Ring game experts - when do you quit???

Hi all and a very merry Christmas

I play a lot of limit O8, around $1/$2 - $2/$4 limits, 10 people.

What I find is that I do well most of the time, get to a decent chip stack (Say take my $80 buy in up to $120) and then blow it down to the starting $80 again

It is rare that I lose my buy in - in fact I have never done it because if I lose 25% of my starting chip stack I leave.

I would guess it is irrelivant what form of poker I am playing.

Do you have any thoughts on how to avoid this problem?

Last night, for example, I started with $80, dropped to $60 after the first hour, then I took it up to $130 after another 2 hours. I was going to stop but I am driven on by accumilating FPP on stars, so I kept going and another 2-3 hrs later I stopped, with $85 - a profit of $5 - less than $1 / hour !!!

I think I am trying to hit 2 targets that don`t work together i.e. accumilating lots of FPP and increasing my bankroll.

My target should be increasing my bankroll and the FPP should be a bonus, but it is difficult when u r about 400 away from hitting Gold

Any help as always is appreciated.

Yes I failed miserably at accumulating cash while reaching gold, I have dropped back down to what I am comfortably making money with. My confidence took a hit. In other words I havn't the skill level to do both yet and am working on it. I can look to substaining gold when I get better at the poker. I just have to tear myself away from the "how many vpps till gold status" box.

edit:not a ring game expert by any means, just throwing in my 2 cents.

why do you care about your stack size? it's irrelevant when you're playing limit as long as you have enough behind to cap all streets.

Also, the swings you describe are absolutely normal. It's called variance. There's no way your upswings are in any way representative of a sustainable win rate, and quitting earlier won't change that fact.

I play some $1/$2 LO8 on Stars. I find for me it works best to set some short term goals. If I meet them, I stop. I know I'd feel better winning $10 in 5 minutes and stopping, than playing for 4 hours and winning $5.

But ultimately it's whatever works best for you.

I generally continue play as long as there are players at the table that I can readily exploit, and as long as I'm not zoning out. After some longer sessions, I'll realize that I don't quite recall the last few minutes of play, I go into auto pilot, like driving on the highway forever at night. If this happens, I'm definitely taking a break.

But really, if the game's good, I'm going to play. I don't take win/loss into the factor much. If I've lost a lot I will, because perhaps I've misjudged how soft the competition is, or perhaps my mindset has subconciously shifted and I'm no longer playing optimally. But if I'm beating a game, I'm going to go on beating it as hard as I can for as long as I can before people start to wise up and go away, or go broke.

Set a number of hands or hours you will play. Play that many. Leave if the table sucks, stay longer if the table is good.

when the guys you borrow money from are prepared to take out loans just to keep you in the game

As long as I'm making good decision and haven't let emotions play a roll in my game then I will contuie to play as soon as I get a feeling of tilt or I get tired I will
leave the game and turn off the computer but I am a SNG and MTT player so I don't know much about the ring game side of it.

Pay attention to you're playing. When you sense your own level of play is dropping, then stop.

Stack size was used as a way of describing the situation.

I was trying to find out if people set a time limit - for example, play for 3 hours then stop.

Or set a `win %` limit (I`m sure I have heard this before and it could have been Ferguson) So, you start with say $100. When it goes to $120 (i.e. 20% of your chip stack) or it drops to $80 (20% loss) you leave.

This way, if you are a good player you should be leaving the table more often than not with a 20% + rather than a minus.

But some other valid points have been raised, especially This is obviously an experience thing.

I also think I should forget about FPP and just play when I feel good.

Thanks for all your responses guys

Having a stop loss figure is better than having a stop win figure.

When table conditions are good and you are winning you should be playing for longer than usual, the opposite is true as well, table conditions are bad or you are playing badly then just leave.

I have a $300/day stop loss, which i rarely have used, I do not have a set figure of when i should leave, but in general I play a set number of hands that I decide on before I play the session. These blocks are 500 hands/1000 hands and 2000 hands, depending on a lot of factors. How tired I am, how I feel about my game, etc. I always finish up when I have played my block unless...

-There is a particularly big fish at one of the tables.
- I am crushing the tables.
- I feel I am playing badly or on tilt

In general anymore I see a poker session as a monthly thing, and more and more seeing it as a yearly thing.

Ferguson was setting his winning sessions as a bankroll managment issue more than anything else. ie my BR is $2,000 and i am sitting at a single nl$100 table with $500, it is now representing 25% of my total roll on a single table and therefor should no longer play that table. So in essence its more of a rare issue unless you are using some aggressive br managment.

~Early morning incoherant rant.

Stop losses, and stop wins are generally horribly flawed thinking. They take you away from tables you are beating, and give you an excuse to give away money at tables you're not.

Think of a taxi driver that wants to make 200 dollars a day in fares. With the daily goal oriented method he's going to work all day on crappy fare days where he isn't getting many fares just to meet his 200 for the day. And then on the good fare days he'll be done with his day very quickly. However, if he put in as many hours on the good day as he does on the bad, he could simply take off the bad days, and still make the same money. And in his line of work enjoy the nice sunny days like all the people walking, and just work the rainy crappy days anyway.

This is the same principal as having a stop win.

A stop loss should really be more down to how the table is, not how much you've lost. Tonight I was at a 2/4 limit table at Foxwoods, and twice in a row awful players hit runner runner straights to destroy a set and a two pair. If I'd had a stop loss I'd have been up and off to spend another 10 dollars at the noodle bar, netting me a loss of 70ish dollars after some duck on rice. Instead I saw that the game was weak, pulled out a 20 to back up what I had left, and played my game until I was pulled away by the guy I'd gone with, making myself 40 dollars along the way. Similarly I've sat at tables where everyone was a nit and there was nothing going on. I would have had to play for an 2 hours to get to down 25%, and it all would have gone to the house after all the small pot swapping. So I stood up after a short while, instead of giving money away because I'd yet to hit some magical number.

Expert would be a bit strong, very consistent long term winner in all games but the accursed .10/.25NLHEFR though.

What works for me is taking my stack up to what I am happy with, (either a 50 to 100 % increase), and leave to go to another table. I find that by the time you reach your goal the people at the table have a good read on you and you stand more of a chance of dropping your stack.

This isn't set in stone. If there are major pockets to be picked I'll stay. And if the table is tighter than an cold oyster I'll leave. The biggest thing that helps you is to know table selection and when it changes. If you master this you will be on the constant upswing.

A stop loss is certainly not a flawed way of thinking.

If you lose a certain amount, I can say with 100% certainly* that you are on some form of tilt.

*That lose amount will vary from player to player, one player may be able to lose 5 buyins and not tilt, if he loses 15 buyins however its a different story. Also anyone that says they dont tilt, is lying or at the stage of their game that they can't see it.

I used to think like this, but I've changed my mind as far as stop losses go. I agree that stop wins are a bit silly. But stop losses do serve a purpose and it's this:

You get to go to sleep that night without that sinking feeling of wishing you had quit much, much sooner.

I've had up- and downswings as good or bad as the next guy, but my joy over my biggest winning days is never as great as my misery over my biggest losing days. If I quit some really good games after being down 6 buy-ins, so what? My expected value, even when I'm sitting at 6 great tables, is still only about a buy-in/hour. So if I play for another hour, I'll expect to recover 1 buy-in, but is feeling bad - which, if I'm down more than my stop-loss, I will be - for another hour worth a buy-in? Can't I instead go to bed now, while I'm still at a manageable level of frustration and play an hour and a half at slightly worse tables tomorrow to make up for it?

Even if I play another hour, and even if I win back one buy-in, I'm still down 5 buy-ins for the night. I'm still going to feel bad about it when I quit, only now I've spent another hour playing stuck. And, heaven forbid, if one of the really bad fish take ANOTHER stack from me, I'm going to feel horrible about not quitting when I had the chance, an hour ago.

There's nothing wrong with stop losses. There are good games available almost 24/7 online, and continuing to play now, when you're stuck and frustrated, is no way to go through your poker career, even if you have a huge edge. Play when you're feeling your best and are having fun.

Personally, I try to play poker in 500 hand chunks. A chunk takes me about 30-45 minutes, depending on how many good tables I find, and after a chunk I go have some water, go to the bathroom, read a chapter in a book or take a walk. Then I might play another chunk or I might not, depending on how I feel. But keeping the chunks under an hour makes me feel good and rested almost all the time.

If I start playing a chunk and, after 100 hands into it, feel tired and unfocused, then there's nothing wrong with just quitting right then. I just try not to play MORE than 500 hands. I like quitting.

I like what Tommy Angelo has to say about quitting, too. It's perhaps the most underrated poker skill there is, and I like practising it often.

do you want to accumulate points or cash? its always wrong to say i will play one hour or i will play until i get some points. as long as you are not tired or you dont have to do something you can stay at the table. but if you get tired and you are not able to play good poker any more just leave. the tables will wait for you.