How big of a bankroll do I need to move up stakes?
Ultimately moving up stakes and bankroll requirements depends more on personal circumstances. It's rare but there's people out there who should skip 1 2 altogether and just jump into 2 5. Usually they have income to replenish their roll if things don't go well and are good enough that they'd be wasting their time at 1 2.
There's others who might have grinded out 100 buy ins for 2 5 by playing 1 2 and they still might not be ready skillwise to move up.
Also not everyone has a lot of options. If the only games offered near you are 1 2 or 5 10... well surely you aren't going to Grind out 250 buy ins at 1 2 before taking a shot.
Trying to have a steadfast rule "x buy ins to play this game" is pretty ridiculous because looking at someone's personal circumstances and making a decision that suits them and only them is neither that difficult nor time consuming. The most imoprtant thing is that you have enough buy ins that you can comfortably play your best.
Should I include tips/food paid for with chips/bad beat jackpots etc. when calculating my winrate?
Answer: It's typically assumed that when someone posts a winrate that tips ARE included, and most likely small purchases too. It's safe to assume that no one is eating a 60 dollar meal every session, paying for it with chips and still winning at $85/ hour. Winning a bad beat jackpot, or other forms of rakeback such as high hands etc. are usually not included.
However, when calculating your winrate/hourly for yourself you are free to do whatever you want. If you want to take meticulous notes on how you are doing in your player pool then it's best to not calculate tips and to pay for meals out of pocket. Some players even calculate the rake they pay. That way you know exactly what your winrate is, how much the rake is taking out, and you can compare your winrate to other winrates in different locations.
If you are more concerned with how much you make/spend on trips to the casino then include any expenses that you feel are necessary and include a bad beat jackpot or a high hand etc, but be sure to factor that in if you decide to compare your stats with someone else's. Ultimately your winrate is being recorded for you so feel free to record it in whatever way makes sense for you.
Do winning players experience less variance?
Quote:
Originally Posted by bip!
Variance gets misused as a term a ton.
It simply means deviation from expected (average) result.
But a lot of people use variance to mean "downswing". It is a term that might be misused more often than it is used correctly.
If you look at the two graphs you'll notice that each graph has a lot of lines (potential outcomes) both above and below the dotted line (average winrate).
Where people get confused is that most of the lines are always winning over the sample size for the 8 bb winner and are still going up for the most part. Therefore their swing doesn't seem as bad, however if they are only winning 2 bbs for a long stretch that's still far below their expected value of 8 bbs for that stretch.
However for the -1bb loser (ideally this would be a winrate of 0, but too lazy to make another), half the lines are in the negative,therefore they are very aware that they are running below ev.
When people look at variance they are focused on the X-axis when they should be focused on the dotted line.