300 big bets enough if I...?

[Sundevils21]

Is 300 big bets enough of a bankroll if I am planning on withdrawling all my winnings? Example...
I feel like I've hit the peak limit that I can be successful and have my highest EV.
Limit: $500-$1000
Bankroll: $300,000
Every Friday I will withdrawl every cent over $300K in my poker bankroll and add it to my personal finances. If I'm below $300K, then I don't add or subtract money from my bankroll.
Do I need a bigger bankroll if all my winnings are taken out, yet I never add funds to my br?

[Blarg]

Your sample size is insufficient.

By which smart aleck foolish remark I mean to say, it's possible to sooner or later go through 300 BB, and even fantastic players have done so. If you're less than fantastic(a fair assumption for almost everyone), 300 BB is proportionately even less of a safety cushion for you personally. There's an important difference between merely technically having enough cash to play and having enough cash to play optimally.

Not to mention a hard psychological fact for almost everyone: after significant losses, most of us wind up at least somehow on tilt, even if it's not obvious. For instance, we might get less aggressive as our bankroll shrinks, or get more aggressive and try to "shoot more angles" with dubious play to get our money back in a hurry.

Furthermore, if you are tapping your bankroll every time you win, hopefully that doesn't mean you are living off it directly. That would be shaving things pretty thin in your life. Jumbling your gambling money in with your living money is a road to ruin.

300 BB is a good guideline, but I don't think never growing your bankroll beyond that is a good plan at all.

If there is such a thing as expertise on all the above combined matters, mine is non-existent, but the above just seems like common sense to me.

[Nottom]

If you are serious about playing exclusively off your BR then you should calucuate your BR needs using the following formula:

BR = -(SD^2/(2*WR))*LN(ROR)

where SD is your Std deviation, WR is your winrate and ROR is your desired Risk of Ruin.

If you don't need to withdraw money on a regular basis than your method should be sufficent. If you need to withdraw money on a regular basis than you should recalulate your BR with a reduced WR to reflect the fact that you are taking out money.

For example, if you make $75/hour and decide to pay yourself $5k month (and will always make this payment tuo yourself regardless of if you are running good or bad that month) and average playing 100 hours a month, you need to subtract $5K/100 = $50 from you win rate and recalulate your BR using this figure instead to acheive your desired RoR.

[MarkL444]

What is your plan if you were to lose 100BB?

[Cerril]

Hmm... I think I get the formula but I'd love to know more of the math behind it.

For example, say I'm making 3BB/100 at 2/4 with a SD of 17.4BB/100 and I'd like a 5% ROR, that implies I need
-(69.6^2 / (2*12)) * LN(.05)
or
-4844/24 * -3 or $600; 150BB. That seems remarkably low, though 5% is also a significant chance. But dropping it to 1% only raises the requirement to 225BB.

Thing is, I'm uncertain what normal SDs are. Those stats are mine (though my WR is slightly over 4, I believe that's unsustainable), but my sample size is insufficient (just under 10k hands, so VERY insufficient). I'd rather use more realistic numbers.


Anyway, getting back to the topic, it's 'enough' as long as you won't be flat broke if you hit 0 and unable to ever gamble again. The main difference is that now if you ever hit a -300BB streak that includes a positive (where your high point is 300BB above your low point), you're almost guaranteed to go broke (i.e. if your weekly totals are -20BB, +50BB (so -30 from the account), -120BB, +30BB, -100BB, -30BB, +50BB, +30BB, -125BB... well you're broke before you finish hitting that last floor). It's improbable but over your lifetime it just might happen.

On the other hand, if you have the opportunity to tap another fund after awhile... if the money isn't all 'no poker ever' money, then if you hit rock bottom after solid profits and investments after a few years then you can throw in another 300BB and shrug off the loss.

[flawless_victory]

[ QUOTE ]
Is 300 big bets enough of a bankroll if I am planning on withdrawling all my winnings? Example...
I feel like I've hit the peak limit that I can be successful and have my highest EV.
Limit: $0.500-$0.1000
Bankroll: $300
Every Friday I will withdrawl every cent over $300 in my poker bankroll and add it to my personal finances. If I'm below $300, then I don't add or subtract money from my bankroll.
Do I need a bigger bankroll if all my winnings are taken out, yet I never add funds to my br?

[/ QUOTE ]
that looks more like it...

[Nottom]

Well like you said, 5% is a pretty high RoR. If you are willing to accept that sort of risk than you can get by with a smaller BR.

It also shows that for the lower limits a 300 bankroll is more than many people actually need.

[BigBaitsim (milo)]

StatKing has a nice calculator that will allow you to fill in such info as winrate, monthly nut, limits, etc and will give you BR requirements.

[fnord_too]

[ QUOTE ]
Hmm... I think I get the formula but I'd love to know more of the math behind it.

For example, say I'm making 3BB/100 at 2/4 with a SD of 17.4BB/100 and I'd like a 5% ROR, that implies I need
-(69.6^2 / (2*12)) * LN(.05)
or
-4844/24 * -3 or $600; 150BB. That seems remarkably low, though 5% is also a significant chance. But dropping it to 1% only raises the requirement to 225BB.


[/ QUOTE ]

The ROR calculations take into account withdrawing money. I can GURANTEE that if you followed your plan with 300BB, you would eventually go broke if you played long enough. Your bankroll is effectively a random walk, and each time you draw down to 300BB you restart it. If you had a 5% ROR, you would be a dog to survive 14 draw downs.

[Cerril]

I gotcha. I wasn't really sure what the impact of the RoR stat was. So basically your bankroll to survive a lifetime of playing like this is astronomical. That makes more sense.

[uuDevil]

Milo,

The formulas used by StatKing may not be as accurate as one would like. Below is a quote from this BruceZ post. (http://archiveserver.twoplustwo.com/showthreaded.php?Cat=&Number=602323&page=&view=&sb =5&o=&vc=1) You may also want to follow the links he provides.

[ QUOTE ]
The bankroll it gives you for a 1% risk of ruin will actually give you a 6.7% risk of ruin.

[/ QUOTE ]

[dogmeat]

Although I find it impractical now, when I played blackjack for a living I used the same 5% element of run (risk of ruin), but did not change my bet size until I had doubled my bankroll. If I/we started with a $10,000 bankroll, we made bets that fit that bankroll and the 5% until we hit $20,000. This allowed us to not worry about the fluctuations and kept us focused on doubling. When we doubled, we took our splits and started a new bankroll, usually for slightly more than the last.

Converted for poker, this would give you the solid 5% and assure that you had some cash put aside for living expenses while you continued building that bankroll from 300bb to 600bb. When the 600 was reached you could take your pay and start over at the same limit, or move up. Just a thought.

Dogmeat /images/graemlins/spade.gif