DD,I need High Roller advice

i started the year using a spread and bankroll that put me at about a 20%ror.i dodged that initial ror bullet because we are now in june and my bankroll has increased to a point where i am pretty much at a 0-1% ROR if i stay with the same spread.i punched in my new bankroll into bjrm and out popped 800 dollar max bets at 13%ror.i dont like playing at a 1% ror because the growth is much slower,but i dont know if i can handle the heat of 800 dollar bets.im pretty sure i will be thrown out of every place within minutes.im sure you had to reach a decision like this on your way to yellow chips.what should i do??stay at the game that got me here or risk it and move up to whale status.

my suggestion would be based on whether you can replinish your bankroll if you lose it. If you can replinish somewhat from other sources (like a job) then I'd move my unit size up somewhat...but it is never a good idea to play full kelly IMHO because it doesn't take doubles and splits into account. In the end, only you can decide what level of risk you are comfortable with. You've managed to successfully use the "hail mary" approach to build a bankroll. Many a player, however, has increased his unit too much and then lost it all by being too aggressive...BEWARE!

If you are a rational risk averter conformist. With a $4o,0o0 bank you have the luxury of making a decent amount with a low risk of ruin. Before that your only option was to gamble at 20%ror.

Do you like to gamble??? You can have high potential growth but the risk is high. How will you feel if you blow it?

Most people prefer to sacrifice a bit of growth for a big reduction in flucs. If you move up, I guess you would accept about 20 times more risk for 4times for growth.

Can't advise you how to ward off heat, that depends on your style and contingency covers. Highstakes doesn't always mean more heat. More heat doesn't makes it high risk. I get all the attention without any problems.

ror- it would now be 13.5% which is conservative for me.im more concerned about the heat.a 800 dollar double down now puts 1600 on the table and i would think unbearable heat.hiding chips is much harder when you win a couple of those because they saw the whole thing unfold.

this bankroll that i have now if i lost it all.first off,i havent worked in a year,and if i lost it all i would have to play red again because it would take to long to save up enough from dealing to play black again.i dont want to play red again-it would be like going from 5 dollar video poker to quarters.

I'm not sure that I recall betting yellow chips more than a few times, although I often color up to several of them. I don't even make my max bet in about half the sessions I play.

Based on the questions you've asked on this page, I don't think you are ready to play for very high stakes. The ulitimate answer will come down to the style you wish to play and what you want out of the game. If your plan is to stick close to home and play the five or six local casinos then you will have to remain at fairly low stakes. High stakes requires playing all over the country, and perhaps the world. It is a process of burning out and recycling casinos. You need lots of them and you must be willing to return after getting kicked out, attempting to set up a new identity. You will get lots of very rude treatment. This does not appeal to most players, even those who can afford to bet much bigger. So they find some place on the scale that seems to suit them. Bank size has very little to do with bet sizes of most high stakes players. They can afford to bet what they want and they bet at the stakes they are comfortable with. My advice is to play small enough that you are not concerned with things such as ruin equations. As your bank grows you will eventually find the level where you feel comfortable.

I'll be on a play trip for about 11 days so will not be able to participate further in this thread.

you will hit a streak in which your bankroll will be substantially destroyed and you will be forced to resize. Choose a unit with a very low ROR (like between 1-3%) and your bankroll will actually grow faster than at 13.5% ROR because for all practical purposes you will never have to worry about resizing. You have, apparantly, been very lucky...don't expect this lucky run to continue forever.

I don't think you have a good grasp on how risky betting full kelly (13.5% ROR) is if you don't constantly resize. Everyone I know who had a strong run and continued to bet full kelly are no longer playing blackjack...they went bust!

in my red days and then kept that ror for green and now black.i always thought the 5%ror was overated and took my chances.i was never in the red more then about 7K.now thats not to say i havent had fluctuations of 10 or 12K but i was always up when i lost it.my strategy up to this point was to never resize downward when i did lose 5k or more.it worked because i came roaring back.if i would of resized downward i would of cut myself short on the way back up and taken twice as long to make my money back.im glad i didnt.if you say i should of resized when i lost alot then there were times i was playing at a 30% ror or more.i guess i wasnt worried because i could always save more money to play back then.now i cant since im betting blacks.that last sentence of yours was a very strong one-care to tell some of your friends stories and were they playing shoes?i think i will stick to my spread after listening to everyone.my bankroll is now bulletproof at the spread im at.

because, assuming you would downsize should you start losing, your bankroll grows slower. Accepting a higher ROR for faster growth ceases to produce gains after you pass a 1K threshold. Suppose two players each resize when they lose about 20% to 30% of the bank. One resizes to a 13.5% ROR and the other to a 20% ROR. The guy betting the bigger fractions will have slower bankroll growth over time.

i dont like playing at a 1% ror because the growth is much slower,but i dont know if i can handle the heat of 800 dollar bets.im pretty sure i will be thrown out of every place within minutes.im sure you had to reach a decision like this on your way to yellow chips.what should i do??stay at the game that got me here or risk it and move up to whale status.

It's not one or the other. Maybe you'd like to try 3% or 5% on for size. You can work with BJRM to get pretty much whatever ROR you want. Just set the bankroll, the unit size ($10 makes things easy), and then experiment with different multiples for the bets (including zero for Wong outs). Press calculate to see the ROR and hourly EV. Don't like what you see? Keep experimenting. Increase multiples to increase EV and ROR, or decrease for the reverse effect.

Ideally, the multiples should be uniform, for all positive TCs up to the maximum you choose, but they can vary a little if it makes the bets easier for you to remember.

ETF

If he doesn't resize, he will have faster growth if he dodge another bullet. The chance of him doubling is greater than halving still. It doesn't sound like he will resize and play nickels from his post to bigpayer.

That is not foolish. Maybe he prefers to accept the greater risk of ruin for the greater ev. For a person who values his time, this may be a good idea. Have you not read Thorp's paper on optimal betting, highlighting that kelly is a conservative betting scheme?

. Have you not read Thorp's paper on optimal betting, highlighting that kelly is a conservative betting scheme?

Have you not read the first line of my post? I stated the assumption upon which my statement was based. While it is possible for someone who is betting 2@ $800 to maintain those bets until bust, I seriously doubt that this is really the plan. If resizing is done at any point, no matter how wide the intervals, then betting to a fraction greater than 1K initially will produce increasingly slower growth the greater that fraction.

Kelly is conservative based only upon a specific definition of bankroll. It is not conservative by any means. If you are talking about fractional betting, it is the largest fraction to which you can increase your bet and still increase the growth rate of your bank. Any upsizing beyond this point will slow bankroll growth.

I am leaving in a little while for a trip and won't be around to respond. But if you'll post Thorp's exact quote then I'm sure that ET Fan or one of the other math guys who read this page will set you straight. As soon as the word "Kelly" is posted, lots of high math guys who don't otherwise post appear.

MIT was correct.my question was should i play a max bet of 800(not 2x800)with my new bankroll that i reached playing at a 20% ror.i figure playing 13.5% ror would actually be conservative compared to what i did to get here.i dont plan on resizing when i lose alot because the cards have a way of turning around.if i were to cut my bets in half after losing alot i would miss out on the huge swing back to positive territory with only half the money that was originaly bet.im just worried about being able to bet 800 max bets.it doesnt seem reasonable in non shoe games.

im sticking to the spread im betting now.btw,what ror were your friend betting when they resized and went bust.

grew rapidly on his occasional weekend trips to Reno and LV playing very good single, double deck, and shoe games....he was betting full Kelly the entire time and eventually he hit a very bad run and delayed resizing...he had gotten to the point where he was betting up to 2x$400 and the losses blew his bankroll back down to where he could bet only green chips.