This is spot on. In a technical sense it is not that hard to beat 1/2, though I know of some people who I think would never beat the game no matter how hard they tried. I have seen a heap of players young and old come and go from the poker room, some of them quite skilled, and most of the time they go because of issues they have outside their technical poker expertise. Things like being able to play long hours playing at least your B game, not taking ridiculously underrolled shots, not gambling it up at the tables or in the pits, not spending all the winnings after a big score are just the tip of the iceberg.

Edit: From my personal observations the ones who tend to stick it out are slightly older. They may not have the extremely sharp skills of the younger players but they control the outside influences far better due to life experience.

Words of wisdom

I am a terrible salesman and I hate making phone calls lol

I am playing on Bovada and I am a 15 minutes drive from Parx casino where at any given time there are never less than 10 tables of $1-$2 going

There is no rakeback on Bovada

One of the biggest pitfalls I have seen is related to why people love poker. If you love the excitement, and love the thrill of winning, you will chase bigger stakes, and play far longer than you should in unprofitable situations, chasing your fix. I think this is why slightly older players have more sticking power-they have a little more life experience to keep them from going full degen chasing the exhiliration of winning easy money.

If you are happy to grind away at stakes that you are bankrolled for, can take variance on the chin without blowing up, and can handle a downswing without worrying if you are going to eat that week, and, on top of that, you have a technically sound game and can be patient, you can probably beat $1-2. But tilt control, bank roll management, and disciplined play will be necessary.

tilt control, bank roll management, and disciplined play are not the hardest imo for new player. I think it's much more difficult to identify if you are losing money because of bad play or variance(downswing) and if you are winning money because of luck or good play.

No rakeback equivalent such as player points that you get on pokerstars? If not, why the hell would you play there? Do they take rake like normal?

I live in the USA, what other option do I have until they make online poker legal in PA?

No i know a lot of good players who suffer from this too it's hard nonetheless to manage...

these are in no praticular order although some are more important

entitlement tilt, winners tilt, losers tilt, not working away from the table, not being as skilled as they think, being lazy, not paying attention, autopilot, gamboolin in the pits, being under rolled, playing too many hands oop, not having positional awareness, playing too loose from the sb., not understand proper timing for aggression, sucking at hand reading, leaving value on the table


this is off the top of my head. The list is endless.

the point is playing winning poker day in and day out takes an insane amount of discipline. I did not say it cant be done all I said was that winning 12k/year at 1/2 is quite difficult for the masses - and I stand by that