Do you have that much experience at the micros? 100k hands on up

[googleit123]

If you do, I am piecing together an Excel Spreadsheet on different winrates. It basically shows how much I can expect to win in a specific LIMIT holdem game.

For the record, I did scan the forums for others posting on winrates but found only stuff on NL and Omaha and higher limits- nothing really on micro limits.

I'm projecting another 17k hands at .25/.50 2 tabling that will yield $255 assuming my current winrate of 1.50bb/100. That will put me at 25k hands in the micros and then I'll move up to .50/1 with a bankroll of $614, plenty for that limit.

I'm projecting playing 50k hands at .5/1 with an initial winrate of 1BB/100 to start out. This will yield an additional $500 and bring my bankroll to just over $1,100.

I also thought about 3-tabling .25/.50 to yield the same $500 won in the bigger .50/1 game. Lots of different scenarios in different limits.

Have you people 3 or 4 tabled a micro limit game and sustained a winrate of 3BB/100 or higher?

In your experience do you think it's just better to one or two table and move up the limits or stay lower where the competition is softer ?

I've watched 2/4 and 3/6 games on Stars and they are like trying to bleed a rock. Two people to the flop? Wow. How do you folks make money on tables like that?

[Clowny]

I dont play limit but I struggle to see how you can determine your expected win rate from others? For that I feel you would almost need to only take win rates from players who play pretty much the same as you, decision for decision, and players who tilt as often or as little as you.

Fair enough you could get an idea for a win rate range but I would be cautious about assuming you can sustain XBB/100 just because others have.

[ottsville]

Winrates for most (winning) players will drop significantly as you move from .25/.5 to 3/6. Fullring online games suck at 1/2 and above(IMO) - they are too tight to be significantly profitable.

Keep playing and working on making the right decisions and the winrate will take care of itself.

Almost all players who have >100k hands to give you winrates from will include a significant portion of hands played pre-legislation when games were softer, so you may not get an accurate picture. Also using someone else's winrate to determine yours is a stretch. Remember, the majority of players are losers.

[KurtSF]

No PT records back this far, but basically:

.15/.30 in 2005, 8bb/100 over 30k hands
.25/50 early 2006, 4 bb/100 over 100k hands
.50/1 late 2006, 1bb/100 over 50k hands
1/2 post-UIGEA, .25bb/100 over 15k hands

4 tabling the whole time. I dabbled at the small games, 2/4 and 3/6, but wasn't winning much and the variance was brootal. Also played ~200 hours live 3/6 without booking much profit. Then I switched to NL.

Variance will make a mockery of your well-thought-out spreadsheets, by the way. Just FYI.

[googleit123]

[ QUOTE ]
No PT records back this far, but basically:

.15/.30 in 2005, 8bb/100 over 30k hands
.25/50 early 2006, 4 bb/100 over 100k hands
.50/1 late 2006, 1bb/100 over 50k hands
1/2 post-UIGEA, .25bb/100 over 15k hands

4 tabling the whole time. I dabbled at the small games, 2/4 and 3/6, but wasn't winning much and the variance was brootal. Also played ~200 hours live 3/6 without booking much profit. Then I switched to NL.

Variance will make a mockery of your well-thought-out spreadsheets, by the way. Just FYI.

[/ QUOTE ]

I knew this was not going to be easy, especially post-legislation. I'm gonna have to be happy with chump change for now and get the experience so I can crush the B&M small stakes games. Needless to say I still plan to stick with my plan and try to build my bankroll.

I also have in the works another part-time money making plan. I invested in Bolt Technology when it was trading in the mid 20s and have a decent profit now. Earnings are due in a few weeks and could drive the price higher. Though undercapitalized for individual stock trading I'm starting rather small in hopes a few good trades could give me a reasonable amount for the stock market.

As it is now I'm studying, along with poker, a technical analysis book and options book.

[KurtSF]

Read Small Stakes Hold'em by Ed Miller.

Then read it again. One more time after that.

If you can read, understand, absorb, and apply what is in that book you will just crush the small stakes live games. I guarantee it.

Are there poker rooms near where you live?

I would be happy to go on a long tirade about the variance in these games (this is one thing that I think I truly understand after all the poker I've played). Suffice to say, you can never count on booking a profit in a given session, week, or even month, but if you study hard and bring your A game every time and grind the hours, the low limit live games can be crushed.

[googleit123]

I normally play at Oceans 11 in Oceanside, CA (about 30 minuites from my house). They have a "Race for Cash" where a player can accumulate hours and cash them in.

In 2006, I played 300 hours and got $300. I kept detailed records of the limits I played, the amount bought in with, the amount cashed out, any rebuys, the players at the table and of course the hours I played. I ended 2006 down $450, not including the bonus. Played 3/6 and 4/8 kill.

I had a tough time at the 4/8 kill tables as the players are more aggressive and the pots are raised and contested more often. I had some session where I lost $300 and some where I won $200+.

I think the areas I have improved on since then ( by playing 8,000 hands online against decent opponents are:

1. Pre Flop- I play better than 90% of the table pre flop

2. My post flop play has improved dramatically but to this day still needs improvement. I am more aggressive post flop and understand the concepts of semi bluffing, free card play, check raising and calling on the river for 1 bet.

3. My reading ability and confidence has improved.


I also play at Commerce. The 3/6 players there are absolutely positively the worst I have ever seen! A pro can easily have the best of it. Unfortunately, I hate driving to LA. The traffic sucks and the drive back can be just as bad especially after a losing session.

I look forward to playing more at Oceans 11 and think winning 3BB/Hour is definately not out of the question at 3/6.

[KurtSF]

3bb/hr will be tough with the rake at these games. If the players are as bad as you say it may be possible, but it would be difficult and you will still have those nights you go home down $200 or more.

Please do yourself a favor and buy and read SSHE. It single handedly turned me into a winning low-stakes limit player, and is truly the bible for beating these games. Once you've digested it and incorporated its ideas into your game check the Books/Publications forum for more good reads.

I haven't had much success live, but in a year and a half I've played less than you did in a year, and I get a little tilty at the slow live games (something I'm working on).

The game you play to beat these games will not be the same as the way you play to beat the online games. Here's a bit from a post of mine a ways back about beating these games:

[ QUOTE ]
The super-loose low limit games are a money machine, and are beatable at an outrageous rate. That said, they are also extremely volatile, and you will both hit huge upswings and huge downswings. The key is to always make the right decisions and the right moves at every point, and to play enough hands that the good luck and the bad luck even out. Abysmal poker being played by your opponents does not make beating this game impossible. In SSHE p.14, "This notion is, of course, absurd. [...] People who equate poker to craps lose, not because the game is unbeatable, but because they make numerous mistakes." And on p.16 "Every cent of your long-term profit playing poker comes from exploiting your opponents errors and predictable tenancies. The more numerous and egregious their errors, the more money you can make."

Now, while you will have a higher expected win rate, you will also have bigger swings. You WILL get sucked out on constantly, you WILL bet up the second best hand a lot, and you WILL miss draws all the time. You will lose A LOT of hands. The idea is to win money, not hands, and this is eminently possible in these games. There is so much dead money in the pot in these games you can lose 5 pots for every one you win and still make out like a bandit. Learn this! Its not about how often you win, but about how much.

[/ QUOTE ]

And lastly, read and post in the strategy forums here. They are a tremendous resource and will keep you sharp and improve your game when you're away from the tables.

Good luck.

[EGO]

140,000 hands since Jan '06, from .25/.50 to 3/6 with a WR of just over .05BB/100. I sucked, and was a breakeven bonus whore.

You can't peice together winrates from what others report, but I don't want to dissuade any type of out-of-the box thinking. Poker is certainly not dogmatic.

I'm guessing that you have 8,000 hands with a winrate of 1.5BB/100 at .25/.50 - that's $60. Assuming $.75/100 hands (1.5BB/100), you will make $127.50 - which is 255 big bets, and not $255. Assuming you started with $150 (300 big bets for .25/.50), then you'll need 780 more big bets to hit $600. That's another 52,000 hands. If you started with more money, then you'll need less to hit $600.

Of course, 8,000 hands is no indicator of eventual winrate. I played 24,000 hands at .25/.50 with a winrate of over 6BB/100 at Prima when I started playing back in '04. This was typically playing four tables.

BB/100 to $$ formula: (# OF HANDS/100)*WR*BB

If you are a decent player, then I'd advise moving up as soon as possible. 300 big bets is plenty at .5/1, and if you lose, then you can always drop down.

If you've played two tables without any difficulty, then you could try three tables out. As long as your don't predict your winrate dropping more than 33%, then you'll make the same amount of money or more, in less time.

I play on Stars, and my winrate since moving back down to .5/1 is actually much higher than it was at 1/2. Of course my winrate was negative at 1/2, since I had to move down.

.5/1 winrate at stars: 3.28BB/100 over 11,533 hands, averaging 5-6 tables.

1/2 winrate at stars + fulltilt: -0.63BB/100 over 47,301 hands, averaging 4-5 tables.

2/4 winrate at stars + fulltilt: -0.42BB/100 over 17,015 hands, averaging 1-2 tables.

All limits at PS and FT: .10BB/100 over 77,123 hands, averaging 3.26 tables.