ITH Poker Forum

[Doc T River]

I have tried using the bankroll calculator mentioned in another thread but I cannot get the link to work.

If I want to play .02/.05 FR, what should my bankroll be?

How big should my bankroll be if I want to play $5 tournaments?

I would say I am average in my risk tolerance.

[Piscivorous]

Here's a chart I made based on the bankroll guide of another site:



Pro column is for those people who would be devastated by a loss of their bankroll. It assumes a 1% failure rate if you are a solid winning player.

Protected column is for those players who don't rely on poker income, but like to make a decent income on the side. This is for players who don't rely on their bankroll, but would have a hard time replacing it.

Finally, Unprotected assumes a 10% chance of busting if you are an average winning player.

If you have an average risk tolerance, I'd go with Protected. This means you should have a $500 bankroll [100 x $5 MTTs]. You need only $125 to play 2c/5c NL. Or $20 if that is 2c/5c FL.

[osmosis21]

While I think Pisc's chart is helpful, there are a couple of things to keep in mind. If your poker bankroll is precious (you are a pro) you should have way more than 550 bb. The games are tougher there are winning players who have gone through 1K bb losing streaks and I think 1k should be the minimum (with the thought of moving down stakes before exhausting your bankroll).


On the other hand playing (for example) limit FR, in your example of .02/.05 according to pisc you would need 20 bucks....but if you played .05/.1 instead and went bust it shouldn't be too hard to replace the 20 bucks. (not taking into consideration the negative feelings towards busting).

Bankroll management is only important if you don't have the ability to replenish or replace the bankroll from an outside source (like a job)

[jrspm]

I don't know if the chart Pi posted was based on math or just comments, but I would say that all the requirements for NL cash, SNG's and MTT's are really low.

I don't think anyone should be playing with a 10% chance of busting unless you're happy to constantly re-deposit, which kinda makes a 'bankroll' pointless.

On the areas in which I'm most qualified to comment, I think 100 + buy-ins for a professional cash game player would not be too extreme. I think part of the issue here is that there isn't really as much of an option to move down levels as there would be for a recreational player, and dropping 20+ buy-ins when you have a 45 buy-in roll is psychologically very different from doing the same with a 100 buy-in roll. Anyone playing significant cash volume is going to regularly experience big swings.

For tournies, 40 buy-ins is particularly low, especially if you're playing in fields of 1,000+ regularly as anyone playing on Stars and FTP at low/mid stakes is likely to. I regularly go on streaks of 40+ tournies with barely a cash. I think a 100+ buy-in roll for a casual player would be a good start, but I'd certainly recommend more.

It's worth noting that tournies can be very different in comparison from other types of games where BR management is concerned, because unless you're playing MTT SNG's you won't be able to just play one buy-in level. So while I would suggest sticking to around ~100 buy-ins, there no problem if you want to play the Sunday Million when you sat in with a $6,000 bankroll, as long as you continue to play your normal $60 and under tournies around this and think you're +EV. There's noting wrong with taking a few shots.

[didod]

you just can multiple by 25 the BB and you will find the level