I was going from the earlier quote of $60/hour. That's 12 big blinds. If we assume 25 hands/hour, that comes out to 48bb/100 = 24ptbb/100. If we assume 30 hands/hour, that comes out to 40bb/100 = 20ptbb/100. It really doesn't matter how insane the game is when we start talking about numbers like that sustained over anything more than a few months.

Here's an excellent post on that, actually, from a thread in the micro stakes forum where the forum moderators answer beginners' questions. In this one, they define good win rates at micro stakes; one described 10ptbb/100 as a "superhero winrate that for the very best is sustainable."
http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...42#post4777842

not sure why i chose to reopen the can of worms

but you're right, no way anyone clears 55/hr hour out of the 2/5 game. just not doable. anyone who does has just been riding the variance wave etc

Some guy, on the eve of a tournament, picked up +40k at the 5/10 game the night before (so a few hours, 6 maybe) at my casino. there's some food for thought.

Individual stories of insane extreme variance are beyond irrelevant.

Don't take my word for it. Ask someone you trust and respect who has a good head for teh poker maths if they think 20+ptbb/100 is a realistic expectation for a long term winrate.

I really don't have more to add, other than referring you over to the various forums on the 2+2 where they deal with these types of questions.

Good luck.

I think even having losing sessions is pretty bad because the quality of play is so bad, some of the regs aren't even longterm winners which is pathetic

Thinking that you won't have losing sessions at 2/5NL is so profoundly ignorant that I know you're trolling.

Waitaminit. . . are you guys levelling? Nice hand, sir!

no, but u missed the point lol, there was none

So far I've played 60 hours of live poker this year, $1/2 - $5/10 NL, crushing the games for almost $4 / hour ... of course change the result of one coinflip last week and that changes to $40/hour.

It's harder to quantify live win-rates, IMO, because it takes a longer time to gather a meaningful sample size and it's harder for your measured win-rate to be meaningful once you have a large sample of hands.

A friend of mine, who is a slight winner at 200 NL online, claims even those who are small losers at his level online can make a decent living live at levels up to 5-10 NL. He says he has earned ~50/hr over 1000 hrs between 2-5 and 5-10 (east coast, FW and AC). I believe him. So the question is, why are the 200 NL marginal players online banging their heads there when they have it so easy live?

boring, the swings are way more devastating (although smaller ime), more life tilt, gotta put in more hours at a time, gotta travel, extra expenses, need a bigger roll for 2/5 or 5/10 live.......and decent 1/2 online players can make >$100/hr in their underwear playing a handful of 45 minute sessions a day

Downswings are much more brutal live, because they can last so much longer. You read guys on the board talking about their 20,000 hand downswing in a game that they are otherwise crushing. If that were to occur in live play, that represents 4 months of full time grinding! Fortunately, all the extra information you have live helps to reduce variance somewhat, but it still occurs, and you simply can't play through it as quickly.

And, for the record, I think $50/hour is certainly achievable -- probably even expected from a very good player -- at 5/10NL. It represents about 10ptbb/100, which I see as kindof a longterm watermark for crushing a game. Numbers much higher and lower than that will surface over any span of a few months tho, even from the same player in the same game. . . .

But certainly there's gotta be breakeven online players, who are actually good players compared to live players at say 2-5, who should be expected to win decently live while they struggle online.

true, but not everyone lives near casinos & not all casinos even spread 2/5 on a regular basis

and then they probably don't have the bankroll if they are breakeven masters

When they first start playing live seriously, decent online players can be anywhere from +EV to even slightly -EV. Once they make some adjustments to the loose passive games, deeper stacked play, slower pace, larger bankroll requirements, longer variance swings, live tells (both sending and receiving), a decent online player can go from +EV to ++EV in live play. This ++EV expectation, combined with the higher stakes, can make serious live play very worthwhile and make up for some of the disadvantages.

That is basically my thinking. If a decent online player lived near a casino to play regularly, he could prolly crush the live games.

How can you be ++EV when you can go 8+ hrs without even seeing AA...I'd get so tilted and 5 bet bluff shove K9o

I didn't want to chime in anymore about this but one more time

how can you be ++EV and not even make $50/hr?

lol who loses 4months in a row at casino, ud have to be pretty bad, **** variance

well if it's theoretical possible you can be the best player on this planet and still lose 4 month st8...

btw any thoughts on plo games? any diffs in the winrate?
i mean online your winrate at plo can be much higher than at nlh but live?
i mean isn't msot of the fish playing nlh because he sees it on tv and think it's cool? on the other hand plo is a actiongame and fish love action...

10ptbb/100 hands is ++EV. . . it's a huge edge.

i feel like standard raises are a better bench mark then Big Blinds....

2/5 game with standard raise of 20-30... 2/5 game with standard raise of 40-50... HUGE difference

Another huge factor is the Buy-In. Borgata 2/5NL is capped at 100BB. Other places I've played at are higher, and some are even lower (boo to Bay101!) This has a huge impact on whether or not there is still play left on the turn and river, which has a huge impact on EV and variance.

Almost every big name pro has a story about how they went through one of these rough patches and went busto. Brunson talks about posting his first negative year a while back.

Newsflash, all those people except 1-2 are not good at poker.

PLO 5/10 at my casino-

guy who has never played PLO before calls off most of his stack over 3 streets with AAxx on a j9872 board. He loses a ~30k pot. next