Grinding from zero: Building a bankroll in online poker

[mardi1987]

Good guide!
The only thing, I think, the bankroll management for today’s games is far too low.

Here an example calculation from Primedope for $1 tournaments with about 400 Runners and the ROI of 10% which is high for beginners.
The used bankroll is $150 (150 buy ins).
The graphs are nice but not very helpful, so I threw them away.

The important part is in table 2:
Bankroll & Risk of Ruin.

Risk of Ruin means in our case losing the complete bankroll.
The Risk of Ruin is about 50 % with a bankroll of $84 (very close to the 100 buy in range).
This means in 50% of the simulations with this bankroll size, you end up losing your complete bankroll.
This approach is a coinflip approach, that is not good advice.
The second class is with a Bankroll size of nearly double the size ($194) of the recommended 100 buy ins and here the chance of risking the whole bankroll is reduced to about 15%.
You will find 2 additional steps in the table that give even more conservative Bankroll sizings.

As OP mentioned in one of his posts, poker is not a sprint, it is a marathon.
So a conservative BRM, with much more than 100 buy ins, will give a bigger last longer chance in the games.

This is also true for Sit and Go and cash games.

The chosen bankroll sizes from the OP are ultra aggressive and risky, a more conservative bankroll approach is much more advised.

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You're right my BRM suggestions lean toward the aggressive side, especially for players who want to progress quickly or start from freerolls. I agree that for those aiming for long-term stability, a deeper bankroll is essential. My guide was written more from the perspective of a recreational player who enjoys the challenge of building from zero, but your contribution adds a valuable layer for those who think in marathon terms.

 

[mardi1987]

Assuming that by "win" you mean "getting to e.g. 2000$", then the main difference is that the 200$ deposit win probably took much less time.

I agree, over time, a $200 deposit can speed up the path to $2000. But for me, the point wasn't speed, it was the process. Freeroll wins carry a different weight not just in money, but in the feeling of building something from nothing. For some, it's a waste of time, for me it's part of the enjoyment of the game 🍻

 

[Goggelheimer]

You're right my BRM suggestions lean toward the aggressive side, especially for players who want to progress quickly or start from freerolls. I agree that for those aiming for long-term stability, a deeper bankroll is essential. My guide was written more from the perspective of a recreational player who enjoys the challenge of building from zero, but your contribution adds a valuable layer for those who think in marathon terms.

I think not only recreational players with the goal of building a bankroll from $0 should take a long-term approach.
Depositing $200 can speed up the progress in both ways, building a bigger bankroll or all time quitting due to loss of bankroll.
Just consider that regulatory influences, poker industry ecosystem reasons and other reasons will reduce
opportunities to build a bankroll (freerolls, daily freebies and so on) extremely.
Why risk the wins from these rare opportunities by playing a risky BRM,
rebuilding this roll will take at least as long as it took to get the roll there.
Not all recreational players play poker for fun and enjoyment only
(the villain that plays 80/50 at your table is painful, not really enjoying, that has more the feeling of stolen lifetime).

 

[mardi1987]

I think not only recreational players with the goal of building a bankroll from $0 should take a long-term approach.
Depositing $200 can speed up the progress in both ways, building a bigger bankroll or all time quitting due to loss of bankroll.
Just consider that regulatory influences, poker industry ecosystem reasons and other reasons will reduce
opportunities to build a bankroll (freerolls, daily freebies and so on) extremely.
Why risk the wins from these rare opportunities by playing a risky BRM,
rebuilding this roll will take at least as long as it took to get the roll there.
Not all recreational players play poker for fun and enjoyment only
(the villain that plays 80/50 at your table is painful, not really enjoying, that has more the feeling of stolen lifetime).

I understand you completely and I appreciate you going deeper into the topic. And yes, freeroll opportunities are becoming rarer, and a BRM that doesn't protect what you've worked hard to build can undo all your hard work.

As for the 80/50 villain yes, that can hurt. But that's part of the game we love too, right? Sometimes it tests us more than the final board

 

[primrose]

I agree, over time, a $200 deposit can speed up the path to $2000. But for me, the point wasn't speed, it was the process. Freeroll wins carry a different weight not just in money, but in the feeling of building something from nothing. For some, it's a waste of time, for me it's part of the enjoyment of the game 🍻

In that case, nvm what I said and go for it! I was only talking about a strategy to maximize earnings with poker. If if you're playing for fun, then I'm a staunch believer that you should do whatever you want.

(I'd extend this even to losing players; if someone has the money and enjoys playing (live or online) poker recreationally, then there's nothing wrong with that. It's not any worse than any other expensive hobby.)

In your case, it's like a hobby that also turns a small profit 💰

 

[OnyxD]

Nope it´s not too conservative. As the calculation with the variance calulator and my database tells me.

Fields got larger since the 2000´s, more material is freely available, solvers, bots, RTA, Multiple-reentries, bounty mechanics and so on.
My database tells me that a conservative approach is much more advised, all other approaches are bingo play.
This is my graph overall, STT(inculding Spins), MTT of all kinds :

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And this is the graph for buy ins from $1 - $2:

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Primedope's tool is pretty interesting, thanks for pointing it out. I've just run a basic simulation, will play around with it more.
I've been on a break of a few years and I agree that structures have changed a lot. Rebuys/re-entries tend to prolong the tourney and create more variance but also we gotta factor in that it gives you extra ROI. I've placed final table and won some tourneys solely because of those. If we could factor in all various types of structures, number and amount of rebuys/addons, poker networks, etc. that would make it more accurate and valuable.
I learned some basic statistical analysis, but don't know where a large downloadable dataset with all those variables would be available.

In $1-2 MTTs my feeling so far has been that the field hasn't gotten that much better, somewhat maybe but I am avoiding pokerstars, so... As for bots on those limits, hard to tell how prevalent they are and how good compared to an average player of those limits. I'd assume not many, at least not so many to make a statistically significant factor, but that is probably is impossible to get a dataset on. We gotta request it from the rooms lol.