vpFREE2 Forums

Bankrolls

#1

Not to stir the pot, but I think you have to consider what type of VP
player you are before you can really determine your required bankroll.
If you are a professional VP player with no other income than I
believe you better have a very safe margin. If you are like me and
have another income and are just a active recreational player then you
still need to consider the volitility and level of your game, but if
you are under bankrolled and 'go broke' then the world doesnt end, and
you just take some time off and build another bankroll, personally
this has never happened and I hope it doesnt, but I could see it
happening. I personally am very interested in all the info about each
game as it does help me make intelligent choices (hopefully) about
what game I should study and play, so thanks to all who contribute.

Jim

#2

bankroll is an objective mathematical concept
in other words it doesn't matter what type of player you are (assuming
you are playing perfect or near perfect, less than perfect simply
changes your er and variance)
bankroll and risk of ruin equally effects pros, amateurs, progressive
bettors, and the truly clueless alike, whether you choose to believe
that or not

Not to stir the pot, but I think you have to consider what type of

VP

player you are before you can really determine your required

bankroll.

If you are a professional VP player with no other income than I
believe you better have a very safe margin. If you are like me and
have another income and are just a active recreational player then

you

still need to consider the volitility and level of your game, but if
you are under bankrolled and 'go broke' then the world doesnt end,

and

you just take some time off and build another bankroll, personally
this has never happened and I hope it doesnt, but I could see it
happening. I personally am very interested in all the info about

each

···

--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "jimnkelli" <jbecker11@c...> wrote:

game as it does help me make intelligent choices (hopefully) about
what game I should study and play, so thanks to all who contribute.

Jim

#3

--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "nightoftheiguana2000"
<nightoftheiguana2000@y...> wrote:

bankroll is an objective mathematical concept
in other words it doesn't matter what type of player you are (assuming
you are playing perfect or near perfect, less than perfect simply
changes your er and variance)
bankroll and risk of ruin equally effects pros, amateurs, progressive
bettors, and the truly clueless alike, whether you choose to believe
that or not

I really dont understand, if I am a pro with no other income and I go
bankrupt I am totally devestated/out on the street homeless. In my
personal situation if I lost my separate gambling bankroll (not the
money I have in the bank) it would dissapoint me, but it would not
effect my standard of living at all. How can these two be equal ??

Jim

#4

"nightoftheiguana2000" wrote:

bankroll is an objective mathematical concept
in other words it doesn't matter what type of player you are [snip]
bankroll and risk of ruin equally effects pros, amateurs,
progressive bettors, and the truly clueless alike, whether you
choose to believe that or not

The amount of gambling I do (short trips to Vegas or similar 5 to 10
times a year, playing mostly quarter VP with "shots" at higher
levels, internet poker in between) is big enough to be exciting when
I win & hurt when I lose. Objectively speaking, it's well within my
means. That is, fluctuations in my gambling don't create significant
changes in lifestyle.

If I have a good trip in Vegas, I may feel *psychologically* better
about making a more "frivolous" expenditure. But I simply don't play
at levels that'd significantly change my ability to pay my bills, or
my plans for retirement, etc, etc.

I do wonder how many gamblers are like this, & whether there's a
difference between the intelligent gamblers on this list & the great
unwashed at the machines, etc. When I see people at $100 or $500
blackjack tables, I wonder how many are wealthy enough to sustain a
big losing streak with minimal effects, & how many are risking
bankruptcy. It's hard to determine, since this type of personal
finance discussion is a societal taboo.

Anyway, my point is that perhaps the original poster was suggesting
that many of us play at a level at which our life bankroll is so much
larger than the bets being made that we don't need any further
bankroll considerations. Calculations of "risk of ruin" etc aren't
critical for us, since we've already (implicitly, instinctively)
chosen to play at a level where our risk of ruin is close enough to
zero.

Stuart (RandomStu)

#5

if you're playing the same game with the same strategy, the bankroll
and risk of ruin is the same
the pain of losing that bankroll might be different for someone who
has bet his total life savings versus say the sultan of brunei, but
the bankroll and risk of ruin is identical
(incidentally, most pros i know have alternate sources of income, some
legal and some not, so just like you, they rebuild bankrolls or they
drop down to lower bets like quarters instead of dollars, etc.)

--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "nightoftheiguana2000"
<nightoftheiguana2000@y...> wrote:
> bankroll is an objective mathematical concept
> in other words it doesn't matter what type of player you are

(assuming

> you are playing perfect or near perfect, less than perfect simply
> changes your er and variance)
> bankroll and risk of ruin equally effects pros, amateurs,

progressive

> bettors, and the truly clueless alike, whether you choose to

believe

> that or not
>
I really dont understand, if I am a pro with no other income and I

go

···

--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "jimnkelli" <jbecker11@c...> wrote:

bankrupt I am totally devestated/out on the street homeless. In my
personal situation if I lost my separate gambling bankroll (not the
money I have in the bank) it would dissapoint me, but it would not
effect my standard of living at all. How can these two be equal ??

Jim

#6

well, let's try to quantify things a bit here:
i'll assume you're playing 5 coin quarter full pay deuces wild with
perfect strategy, for that the risk number is 0.999346831, 5 royals is
4000 bets ($5,000), and for that bankroll the risk of ruin is
0.999346831^4000=0.07=7%
now, you said, "close enough to zero", so in your case a bankroll of
10 royals ($10,000) would be more appropriate and the risk of ruin
would be 0.999346831^8000=.005=0.5%
now, you've got savings of over say $100,000, so a $10,000 loss is no
big deal
but .... what happens if you decide to switch to dollars?
progressives? 10/7 doublebonus or even one eyed jacks?

ignore bankroll and risk of ruin at your own peril, it always exists,
whether you choose to believe it or not

for any gamble you need to ask:
1. is it fair and regulated?
2. what is the best strategy?
3. is it positive? (er>1) (add any cashback to er)
4. what is the variance?
5. do i have the bankroll to play? [variance/(er-1) bets]
6. do i have the patience to play a sufficient number of hands?
[N0=variance/(er-1)^2 hands=84% chance of winning]
7. are there better gambles? sharpe ratio squared (bankroll growth) =
(er-1)^2 x 10^7/variance

you are free to ignore these considerations, but they always apply
that's the nature of math, it's true whether you believe it or not

Anyway, my point is that perhaps the original poster was suggesting
that many of us play at a level at which our life bankroll is so

much

···

--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "Stuart" <sresnick2@c...> wrote:

larger than the bets being made that we don't need any further
bankroll considerations. Calculations of "risk of ruin" etc aren't
critical for us, since we've already (implicitly, instinctively)
chosen to play at a level where our risk of ruin is close enough to
zero.

Stuart (RandomStu)

#7

<<Anyway, my point is that perhaps the original poster was suggesting
that many of us play at a level at which our life bankroll is so much
larger than the bets being made that we don't need any further
bankroll considerations.>>

This is so true. Although some people seem to like living "on the edge," I have always found gambling to be much more enjoyable if I play quite a ways below what math would say should be my bankroll amount. I always would drag my feet at going up in denomination. I also don't enjoy "taking shots" at levels above my bankroll although some do. Maybe these characterize a frugal treatment of gambling.

Another factor to consider - one that is often overlooked - is that there is a big difference in a session/trip bankroll and a life-time bankroll. That can give rise to different definitions of bankroll. And from my personal experience in talking with a lot of gamblers, most of them are interested only in short-term bankrolls - how long is my money going to last today or on this trip.

···

________________________________________
Jean $¢ott - Go to http://www.FrugalGambler.biz
  for VP software and strategy cards and for the
  Frugal series of books.

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

#8

"nightoftheiguana2000" wrote:

i'll assume you're playing 5 coin quarter full pay deuces wild with
perfect strategy, for that the risk number is 0.999346831, 5 royals
is 4000 bets ($5,000), and for that bankroll the risk of ruin is
0.999346831^4000=0.07=7%
now, you said, "close enough to zero", so in your case a bankroll of
10 royals ($10,000) would be more appropriate and the risk of ruin
would be 0.999346831^8000=.005=0.5%

There's an additional consideration. Say a casual gambler plays less
than 100 hours of video poker per year (I'd guess that my own play is
something on that order of magnitude). If I know that $10K means
a .5% risk of ruin... the practical risk may be less than that, since
the .5% must include at least some theoretical cases in which
the "ruin" comes after 10,000 or more hours, & I'll never reach that
in a lifetime.

Maybe these long-term ruinations are so unlikely as to be discounted,
maybe the more mathematically inclined can clue me in. But we ought
to at least consider that the actual lifetime risk is less than the
infinite time risk.

Even on the psychological level... for many of us, if we play 100
hours in a year & lose $10K, it'd put a serious crimp in our
enjoyment & affect our overall budget for that year. But that .5%
would include those cases in which we lost a total of $10K over 20
years, & in that case we'd just experience it as a reasonable
expense for a generation of entertainment.

now, you've got savings of over say $100,000, so a $10,000 loss is
no big deal
but .... what happens if you decide to switch to dollars?
progressives? 10/7 doublebonus or even one eyed jacks?

Yeah, I'm sure there are lots of us who remain at the quarter level
for that very reason. We naturally stay at the level at which we
don't need to concern ourselves with losing amounts that will greatly
impact the rest of our lives.

I know there are people who gamble at a level where they'll go to
Vegas for a long weekend, & after one day have lost so much that they
have to stop gambling for the rest of the vacation, or get an earlier
flight home. I myself simply don't gamble that way. When I leave for
my few days in Vegas, I have an amount in my pocket (plus available
in easily accessible accounts) that I never go through it playing
quarter VP.

I don't know what the breakdown is between these different styles of
gambling. As with differing levels of desires for food, sex, etc,
etc... each of us has an internal thermostat for the amount of risk
we want in our life, & we automatically adjust our lives to hit a
particular level of risk: not too high, not too low.

Stuart (RandomStu)

#9

There's an additional consideration. Say a casual gambler plays

less

than 100 hours of video poker per year (I'd guess that my own play

is

something on that order of magnitude).

so about 60,000 hands? you can assume you won't hit a royal, the
deuces cycle is about 5,000 hands, so instead of the average of 12
deuces you can assume you only get 2 (so missing 10), which would put
you down about $3,500 on quarters, three years of that kinda bad luck
would brush you right up against that $10k figure, or perhaps you
break even one year, but then resume losing the next ...

If I know that $10K means
a .5% risk of ruin... the practical risk may be less than that,

since

the .5% must include at least some theoretical cases in which
the "ruin" comes after 10,000 or more hours, & I'll never reach

that

in a lifetime.

the risk is front loaded, the more you play the better your chances of
wining (because the er is catching up to the variance)
at N0 hands you have 84% chances of being a net winner
at 4xN0 hands your chances have improved to 98%
N0=variance/(er-1)^2 hands (for fpdw=444,930 hands)
assuming you have the bankroll to survive to that many hands
most of the risk of losing occurs under N0 hands, there is a worst
case minimum around N0/4

···

--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "Stuart" <sresnick2@c...> wrote:

#10

"Stuart" <sresnick2@c...> wrote:
> There's an additional consideration. Say a casual gambler plays
> less than 100 hours of video poker per year (I'd guess that my
> own play is something on that order of magnitude).

<nightoftheiguana2000@y...> wrote:

so about 60,000 hands? you can assume you won't hit a royal, the
deuces cycle is about 5,000 hands, so instead of the average of 12
deuces you can assume you only get 2 (so missing 10), which would
put you down about $3,500 on quarters, three years of that kinda
bad luck would brush you right up against that $10k figure, or
perhaps you break even one year, but then resume losing the next

For a casual gambler like myself, the limiting factor is more likely
psychological than monetary. Which is to say... if I lost $10K over 3
years, I'd have plenty left in my life bankroll, but I may have
reached the point where I become disgusted & lose the enjoyment & so
quit playing.

I don't know where that point is for me; I've never had such a
sustained losing streak. But time would definitely be a factor, not
just raw numbers. Losing $10K over 4 years would affect me
differently than losing it in half a year. For that matter, losing it
in a zig-zag manner over a sustained time would affect me
psychologically differently than losing every trip consistently.

Stuart (RandomStu)