Heads up SNG breakeven question? - Beginning Poker Questions

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Heads up SNG breakeven question?

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09-19-2014 , 09:11 PM

Killme37

grinder

Join Date: Mar 2014 Posts: 673

So im grinding out the 5 dollar heads up sngs on bovada and they take a .25 cent rake. Since .25 cents is 5% of 5 dollars does this mean i need to sustain a winrate of 55% to breakeven?

Also what would be a decent winrate? Im sure i would be happy with 60% I have 60 wins out of 109 so far.

Can anyone tell me how this translates into ROI?

Thanks

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09-20-2014 , 07:23 AM

DiamondDog

Carpal \'Tunnel

Join Date: Jul 2007 Posts: 7,474

ROI = (net profit/total invested)*100%

So if you have the following structure:

buy in for $5 (i.e. $4.75 + rake of $0.25)
winner gets $9.50

and you played 109 games and won 60

you've invested a total of 109 x $5 = $545
and you've got back 60 x $9.50 = $570

giving you a net profit of $570 - 545 = $25

for an ROI of 25/545 x 100%
= 4.58%

To breakeven over 100 games
you invest $500
so you need to get back $500
which means you need to win $500/9.50 = 52.63 games
ie 52.63% winrate

A 60% winrate would give you a ROI of [((60 x 9.5) - 500)/500] x 100%
= 14%

The games would have to be mindblowingly soft for that to be even close to sustainable imo.

Last edited by DiamondDog; 09-20-2014 at 07:29 AM.

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09-20-2014 , 12:46 PM

Killme37

grinder

Join Date: Mar 2014 Posts: 673

Thanks diamond dog. You got your poker math down. Now I see how ROI worksmyselfs about to post questioning why it is 9.50 back. But then I realized I didnt clarify. Its actually 5.25 total (5 +.25 for rake)

So in this case it should be
109× 5.25=572.25
60×10=600

27.75/572.25=4.84%

And to breakeven I only need 52.5% because I only pay the rake once (for myself) which is why it isnt 55% like i originally thought. Its half.

Is this correct?

Also what is a decent sample size to get an accurate winrate/ROI?

Last edited by Killme37; 09-20-2014 at 01:14 PM.

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09-20-2014 , 01:40 PM

Killme37

grinder

Join Date: Mar 2014 Posts: 673

Just got home from work. I always make typos on my phone and it wont let me edit. Anyway so if 4.84 is my ROI then if i mulitply 5.25*.0484 i get .25 per game. So about .75 to 1$ per hour. LOL CHUMP CHANGE. But thats where you gotta start out i guess.

I realize that this is a small sample size though. I plan on moving up to 10 dollar sngs when i have 400 dollars in my account.

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09-20-2014 , 01:47 PM

DiamondDog

Carpal \'Tunnel

Join Date: Jul 2007 Posts: 7,474

Yes, those figures look good to me.

I don't know exactly how many games you need to come up with a decent estimate of winrate but it's going to be in the thousands for sure.

Probably a pointless calculation given that by the time you've played that many games you've (hopefully) improved as a player.

There are guys round here who can tell you how many buy-ins you need to move up. To me, 40 sounds near the lower end of the scale but then I'm a bankroll nit. Definitely need to be prepared to move down if the swongage bites your ass (which it most definitely will at some point in these things).

Good Luck.

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09-20-2014 , 01:57 PM

Killme37

grinder

Join Date: Mar 2014 Posts: 673

Quote:

Originally Posted by DiamondDog

Thanks again man.

Now that you mention it i guess 40 buy ins is fairly low. Thats what i have been using for the 5s. i started with 200. The problem is I dont multi table these. Its definately hard to concentrate on getting reads and exploiting the player if im playing more than 1 heads up SNG.

Its just difficult to get the volume in. I also rarely play turbos because i feel that it would increase variance. But i know a lot of these heads up specialists love hypers.

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09-20-2014 , 05:06 PM

DiamondDog

Carpal \'Tunnel

Join Date: Jul 2007 Posts: 7,474

Ah, right - I was assuming hypers 'cos those are the only husng's I've dabbled in.
I'm pretty sure that in low stake normal speeds, 40 buy ins is much closer to OK.
Good Luck.

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