Bankroll Requirements

[pzhon]

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I would win a lot more by buying in for $50 at a NL 100 or NL 200 table than I do buying in for $50 at a NL $50 table.

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Explain please.

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My win rate in BB/100 does not drop noticeably when I buy in short.

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My win rate in BB/100 does not drop noticeably when I buy in short.

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And I'm sure you have the sample size to prove it? 1 or 2 bb/100 over 30,000 hands is very big.

Sorry, I didn't really explain my position well. The idea behind it is that buying in for 50BB should be exactly as profitable as buying in full for 100BB at half the stakes, minus maybe .5bb/100 for higher blinds. Thus, in bb/100, your winrate should be half as high at the 100s than the 50s because at the 100s the BB is twice as big, for the same buyin.

If your winrate is the same at both levels, you are running hot as [censored].

[pzhon]

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And I'm sure you have the sample size to prove it? 1 or 2 bb/100 over 30,000 hands is very big.

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You don't think I have enough hands? What's next, will you say that I probably buy in short because I am underbankrolled, or some other speculative nonsense? That's usually how these discussions have gone in the past. To forestall that, I am massively overbankrolled for the highest NL game I play regularly, NL 400. Despite this, when I play NL 100, I usually buy in short, and I have for the past 20k NL 100 hands. I usually didn't buy in short for the first 20k hands. My win rate hasn't changed noticeably between those.

However, even if my win rate drops by 2 BB when I buy in short, it would still mean that buying in for $50 at a NL $100 table is much more profitable than buying in for $50 at a NL $50 table. Winning 8 BB/100 ($16/100) at NL 100 is better than winning 12 BB/100 ($12/100) at NL 50. (Actually, according to PokerTracker, my win rate is higher at NL 100 than NL 50, but I didn't use my observed win rates.) So, your suggestion (which is not supported by my evidence) argues for buying in short at a higher stakes game.

[yeau2]

How do you feel about giving a weighted average to the percent of times I should be re racking to the full amount and the times I stick with a short stack. In other words, the % of times I decide I need a full stack vs the times I don't should be added above the "standard" bankroll I judge from my shortstack times 20 bankroll.

[rachelwxm]

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And I'm sure you have the sample size to prove it? 1 or 2 bb/100 over 30,000 hands is very big.

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You don't think I have enough hands? What's next, will you say that I probably buy in short because I am underbankrolled, or some other speculative nonsense? That's usually how these discussions have gone in the past. To forestall that, I am massively overbankrolled for the highest NL game I play regularly, NL 400. Despite this, when I play NL 100, I usually buy in short, and I have for the past 20k NL 100 hands. I usually didn't buy in short for the first 20k hands. My win rate hasn't changed noticeably between those.

However, even if my win rate drops by 2 BB when I buy in short, it would still mean that buying in for $50 at a NL $100 table is much more profitable than buying in for $50 at a NL $50 table. Winning 8 BB/100 ($16/100) at NL 100 is better than winning 12 BB/100 ($12/100) at NL 50. (Actually, according to PokerTracker, my win rate is higher at NL 100 than NL 50, but I didn't use my observed win rates.) So, your suggestion (which is not supported by my evidence) argues for buying in short at a higher stakes game.

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I think buying 25 at 50NL has a higher hourly rate than buyin full at 25NL especially if there is alot of raising pf. I have some success at 400-1000NL games.

I think the general knowledge in this forum is
Buyin short = moron/fish/(stupid guy who push 22 pf)

This is far from truth. I think it requires different skills to be successful.

I hate playing against short buyings btw.

[dbitel]

I agree that there are times where buying in short can be the more +EV, but it should by no means be your default move. I find that at SSNL, most of my money comes from my AA vs KK or QQ and me hitting sets vs an overpair. And in these situations, if my oppponent has 100BB, I usually get all 100. So I want to be fully stacked to take full advantage of these situations, so i think that more often than not, buying in for the full amount is the most +EV

[teamdonkey]

Phzon, i absolutely disagree in several spots:

-20k hands is about 480k short of what you'd need to tell if there's any real difference in your winrate when buying in short. Actually closer to a million: half buying full, half buying in short. Do the calculations for yourself... i'm not joking. I don't think anyone would argue your buyin amount would make more than 3 or 4 BB/100 difference, and since you can't narrow your winrate down to a range that proves this difference without at least a half a million hands, you'll never be able to make that statement with any sort of credibility.

-Tommy Angelo / ElDiablo are talking about buying in short until you get a feel for the table, then buying in for more. Not buying in short and staying there.

-in small stakes NL, not buying in for the max because the other big stacks are good is close to rediculous. There's only 2 situations where it's a disadvantage:
1. your post flop play is poor. If this is the case, you should be actively working to improve it (which you need larger stacks for) or playing a game where it isn't as important (MTTs, STTs).
2. the big stacks at the table are much better than you. If this is the case, you have no business being at that table. The rake is too hard to beat by itself without having to deal with losing chips over time to better players also. I'd argue strongly that if you're not at least very close to the best player at your table, in almost all cases you're losing money.

Buying in small makes your decisions easier. It certainly allows for plays and situations not available to you when you're deep. But it's the complexity of poker that makes it difficult (and profitable), and the difficult decisions you face when playing deep should be where the majority of your edge against bad players comes from. In the long term there really shouldn't be any arguement as to which is more +EV to a winning player.

[pzhon]

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-20k hands is about 480k short of what you'd need to tell if there's any real difference in your winrate when buying in short.

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There seems to be a folklore about how many hands you need to be able to draw conclusions about your win rate. Below whatever number someone wants to give in an argument, they will say your sample size is negligible. (By contrast, thedustustr offered NO evidence for his assertion that buying in short should cut my win rate proportionately. I have offered numerical and logical arguments against it.) As a mathematician, I prefer the much more accurate idea that rather than using an arbitrary threshold (chosen beforehand, or adjusted later to try to disqualify my evidence), we can recognize that the observed win rate smoothly becomes increasingly accurate with more evidence. A very high number of hands is needed to pin down a win rate within 1 BB/100. A much lower number of hands is needed to provide substantial evidence that my win rate is not cut in half when I buy in short.

20k hands each is enough that I would notice if buying in short were to cut my win rate in half the vast majority of the time. The 95% confidence interval from the last 20k hands does not include winning only 6.5 BB/100. (33 PTBB/Sqrt(200) = 2.33 PTBB/100.) While I don't have strong evidence that I would not win 13 PTBB/100 by buying in for 100 BB, I don't believe it.

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I don't think anyone would argue your buyin amount would make more than 3 or 4 BB/100 difference,

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That's precisely what people are arguing when they say you must cut your stakes in half and buy in for 100 BB instead of buying in for $50 at a NL $100 table.

I'll respond to the rest later.

[teamdonkey]

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That's precisely what people are arguing when they say you must cut your stakes in half and buy in for 100 BB instead of buying in for $50 at a NL $100 table.

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I agree with you, thats a stupid arguement. And i'll retract my figure of 500k hands needed.... using my standard deviation, just shy of 250k hand samples would narrow your win rate to a 3BB/100 range (95% confidence), and you could statistically claim at that point, if your observed win rate was exactly the same for both sets of data, that the difference (if any) in buying in short vs big was not more than 3BB/100. With 20k hands all you can say is it's not costing you 10.75BB/100 (again using my SD, and assuming observed win rate for both is exactly the same).