At what point do I know if I'm any good? and other questions...

[cognito20]

Harrington's HOH2 has some good advice on starting hands for NL headsup play, including a working default strategy you can use that'll keep you above water, and such for headsup play, but while it's one of the better parts of the book it doesn't deal as much with postflop play, which is very opponent-dependent anyway so that's understandable. Although his analysis of the Ivey-D'Agostino headsup battle at the Turning Stone tournament last year is very insightful and well worth the read.

I only play Stars HU SNGs every now and then as an occasional break from 6-max and stud/8 ring game play. I consider heads-up no-limit sit and gos to be the poker equivalent of my Frank Zappa albums: I love them, but I'll play them almost exclusively for 2 or 3 days and then go back to my regular games, just to keep myself fresh. In other words, I take them in limited, but intense, doses. The variance, as you might imagine, can be rather high....although I am (slightly) overall profitable in these games (.551 on Stars $5 and $10 level, in 376 matches), I once lost 10 of them in a row and had a 24-match sample in which I went 3-21. I also once won 11 in a row, and 18 of 20. Make sure you have the bankroll to withstand the swings.

What that bankroll would be, I don't know. I'm sure there's a mathematical way to figure it out, probably in Mason's book "Gambling Theory and Other Topics", but since this is not my regular game and I play them more as a break than anything else I haven't bothered. That book is highly recommended for any bankroll questions you might have, actually.

--Scott

That's precisely the problem with them. For example, on UB at $10 HU SNG costs you $11. If you win one then lose one, you're now down $2, so, you have to do much better than break even to show a profit.

[cognito20]

[ QUOTE ]
That's precisely the problem with them. For example, on UB at $10 HU SNG costs you $11. If you win one then lose one, you're now down $2, so, you have to do much better than break even to show a profit.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yep. The vig causes a .500 player to be a loser. On Stars, where I play, the breakeven point is .525. At .551, I'm profitable, but slightly....which matches my assessment of my headsup skill level; good, but not great. Again, I only play them as a break from my regular grind, I'm not ever planning to specialize in them. A decent, if maybe flawed, way to think of it is to compare your winning percentage to a major league baseball team. .550 is good, .600 is great, and .700 is 1927 Yankees. I would doubt that anything above .700 would be sustainable for any long period, and even that would be iffy for all but the greatest players. Just a guess though.

--Scott