Going to try playing live 1/2 for a living....

[MegumiAmano]

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Too bad they don't have .50/1.00 live.

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The toke alone would kill you at this limit. It's bad enough at $2/$4.

[Ryan Z]

Does anyone else think that the OP is asking the wrong question? Perhaps he should be asking, "Is playing 1/2 NL a viable option for a living?" Hopefully, this isn't the OP's goal at the end of the road; sure, only you can determine what you want to do with your life, and don't let anyone tell you NOT to do what you love to do if you can make a living at it. But you've got to ask yourself if you're ok with putting a ceiling on your income. There isn't another bearable occupation out there where you could make, say $25-50,000? I don't see how you could make anything more than that playing 1-2 NL for a living.

Perhaps I'm just biased by the belief that I could make more money than that doing something other than playing 1-2 NL. Truthfully, I think this month's magazine addresses this subject well, between Dr. Al and Ed Miller. Who knows what the tables will be like in 5 years? Right now I'm a college student and can get by making <$10,000 a year. But what about having kids? Dental insurance? Health insurance? Mortgage payments? I don't see any way you could put the weight of a house on a 1/2 NL table. I'm probably rambling right now. I apologize if I am. But sometimes I wonder if "going pro" is an option that too many people think is realistic.

-ryan

[lefty rosen]

What about inflation. I will give you guys a story from me. I played 5/10 back in 95' to 97'. I was making 10 bucks an hour during the day and 15 on weekends and late night sessions. Everything is 25 to 50 percent more expensive now. Lord knows you will have to move up or be starved out trying to earn money at 1/2 in a 10 years. Really you should aspire to get a roll together and beat the next limit up at least.......

[Lawrence Ng]

40 buy-ins.

I assume it's a $200 max buy-in. So that would be around $8k.

If you want to make some serious dough in NL, you have to be able to capitalize on a lot of small edges which means you will have some larger swings. Thus the bigger bankroll.

Lawrence

[DaveduFresne]

Guys, guys, guys. No one said my life's ambition was to play 1/2 NL at B&M's for the rest of my life....its just a way of building up my bankroll, and just fyi, including taxes, my weekly expenses average $400/week, but I've just turned 25 and hopefully in the future I will have a much more ornate life.

No offense, but the purpose of this post wasn't to get ideas of what you thought of playing for a living or whether I'm a slacker or whatever other ideas are in your heads.

What I wanted to know is it doable? If I can average $700/wk than I would say that would satisfy me for the time being. (The cost of living in my city is probably 1/10 of Los Angeles lol).

Just as an update, I went to Turning Stone today. I had to wake up early this morning and had a number of errands to do, so by the time I was able to get up their (1 1/2 driving as well I was quite fatigued. And then it took forever for them to get a 100 NL table together. So it was like 10pm by the time I finally got to play poker, and I had been up since 6am.

But being it was my first "official" day, I was feeling pumped. Mostly college kids at the table and one college kid's dad (which is basically the usual Turning Stone crowd), I knew I had a chance for a good night when college kid in seat 2 called older guys all in on the flop with just overcards.

I got terrible cards for the first half hour or so, and folded pretty much every hand. Then I got KJ suited in UTG +1 and did a little image raise to ten in case I ever happened to get real cards. One caller then a shortstack goes over the top for 25 total. I looked at the first caller as he was looking at his cards and making the call, so I figured him for some kind of speculative hand like suited connectors or a small pp. Still wasn't happy knowing I was behind shorstack, but figured I probably wasn't way behind and the way things go at this casino I could be ahead. So I call and first caller folds like I thought he would. Shorstack flips over fives and I win the race.

A little later I get pocket tens and reraise this midstack fishy player from his ten to thirty. I was hoping he would fold his AJ or whatever he had, but he pushed for like thirty more. I called and he flipped up KQ offsuit and a river king gave him the pot.

So I was a little shorstacked at this point, had about seventy or so. I'm in BB and look down at lovely ladies. There has been a raise to seven by a college kid waiting for a bigger game, and then a reraise to 15 by older guy. Older guy seems pretty solid, but he isn't a nit either. One thing I've picked up on him is postflop anyway, if he bets he doesn't have more than top pair. Any time he had a monster he slowplayed. So I'm hoping this theory bears out and that he would have smoothcalled with Aces. To be honest though, I thought he could have Kings, and less likely Aces. However, the way this game plays (people calling all ins with far less than Queens) I figure a push is in order, as I'm surely not folding. Older guy told me had pocket fours, but he ended up mucking so I'm not sure if that was true or not. College kid calls with some random hand, I want to say KJ offsuit, but anyway he doesn't improve and I a little more than double up.

A little later, an ep raiser makes it seven to go (generally a pot sweetener raise with a speculative hand in this game, although occasionally you have to watch out for a big pair with it) anyway, there's three callers in front of me, and I'm one of the button, and look at J7 of spades. Now online this hand would be in the muck in a second, but in this game if I make a flush, two pair or trips I can easily stack somebody. Flop came J72 two clubs, I led out weakly hoping original raiser would put me all in or something, but he folded, and older guy calls, I jazz it up to twenty on the turn (which was a brick of some kind) and then the river was a Queen (not clubs). This worries me slightly, and I'm wishing I put more money in on the flop, but I put a twenty dollar stop bet in, and older guy folded, claiming he had AJ (I think flush draw most likely.)

Now at some point a little later, a weak player came in to the left of me, you could tell by his body language and whether he appeared interested in the hand or not whether he had something. He had made all small preflop raises up until a hand with me came up. He had lost about 1/3 of his stack by raising preflop and someone else taking his pot down. Anyway, I was on the button or one off the button, and we already had about six callers, I looked down at A5 offsuit, decide to limp in even though I hate Ace rag, but figure maybe I can get a nice flop. Well guy to my left makes it eighteen. Everyone folds to me. Now I've seen this move in B&M a few times before, with a player like that it usually means some kind of speculative hand with which he wants to pick up the pot with. I put him on suited connectors or possibly AJ. I think for a second and then say I'm all in. He fidgets with his chips clearly frustrated but then calls. I then get annoyed at myself for thinking I had made a great read, and honestly tell him "nice call". Except then he flips over his hand and he had QJ. Neither of us improve and I take the pot.

The one hand I cant seem to remember occurred a little after this. I had about 220 before the hand, and it dented me back to 140 or so. I was a little annoyed after it because it was the second race in a row I lost so I guess thats why it flew out of my head. I want to say I had pocket Jacks which got beaten by KQ but that could be wrong.

I got myself back up to about 220 in some inconsequential hands where I raised a couple pots, bet on the flop, got called, and took it down on the turn.

The last hand I was involved in was with AK suited. Old guy raised to seven (I wouldn't say he was loose, but this could mean anything). Guy that beat my Jacks or whatever it was with KQ reraises him. To be completely honest I really wasn't worried about his reraise. Sure he couldve woken up with pocket Aces or Kings, but his range of hands included many considerably weaker than mine. Even though he had over a hundred, I determined I was going to get him all in preflop if I could. I reraise to 45, and older guy mucks. Kid goes into the tank for some time, and then says "what the hell it's only money" and moves all in. I call and he flips over KQ again, but this time suited. This time neither one of us hits, and I take his stack.

At this point a lot of the fish had busted, and a couple other players had stacks around my size (older guy had considerably more) and I was feeling tired and hungry, so I waited for my blind and racked them up for a $240 3 hour profit and used my comp card towards a nice seafood dinner. With expenses, my profit was probably more like 180 bucks, but considering it was a long day for me, I was quite happy.

And yes I know this was only one session, but so far in my ten+ trips to Turning Stone, I've never gone home stuck save for one time when I foolishly played for 36 hours straight where I was up 700 in the first 24 hours, suffered a horrendous beat for $350 and then donked off the rest of my profit plus a couple hundred extra.

If I lived closer to Turning Stone I would surely try it everyday (not sure how live weekdays are though as I've pretty much only gone up on weekends), but as it is its a pretty grueling drive, so I haven't decided what I'm going to do.

I have a few more questions I like to ask of those who would like to help (not bankroll just some other general matters, but I'm completely whiped now so I'll post them later.)

Thanks to those of you who have been helpful, and good luck at the tables all.

David duFresne

not sure where you are...but since it is "up" to turning stone I'd assume you are just as close to foxwoods or to the city...
why not check out some other rooms with better game selection and more fresh faces so that you don't become the guy that everyone has a read on...

[Malachii]

Excellent strategy David, as usual. Making "image raises" with KJs UTG and coinflipping with riffraff in cash games is so +EV.

[DaveduFresne]

You're just pissed because you were way off on that trips hand. You woulda made a nice fold there pussy.

[Malachii]

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You're just pissed because you were way off on that trips hand. You woulda made a nice fold there pussy.

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Not really. I made what I thought was a logical argument for folding. This opinion was probably prejudiced by a recent hand of mine where I had open trips and ran into a fullhouse. Anyways, in the hand you're referring to, the results didn't justify my opinion. A mentor of mine who looked over the hand disagreed with me, so I'm willing to admit that I could be wrong.

Calculate your EV in every one of your all in hands. Then go find a college stats book and look up standard deviation. Factor in the amount of time that you're going to spend driving to Turning Stone, your food and gas expenses along the way, plus the psychological turmoil of inevitable downswings and I can tell you that this is extremely unrealistic. Personally, from what I've read of your posts I don't think you have the technical skill to succeed yet, although with your apparent determination I'm sure it's only a matter of time until you acquire it. In the meantime I'd reccomend playing online and getting a dayjob. And I'm 19. That should tell you something.

[RollaJ]

Take whatever roll you have and play online for 3 months, get bonuses and whore as many sites as you can. If you are good at the game you can start with 1,000 and have 10,000 by the end of the 3 month period without a problem . Then decide if youd rather play live