how to deal with the downswing

one more thing to add, i'm currently having adequate bankroll, so bankroll management is not an issue

Well i really don't know what you want. If your EV keeps going up(meaning your playing well) and your not on tilt mentally then it seems that your dealing with your downswing just fine.

currently i'm having a net loss even after rakeback, so although i'm dealing with the downswing seemingly well, but i need to turn this net loss into a profit, even it's a small sum of amount; i don't know which is the correct way to do it, staying on current stake with less vol, or moving down with a higher vol

Originally posted by renzs
currently i'm having a net loss even after rakeback, so although i'm dealing with the downswing seemingly well, but i need to turn this net loss into a profit, even it's a small sum of amount; i don't know which is the correct way to do it, staying on current stake with less vol, or moving down with a higher vol

Well putting in less volume definitely won't help you beat the variance. If you have BRM concerns then you should move down a limit, especially if you don't feel comfortable playing the current one if your getting on the low end of required roll. Personally i have no idea about hypers and BRM needed to play them comfortably, but generally speaking you have to put in a ton of volume playing such a high variance game for it to even out.

Its impossible to always make a profit in those. You can move down and run even worse still making a net loss after RB. The only thing to do is to grind it trough.

How many tables you are playing at the same time? I think it might be a good idea to decrease the number of tables for a while and increase steadily.

Originally posted by renzs
i'm currently suffering from a 200+ buy in below ev

I don't think any program out there calculates this anywhere near accurately enough for you to make monetary decisions based on it. Keep the EV graphs for the lolz.

No reason to move down if you have adequate BRM and you are not tilting and your confidence is still high.

The only advantage to moving down might be softer competition and easier to book a few wins. (But assuming you have a good mindset and confidence this would be completely irrelevant).

Btw, I don't play SnGs so I've never understood why people play hyper-turbos when your edge is higher in standard SnGs for the same rake. (Lower variance too)

(mispost)

Take a break, do something you consider fun, buy something you want, get a haircut and then come back fresh

The mere fact you're asking the question indicates that you have some doubts.

if your BR can handle the level you're at, why move down?
However, for such a high-variance game, you need some overhead in your BR.
If 100BI downswings are "normal" in your game, you need at LEAST double that so that you don't get pushed out of the comfort zone.

If you're NOT comfortable -- at it appear that you aren't -- do what needs to be done to GET comfortable.

Things like:
♦  Sleep
♦  Nutrition
♦  Breaks -- include fun activities.

Take some time to document your assessment of your current mental state.
Put down on paper your feelings as you play, and review at the end of the session.
As you play talk to yourself about your attitudes. This makes you aware of them.

Mind you, it makes your family think you've gone over the edge, but if it's +EV who cares?

If you're playing too many tables to take such notes, play a couple of tables less

I've moved this thread to "Learning to Win", since that board is designed for these sorts of discusssions.

Good Luck!

Originally posted by w34z3l
No reason to move down if you have adequate BRM and you are not tilting and your confidence is still high.

The only advantage to moving down might be softer competition and easier to book a few wins. (But assuming you have a good mindset and confidence this would be completely irrelevant).

Btw, I don't play SnGs so I've never understood why people play hyper-turbos when your edge is higher in standard SnGs for the same rake. (Lower variance too)

Faster games > Higher Volume > Higher Hourly

Originally posted by renzs
currently i'm having a net loss even after rakeback, so although i'm dealing with the downswing seemingly well, but i need to turn this net loss into a profit, even it's a small sum of amount; i don't know which is the correct way to do it, staying on current stake with less vol, or moving down with a higher vol

You don't really have a whole lot of an effect on whether that will happen or not ;).

The things that you do have an effect on would be:
-constantly learning and improving your game -> higher winrate
-playing fewer tables, not going on autopilot -> higher winrate

Focus on how you play, not how much money you earn. The results will come.

PS: going down the stakes doesn't make much sense IMO if you have the bankroll for current stakes. If you can beat the games, you will earn much more by playing current games in the long run than if you move down the limit.

PPS: downswing is a thing of past, not the presence. So moving down the stakes won't really have much of an effect on that. If you move down the limits and increase the number of tables, your winrate will increase because of softer games, but it will decrease because you will increase the number of tables. The buy-in will however be lower, so you will be earning less money with approx. the same winrate in the long run.

-SF

Does being card dead/ running into coolers constantly count as a downswing too?

Originally posted by tommygecko
Does being card dead/ running into coolers constantly count as a downswing too?

Of course.
Downswings last one or more hands.
Even break-even "swings" suck.

Think of how horrible poker would be to play if every win was immediately followed by a loss.

Nobody would play for long.

What keeps us all going is the hope (or expectation) that we will win.

So any stretch of hands where we do not win adds to our disappointment.

I even get tilted if my premium hands just pick up the blinds several times in succession.

It is in our nature to get angry when our expectations are not met.
Being in control of our reaction to disappointment is critical to poker players

So running above EV doesn't equate to not having a downswing right. Since coolers are not accounted for

Originally posted by Wriggers
Faster games > Higher Volume > Higher Hourly

Theoretically yeah. It's not necessarily true though imo. You can certainly make VPPs faster in turbos.

Variance is a lot higher in turbos though, and depending on how much of a bigger edge you have in the standard games it might not affect your hourly rate too much. (You'd need big sample to tell ofc).

Some players may even prefer taking small cut to their hourly to avoid huge swings also....saves getting stressed out, maybe you'd play better too.

I'll use HU SnG as my example here since the ROIs I use are realistic.

HU SnG Turbo you can play 8 games/hour 1 tabling and achieve 10% ROI
HU SnG Hyper you can play 20 games/hour 1 tabling and achieve a 5% ROI

So the hourly for hypers is higher, plus it's a lot easier to multitable hypers. If you can take the variance it's usually the more profitable way to go.

You need to a huge sample to know your actual ROI - even more with hyper-turbos. More games than 95% of players think.

I think certain players with excellent post-flop skills might be able to achieve higher hourly in non-turbo. It's also a reasonable business decision to accept a slightly lower hourly for a lower variance run. It decreases your chance of "blowing up" as the traders call it.

Possibly this thread wouldn't even exist if OP played non-turbos.

If you still play good and feel good mentally you should stay on the same limit and reduce the tables you play a little bit, there's nothing you can do to change variance itself, but most people (like me) tilt hard, get mad and lose even more or win less on an upswing. Best thing that removes tilt for me, to watch any kind of stupid funny stuff on youtube or wherever you find them, just laugh hard on something when you take a break, anything actually... for example this

there are alot of dimitri videos, all hilarious, the guy is a legend. whenever I see that stupid dance of his, I just forget about the bad beats or anything that tilts me..really there are alot of these things on utube, best things on earth to calm somebody down and to get back focus on the current hand, not thinking about what happend half hour ago in a suckout situation.