Hey LLSNL how's it going? I would really appreciate some advice/feedback/criticism of my upcoming venture into the world of live poker. I'll try to be as short as I can.

I am backpacking around Australia and I am currently in Melbourne doing a clinical trial. After this trial I would really like to give live poker a shot for at least 3 months and, if all goes well, for longer. I plan to play 40+ hours a week at the Crown, starting off at $1/2 ($150 max buy in). The games run 24/7 and are unbelievably soft. At the weekends it is amazing, I have never seen anything like it. I have played around 40 hours there so far and I have made around $1000-1500, I didn't record any of the sessions but this figure is pretty accurate. I am very confident in saying I can beat the game comfortably.

When I have finished this trial, which is in 2 weeks time, I will have around $6k to my name. This is a lot to me, I am only 19. I have a place to stay for $75/week. I do not live an extravagant lifestyle at all. If I had to guess, my expenses (excluding rent) would be around $150-200/week. So let's just say my outgoings are around $300 a week including rent. This is probably an overestimation, better safe than sorry.

I plan to put $4k in my BR, leaving $2k in my liferoll. I will play exclusively $1/2 until I hit $6k in my BR and then I will take a 2 BI shot at $2/3, only at the weekend.

I am a very unorganised person and I want to change this. I am going to buy a small notebook, yes, good old fashioned pen and paper! I will use this to record hours played, profit and notable hands. I'll probably use it to make notes on the regs too. I also want to use this notebook to keep track of my expenses off the table, and see if I can find any leaks.

That's about it. If anyone has any constructive criticism, please feel free to comment!

Thanks

Edit: Forgot to add, I love playing live poker. I love talking to people at the table, love chatting to friendly dealers and especially love taking peoples money. I am very smiley at the table and usually try and build up a rapport with most players and dealers.

Oh another thing, the floor at the crown suck ass!

I advise you to stick to your plan, as it seems pretty solid. I'm not sure for how long you can live on $300 a week in Melbourne, though. So you might find your living expenses eat a little into your bankroll, especially as you can't expect to make $30 an hour consistently at 1/2 (given the rake structure, anything above $10 per hour is pretty decent).

Definitely recommend posting hands occasionally just to ensure your playing style is optimal for 1/2, as well.

And be nice to the floor otherwise you won't get the transfers when you need them. Most of the floor are okay if you're polite and aware of when they're busy.

Finally, I would also recommend recording your sessions on an I-phone App like Poker Journal. Sitting at a table with a paper and pen is kind of bad for your image.

I can very easily live off $300 a week, probably less, I'm a life nit

I know $30/hour isn't reasonable. I think $20/hour is however.

Yeah I post hands in LLSNL.

Yeah I am very polite to all floor staff, on a first name basis with a couple. I am polite to most of the dealers, but some are very rude, it annoys me.

I have an iPhone, I might try an app, I find a pencil and paper so much easier though. I really couldn't care less about what people think about me using a pen and paper though :P Unless it has a detrimental effect on my winrate? Not sure it would though.

Thanks for the encouragement!

Just do it away from the table. If you've just played a notable hand and want to write it down, leave the table and go to a bathroom stall / sit at a slot machine / etc. And should be easy enough to keep track of session win/loss and time played by writing this down away from the table too.

1. create your own thread
2. using pen will affect winrate. download free "session logger" from android or pokerdominator.com
3. good luck

One thing that you left out is if you've beat any games for a reasonable amount. 40 hrs is nothing. If the reason you feel you can crush the game is just that 40 hours I'd say it's an awful idea to play for a living. If you had a reasonable track record of winning you'd probably want 6 months living expenses on top of a 4k roll. Get a pt job if that's possible and play on the side. Sounds like you'll probably give it a try anyway, gl and plz post updates.

Sorry, should have been clearer in my post. The reason I feel I can crush the game isn't just because I have won after 40 hours, I know that this is a ridiculous sample size and I'll only get an indication on my winrate after 300+ hours. I am confident I can beat the game because of what I have seen in my 40 hours playing there. I have never sat down and felt like I wasn't the best at the table. Pretty much everyone at $1/2 at the Crown makes basic, fundamental mistakes and are very, VERY easy to exploit. Granted, I have seen 2, maybe 3 players I would call good, but the overwhelming majority are fish, or donks. Also, there is sometimes 10 $1/2 games running at once, so if for some reason I find myself at a semi-competent table I can just move, there is plenty of choice.

I appreciate I don't have very many hours played, but I am very confident in my abilities to crush these games

Thanks, and yeah I will probably start a PG&C thread about it.

Meh, will probably just use my iPhone then.

Very seldom would there be 10 1/2 games at Crown, there's usually around 2-3 tables. In fact, I don't believe there has more than 5 in the last few years, but I'll check with the floor staff. Are you sure you're not confusing 1/2 with 2/3?

You need to consider the rake structure too, since it's very steep (10%, capped at $15). When you play next, establish how many b/b you're paying in rake, on average per hour; I would say it's at least 5bb. So, if you're expecting to win $20hr, then, effectively you're talking about 15bb per hour

If you're serious about your plans, make sure you're honest with observations and expectations.

At the weekends there is usually 6 $1/2 tables from tables 59-65 and I was assuming there are at least another 4 in the main area? Anyhow there is never a lack of games running.

$20/hr would be nice, but over a big sample size I wouldn't be unhappy with $15/hr. I'm assuming you've played $1/2 there before, it is unbelievably juicy.

Maybe on a monday or tuesday morning at like 9am

But seriously if you go at good times there is always 5+ tables of $1/2...

Did someone suggest to go pro with 6mo living + a 4k bankroll?

Umm.................

full time pro needs 10k cash and minimal life expenses imo.

I wouldn't even think about it for less then 25k...

Any downswing and your busto

I wouldn't really describe it as "going pro". I'm going to give it a shot for 3 months and see how it works out. This is probably going to be the only chance I ever have to try anything like this. I love Melbourne and I love live poker so I am going to give it a shot. Also, Rob, have you ever played $1/2 at the crown? If you haven't played there then you won't understand how bad the players are.

If I go busto I can just do another clinical trial.

A reasonable DS would be like 3k, i think if you lose like 7k at 1-2 you should quit and find a job. 3k at 1-2 is 15 buyins, thats a hell of a lot.

I wouldnt think about it with less than 10k, the more the merrier obv.

But honestly 1-2 with $200 max is a joke, you are basically making minwage, you should be looking for deeper 1-2 ($500 max) or 2-5 to live comfortably.

For a single guy with no commitments except a cell phone and car/ insurance 10k cash should give you breathing room to play for a while and figure out if its something you want to do.

The extra softness of the game is neutralized by the rake imo. I know their structure is terrible.

As far as bolded, can never hate a guy for chasing dreams. I'm doing the same, good luck.

Yeah I thought that the rake would make the game very hard to beat, but after playing there I still believe I can have a decent hourly even with the extortionate rake.

Thanks, let's just hope I run good at the start then!

If you are a break-even player, then by definition you would be winning 50% of sessions and losing 50% of sessions over a large sample (or approaching 50%)

The real question is...

If you're a decent player, what % of sessions are you at profit?

What if you're absolutely crushing it?

Include as much evidence/logical reasoning/data as possible.

Discuss

Thanks

Your definition is wrong to start with; you could either be crushing the games or bleeding money and win 50% of your sessions depending on what the distribution of your wins looked like relative to the distribution of your losses.

I disagree. It might be normal to have more smaller wins and fewer large losses or vice-versa.

For example, suppose a break-even player only ever brings one buyin. The most he can ever lose is 1 BI, but he can win more than that. So he might win an average of 150 BBs 2/5ths of the time and lose 100 BBs 3/5ths of the time.

Another example, a winning player might have a personal stop-loss of 3 buyins, because he feels he is too tilted to continue after losing that much.

On the other hand, a losing player might have no such stop-loss. He might win 20BBs on average 7/10ths of the time, but lose 300BBs on average 3/10ths of the time because as soon as he takes a beat he goes on monkey tilt. He'd have over twice as many winning sessions as losing ones, but still be a massive loser.

Shouldn't this be in the poker theory forum?

I often wonder what is the optimal percentage of winning sessions? I suspect it wouldn't be much higher than 60%.

Bankroll, standard deviation and stop-loses would be relevant, as well as the less quantifiable factor of game dynamics.

The real answer to this question requires analysis of large samples of wins and losses. And I don't just mean looking at the wins / losses but rather THE NATURE of the wins/losses

Tommy Angelo talks about an advanced concept called Reciprocity.

Whenever you make money in a situation where the average player would not that is a +
Whenever you make a money saving fold that the average player would not that is a +

-Breakeven players tend to be passive and only win at showdown
-Winning players tend to be more aggressive to include semibluffs and value bets
-Players that CRUSH are ruthlessly exploitive against all player types, go for max value, and go for both value bets and thin value bets to a degree that would make most players physically ill.

I think the test of what category you belong to is in how you tend to approach a situation.

-Breakeven players tend to take a MUB passive approach that 100% depend on their hand strength
-Winning players tend to take successful ABC +EV lines that are more or less standard
-Players that CRUSH tend to adjust/exploit the situation and wring every single drop of value out of it.

mine is %66.

however, this is only over 200 hours, i could skew my results to increase that number. (play longer sessions until im never stuck).

But could you say that Breakeven players have a higher winning percentage than Winning players because Breakeven players are more risk-averse? It's counter-intuitive, but wouldn't the data confirm this fact?

The point being that if your winning percentage is high (say 70%), then you may be too risk-averse and not fully exploiting your edge in terms of reciprocity.