Variance in different forms of poker

[ohnonotthat]

I was operating under the assumption that with so many HUGE edges available in NL you could earn a ton of money without having to subject yourself to the swings associated with AK/QQ-type matchups.

I wrote once that "you can make alot of money taking the best of 6-5ish matchups but you can get obscenely rich by repeatedly taking the best of 4-1 confrontations".

Does the strategy of passing on small edges to both lower varience AND preserve bankroll (aka lower one's risk of ruin) does not apply here ?

It may also be that as someone who generally plays limit I am skeptical of the truly atrocious play found at lower levels of NL (especially .50/1 and 1/2 blinds).

Note: I am becoming less and less willing to toss aside as fiction the reports I have been hearing re. these games. There are just too many such claims being made - too many of which are coming from reputable sources.

- Are 100 and 200 NL games REALLY this soft ?

PZHON quotes a win rate of ~$70/hour from 4-tabling 100-NL; moreover, the tone of his post makes it sound as though he is (in his opinion) good but not yet great.

Good L-rd, if a "good but not great" player is earning $500+ for eight hours of work it's time for me to retire my "extremely good (albeit likely not great)" limit game in hopes of attaining a level of skill that many others seem to posess at NL.

I still have more than a modicum of healthy suspicion as to the long-term prospects for earning these obscene amounts at NL ($20+/100hands with blinds of .50 and $1) but, well - I never got into poker to begin with an eye toward doing this forever. If this NL gig lasts a week, or a month or a year . . . I think I'll be riding this horse until her knees give out.

I must point out that I blame you for some of this, Mason. Your excellent chapters in your Poker Essays trilogy regarding that evil monster known as NL caused me to shy away from the game - as did the fact that prior to 2 yrs ago there was almost no such thing as a regularly spread game in A.C. They would put down the occasional 25-50 or 50-100 when the big boys came to town but this amounted to far less than 50-75 hours per year, not to mention that I didn't have the cash for this game and would have undoubtedly been gutted if I have.

Three tables of 2-5, each full ? That is a very new phenomenon.

I may just hop in the car and see if I can get into one of them.

Saturday night - Christmas Eve no less - in A.C. playing NL ?

How cool am I ? [img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img]



Oh, if the fiance asks - I went out to help a friend with car trouble.

- (Sigh) They don't make a big enough piece of jewelry to get me out of the jam I'll be in if she finds out I left the house to play on Christmas Eve . . .


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and didn't take her with me. [img]/images/graemlins/mad.gif[/img]