Playing at a new level

[astarck]

We all know variance can make life a living hell from time to time. And we also all know that even winning players go through horrendous swings. So I ask you, how many do you play at a new level before you say to yourself "I cannot beat this level at my current level of play."?

The reason I ask is because I have a 15% known ROI at both the 22s and 33s and am trying to move up to the 55s. Through my first 160 55s my roi is hovering right around -6%. If I was an already established player at the 55s I wouldn't be concerned at all, but since I'm new to this level I wonder if I should drop back down or keep on playing. I have suffered swings this bad in both the 22s and 33s, but they came after I had already built up a healthy profit and had determined I was at least somewhat able to beat those levels.

Throughout the last 160 SNGs I have suffered what seems like an endless string of bad beats. This isn't a bad beat post, but the beats do make me think I might just be seeing the bad side to variance right as I try this new level.

So again, how many SNGs and at what ROI before you finally decide you can't take the new level?

[ace_in_the_hole]

Just keep playing till at least 500 before seriously questioning your ability to beat the level. I think you just happened to have started with a downswing. My first 300 22's I was only at 3% ROI ready to give up and now i'm at 1200 with 11% ROI and still making major improvments to my game.

[astarck]

WARNING - BAD BEAT RANT!

Ignore this throughout the rest of the thread.

Since typing my inital post I lost QQ to T9o and AA to A9c.

It's hands like that that make me consider maybe I'm just getting unlucky.

RANT OVER.

[astarck]

Maybe I should also add another question.

How long have you kept at a level while losing only to "become" a winner? By keeping at, I mean knowing you are on a downswing and can beat the new level and not jumping down in limits for a few months to practice and then returning later.

[tom441lbk]

you might want to jump down and maybe play a couple sets of 22s to get your confidence back up, maybe a warmup before you play some 55s or something like that, i like to do this if i've been experiencing a bad run

[maddog2030]

You can beat the 55s. You've played 160 and ran into some bad luck. You're underestimating how even a few (read: in the single digits) bubble coinflips can affect your ROI significantly with such a small sample size. You know when you're getting outplayed, and it certainly isn't often at the $55s.

When should you stop playing a level? When its becoming clear you're getting outplayed. Marginal numbers over insignificant samples indicate absolutely nothing, except that you aren't a +/- 100% ROI player. Congratulations, welcome to the club.

No one's going to be able to give you hard numbers about when to stop. Maybe a sob story or two, but given the math you already know the answers.

Confidence wise, downward variance always sucks when its during a new level transition. Reviewing your plays and seeing you made +EV moves should be all you need. -EV ones obviously need to be fixed, but will boost your confidence that you now have plugged leaks.

Once we get back to school you'll be profitably pushing out 160 a week and these first 160 will be forgotten.

[GtrHtr]

perhaps overly simple answer, but just go by bankroll guidelines. If you hit a point in your br you are not comfortable with - then drop back down. I truly do not think this is a matter of skill at all - more likely an adjustment and variance.

I'd be willing to bounce back and forth for a while, if it doesn't work in the long run, turn the 33s into your ATM but I doubt that will happen.

[Isura]

As long as you have the adequate bankroll and are playing youre A game, I would say to keep grinding it out. I'm pretty much break even over my first 150 33s, but I know I can beat that game for a decent ROI. I don't feel like I'm ever being outplayed on the bubble or anything, so it's mostly variance.

Let me first say I'm a long time lurker and first time poster here at 2+2, /images/graemlins/smile.gif. I was going to begin a new thread very similiar to this one but instead I'll just post here.

I have been playing online poker for just about year and in the past several months I've really been focusing on Sit-N-Go's. My bankroll is very meager, built-up by freeroll winnings on InterPoker and since transferred to PokerStars long ago to play in $5+0.50 1-table SNGs. I've had to make several withdraws for various reasons and have gone on tilt a few times after moving up to $10+1 for a short time and have good success initially but then crashed, burned and drained my bankroll to my threshold for $5+0.50 buy-in tourneys.

I took almost a month off from online poker for personal/family issues and since I started back up at the beginning of July my $5+0.50 stats are ROI 102.91% & ITM 60.00%. Obviously I think I should move up as I tried to previously and currently but I have been finishing very poorly. In the $10+1 sngs I've played since restarting in July my stats are ROI -59.09% & ITM 10.00%. I really don't feel like there is a whole lot of difference between the $5 and $10 tables but then again my luck at them hasn't been all too kind lately either. Over the next few days I'm going to take time out to look over my $10 sng's to see if I can find out exactly what I'm doing wrong in them versus my $5 games.

I use pokertracker for mundane things such as realtime analysis and record keeping. But when it comes to stats that really could help me to plug leaks in my game for the SNGs I'm not exactly sure what are the critical stats/areas to look at. Are there certain stats/areas I should look at in pokertracker to help me find these leaks in my game?

Any advice would be great, thanks.