Stop Loss- When to quit a Session

greg73 · #1 10-10-2005, 09:44 PM

I am wondering if I should employee a stop/loss method to decide when to quit a session of 10/20 Limit. EX: If I am ahead 10 BB and I lose 5 BB on the next hand should I quit to maintain my profit. Most of the articles I read say not to do this but, it seems to never fail that I get ahead and then get 2-3 big hands cracked and end up losing.

Thanks,

Greg

#2 10-10-2005, 10:05 PM

You stop when your no longer playing your "A" game...or you go broke. We all have played when we shouldn't. The game never ends unless you stop forever.

Kaeser · #3 10-10-2005, 11:18 PM

The problem with a stop-loss technique is that if your a winning player it turns into a stop-win technique. As long as you can honestly say to yourself that your playing in a good game and that your losses aren't effecting your play then you should keep playing until you feel inclined to quit. If your a losing player who plays for fun then there's nothing wrong with stop-loss.

Mike Caro's talks more about it here

Cincy Peach · #4 10-10-2005, 11:52 PM

Many of us here have our roots in blackjack and have carried over the idea that all playing sessions are really part of one big session, and when we employ stoplosses we are just playing mind games with ourselves.

This concept is accurate for blackjack because it is a closed parameter game - which is to say that all the variables are known and measurable.

Unfortunately, this concept does not transfer well to poker at all, because poker is fundamentally different in that regard. When you are losing, you may not know the real reason. Two variables which are hard to pin down are the skill and the honestly of your fellow players. At the end of the day, you just don't know if you saved a bet by folding or got bluffed out of a pot. Likewise you just don't know if both of the players who raised you out of a pot had strong hands or if there was collusion.

Therefore, i am going to dissent from the majority and maintain that a stoploss - at least to indicate a table change - is a good idea.

Xhad · #5 10-11-2005, 12:37 AM

Cincy brings up a couple good points. You should NEVER stop-loss to "preserve your profit" because it makes no sense, but if it's possible that there's cheating, the other players are sharks, you're on tilt, or they're playing better against you because you're losing, all of these are valid reasons to quit a game and a stop-loss might be "accidentally correct".

Kirkrrr · #6 10-11-2005, 06:25 AM

I always play for as long as I consider myself to be in a lucrative game and I am playing well. Once the game changes and is no longer good, or my play deteriorates, I'm out. It shouldn't have anything to do with your stack size, or whether you're up or down.

Kirk

AaronBrown · #7 10-11-2005, 05:20 PM

While I see the points in both (actually all three) sides presented here, I think about it a little differently.

It's extremely hard to know when you are playing your best Poker. You don't have a coach or partner to critique you. While it can't make sense to quit every time you lose a few pots, it does make sense to worry if you "never fail" to lose back your profits. If you track your results and discover that you have real losing streaks, beyond what is expected by random chance, it certainly makes sense to try to correct that. Quitting is only a short-term patch, you need a better long-term solution. But until you figure one out, better not to play.

However, the best reason not to quit after a loss is the loss should increase your future expected value. If you went to showdown and lost with a strong hand, you can expect people to fold faster against you. If you got called with a complete bluff, you can expect people to call your future bets. If you folded after contributing a lot to the pot, you can expect people to bluff you. You can exploit any one of these tendencies.

The biggest reason for losing streaks, in my experience, is playing the way people expect losers to play. That means each loss makes you easier to beat. Doing the opposite makes your losses productive.

If your losses are not productive it's either because you're not losing the right way, or you're not adjusting your play properly afterwards.

Kirkrrr · #8 10-11-2005, 06:07 PM

Really great post. I have never thought about it quite that way before. It's a shame you don't post in the NL sections of the forum [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Kirk

#9 10-11-2005, 06:14 PM

I've posted on this topic here. To those who have read this before, the answer is yes, I will continue to link it everytime I see a related new post.

I also think that Aaron has excellent advice here.

UATrewqaz · #10 10-11-2005, 06:17 PM

If it's a great game (you are bette rthan your opponents and they are making lots of mistakes, etc) then you shouldn't quit, no matter how much you are ahead/behind.

If you have a tendency to tilt if you are way behind or play conservative if you are way up, only then would a stop loss/gain be worth considering.