I just recently moved here and have only started playing regularly since mid December so I cant say how much its changed, but Im talking about numerous poker rooms in the area with 10-40+ tables running.

When I left at about 6PM yesterday, there were at least 30 tables running where I play. I think 5 of them were $2/$5 NL. There's a hell of a lot of OMC here.

this is definitely true in Sydney, where there is only 1 casino for a city of 5m people. Even on a weekend night, we'd rarely have more than 25 tables open. Conversely around the city there would be at my estimate, an average of 50-60 tournaments going on per night at pubs and clubs with buy ins from $20-50 as part of bar poker leagues and the like - again, I'll guess an average of 40 players at each of them per night. Sometimes these tournaments have 'high roller' type events for $200 ish or regional/national qualifiers with major payouts for the ME

almost all new poker players learn poker at these clubs and most of them are very happy to stay there. almost all of these guys are losing players, but at $30 a pop, their weekly or twice weekly poker habit never costs them too much and is a social occasion as well. only the best or the more degen graduate from there to the casino cash games and tournaments - we'll often get 1k entrants for the $330 buy in opening events for big series.

the cash game exposure is generally occasional private, social home games amongst the friends from the clubs/pubs. this is how I started in poker 8-9 years ago and I graduated from there to online and then to the casino. Interestingly, even our once twice monthly cash game has dissolved to nothing, as over time it became apparent to the losing players that they were losers and they lost interest and began to focus solely on the pub poker for their fun and enjoyment.

so while poker could actually be said to be growing or still booming here, very little of the growth in new players ever make their way to the casino cash tables

I've played in more than 30 rooms. Cleveland and Toledo would be right at the top of the list for worst 1-2 games due to short stacks (I was in Cleveland prior to switch to 1-3) motor city Casino seemed very good, but I was only there for one night.

No one has said anything about detroit being a poker mecca. Gotta go to LV, borg, cali, SF to catch the good action. It probably doesnt make too much sense to stay at one place anymore and grind, you do have to move in accordance to the tournament circuit or scope out good home games in order to thrive. Relying on one casino, even if it can regularly sustain 20+ tables will most likely lead to a meager subsistence, especially because ALL poker markets are slowly downtrending.

You don't know what you're talking about.

Motor City is the big poker room in town. It's packed all the time. But they don't have Bravo. MGM and Greektown are secondary at *best*. Then we have games in every town in local bars, so the player pool is rather dilute, but there's plenty of action.

The max buys at MGM and GT are both 150BB, Firekeepers is 200BB, and many of the charity rooms are 150BB. Rarely do I sit at a table filled with shortstacks, in any room. It happens occasionally, but there are more than enough big donators around to keep the games going well.

Or just go ahead and keep assuming instead.

Southern Michigan is a candy store.

I apologize for my false assumption. Why was there such a big drop off in northern Ohio from southern Michigan? You couldn't even find a 2-5 game at Horseshoe Cleveland unless it was Friday and Sat. night and these games would break in a half hour of starting.

The 1-3 games were god-awful. Pukey buy-ins of $100 at every table.

Previous awful management really hurt the room. Management has since improved but it's still very flawed. They can't seem to hire anyone who understands what promotions are supposed to accomplish.

The crazy number of short stacks probably has more to do with the economy though.

Well, first off Ohio sucks. Everything about it is awful. If I had to live there I'd probably blow my brains out.

Even with the economy in the ****ter there's still a lot of industry in SE MI, probably more than Cleveland. (It was glorious for a few months when the auto-workers were getting bought out and had $40k checks handed to them to quit, juicy as hell.)

We've also got a lot of Caldeans and Arabs that own small businesses and chain stores that ****ing LOVE to gamble. So there are feeders for a lot of the games.

The "charity rooms" are essentially home games on steroids. You've got pools of regulars that almost never go to the casino, but stop at the corner bar on their way home from work 4 nights a week and gamble and drink and hang out with their "poker friends". Then since they're 2 blocks from home they drink a *lot*.


I watched bad management kill a really juicy, consistent $2/5 game that switched to $5/10 most Fridays. Let the players get away with murder for a long time, then when management decided to put its foot down and enforce some things, the players bailed and the game died. It's really easy for a bad poker room manager to kill a game.

I was having a little back and forth in another thread and was very surprised to hear from an experienced 2plus2 member that a sustained $25-$30/h win rate over a 500-1000 hour sample at 1/2 was next to impossible.

I'm sure the info is buried in here somewhere, but there must be some of you 1/2 veterans out there that have accumulated these stats. Can anyone confirm?

I wouldn't say its impossible but I bet there's not more than 2% of 1/2 players who can do it.

Do you think in part this is because ppl good enough to beat the game for this win rate move up before the 1000 hour mark typically? Or is it just that impossible to do?

I'm close. A few more hours and I think I'd hit it.

(really bad player pool though)

It's possible, but is it possible for YOU?

I don't know. Probably not. I'm close to 300 hours in and am not there and have run pretty well overall

What difference does it make if the answer is yes or no?

I suppose it helps to set a realistic understanding about what's possible. If I'm 300 hours in, shy of the win rate and have self assessed to have run well, it seems like a pretty damn impossible to target to hit.

WR is determined by bunch of factors:

-Size of pool
-Average BI
-Day of week
-Time of day
-Ability

It's definitely possible. I was at $36/hour over 400 hours or so before moving up to 2/5. I play in a room that is $300 max and ample table selection so the results probably don't apply to most markets.

I actually set a goal to beat 1/2 for $60/hour in 2016 but sadly I've only played two sessions this year.

That's one of the major reasons but I dont think more than 5% of all players can beat 1/2 or 2/5 for more than 10BBs/hr.

$60/h! That would be some kind of world record. Damn. 36/h tho is impressive. I play in similar conditions. $300 max and lots lot tables to choose from. There are likely 20 tables I could sit at within a 30 minute drive on this Tuesday night.

I wouldn't be surprised if 60 per was achieveable at 1/2 but putting in the hours to do it would make me cry. Once you break 10 dollars an hour at 1/2 for 200 hours I think you should at minimum be shot taking.

^^^^^^

Running like Usain bolt .... Jus' sayn'

LOL, every time I read in this thread of things that people are awing of, I giggle a bit.

It's possible. I will admit my sample is a bit small because I moved up as soon as I could but I was making $33 per hour over about a 300 hour sample. This was with zero table selection and playing every day of the week. I also play in Oklahoma casinos though where the player pool is super weak.