BR disagreement/fallacy

[WhiteWolf]

Interesting points on this thread.

On the one hand, as many posters have noted, a player with a 200BB bankroll has exactly the same risk of ruin as the identical player who started out with a 500BB bankroll but has been on a 300BB downswing (of course, this is treating each hand as an independent event + ignoring factors such as tilt, etc).

On the other hand, presumably the player who started with the 500BB decided on what risk of ruin factor he was willing to accept, and arrived at the 500BB size based on the factor. By moving down (effectively increasing the number of BB's he can play with), he is showing that he is actually much more risk adverse then his original calculation assumed. He should have have started with a bigger bankroll, which would have allowed he to stay at the higher limits for longer + increased his EV as expressed in dollars.

Perhaps this shows how you could use the mixed strategy to play at higher stakes for a given risk of ruin. Say I had a 4000 bankroll and decided that a 400BB bankroll gives me the risk of ruin I am willing to accept. The normal strategy would have me starting at 5/10 limits. But if I adapt the variable strategy, I could start at 10/20 (giving me 200BB),
move to 5/10 if I lose 100BB (Putting me at 200BB for the lower limit), and move down again if I lose another 100BB (giving me a final 200BB at 2/5). For the same 400BB my risk of ruin calculation said I needed, I could start at a higher limit and potentially increase my $EV as opposed to a flat strategy...

- The Wolf

Personally from all the posts and info I no longer believe a BR is as important as I once thought. Even if your a winning player you can still lose a 500BB BR so what is the point of having one that big? I thought with a break even player or better with at least a 300BB would prevent one from going broke but obviously I was mistaken. I'm just going to do what I want in terms of my money management.

[dogmeat]

[ QUOTE ]
Personally from all the posts and info I no longer believe a BR is as important as I once thought. Even if your a winning player you can still lose a 500BB BR so what is the point of having one that big? I thought with a break even player or better with at least a 300BB would prevent one from going broke but obviously I was mistaken. I'm just going to do what I want in terms of my money management.

[/ QUOTE ]

I thought you were in college. If you are, have you had no stats classes? Did you learn nothing from the posts, or are you being funny because you don't want to understand the points made about an acceptable ROR for any particular bankroll?

The 300BB listed so often as a reasonable starting bankroll assumes:

The player is a winner, at a rate of 1.5BB/100 hands (and for the sake of clarity, I would also add that this is over at least 50K hands)

This leaves you with a 5% chance of going broke if you never step down in limits. However, my own view is that I have a 5% element of ruin to "double my bankroll." Which means I don't spend any of the income I make playing until I drive that 300BB to 600BB, and then I reset my bankroll to whatever I am comfortable with and start again - with 300 units, and double that.

{by the way, it's pretty easy to see what you want for a bankroll given your win rate and SD; if you can't, use the search functions for it on 2+2 - I've shown it, but BruceZ is the master)

Dogmeat [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]

You obviously didn't read all the responses.

[Zetack]

[ QUOTE ]
Personally from all the posts and info I no longer believe a BR is as important as I once thought. Even if your a winning player you can still lose a 500BB BR so what is the point of having one that big? I thought with a break even player or better with at least a 300BB would prevent one from going broke but obviously I was mistaken. I'm just going to do what I want in terms of my money management.

[/ QUOTE ]

Allright I have my sarcasm meter off.

Interesing lesson you have choosen to take away from this discussion. The proper lesson would be that yes, moving down in limits if your bankroll becomes too depleted for the limits you are at is the proper way to manage your bankroll. Instead you are going with, Big Bankrolls are stupid so I'll just play short.

A willingness to learn is actually helpful in poker. But learn or don't, as you will youngling.

Good luck to you. I suspect you may need it.

--Zetack

Did I say I was going with a short BR or indicate what BR I was going to play with???

It is just a debate.

[silvershade]

I'm curious what people think about playing short, say a roll of 250bb, so long as you are willing to move down if you lose half of it this would seen fine to me. 500bb seems excessive if you are going to move down as well, unless you need that much to avoid playing scared it just looks like overkill. ( obviously I'm not thinking its ok to play pro with a short br. )

[Zetack]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm curious what people think about playing short, say a roll of 250bb, so long as you are willing to move down if you lose half of it this would seen fine to me. 500bb seems excessive if you are going to move down as well, unless you need that much to avoid playing scared it just looks like overkill. ( obviously I'm not thinking its ok to play pro with a short br. )

[/ QUOTE ]

Even as a non-pro 500 BB is much better than 250 even if you move down when you lose a lot. At a 250 BB bankroll, if you are pulling money out of your bankroll as you win (say every time you hit 400 BB's you pull out 150 BB's) to stay around 250 BB's with the plan on dropping down if you lose half (down to 125 BB's) then its invevitable that you will have to drop down. 125 BB downswings are routine. If you pull money out of your 500 BB bankroll everytime you get up to 650 BB's you have a much better shot at not having to drop down in limits since 375 BB downswings are pretty rare.

--Zetack

[Fabian]

[ QUOTE ]
Personally from all the posts and info I no longer believe a BR is as important as I once thought. Even if your a winning player you can still lose a 500BB BR so what is the point of having one that big? I thought with a break even player or better with at least a 300BB would prevent one from going broke but obviously I was mistaken. I'm just going to do what I want in terms of my money management.

[/ QUOTE ]

Which is why you need a bigger bankroll than 500BB if you're unwilling to move down.

[Guernica4000]

"Nothing is certain, except the fact that you can be certain of nothing in poker."
dogmeat


I like it.