Calculating Rake while playing live

[El_Timon]

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Hmmm... simple seems better. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

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My (overly) simplistic method (as taught by one of the dealers in the casino) is that in average you pay the same amount of rake as everyone else.
So you pay:
rake/hour = hands/hour * 1/#_of_players * rake

In my case: 35 * 1/9 * (3+1) = $15.55/hour (I'm a 1-2NL player)
Casino has 10-handed tables, so the average is about 9 players in a main table. Also, the "fudge factor" averages with the amount of hands played - less rake means more hands played.
Is this way off? Actually it agrees nicely with your latest calculation [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Edit: I just realized that the casino has taken $6k+ from me in the year that I have been playing live. I am up $3k for that year, the casino doubles that. BAD BEAT.

[CEE]

Glad I ran into this discussion. I did some analysis using my poker tracker database a few years ago into the effect of rake on winrate. Obviously... it has a major effect.

I used data from ~12,000 hands of $0.50/$1.00 limit HE, figuring this style of play was roughly analogous to card room $2/4 or $3/6. I was a pretty successful low limit player back in the ultra fishy PP days. I won at a rate of 5.7 big bets per 100 hands, or at card room pace of play (35h/hr), 2.01 big bets per hour. I paid out 57¢ of rake for every dollar I won. I was a 20% VPIP player, and won a bit over 8% of pots.

I went back and recalculated the rake for each hand based on prevailing casino rake arrangements, and found the following results, assuming all hands played out exactly the same, only changing the rake:

$2/4 Limit, 10% rake max $3
Win Rate/Hr (BB): 1.06
Rake as % of Win: 142%

$2/4 Limit, 10% rake max $4
Win Rate: 0.65
Rake % of Win: 263%

$2/4 Limit, 10% rake max $5
Win Rate: 0.42
Rake % of Win: 435%

$3/6 Limit, 10% rake max $3
Win Rate: 1.66
Rake % of Win: 73%

$3/6 Limit, 10% rake max $4
Win Rate: 1.15
Rake % of Win: 128%

$3/6 Limit, 10% rake max $5
Win Rate: 0.77
Rake % of Win: 217%

$4/8 Limit, 10% rake max $3
Win Rate: 2.10
Rake % of Win: 47%

$4/8 Limit, 10% rake max $4
Win Rate: 1.60
Rake % of Win: 78%

$4/8 Limit, 10% rake max $5
Win Rate: 1.18
Rake % of Win: 124%

This analysis helped me understand why I was a solidly winning online player, and could beat my home game... but when it came to playing at the casino, I couldn't win in the consistent manner I was used to. It also convinced me that, given that the skill levels weren't that different, I needed to play at higher limits. At the very least, the skill level differences could be made up for by the rake difference.

To answer the OP question... I'm not sure there is an easy back of the envelope formula. I would say that it depends on 1) How many hands you play 2) Of the hands you play, how many you win, 3) The rake $, and 4) The size of the rake cap relative to the betting structure. My simulation shows that for $3/6 with a 10% to $4 rake, the average rake per hand would have been $3.10, or 78% of the rake cap ($3.51 for $5 cap, $2.54 for $3 cap).

Which brings me to my question... why is there not a listing of all card rooms and rake arrangement? You would think that it would be in allvegaspoker, but the listing shows available limits, but no rake info. This would seem like a good tool to keep the casinos honest. I was shocked to sit down last week at Bally's and find a $3/6 table with $5 rake cap! I love the players there, but maybe time to try another room.