[TimovieMan]

First of all: SUPERB post, Aaron! That stuff really is golden, and a must-read to anyone playing poker semi-seriously.


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What is your bankroll experience? When did you start playing poker semi-casually? How much did you start with? Where are you now? What have you done with your winnings?

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I've only started playing poker earlier this year. I knew the rules of draw poker and the hand order, but that was it. I knew enough to understand what was going on in Rounders when I first saw it, but that was long enough ago to have completely forgotten about Texas Hold'em since.
And then it hit me again in Casino Royale. It looked like I'd never seen Hold'em before (Rounders was but a distant memory), but I got the rules after the first ten minutes of movie poker.
Since I'm a real moviegeek (hence the nickname), I spend lots of money in the theater and buy lots of DVDs each year. So I started thinking: "what if I invest only a small amount of $, and gamble it up to something that can sustain my DVD and other movie-expenses without actually having them "cost" me a good month's salary each year?".

And there you have it: my entire motivation for learning and playing poker: paying for the further expansion of my DVD-collection.

I started with an amount I was very much prepared to lose without it hurting me. But I only started playing for real money when I was convinced I could beat the game at low stakes AND clear some bonuses on the side.
So I started with reading and studying before I took real money to the online tables. (Live tables are impossible for me to find in Belgium, and I really don't feel like driving a good couple of hours to poker rooms in Breda, Holland, so online's all I got...)
When I played my first real money hand, I had already made sure I had PokerTracker and PAHud running, as well as a good knowledge of SSHE (I'd already adopted Ed Miller as "my personal hero"), and I was already lurking here. This was in July.

I took 200$ to Pacific, played for a few weeks, but found it impossible to clear the deposit bonus, so I cashed it all back out, and went to Stars.
I played a lot of .25/.50 in August and September. Maybe some of you have seen me there - same nick and avatar and everything (yes, I'm one of those dumbasses that doesn't change them). When I cleared my deposit bonus, I'd made a small bit of profit, and figured that was enough to attempt .50/1.00. Needless to say, I was underrolled, and got my ass handed back to me, raped. Fortunately I knew when to call it quits and I basically only lost what I had won at .25/.50 + my deposit bonus. So again I cleared everything out and now made my move to Everest (thanks to the wonderful 5 Free 2+2 Books bonus).
That was near the end of September and that's when I got real serious about the game. More learning, more analysis, plugging some leaks (getting my WtSD% down for instance), etc.
That's also when I starting noticing I was actually improving. It was no longer just tight play.
So I saw my initial 100$ (I kept 100 back for other sites) grow, and when I reached 250, I cashed out 150 and kept playing with the rest (which is now 250).
When my bonuses were all cleared (and I got my books!), I put 100$ at PokerRoom, for an additional 5 books... [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]
Now I've got 250 at Everest and 160 at PokerRoom.
The idea is to go incremental: when I reach 1000, I plan on cashing out 500, then when I reach 2000, cashing out 1000, then at 4K, cashing out 2K, etc.
But that's still a long way to go, and I'm not planning on moving up soon. I'm enjoying myself at .50/1.00 at Everest and .25/.50 at PokerRoom (though I'm not staying at PokerRoom, just 'till I clear my bonuses).

And the winnings are still intended to go towards my DVD-collection, although I must admit that watching DVDs has been moved to the background ever since I started playing poker more seriously... [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]


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What is your bankroll philosophy? Do you agree with me? Disagree? How do you look at your poker money?

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I totally agree with everything in the first post. My own philosophy is that everything I win should be seen as an "extra", I'm not planning on using it to pay rent or whatever, that's what my job salary is for.
I'm also trying to stick to a bankroll table I made, telling me at what bankroll I should move up or down. But I think I'm gonna go with an overroll from now on.
Last month I experimented a bit with NL, 6-max, SnGs, MTTs and the likes, and although I broke even with SnGs and MTTs, and I won at NL more or less the amount I lost at 6-max, I'm definitely sticking to full ring limit. It's what I enjoy the most, and that's still the most important part.
It was a good thing that I cashed out my initial deposit at Everest (+ some profit). At that moment it became less "playing with money" and more "playing with chips". I'm now less edgy when the bets go up, or I have a bad session. It's no longer MY money, it's now just winnings and thus FREE money. That in turn has made me (hopefully) a bit less weak tight at the tables...


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What are your struggles with your bankroll? How have you dealt with bad variance? Have you ever been close to busto? What did you do about it?

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I made a table telling me at what roll I should attempt to move up or down. I have difficulty staying true to it. I know I can beat .50/1.00 so I start there immediately, even if I've just deposited and am underrolled for it. I haven't had any downswings yet (fingers crossed), so it always worked out. I am however sure that I'll really move down when things are bad. I know I've got a huge ego, but I can still command it... [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]
And I'm not attempting anything higher than .50/1.00 until I've got some decent roll to support that. Last month there was a particularly juicy 2/4 game at Everest, lots of fish from the .50/1.00 stakes, 45% VP$IP, and I took a shot at it with 50BB (200BB at my normal stakes). And then I got outdrawn every single time, missed my draws, went with Kings against slowplayed aces, basically one seriously messed up session and I lost my entire buy-in.
If that didn't hit the "don't go up until you have the roll AND skill to stay up"-button, I don't know what does...

As for now, I intend to keep clearing the "5 Free 2+2 Books" bonuses until I've got an entire 2+2 library, and then I'll probably keep playing at Everest, Pacific and Party, slowly building my roll, and cashing out parts of it whenever I hit a certain mark.
Moving up will depend on how confident I am that I can beat that specific limit, even if that means playing overrolled at a lower limit for far too long.
It's still all meant to be fun - and slightly lucrative on the side. I'll see...

If I ever get good enough to consistently win more at poker than I make at work, I'll be happy to go pro, but I'm not counting on it.
One can dream, though... [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]



Well, did THIS end up being tl;dr, or what??? [img]/images/graemlins/blush.gif[/img]