Lowest beatable limit?

[AAmaz0n]

well, let's take a rough cut at the CA rake.

Let's deal with the $3 house drop, the $1 jackpot rake is essentially a side bet.

In 100 hands, the house takes in $300. assuming you are playing 9 handed, that makes your contribution $33.Ok, if you are a tight player, your end is a bit lower, but let's look at this number.

At 2/4 $33 is a bit more than 8 BB, so you would need to make more than 8 BB/100 to break even, not counting the $1 jackpot sidebet that is taken out.

If the rake is the same $3 at 3/6 and 4/8. Then the numbers are 5.5 BB/100 and 4 BB/100 to break even.

Ok, this is just an initial hack, I'm ignoring the fact that you play tight enough that you pay less than the table average of rake, so the actual number should be a bit lower.

It also doesn't count the "no flop no drop" situations that come up every so often, but those shouldn't affect the bottom line too much.

Also, I'm treating the jackpot drop as a side bet that should even out over time, although it will take quite a while to get into "the long run" where folks at your table (hopefully you!) hit the thing. They are taking $100 over 100 hands for this which 9 handed translates into 3 BB/100 at 2/4, 2 BB/100 at 3/6 and 1.5 BB/100 at 4/8 until that glorious day when the jackpot is hit at your table.

I play very tight, and my contribution to the rake online seems to be about 2/3 of table average. If we apply that number to the above analysis, it would be:

5.3 BB/100 at 2/4
3.7 BB/100 at 3/6
2.7 BB/100 at 4/8

just to break even.

I think that they take $4 at 6/12, which by the same set of calculations would be 3.7 BB/100 for table average rake and 2.5 BB/100 for someone fairly tight.

by contrast, the 10/20 game with the same $3 drop would be 1.6 BB/100 by the table average, and about 1 BB/100 for a tight player to break even.

I think that this is a pretty fair appoximation. Hope that others agree.

Shauna

amazon/shauna,

those are in the ball park of some of the other numbers.. sounds like you have to move way up in limit to avoid the effect of the rake.

one thing about B&M is that the players can be really, really bad, which i only see online in tournaments, B&M where the downside is capped or in micro-limits... there are lots of o.k. players at 4/8 online i find. B&M the o.k. players just don't have to patience to wait for cards that they do online (either multi-tabling or watching TV)

If you leave the table with more than what you sat down with, you beat the rake. Maybe you win more in the same situation on-line, but I don't get free drinks brought to my study by "silicone valley", either

[Dazarath]

[ QUOTE ]
well, let's take a rough cut at the CA rake.

Let's deal with the $3 house drop, the $1 jackpot rake is essentially a side bet.

In 100 hands, the house takes in $300. assuming you are playing 9 handed, that makes your contribution $33.Ok, if you are a tight player, your end is a bit lower, but let's look at this number.

At 2/4 $33 is a bit more than 8 BB, so you would need to make more than 8 BB/100 to break even, not counting the $1 jackpot sidebet that is taken out.

If the rake is the same $3 at 3/6 and 4/8. Then the numbers are 5.5 BB/100 and 4 BB/100 to break even.

Ok, this is just an initial hack, I'm ignoring the fact that you play tight enough that you pay less than the table average of rake, so the actual number should be a bit lower.

It also doesn't count the "no flop no drop" situations that come up every so often, but those shouldn't affect the bottom line too much.

Also, I'm treating the jackpot drop as a side bet that should even out over time, although it will take quite a while to get into "the long run" where folks at your table (hopefully you!) hit the thing. They are taking $100 over 100 hands for this which 9 handed translates into 3 BB/100 at 2/4, 2 BB/100 at 3/6 and 1.5 BB/100 at 4/8 until that glorious day when the jackpot is hit at your table.

I play very tight, and my contribution to the rake online seems to be about 2/3 of table average. If we apply that number to the above analysis, it would be:

5.3 BB/100 at 2/4
3.7 BB/100 at 3/6
2.7 BB/100 at 4/8

just to break even.

I think that they take $4 at 6/12, which by the same set of calculations would be 3.7 BB/100 for table average rake and 2.5 BB/100 for someone fairly tight.

by contrast, the 10/20 game with the same $3 drop would be 1.6 BB/100 by the table average, and about 1 BB/100 for a tight player to break even.

I think that this is a pretty fair appoximation. Hope that others agree.

Shauna

[/ QUOTE ]

This is a very good start. For the purposes of this discussion, let's just count the jackpot drop as rake. I understand that the EV evens out in the long run, but I'm not sure my friend will be playing 200k hands at Commerce during the next couple years of school. So for all practical purposes, he just looks at the BBJ drop as gone forever.

I'm not sure what the general win percentage is for a 9-handed table, but I just assumed it'd be around 7%. In which case, one would need to win 7 BB/100 just to breakeven. Someone earlier posted that he believes the PP 0.50/1 is tougher than the Commerce 2/4, so if we assume that's true, then using the PP 0.50 game as a comparison is good enough.

The only thing we need now is the amount lost to rake over 100 hands.

[ QUOTE ]
If you leave the table with more than what you sat down with, you beat the rake.

[/ QUOTE ]

Just.. no. I don't think I should need to explain why.

[ThaHero]

[ QUOTE ]
amazon, thanks for the jackpot information!!!

i think 4/8 is reasonably beatable.... i said 1.5 or maybe slightly less rake per hour. and i think i was 30 hands an hour, so that 5 BB/100....

i think one nice thing about B&M being so slow is that very few people have the discipline or the interest to play tight=aggressive. you can easily fold 15 non-blinds in a row.

but it would be nicer to play the 10-20 limit.

can someone tell me what i need realistically to play at that level? i saw the comment that you don't need 300BB's to play tight-aggressive and i agree.. can you get away with 150 BB's??

don't get me wrong, no-limit cash or shorthanded limit are completely different stories

[/ QUOTE ]

If you are playing live, obviously the game goes slower. Therefore, I suppose you would lose money slower as well than if you were in a similar game online playing twice as many hands an hour.

If you had another job, then no, 300bb isn't necessary if you're playing on a regular basis. The amount you play probably won't be so great to where you wouldn't be able to "reload" if need be, or increase your bankroll.

FWIW, I never have 300bb for any live limit I play, but I don't play live that much. I sit down with what I have, maybe a little in reserve. Essentially I view it as taking a shot, although I don't plan on playing it fulltime. I play .5/1 and 1/2 limit online, $25-$100NL online. Obviously the quality of opponents I face in the 4/8+ limit and $100NL aren't going to be up to par with what I face online, since online is somewhat tougher. I should be a winner in these games and a huge bankroll shouldn't be necessary if I'm just sitting in those games for once or twice a month or so.

[AKQJ10]

I certainly think Foxwoods $2/4 is beatable. I put some relevant thoughts here: http://poker.wikicities.com/wiki/Low-limit_rake (Feel free to edit.)

[Dazarath]

Ok, I couldn't get any response from the micro forum, so I took a look at Party's rake structure instead. From that, I'm going to assume a $0.50 rake per hand you win. This would mean that 5 BB/100 at a 7% hand winning rate translates to ~8-9 BB/100 unraked. This would imply that it's possible to beat the rake.

Of course, each assumption I made in the calculation has some possible degree of error associated with it. If I erred on the plus side, then the actual number may be too low to be beatable. If I erred on the minus side, then the 2/4 game is definitely beatable, as well as quite profitable.

[Dazarath]

[ QUOTE ]
I certainly think Foxwoods $2/4 is beatable. I put some relevant thoughts here: http://poker.wikicities.com/wiki/Low-limit_rake (Feel free to edit.)

[/ QUOTE ]

One thing you should note. If you're beating the game for 1 BB/hr, then the game is beatable. It doesn't matter what the rake is at that point, because it's already been factored into the winrate.

The problem comes in when you try to compare online to live, because the rake structures are not comparable. The rake live is so much higher. The way I was trying to get around this was to calculate a theoretical BB/100 in an unraked game, and then factor in the rake. Your true winrate will be your unraked BB/100 - rake/100. If this number is positive, then the game is beatable. If this number is really low, like 0.5 net BB/100, then the game is beatable, but not worthwhile. If it's negative, well, you're better off playing 2/4 online until you're bankrolled to play higher stakes live.

[mosquito]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I certainly think Foxwoods $2/4 is beatable. I put some relevant thoughts here: http://poker.wikicities.com/wiki/Low-limit_rake (Feel free to edit.)

[/ QUOTE ]

One thing you should note. If you're beating the game for 1 BB/hr, then the game is beatable. It doesn't matter what the rake is at that point, because it's already been factored into the winrate.

The problem comes in when you try to compare online to live, because the rake structures are not comparable. The rake live is so much higher. The way I was trying to get around this was to calculate a theoretical BB/100 in an unraked game, and then factor in the rake. Your true winrate will be your unraked BB/100 - rake/100. If this number is positive, then the game is beatable. If this number is really low, like 0.5 net BB/100, then the game is beatable, but not worthwhile. If it's negative, well, you're better off playing 2/4 online until you're bankrolled to play higher stakes live.

[/ QUOTE ]

You seem predisposed to steering your friend away from the 2-4 game, which is fine. No argument here. There are very few good reasons to play that low live, most of them will not apply to most people trying to make money at the game.

But if you tell him it's unbeatable, you are just lying to yourself and him both. What I see is that you are trying to make the math fit your views, when there is evidence that your views are incorrect.

i know i did my own "back of envelope analysis" but was wondering if it's correct.

i was thinking 10% rake to $3 max at lower limits (2-4) and 5% rake to to $5 max at 5-10... is that correct?

are online rakes lower per 100 hand basis? i thought they were somewhat similar (before rakeback or bonus $$$$$ - which are basically price discounting).

now that i think about it, i'm thinking that B&M rake for 5/10 might MAX out at $5, whereas internet rake for 5/10 might MAX out at $3... is that correct? (again, before any discounts)

thanks in advance!!!