must have 30 for the same risk of ruin. Why? His edge is much smaller at 5-10 than 1-2 on average.

And as DGi says above, i think quite a few players are using or thinking of the term incorrectly.

The Mental Game of Poker 2 has a great part on how important it is to truly understand variance in relation to the game. A lot of great stuff has been posted here on how to do that. For me Poker Journal (and posting and talking over hands) has been extremely helpful in understanding variance in the game. You can't lie to yourself about variance when you keep track of your earn and talk about the game with others who are better than you are.

You want to reduce variance but do you really understand what it is? Over 2000 hours my hourly has swung wildly up and down, as has my play. I know what my long term winrate is (I know that's up for debate but it will have to do as a sample size) and I can more accurately identify when I'm playing like a donkey, when I'm running bad and even more importantly, when I'm running good. It's so important to know when you are running good.

In general op the concept of waiting until later streets to commit only provides the illusion of decreasing negative variance because frequently you will fold hands ott that didn't get there with the free card or cheap card whereas they may have committed their stack otf.

You can play a nitty nut peddling style but your win rate will be reduced as much or more than the variance.

Plug your leaks, play well, play during "good times" in "good games" and realize the variance is what makes bad players willing to play.

Having said that you can avoid things like preflop flips and non nut draws oop.

Also, tight passive is high variance.

You got your stack in as a 3:1 fave. Why are you complaining? Every pro ANYWHERE will take that spot every day of the week (although that back-raise is a bit of a wierd line).

Here's your main problem, Op:
Clearly you're under-rolled. On un-rolled, as the case may be.

Your going to take beats, your going to lose from time to time even as a huge favorite. That's the game. But if you keep getting it in good like above, over time you'll be profitable. But you have to be rolled to ride those swings. So when you take a beat like described in Op, you can (a)know you're in a good game, and (b)happily bring out another re-buy and keep playing. Instead, you blow your nut, and you're forced to mumble something about hitting the ATM and taking the walk of shame to your car, re-playing that same hand over and over, wondering how you could have won (or not lost). The fact is, you won the hand, no matter the turn of the card. Gg you.

Here's a thought: Don't go play for a month. Save up the money you would've played, till you've got at least 5 BI's for 1/2 (you really want to have 10, but lets keep it real lol). Set a stop/loss of 2BI's. Now take shots (at 1/1 or 1/2; don't move up at least until you've got 1/2 under control and can run over the table). This is still dangerously under-rolled, but at least you've decreased your risk of ruin, and if you find a spot with a really good game, you do have some backup so you can keep playing when you get sucked out on. (Note this is STILL terrible BRM, but better than what you're doing now).

As poker players, a lot of us tend to use the term "variance" interchangeably with "swings" rather limit ourselves to the strict mathematical definition. Good idea or not, I think it's basically because variance makes us sound more like winning players and less like degens when discussing swongs with non-poker players lol.

Yeah I don't think I understand. How exactly does increasing my variance--in the statistical sense--increase my winnings? Shouldn't increasing variance have no long-term impact whatsoever, just add short term noise to my results, increase my risk of ruin, and make my true win-rate harder to calculate? If it's easier to just post a link or two up that's fine too. I'm sure this has been covered before.

Fwiw, variance is one of the most used poker term, but like the least important. If you focus on making the best play you'll realize variance is over rated. Also, the bigger your bankroll the less you think about variance.

variance is also the same as luck. If someone draws a two outer on the river, it wasn't luck. It's was variance.

Instead of saying "good luck", just say "happy variance", and then you can explain it after all the weird looks.

It's hard to talk about "variance" in such general terms as outlined in the OP. What's interesting is applying the concept to specific situations.

Often, people post hands on this forum that are very close decision. So close that they may not be worth worrying about. Some of them boil down to this: "I can fold and have 0 EV or I can call into a $1,000 pot and have +$2 EV." In this case, you may want to fold to reduce variance, if your BR is small, even though you are giving up $2.

But there's a trick here: lower pots does not mean lower variance. Let's say that the flop is Q72cc and you hold 34cc. A guy c-bets into you. If you semi-bluff him, he will fold here very often. In this case, calling to see the next card is actually higher variance, from what I can tell. If you bluff you will win a smaller pot a lot of the time; if you call, you'll win or lose a bigger pot.

Variance is also a lot broader than just all-in EV (Sklansky dollars). Sklansky dollars are really only a small part of variance I think. Let's say you raise preflop with AK and the flop comes Q42. That's variance. Now let's say you c-bet and get called, or you get a fold. Both of those outcomes are variance. The board and your opponents holding will be randomized from hand to hand. Some days you get people to call preflop with worse hands and you whiff every flop; some days you are raising with 9T and flop the world every time. Some days you hit 0/10 sets, some you hit 5/10. All variance.

So the real way to reduce variance is to sniff out the coinflip situations, those +$2 situations where you're playing for a $500 pot, and fold them. It's very different from playing passively. If you do this wrong, it's dangerous, but you can do it.