Going to try playing live 1/2 for a living....

[IgorSmiles]

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but rarely do you get a 2:1 draw, that you can put your stack in and be right, ie you ARENT getting the right odds.

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It is very common to get these odds in a 1/2 B&M game.

[IgorSmiles]

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That is flat out wrong. Tight and conservative is the best way to make the most possible at 99.999% of games. Gone are the days of "doyle's style", or whatever you cats call it.

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Doyle's style? No, that isnt the issue here.

If you are in the BB with a suited ace, and an early player makes it $10 to go, 6 players call, do you see a flop?

I do.

There is now $81 in the pot (SB folded) and the flop comes ace and 2 of your suit. Original bettor goes all in with his obvious A/K or A/Q. Do you call?

I do. This hand and similar ones come up 5-20 times per session at 1/2 NL. You want to tell me that a 5/10 limit game has bigger swings than this? I dont buy it.

[lefty rosen]

What about inflation. I will give you guys a story from me. I played 5/10 back in 95' to 97'. I was making 10 bucks an hour during the day and 15 on weekends and late night sessions. Everything is 25 to 50 percent more expensive now. Lord knows you will have to move up or be starved out trying to earn money at 1/2 in a 10 years. Really you should aspire to get a roll together and beat the next limit up at least.......

[Lawrence Ng]

40 buy-ins.

I assume it's a $200 max buy-in. So that would be around $8k.

If you want to make some serious dough in NL, you have to be able to capitalize on a lot of small edges which means you will have some larger swings. Thus the bigger bankroll.

Lawrence

[MicroBob]

you call an opponents' all-in up to 20x in a single session?

[DaveduFresne]

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since when is $35K-$50K not a living wage..you must be kidding me..read the guy's posts...he just bought a car for $2K. If he is single depending on the cost of living of where he plays-$750-$1000 a week is a decent wage not just for him but 40% of Americans.

What area of the country are we talking about OP?



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$35-50K is barely getting by in cities like Los Angeles, New York, and San Francisco. Making that amount, a reasonable rent is $400-700 a month. If you live in Austin Texas, you are not gonna have trouble finding a one or two bedroom apartment on the low end of that amount. In the bigger coast cities though, you can only find those type rents in rougher areas. In any half decent area, the cheapest, smallest studio you will find runs $750 and up. So your income is extremely streched due to high rents. At $35-50K a year in Los Angeles you are looking at 1/4 to 1/2 of your take home income for rent.

Sometimes those of us in these type areas forget that much of the country has a lower cost of living than we do.

[/ QUOTE ]

Guys, guys, guys. No one said my life's ambition was to play 1/2 NL at B&M's for the rest of my life....its just a way of building up my bankroll, and just fyi, including taxes, my weekly expenses average $400/week, but I've just turned 25 and hopefully in the future I will have a much more ornate life.

No offense, but the purpose of this post wasn't to get ideas of what you thought of playing for a living or whether I'm a slacker or whatever other ideas are in your heads.

What I wanted to know is it doable? If I can average $700/wk than I would say that would satisfy me for the time being. (The cost of living in my city is probably 1/10 of Los Angeles lol).

Just as an update, I went to Turning Stone today. I had to wake up early this morning and had a number of errands to do, so by the time I was able to get up their (1 1/2 driving as well [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img] I was quite fatigued. And then it took forever for them to get a 100 NL table together. So it was like 10pm by the time I finally got to play poker, and I had been up since 6am.

But being it was my first "official" day, I was feeling pumped. Mostly college kids at the table and one college kid's dad (which is basically the usual Turning Stone crowd), I knew I had a chance for a good night when college kid in seat 2 called older guys all in on the flop with just overcards.

I got terrible cards for the first half hour or so, and folded pretty much every hand. Then I got KJ suited in UTG +1 and did a little image raise to ten in case I ever happened to get real cards. One caller then a shortstack goes over the top for 25 total. I looked at the first caller as he was looking at his cards and making the call, so I figured him for some kind of speculative hand like suited connectors or a small pp. Still wasn't happy knowing I was behind shorstack, but figured I probably wasn't way behind and the way things go at this casino I could be ahead. So I call and first caller folds like I thought he would. Shorstack flips over fives and I win the race.

A little later I get pocket tens and reraise this midstack fishy player from his ten to thirty. I was hoping he would fold his AJ or whatever he had, but he pushed for like thirty more. I called and he flipped up KQ offsuit and a river king gave him the pot.

So I was a little shorstacked at this point, had about seventy or so. I'm in BB and look down at lovely ladies. There has been a raise to seven by a college kid waiting for a bigger game, and then a reraise to 15 by older guy. Older guy seems pretty solid, but he isn't a nit either. One thing I've picked up on him is postflop anyway, if he bets he doesn't have more than top pair. Any time he had a monster he slowplayed. So I'm hoping this theory bears out and that he would have smoothcalled with Aces. To be honest though, I thought he could have Kings, and less likely Aces. However, the way this game plays (people calling all ins with far less than Queens) I figure a push is in order, as I'm surely not folding. Older guy told me had pocket fours, but he ended up mucking so I'm not sure if that was true or not. College kid calls with some random hand, I want to say KJ offsuit, but anyway he doesn't improve and I a little more than double up.

A little later, an ep raiser makes it seven to go (generally a pot sweetener raise with a speculative hand in this game, although occasionally you have to watch out for a big pair with it) anyway, there's three callers in front of me, and I'm one of the button, and look at J7 of spades. Now online this hand would be in the muck in a second, but in this game if I make a flush, two pair or trips I can easily stack somebody. Flop came J72 two clubs, I led out weakly hoping original raiser would put me all in or something, but he folded, and older guy calls, I jazz it up to twenty on the turn (which was a brick of some kind) and then the river was a Queen (not clubs). This worries me slightly, and I'm wishing I put more money in on the flop, but I put a twenty dollar stop bet in, and older guy folded, claiming he had AJ (I think flush draw most likely.)

Now at some point a little later, a weak player came in to the left of me, you could tell by his body language and whether he appeared interested in the hand or not whether he had something. He had made all small preflop raises up until a hand with me came up. He had lost about 1/3 of his stack by raising preflop and someone else taking his pot down. Anyway, I was on the button or one off the button, and we already had about six callers, I looked down at A5 offsuit, decide to limp in even though I hate Ace rag, but figure maybe I can get a nice flop. Well guy to my left makes it eighteen. Everyone folds to me. Now I've seen this move in B&M a few times before, with a player like that it usually means some kind of speculative hand with which he wants to pick up the pot with. I put him on suited connectors or possibly AJ. I think for a second and then say I'm all in. He fidgets with his chips clearly frustrated but then calls. I then get annoyed at myself for thinking I had made a great read, and honestly tell him "nice call". Except then he flips over his hand and he had QJ. Neither of us improve and I take the pot.

The one hand I cant seem to remember occurred a little after this. I had about 220 before the hand, and it dented me back to 140 or so. I was a little annoyed after it because it was the second race in a row I lost so I guess thats why it flew out of my head. I want to say I had pocket Jacks which got beaten by KQ but that could be wrong.

I got myself back up to about 220 in some inconsequential hands where I raised a couple pots, bet on the flop, got called, and took it down on the turn.

The last hand I was involved in was with AK suited. Old guy raised to seven (I wouldn't say he was loose, but this could mean anything). Guy that beat my Jacks or whatever it was with KQ reraises him. To be completely honest I really wasn't worried about his reraise. Sure he couldve woken up with pocket Aces or Kings, but his range of hands included many considerably weaker than mine. Even though he had over a hundred, I determined I was going to get him all in preflop if I could. I reraise to 45, and older guy mucks. Kid goes into the tank for some time, and then says "what the hell it's only money" and moves all in. I call and he flips over KQ again, but this time suited. This time neither one of us hits, and I take his stack.

At this point a lot of the fish had busted, and a couple other players had stacks around my size (older guy had considerably more) and I was feeling tired and hungry, so I waited for my blind and racked them up for a $240 3 hour profit and used my comp card towards a nice seafood dinner. With expenses, my profit was probably more like 180 bucks, but considering it was a long day for me, I was quite happy.

And yes I know this was only one session, but so far in my ten+ trips to Turning Stone, I've never gone home stuck save for one time when I foolishly played for 36 hours straight where I was up 700 in the first 24 hours, suffered a horrendous beat for $350 and then donked off the rest of my profit plus a couple hundred extra.

If I lived closer to Turning Stone I would surely try it everyday (not sure how live weekdays are though as I've pretty much only gone up on weekends), but as it is its a pretty grueling drive, so I haven't decided what I'm going to do.

I have a few more questions I like to ask of those who would like to help (not bankroll just some other general matters, but I'm completely whiped now so I'll post them later.)

Thanks to those of you who have been helpful, and good luck at the tables all.

David duFresne

[MicroBob]

i only skimmed over your post because it was actually longer than my average post-length.


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in my ten+ trips to Turning Stone, I've never gone home stuck save for one time

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you are not a long-term winning player if you have only played 10x.
you are also not a winning player if you think that your success over 10 sessions means ANYTHING.


[ QUOTE ]

If I lived closer to Turning Stone I would surely try it everyday (not sure how live weekdays are though as I've pretty much only gone up on weekends), but as it is its a pretty grueling drive

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not sure how close you are to any other poker rooms...but I get the impression that the 1.5 hour drive to Turning Stone is because it's the CLOSEST to you (to my knowledge there's not much else up there...maybe Niagara Falls if you're coming from that direction).

The cost of gas (and tolls perhaps??) as well as the fatigue from kaing that drive regularly will eat you alive.
no way you can make it given the new information you are providing.


I believe you also mentioned that it took them awhile just to get an NL game going. If this is the case on the weekends...then your problem on the weekdays might not be regarding how GOOD the game is..but whether the game even is there to be played.
(turning-stone regulars around here perhaps could provide more info on whether or not 1/2 NL is regularly spread at TS)

[DaveduFresne]

Guys, guys, guys. No one said my life's ambition was to play 1/2 NL at B&M's for the rest of my life....its just a way of building up my bankroll, and just fyi, including taxes, my weekly expenses average $400/week, but I've just turned 25 and hopefully in the future I will have a much more ornate life.

No offense, but the purpose of this post wasn't to get ideas of what you thought of playing for a living or whether I'm a slacker or whatever other ideas are in your heads.

What I wanted to know is it doable? If I can average $700/wk than I would say that would satisfy me for the time being. (The cost of living in my city is probably 1/10 of Los Angeles lol).

Just as an update, I went to Turning Stone today. I had to wake up early this morning and had a number of errands to do, so by the time I was able to get up their (1 1/2 driving as well I was quite fatigued. And then it took forever for them to get a 100 NL table together. So it was like 10pm by the time I finally got to play poker, and I had been up since 6am.

But being it was my first "official" day, I was feeling pumped. Mostly college kids at the table and one college kid's dad (which is basically the usual Turning Stone crowd), I knew I had a chance for a good night when college kid in seat 2 called older guys all in on the flop with just overcards.

I got terrible cards for the first half hour or so, and folded pretty much every hand. Then I got KJ suited in UTG +1 and did a little image raise to ten in case I ever happened to get real cards. One caller then a shortstack goes over the top for 25 total. I looked at the first caller as he was looking at his cards and making the call, so I figured him for some kind of speculative hand like suited connectors or a small pp. Still wasn't happy knowing I was behind shorstack, but figured I probably wasn't way behind and the way things go at this casino I could be ahead. So I call and first caller folds like I thought he would. Shorstack flips over fives and I win the race.

A little later I get pocket tens and reraise this midstack fishy player from his ten to thirty. I was hoping he would fold his AJ or whatever he had, but he pushed for like thirty more. I called and he flipped up KQ offsuit and a river king gave him the pot.

So I was a little shorstacked at this point, had about seventy or so. I'm in BB and look down at lovely ladies. There has been a raise to seven by a college kid waiting for a bigger game, and then a reraise to 15 by older guy. Older guy seems pretty solid, but he isn't a nit either. One thing I've picked up on him is postflop anyway, if he bets he doesn't have more than top pair. Any time he had a monster he slowplayed. So I'm hoping this theory bears out and that he would have smoothcalled with Aces. To be honest though, I thought he could have Kings, and less likely Aces. However, the way this game plays (people calling all ins with far less than Queens) I figure a push is in order, as I'm surely not folding. Older guy told me had pocket fours, but he ended up mucking so I'm not sure if that was true or not. College kid calls with some random hand, I want to say KJ offsuit, but anyway he doesn't improve and I a little more than double up.

A little later, an ep raiser makes it seven to go (generally a pot sweetener raise with a speculative hand in this game, although occasionally you have to watch out for a big pair with it) anyway, there's three callers in front of me, and I'm one of the button, and look at J7 of spades. Now online this hand would be in the muck in a second, but in this game if I make a flush, two pair or trips I can easily stack somebody. Flop came J72 two clubs, I led out weakly hoping original raiser would put me all in or something, but he folded, and older guy calls, I jazz it up to twenty on the turn (which was a brick of some kind) and then the river was a Queen (not clubs). This worries me slightly, and I'm wishing I put more money in on the flop, but I put a twenty dollar stop bet in, and older guy folded, claiming he had AJ (I think flush draw most likely.)

Now at some point a little later, a weak player came in to the left of me, you could tell by his body language and whether he appeared interested in the hand or not whether he had something. He had made all small preflop raises up until a hand with me came up. He had lost about 1/3 of his stack by raising preflop and someone else taking his pot down. Anyway, I was on the button or one off the button, and we already had about six callers, I looked down at A5 offsuit, decide to limp in even though I hate Ace rag, but figure maybe I can get a nice flop. Well guy to my left makes it eighteen. Everyone folds to me. Now I've seen this move in B&M a few times before, with a player like that it usually means some kind of speculative hand with which he wants to pick up the pot with. I put him on suited connectors or possibly AJ. I think for a second and then say I'm all in. He fidgets with his chips clearly frustrated but then calls. I then get annoyed at myself for thinking I had made a great read, and honestly tell him "nice call". Except then he flips over his hand and he had QJ. Neither of us improve and I take the pot.

The one hand I cant seem to remember occurred a little after this. I had about 220 before the hand, and it dented me back to 140 or so. I was a little annoyed after it because it was the second race in a row I lost so I guess thats why it flew out of my head. I want to say I had pocket Jacks which got beaten by KQ but that could be wrong.

I got myself back up to about 220 in some inconsequential hands where I raised a couple pots, bet on the flop, got called, and took it down on the turn.

The last hand I was involved in was with AK suited. Old guy raised to seven (I wouldn't say he was loose, but this could mean anything). Guy that beat my Jacks or whatever it was with KQ reraises him. To be completely honest I really wasn't worried about his reraise. Sure he couldve woken up with pocket Aces or Kings, but his range of hands included many considerably weaker than mine. Even though he had over a hundred, I determined I was going to get him all in preflop if I could. I reraise to 45, and older guy mucks. Kid goes into the tank for some time, and then says "what the hell it's only money" and moves all in. I call and he flips over KQ again, but this time suited. This time neither one of us hits, and I take his stack.

At this point a lot of the fish had busted, and a couple other players had stacks around my size (older guy had considerably more) and I was feeling tired and hungry, so I waited for my blind and racked them up for a $240 3 hour profit and used my comp card towards a nice seafood dinner. With expenses, my profit was probably more like 180 bucks, but considering it was a long day for me, I was quite happy.

And yes I know this was only one session, but so far in my ten+ trips to Turning Stone, I've never gone home stuck save for one time when I foolishly played for 36 hours straight where I was up 700 in the first 24 hours, suffered a horrendous beat for $350 and then donked off the rest of my profit plus a couple hundred extra.

If I lived closer to Turning Stone I would surely try it everyday (not sure how live weekdays are though as I've pretty much only gone up on weekends), but as it is its a pretty grueling drive, so I haven't decided what I'm going to do.

I have a few more questions I like to ask of those who would like to help (not bankroll just some other general matters, but I'm completely whiped now so I'll post them later.)

Thanks to those of you who have been helpful, and good luck at the tables all.

David duFresne

[zombies kill]

when i used to play the foxwoods 1/2 almost exclusively, i used to make this much. and i dont think that im very good.

also, you dont need as big a roll as people are saying for this game. the variance is smaller than in limit... you can EASILY win 4 out of 5 times (depending on your style of play). unless you have a lot of living expenses... as long as youre paid up on your bills, $4k sounds about good.

dont listen to pseudo-bragging idiots who claim $50k/yr isnt a livable wage. it should go without saying that if it sounds good to you for whatever reasons, then itll work for you personally.

and the best tip i could ever give anyone for these lowlevel NL games is two words... LIMP RERAISE.

[zombies kill]

on a side note....

when i would play the fox 10/20 limit sometimes, i would often find myself playing with 2 or 3 late 20s pros. i would always be amazed how they would talk down about the 1/2 nl (which, of course, they never played). amongst a lot of midlevel limit players, the 1/2 games are thought of as somewhat of a joke... a kiddy game.

they would get excited when theyd scoop a nice $180 pot, and then claim theres no money whatsoever in the 1/2. they would look over at some total dumbass with $1200 in chips in front of him and say "the charge is just way too much".

it still amazes me to this day