my advice: find a good game and play in it but play 1/3 and 1/2 at everyplace but the bellagio and play 2/5 at the bellagio.

It would make sense that higher end casinos should run 1/3 instead of 1/2 because:

1. 1/3 is a bigger game
2. 1/3 players would generally have more money to spend
3. Casinos want these kind of gamblers at their properties

True, being deeper stack is a great advantage for competent players. However, is it not the concensus of this thread that a higher hourly can be achieved by short stacking(100bb) the next level game rather than being deep stacked (150+bb) at the lower game?

1/2 300 max and 1/3 300 max are still going to have the same approximate amount of total chips in play at any given time. I don't think there's any evidence that 1/3 players have more money to spend than 1/2 players when the buy-in minimum and maximum is the same in both games at most places. Personally I don't like playing 100bb max just because there is less room for set-mining and making nut straight/flush hands that lead to big pots where players make more mistakes.

Yeah, but 1/3 games often have a higher avg opening raise, which can juice the pots.

That advice is kind of wrong. It's more like, if you're better than everyone else who's deep, or have good relative position, then you should buy in deeper.

If there's 3 deep fish on my right and a deep strong player across the table, I'd still buy in full even though the other guy is better than me.

15winning sessions 3 losing sessions, total won 3134$ net over 124hours, at 1/2 NL 200 max, weeeeeee
question do you think I can pull the 10k mark by the end of june by playing 2-3 times a week?

Can is a very different question from will.

Can? Sure. Likely? Not at all if you are only playing 15 hours a week or so. You're asking to make $7,000 in like 50-60 hours. That's well beyond the sustainable winrate of anyone over a long sample size. You'd have to run hot like the sun.

NickTheNit I think you can if those 3 sessions are at least 6hrs+.

well... that was silly...let me reformulate my question. I am a student and only have for expenses small commodities (food, beer, shows etc.). Can I sustainably, from poker revenue (playing 2-3 times a week) pay for these expenses and still manage to grow a BR for 2-5NL?? I have lost my part job last month... lazy to find another, should I get another or from my first 100 hours I can assume poker can cover my expenses

You may want to put in 32 hours a week, if you survive the variance you will reach all your goals. Close to a 100hrs a month is perfect.

1. 124 hours is a small sample
2. It's extremely difficult to "grow a roll" at 1/2 or 1/3 without taking anything out of it. It's beatable, but unless you're crushing and playing perfectly, not for any significant amount. If you're paying expenses on top of that it probably is impossible to grow your roll.

I actually had a very similar winrate to you in my first 120 hours, and I was maybe a fifth of the player I am now. I then broke even or so in my next 200 hours of 1/2, while steadily improving.

To compare my skill then to now, back then I couldn't even comment on LLSNL threads. I'd read a thread, and I'd be like hmm, I don't know what to do! I was totally clueless. Now I feel I can pretty competently answer all but the trickiest hands posted here.

It's amazing just how lucky and unlucky it is possible to be in live poker, even for someone aware of variance and sample size it's easy to say "Wow I did GREAT, well I might have been a bit lucky but if my winrate is even half of this that's good!" And 400 hours later you discover you're a breakeven player.

my sessions range between 4-12 hours. I feel like 6-9h are my best sessions, 100h/month sounds like a lot tho... college ends by the end of april so I can put much more hours during may & june, I'd really like to have 5k cash for a trip I am planning to make in july. I think I can make it through if I persevere

I'm actually surprised you feel you're able to play your best in 6-9 hour sessions. The rooms you play in must be really soft if you expect to win $27/hr at 1/2 playing your B-game.

the game sure is soft (I was already bumhunting within my first 50 hours lol), but my winrate probably is overvalued. anyways i'll keep your words in mind and will post back at 250 hours

This is sooooo true.

I ran like Jeebus my first 100 hours. And then the variance train began! Now have a much larger sample size and a very consistent wr, but man it hits you at first, when the run goot stops all of a sudden.

Phil Galfond had an interesting post (think its a "best of" somewhere) that most good poker players had to run good in the beginning, thats why we are here. We played (semi?) decent, ran like god, and got into the game. Then when variance hit we had the moxie to stick around bc of all of our previous run goot. It was a pretty interesting concept.

+1 to not milking your BR, it would be very challenging to grow it with just llsnl play if you are using it as the source funding for your life expenses.

Looking for some opinions on this BRM idea:

I have a 1.8k BR, I play 1/2, and have probably played somewhere around 150 hours lifetime. Pretty much breakeven over all those hours. This is mainly from playing very poorly when down. I am a student and have a good job. Actually starting in the summer I will be padding the BR every paycheck to get up to 2/5 as quickly as possible.

To the point: My biggest leak is the difference between my A and B game. Considering I am under rolled, I want to avoid my B game at all costs. I don't trust myself at the tables...I usually get up from the table after the 2nd or 3rd decent sized pot I lose, which is always a result of bad play following the 1st big pot I lost.

So until I feel more comfortable, I am thinking of going to the casino with $300 on me, buying in (150bb max BI where I play), and leaving once I either bust in a hand or the stack dwindles to 75bb. It's going to suck if/when I bust quickly and then have to drive home, which is why I'm reluctant, but at the same time I'd rather do that than spew off another stack...

EDIT: fwiw when I spew its not like monkey tilt or anything...just calling pre in too many marginal spots, cbetting the wrong boards, not cbetting the right boards, calling instead of folding rivers, etc...just small minor things that add up

Stoplosses work for some people. But what about the rare occasions where you end up in a game with two drunk gamblers stacking off every hand, and lose the first hand you play against them?

I used to have a stoploss of 2 BIs, but I would always bring 3 or 4 and just never use them except in that rare case where the game was outstanding and I wasn't tilted.

Stoplosses also are just one tiny method to the real problem solver, which is quitting. So your B game is horrid, that's fine. What happens when you win a BI in your first hour and transition into your B game while you're up $300? You're not getting up and leaving (which you should be doing if your B game is that bad), you're staying because you're not down, right? The best solution would be to leave when your B game creeps in regardless of results.

Thanks for the reply. That's a good point about the drunk gamblers and is something I've considered.

In no way is what I'm proposing anything other than a short term solution. The thing about the drunk gamblers is that chances are I am more often going to be down in a more "standard" spot, as opposed to those juicy but less often spots against some drunk degen. So in an effort to minimize RoR, I may have to miss out on a spot like that if/when it were to occur.

And yeah, I totally agree that the real solution is to become more disciplined and able to quit when I am playing poorly... Whether up, down, or even. But it's not something I can just do overnight. In the interim I'll have to be paying close psychological attention to myself and noting patterns, etc.

What would you suggest doing?

The bad thing about bringing only 1 or 2 buy ins like DK mentioned is if you get at a juicy table. You need to be able to stack off and still stay in that game.

Its easier said than done but just get better at not tilting. There are some good threads in here how to avoid it, but really I think the best factor is time/experience.

I really don't tilt anymore, and I take lol bad beats all the time, by horrible players, making horrible calls, ridiculous suckouts, etc. The biggest nirvana moment for me was realizing we want bad calls, we want suckouts. A suckout means you got your money in good, you are profiting from this situation in the long term. A suckout shouldn't faze you. Smile and say nh.

Suggestions for not tilting/getting off your game at the table.

Do not live in the past. This was one of my biggest leaks early on. I would make a bad bet/raise/call and be thinking about it the entire night. I wouldn't tilt per se, but my mind was on that hand and that hand only. This affects your play.

My solution was to immediately note the hand (in my phone so most people just think I'm texting). And then forget about it and move on. I mean certainly make a mental note on villains if pertinent, but do not focus on your mistake. Then once you get home you can go over the hand, see that this particular situation was clearly a bet/fold on the river, why did I check call? Then you've learned from it, in a calmer state, and can use it. Focusing on mistakes while playing only compounds mistakes.

As for suckouts, see above post. We don't mind suckouts. People calling bad is the entire reason we are able to profitably play poker. Phil Helmuth is famous for always saying "if this game was 100% skill, I'd win every tournament" What he doesn't realize is, if this game was 100% skill, there would be no tournaments. Or at least a lot less juice anyway.

Yeah getting my money in good and getting sucked out on doesn't phase me, not even a flinch. It's when I get it in as a slight dog and wonder if I'm just hitting the top of his range or made a mistake, that causes my game to unravel.

Anyway, don't want to wander off topic as I know this is a winrate/BR thread.

Tonight I crossed the $10K mark in career 1/2 winnings. No big deal, but it feels nice. I did it in 501 hours.

There's 1/2 max $300 buy in and 1/2 max $200 buy in where I live.

You think I should play the max $300 buy in more often?

What do you think difference in win rate could be between the two games?

In my experience they play exactly the same but one is a little bigger so add some to the win rate with the bigger game. Are they in the same establishment? That may change things some.

Two different casinos.

But, both games have a couple short stacks at each table.

Play is the same at both places.