Poker Poker Poker!: [vpFREE] Re: A Stupid Bankroll Qestion

--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "Harry Porter" <harry.porter@...> wrote:
> I'm not reexamining my numbers, but I had the impression that Kelly
> betting would be much more aggressive than this.

Betting double Kelly is pretty standard. At least in futures/forex.
I'm not sure if this applies to you or not, but you don't have to
exactly bet the Kelly number. You just don't want to overbet it. When
you overbet Kelly, you get less bankroll growth than maximum and you
get more risk. That's the fool's quadrant. If you underbet Kelly, you
get less bankroll growth but in exchange for less risk. That's called
risk management. I don't remember the exact Kelly number for 15/9/5
deuces, but Jazbo has a Perl script that generates it:
http://www.jazbo.com/videopoker/kelly.html
Or you can be lazy like me and just go for the approximate value:
Aprox. Kelly = variance/advantage = 26/.0077 = about 3400 or about 4
royals. So this says you should never play without a minimum of a 4
royal bankroll pad to back it up. Doubling it to 8 royals is safer,
plus it gives you some headroom, since it's more likely you'll lose
some before you win. So, my recommendation, start with an 8 royal pad
(select the game based on your dollar bankroll amount) and if you fall
back to 4 royals (something like a 10% chance of happening even with
absolute computer perfect Bob Dancer class play), then you should drop
your bet in half, whereas if you get lucky and double up your
bankroll, you should move up in denomination. Repeat as necessary, so
you might go up and down a couple of times, hopefully eventually
you'll go up. If you read Dancer's "Million Dollar Video Poker",
that's basically what he did (though perhaps without knowing about
Kelly, and he probably overbet Kelly at times and just got lucky), he
started as a typical Vegas lowlife coupon hustler decked out in free
casino clothing pushing the rules to the limit and maybe sometimes
beyond back in 93, and today he's a hotshot multi-million dollar high
roller, just like those guys you see in the infomercials on TV.

> You aren't terribly
> specific, but since a deuces game with a strong return can be
> inferred, I'm assuming that you're talking about playing $.25 FPDW
> (say w/ .2% added cash incentive). In that case, it's my impression
> that a Kelly jump to $.50 play would be called for well before
> achieving a $16K bankroll (perhaps at as little as $8K).

8K would be about the absolute minimum to play $.50, and how long
would that last? One bet down and you're under again, and now
overbeting Kelly, exactly what you should not be doing. (You
understand that "bankroll" is a moving, not a fixed number?) Better to
build up some headroom before moving up. My recommendation: 16K (8
royals). If you wanted to be more agressive you could double your bets
at 6 royals (12K) but then go back down if you drop back to a 4 royal
pad. The key is that you never want to have less than about a 4 royal
pad, or whatever the exact Kelly number is. But more is always OK,
more than OK, it is also safer (less risk).

> Of course, it's the inelasticity of vp game supply (i.e., you can't
> readily find a game/paytable in all desired denominations) that makes
> Kelly betting awkward for vp.

Well, for example, deuces mostly exists only in nickels, quarters and
maybe fifty cents. And maybe it's hard to find deuces above fifty
cents, or maybe not if you look around a bit. As you move up in
denomination, the good games will be harder to find, the reasons for
that should be obvious. But there are other games. You don't have to
limit yourself to deuces.

> As for your suggestion that Kelly
> betting comes naturally for a lot of people, I'd have phrased it that
> (at best) many people feel their way in the dark for a wager that
> feels Kelly optimal ... and often fall far off the mark.

Probably true, everyone wants to think of themselves as a high roller
even if their bankroll screams penny player.