Just getting started with $100 - Need advice...

I am going to gently wade into the partypoker real money scene with $100 taking advantage of a $50 bonus.

I don't need to make any major money with this, but I would like to make SOMETHING... Maybe $5-$10 a day by playing for a few hours in the evening...

Does anyone have any advice about which tables to play? My game is holdem and I prefer NL... But, given the small bankroll, I am open to suggetions for tables/stradegies...

Thanks!
TX

DONT GO TO PARTY POKER!

Put it in Pokerstars and play in the small games to start off. A $100 bankroll is not enough to get started on anything on party.

Originally Posted by gabe

DONT GO TO PARTY POKER!

Put it in Pokerstars and play in the small games to start off. A $100 bankroll is not enough to get started on anything on party.

Hmm... I was watching realmoney games that had $.25 and $.5 blinds... How much lower can they go? Could you explain what you mean?

TX

Originally Posted by texaslooby

Hmm... I was watching realmoney games that had $.25 and $.5 blinds... How much lower can they go? Could you explain what you mean?

TX

Read 'rilla's bankroll post
http://www.flopturnriver.com/phpBB2/...pic.php?t=4971

You need more than 4 buy ins to play this game.

With $100 I would reccomment lower stakes as well.

$100 can go very quickly on .25/.50 on PP, especially since people are All-in happy and will chase down flushes and straights at any cost. It's like putting $20 in a nickel machine in a casino. 20 minutes later (or less) it's gone before you know it.


You can play some sit and go's which cost $5 + $1 and if you are top 3 you get $25, $15, $10 respectively. I would suggest this only if you perform well in tournament style play.

UltimateBet (I know) and PokerStars (I think) go as low as 1-2 cent NL real-money games. I cut my teeth at UB 1-2 cent games ($2 Max buy-in), and just moved up to 5-10 cent games ($10 Max Buy-In).

In the 5-10 cent games, $100 is still only 10 Max buy-ins... so that's probably where you belong (assuming you aren't totally new to Hold Em and real-money games... and take it from me, Limit real-money games and No-Limit play-money games don't prepare you for real-money No-Limit games).

I've had sessions where I've had the equivalent of 3, even 4 Max Buy-Ins in an hour or two. I say equivalent, because I don't like my stack being much below 75% of the max buy-in so I re-load often for smaller amounts. Nothing worse than getting a monster hand with a short-stack where you can't take advantage.

I've been very happy at UBet 1-2 and 5-10 cent games, for what its worth.

And don't chase any site's Buy-In Bonus til you're ready for the games they offer. Those bonuses will ALWAYS be there when you are ready and properly funded.

Good Luck.

Originally Posted by texaslooby

.. Maybe $5-$10 a day by playing for a few hours in the evening...

Okay, for that you need to be playing something with (1/few -- 3?) X $10 BB

i.e. $2-$4.

Alas, to play 2/4 you should really have 1200 in the bank. Ick.

Not ragging, just pointing out that $10 a day is not a reasonable expectation for a beginner. Or anyone with a $100 BR.

If you like NL you've got the BR to do 5/.50 at stars. Or the .25/.50 if you're pretty confident you can start winning from the gate.

But at .25/.50 you can only count on $1.50/hr or so.

This is the one area where I'm either a total idiot or a total exception. I play on UB. When I started playing, I deposited $25. I played the micros for the first part of december and was exstatic when I had made $5 after a week or two. I did what I now know (according to everyone) was wrong. I moved up from .01/.02 to .05/.10. With $30. And I won. Within a couple of weeks I was up to $80. As the holidays approached it became bothersome to find a game in the always-full .05/.10, so I moved up to .10/.25. And I won. By the end of my X-mas break, I was at $190. I had achieved my goal - making more over the break than my friends made on their trip to Vegas.

What makes this either completely wrong or delightfully right is that I did all of it playing with the min buyins. So those .10/.25 tables weren't costing me $25 to play at and if I busted, I didn't lose that much. I lost $5. Again, this goes against everything almost anyone here will tell you. For some reason, it worked for me (up to the point that a bad run of cards combined with too little sleep and a mistaken attempt to move up yet again - to .25/.50...a week in which I lost all but $10 and started over again at the .05/.10 tables). The rest is in my sig. I'm still trying to decide if/when to adjust my min-buyin strat. Just seems to easy to make more money than I could otherwise for me to give it up...

- Jeffrey

Jeffrey... our UBet stories and timelines are similar... we have no doubt played against each other. Some observations.

1.
By my counting, you have lost $15 in all your playing. Yes, you had your roll up to $190, but now it is at $10 from a $25 start. Attribute the losses to whatever excuses you wish (and it is good to analyze past play), but that fact is that today you have $10. I think you'll be better to view it that way, rather than just "dismiss" the $180 loss to poor game-choice or playing when tired. Las Vegas was built off of people who remember their wins and dismiss their losses.

2.
Lots here, and from my limited experience I'd concur, advise never playing NL with the minimum buy-in. You limit both your downside, but also your upside with minimum buy-ins. And if you are a winning player, it is the upside potential you should optimize. A monster hand with a short stack just kills your winning potential. Min Buy-ins are for poor players waiting for their next payday so they can deposit more money. I assume that is not you.

3.
Read your own words again...
"Just seems to easy to make more money than I could otherwise for me to give it up... "
Then read item 1 again.

Good Luck

Originally Posted by JeffreyGB

Again, this goes against everything almost anyone here will tell you. For some reason, it worked for me (up to the point that a bad run of cards combined with too little sleep and a mistaken attempt to move up yet again - to .25/.50...a week in which I lost all but $10

i.e. did not "work" -- except on a very short timescale.

No offense at all, man: anyone from Tulsa has got to be cool. But your startup streak is not uncommon at all. A surprising number of people pop up quickly when they first play online. LOL I popped up $500 my first week, with a $45 deposit.

But I knew Zero about what I was doing so when it popped back down I was all angry -- because I was confused and uncertain. It's just part of the process, I think.

Your first few months online are for finding your feet. Poke around at some games and see what you're good at. No, you don't absolutely HAVE to have 300BB to check out a game -- but your "main game", where your steady cash is coming from, should be planned out, played, and bankrolled properly.

Originally Posted by hankr

I'd concur, advise never playing NL with the minimum buy-in. You limit both your downside, but also your upside with minimum buy-ins.

Yes. You don't need to buy in for the max, but near it. How will you feel when you get that straight-flush versus two guys with deep stacks and good hands, but only drag $10 with it?

Moving away from ring games, I think $100 is enough for Party's $5 SnGs (even with the astronomical rake).

I started Party's $5 SnGs with $60 and in 4 days I was at $150.

Originally Posted by hankr

Jeffrey... our UBet stories and timelines are similar... we have no doubt played against each other. Some observations.

Very possibly. What's your handle? I'm JGB146.

Originally Posted by hankr

1.
By my counting, you have lost $15 in all your playing. Yes, you had your roll up to $190, but now it is at $10 from a $25 start. Attribute the losses to whatever excuses you wish (and it is good to analyze past play), but that fact is that today you have $10. I think you'll be better to view it that way, rather than just "dismiss" the $180 loss to poor game-choice or playing when tired. Las Vegas was built off of people who remember their wins and dismiss their losses.

I failed to mention that once I had tripled my deposit I withdrew it so I was playing only on profit. When I hit $10, technically I was at $35. And I'm not just dismissing the loss without analyzing it. There were many things I did wrong that week: playing out of my BR (when I tried first to move up in stakes and then to start playing with the max buyin), playing at all when I was having to wake up at 8am or earlier for class and couldn't get to sleep 'til after 4am due to the patterns I developed over the holiday break, playing more hands than I had previously/have since (again, a behavior I attribute to bad judgement from the above). I took a week off from playing afterwards to analyze and gather myself together.

Originally Posted by hankr

2.
Lots here, and from my limited experience I'd concur, advise never playing NL with the minimum buy-in. You limit both your downside, but also your upside with minimum buy-ins. And if you are a winning player, it is the upside potential you should optimize. A monster hand with a short stack just kills your winning potential. Min Buy-ins are for poor players waiting for their next payday so they can deposit more money. I assume that is not you.

The reason I started doing this was game selection - I wanted to be able to play without waiting around for an hour on a waiting list. Since then I've continued because I feel I can beat the competition here. It's only slightly riskier to play at .10/.25 with a $5 roll than it is .05/.10, but I can make a huge amount more. I can't count the number of times I've bought in with $5 and left with $30-$50. (Granted probably half of those I busted out at least once or twice first, but therein is my point - because I'm buying in with an amount that is affordable to my BR, I do not get pushed around even though I've got a small stack).

Originally Posted by hankr

3.
Read your own words again...
"Just seems to easy to make more money than I could otherwise for me to give it up... "
Then read item 1 again.

Good Luck

Thanks for the GL. I know that was worded badly, but what I was saying is that I can make more for my $5 buyin at the .10/.25 stakes than at the .05/.10. So I don't want to buy in at the lower level. I beat the competition with about equal results either way.

- Jeffrey

Originally Posted by LeFou

Originally Posted by JeffreyGB

Again, this goes against everything almost anyone here will tell you. For some reason, it worked for me (up to the point that a bad run of cards combined with too little sleep and a mistaken attempt to move up yet again - to .25/.50...a week in which I lost all but $10

i.e. did not "work" -- except on a very short timescale.

We'll see Currently I've made back all my losses and then some. I think I have a more thought out and controlled approach to my BR now than I did then. And as I said in the quote, it wasn't playing the way I had been that hurt me - it was changing it up (and doing it at the worst possible time relative to my mental ability). The changes I made reflected the more traditional BR strategy (i.e. Max buyin) and exactly what people would have told me not to do (i.e. move up yet again before my BR was ready). I think I actually lost more playing at the level I'd been dominating (for small amounts) because my losses actually hurt me significantly and it was a lot harder to make back a max buyin than a $5 buyin.

- Jeffrey

Originally Posted by texaslooby

I am open to suggetions for stradegies...
TX

72o AI



Seriously youve jinxed yourself with that typo.

I definently notice i go in an ebb and flow with what i make. I started with 10 bucks and got up to 200 in like 3 days... then i blew it down to 50, got up to 200, down to 100, up to 300, etc. etc. up to 480 and now i'm at 410 and climbing. i play at .25/.50 even though my BR can't quite afford it according to most advice, because i eased my way in and am comfortable there. i've lost down from 400 to 350 about 4 times, a 50 dollar loss wouldn't phase me, and its not like i'm going to lose 7 buy-ins to bust out totally. just play at a level where you're comfortable and a streak of bad luck won't eat your whole br.

moral of the story - in my experience, you will probably do well at points, and lose a lot at other points. best things you can do are don't get overconfident when you win, don't move up in limits after a big run as you'll just go AI and lose it all too fast, and expect to struggle for a while before you win.