How do you guys go on such insane downswings?

[punter11235]

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I have a theory (being too tight and slightly weak magnifies downswings greatly), but I'd like more opinions.

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I dont know about limit but I think in NL variance is vastly overestimated on this forum. Even if CaptZeeBoo is making fun as usual he can be right. I just cant imagine losing 10xbuyins while playing good poker at least up to 5/10NL level. I lost even more few times but I played like crap and I admit it.

[Subfallen]

Obviously not tilting is marvelous, but if you play short-handed poker I don't care how good you are---you will have 200BB downswings pretty regularly.

In my last 30k hands at 10/20 and 15/30 5-max, I'm grinding out a respectable 2.5BB/100. But during these 30k hands I have had four 100BB downswings and a 250BB downswing.

[SoftcoreRevolt]

I deal with it by playing with a bankroll far too huge for the limits I play, so huge downswings barely dent my bankroll.

I have lost 3-5 stacks in NL before. When this happens I take a small break because most of the time I take big hits while on tilt. Over the past few months I have worked on the biggest leak I could see which was playing while tilting. Some things that have helped me from tilting are playing more then one table at a time.

[Danenania]

You don't understand math.

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You don't understand math.

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I have a master's degree in it actually, lol.

[albedoa]

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You don't understand math.

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I have a master's degree in it actually, lol.

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So then you can tell us honestly that you do make more than 200 BB per month on average?

[WhiteWolf]

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You don't understand math.

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I have a master's degree in it actually, lol.

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If you have a master's degree in math, and you understand how much variance there is in poker, the idea of a 200BB downswing should be easy for you to grasp.

Use some sample numbers of a 2BB/100 hand win rate and a 15BB/100 hand standard deviation (typical numbers for a winning limit player). Over 5000 hands (50 * 100), you would expect a win rate of 100BB, and a standard deviation of 15 * sqrt(50) = 106 BB. A 200 BB downswing over 5000 hands would only be a 2.8 standard deviation event - rare, but not extrodinarily so. For players who play hundreds of thousands of hands per year, it would not be too unusual to encounter a 200 BB downswing.

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You don't understand math.

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I have a master's degree in it actually, lol.

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If you have a master's degree in math, and you understand how much variance there is in poker, the idea of a 200BB downswing should be easy for you to grasp.

Use some sample numbers of a 2BB/100 hand win rate and a 15BB/100 hand standard deviation (typical numbers for a winning limit player). Over 5000 hands (50 * 100), you would expect a win rate of 100BB, and a standard deviation of 15 * sqrt(50) = 106 BB. A 200 BB downswing over 5000 hands would only be a 2.8 standard deviation event - rare, but not extrodinarily so. For players who play hundreds of thousands of hands per year, it would not be too unusual to encounter a 200 BB downswing.

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If you change your BB/100 assumption to 3+, that's what I was expecting most expert players around here won. If it isn't, and the real number is more like 2/100, then yes, I should expect to see more of these downswings posted about I suppose. That having been said, it is still a rare enough event that I wouldn't have expected to see it posted about so often here. I think it must be a combination of poor players who don't realize it, the high-variance style Diablo posted about, the sheer number of people posting here, and tilt that results in so many posts about downswings. Plus, poker players are easily the world's biggest whiners. [img]/images/graemlins/crazy.gif[/img]

Maybe I shouldn't be so paranoid about it, but damn if reading these boards doesn't make me a bit jittery sometimes.

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If you change your BB/100 assumption to 3+, that's what I was expecting most expert players around here won. If it isn't, and the real number is more like 2/100, then yes, I should expect to see more of these downswings posted about I suppose.

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I believe 3+ BB/100 would be above world-class at a game such as the full ring 30/60. If I heard anyone was winning at that rate I would immediately assume they were running well. I don't doubt that there a few players in the world that could do it over the long run, but only a few. They would probably choose a higher game anyway. 3BB/100 is definitely not the standard win rate of an 'expert' 2+2'er.

2 BB/100 is more reasonable, although I would put that at the upper limit of what an expert player could expect in the long run at the 30/60. Its doable if he plays his best game consistently and has good table selection.

Also, boosting your win rate from 1.5BB/100 to 2BB/100 is much tougher than boosting from 1BB/100 to 1.5BB. Each marginal unit of +EV is that much harder to discover and unlock.

What was DERB's win rate again? Isn't he 1.5BB/100 or so?

There was a thread a while back about confidence in win rates, I don't have the link. Basically the long run is very long, and even very large hand samples leave large confidence intervals.

These are just my opinions of course. I played the 30/60 for 2 months until I hit a 250BB+ downswing and moved down. I currently play 15/30.

PS All of my statements are for full ring multitablers (4+ tables). Single-table play and HUSH could be more profitable (and swingy).