When can you know?

[getitfixed]

I started playing PLO on July 25th and have been doing pretty well. I have done quite well (I think) in the 1/2 6 max games but failed in HU action. How many hands of 6 max do you need to play before you can assume you are playing well and not just running well? What PT stats would help indicate this? Should I post stats to help analyze? Thanks in advance.

GIF

[jbird]

Troll / et al know more about this...

But the answer is: A LOT of hands.

But that goes both ways, you could be the loser in HU simply because of the small sample as well.

How many hands do you have? 1k? 10k? 100k?

[getitfixed]

20k in total....I think it is somthing like 15k of 1/2 6 max and maybe 3k HU

I'm at work now, but can post my PT when I get home.

[rine]

Way more, definitely. That would be way to few hands even for holdem. in 10k hands two 60/40 won or lost can change a lot. Let's say for simplicity you win 5PTBB/100. You figure to win 10 stacks in 10k hands. These two lost pots change it from 10 stacks to 6 stacks.

[cmyr]

this turns into a standard deviation question pretty quickly. If you're running at 10bb/100 over 10k hands it's pretty likely you're at least a small winner. If you can do that over 25k hands I'd have decent confidence. If you want to have like 99.5% certainty, you'll have to play in the hundreds of thousands of hands, but you should be able to get a good idea without going to those extremes.

[getitfixed]

cmyr- Thanks for responding as it seems you are the most accomplished/successful player who posts here. At roughly 15k hands at ~12bb/100, I can assume I have a clue? Would any of the pokertracker stats lend any help in assessing my situation?

[iggymcfly]

If you're over 10BB/100 over that sample, you're almost certainly a winner. I wouldn't worry about it. If you're looking to take shots at 2/4 and you've got the roll for it, you're probably ready to start and if you're just looking for peace of mind, take comfort.

If you play a straightforward game and have difficulty hand-reading to make big calls or bluffs on the river, you could definitely be a winner at 6-max and a loser HU though. I'm guessing you have a smaller sample HU though, so that could be less definitive.

[FireStorm]

This is way off topic and probably should be posted elsehwere, but as more of a general question: Given the above, how could anyone ever have any idea if they were a winning live player? If one needs hundreds of thousands of hands to ascertain winrates, it would seem that less than 1% of the live playing population could ever accurately attach meaning to their results. If there's a better link anyone knows of for this question, feel free to post it, b/c I've had this convo with others before.

[flameboy]

There's more to knowing if you're a winning player than measuring ptbb/100 to the tenth decimal.
Looking at the money certainly helps to gauge if you are a winning player, but I'd say it's not necessary and if you take a look at how well you are playing (putting opponents on hand ranges and acting accordingly - even when you are not in the hand) you can make a good educated guess if this is a game you can beat.

[SuperSnort]

trust me if you think you cant beat HU then you cant. it is incredibly hard to switch to HU plo as i have tried and failed at low limits yet i nail the 6 max. i like to be the aggressor but it doesnt work HU as they know you dont know or dont put you on such big hands. i would advise staying away from HU, but if u do gl