Limit vs Pot limit Hold'em - which has the biggest swings?

[bunky9590]

Limit has much wilder swings and its not even close.

PL and NLHE (and Omaha even moreso) give a much larger advantage to the good players and the variance is way lower.

[umdpoker]

"Limit has much wilder swings and its not even close.

PL and NLHE (and Omaha even moreso) give a much larger advantage to the good players and the variance is way lower. "

i thought that variance was higher in nlhe in terms of the blinds, but was much lower in terms of winrate if you are a good player. iow,

(var nl)/blind > (var limit)/blind, but

(var nl)/winrate < (var limit)/winrate

i think that the variance in terms of win rate is much more important. basically, this means that you can make the same amount of money with a smaller bankroll by playing nl.

i think i read the above somewhere, and my play seems to back it up. i am by no means a great nl player, but my winrate at nl25 was much higher than the comparable limit game, whereas my biggest downswing was almost twice the size of my biggest downswing in limit. anybody agree/strongly disagree with me on this?

[Zetack]

I haven't played enough big bet poker nor do I have the theoretical expertise to know whether your hypothesis is actually true.

Assuming however, that the variance is bigger in Limit than big bet poker, I'd assume its because, no matter how bad your session, a monster hand or two at the right times can turn it all around for you in big bet poker. And how many sessions of any length do you ever have that don't have a few big hands with some nice action?

In limit, a monster hand or two even with some decent action may very well not make a dent in a run of dismal cards or suckouts.

--Zetack