proper size bankroll

I am having a hard time with the concept of a proper bankroll. Lets say I go to the casino with $2000 at a $5 table because I want my risk of ruin low. I don't think I could handle losing $2000, I think at $1900 in one day I would be like "screw this" and quit blackjack. Is this a poor attitude?

OK man. I didn't understand if the $2000 is your bankroll!?
So consider 100 maximum bets of bankroll to be safe. if you are playing $5-40 bankroll= $4000 $5-60 = 6000 bankroll. have fun.

yah so if I had a $6000 bankroll and I am confident that I have the advantage I should play right up until I lose the $6000 and be content with the fact that I can win with my next bankroll?

You never defined the game you are playing.

If it is 6Ds, your spread probably needs to be in the 1 to 15 range which puts your max bet around $75 in reds. That's 27 max bets on a $2K BR. Your risk of ruin is high.

If you restrict your bet ramp in this same game so as to 'protect' those max bets (in other words not betting appropriately high in those high counts, being afraid to double or split when called for) you will not be putting enough in play at the appropriate time to earn a proper EV.

It's a two edged sword and a $2K BR is not enough to properly play to a low risk of ruin.

Accept it. Learn to play properly and then go play properly. Maybe you'll fall immediately into that positive variance and be on your way. If you don't, save another BR and go again .. or, just say screw it!

But whatever you do, if you decide to play, play properly even though your ROR is high. Otherwise it is (most likely) just a slow march to the BR poor house.

Sun Runner- What should your spread and bankroll be for $5 min. playing DD, DAS?

Your question:

I am having a hard time with the concept of a proper bankroll. Lets say I go to the casino with $2000 at a $5 table because I want my risk of ruin low. I don't think I could handle losing $2000, I think at $1900 in one day I would be like "screw this" and quit blackjack. Is this a poor attitude?

seems to involve emotional questions as well as mathematical one.

Let me make a couple of comments. First, there is a difference between your total bankroll and a session bankroll. Most of us do not take our entire bankroll to a session.

You do not want to have enough money with you so that you can finish hot shoe that you are in. And you always want to make sure you can double any bet that you make.

Now as a practical matter, it is very unusual to lose more than 10 max bets in a session. Playing head-on, you could lose more in one Shoe. But at your stakes you aren�t going to see much head on play.
If you spread 5-50, then 500 is 10 max bets. You could take 800-1000 with you and have a good session stake. I would nto worry if you only $500 on hand when you go to the casino.

Now as to global bankroll. You have $2000. It is possible to lose 40 max bets, but it isn�t that likely. I think my biggest downturns have been 30 max bets. But make no doubt about it, you could lose. If you play a sound game, it is more likely that you will win. But you do need to be prepared to lose.

Now I want to add one other comment about spreads. One poster stated that you need a �big spread� to play shoe games. This is just not true. You can play with a small spread, as long as you can avoid negative shoes. If you are playing shoes, you should think about doing a lot of Wonging. At least Wong out of negative shoes, if you can�t wong into positive ones.

relates a lot to your attitude toward BJ. BJ card counting is a form of investment. From return standpoint without considering your personal wages, if you count right, at not too high a BR, you get 100% plus on your BR per annium. Now ask yourself: How much you were getting from your other investments? How you feel when your other investment lose money? Remember you are getting serveral times return from your BJ "investment". You should use the same attitude toward BJ vs. other investments. When you lose money on stocks, what you do? Quit investing stocks? If you respect BJ CC, BJ CC will reward you with lower risk and higher return. I made several million $ from BJ CC from scratch, if you learn the right attitude, you can too.

If you were going to play double deck at the $5 table and spread $5 to 60 which I think you could get away with easily, you would need about $5000 total for your bankroll.

This is a H17 2 deck, DAS, DOA, spA1, Sp3, no surrender game.

Unless you live in vegas, this is a hard game to find these days. Maybe you live in Vegas and if you do, good.
For a $10 minimum with same spread, you need twice as much, $10,000 .
Both of these would give you a ROR of 10% . Not too bad but not fantastic.

At the $5 minimum on DD game above, you would make $14/hr . At the $10 table, you would make $28/hr .

What I would do:

If I found a $5 minimum DD game,
I'd spread $10 to $300 and earn $82/hr with a c-score of 42. I'd clean out the tray of black chips and get banned at that casino and many of the surrounding ones, too. On my way out, I'd be kicking and screaming and babbling incoherently.

Blackjack is long-term proposition. Anyone looking for the quick hit will eventually go bust, because of the "quick hit" mindset. From my perspective, to be successful in blackjack, you need four things: 1) a fundamental understanding of basic strategy and a commitment to play it, regardless of your "instincts"; 2) proper money management; 3) discipline; and 4) a sufficient bankroll to survive the inevitable swings.

I have learned this from playing blackjack, from talking to good blackjack players, from reading all the blackjack books, and by participating in the Green Chip forums.

I have developed a very structured method of blackjack play. Up until recently, I have been playing exclusively red chip. I have used $300 as my session stake and $1,500 as a bankroll. And, believe it or not, although I have lost my session stake many times, I have NEVER lost my total bankroll. Guess I have been lucky over the past 10 years.

However, the point of this post is to advise you to get the fundamentals down so that you can protect the limited bankroll you have. Then, when you are confident of your ability to make money, increase your bankroll.

Good luck.

First, I disagree with your numbers. I plugged a 5-50 spread into BJRM for a H17-DAS DD game (70 cards dealt ) , I came up with an RoR of 2.31% with the �optimal� spread. If there were only 62 cards dealt (not what I consider a very good game), you would have an RoR of 3.54%. This is significantly less than the 10% you mentioned in your posts.

But more importantly, I disagree with the method �If you want to play XYZ game you need a bankroll of MMM�. You have a bankroll. You aren�t going to print more money to play a certain game. Instead of asking �how much bank do I need�, you should say �this is the bank that I have, at what games and with what strategy should I employ it.�

More important than talking about �bankroll� is talk about overall risk-tolerance or risk-aversion. A convenient way to measure this is with the parameter �Kelly Equivalent Bank.� To say someone has a KEB of 10K, says that they have the same risk-aversion/risk-tolerance as a Kelly player withy a 10K bank.

My �bankroll� is about 20% of my Net Worth. For a full-time pro, it might be 80%. Obviously, I can play to a higher RoR that the full-time pro. That is why �Bankroll� is only part of the picture; risk-tolerance is part of it.

I am willing to guess that our friend has a lot more than 2K available in terms of funds. The issue is not the size of the funds, but rather his/her willingness to risk it at BJ.

Here is a type of questions players can ask themselves: Suppose you had an investment opportunity where you have a 75% chance of doubling your investment, but a 25% chance of losing the whole thing? Would you invest 2000 in it? Would you invest 5000 in it. . If not, would you invest 2000 is you chance of successfully doubling it were 90%?

He asked what size bankroll he needed for a $5 game so I told him. Also, I was being realistic. If Atlantacajun or jj want to fly to Iraq to get a good double deck game, then they can put in the fantastic numbers that they would find for a game there. Here in the US, I don't think you'll find a double deck game with 70% pen at least not in the midwest. Also, I am absolutely fine with 50 % pen on a double deck game. I'd play that over a 6 deck game anyday.

The spread was 5 - 60 , pen %50, H17, DAS, DOA, no surrender, spA1, Sp3

If you want to calculate and see what you get for that, go ahead. I didn't make the numbers up. I wouldn't do that to someone.

Most of you calculate ROR for a game that you might have gotten in 1985. I don't know about you but when I get to the casino and see the pen, it is usually 50 % for DD and about 66 - 70 % for 6 deck. I am there so what I am going to do buy another plane ticket and go somewhere else. Not me. I play.

I see 50% on DD a little less than half the time. I usually get between 60-90% pen. I have a casino where every dealer gives 80-90% pen. If my game was DD and I was flying, I don't think I would be booking a ticket to where they only had 50% pen games when there are better places all over the map. But that's me.

kRis

I used to ask the same question you just did until I discovered I was only looking at the tip of the ice berg.

Math Prof's first post above is a good place to start, although it will not give you a 'specific answer' to your question. And I like specific answers!

His point about 'not what BR do I need, but what BR do I have' is an excellent perspective. Most who are committed to playing BJ seriously have a bigger BR than they first imagine. It's not limited to what you have in your pocket right now.

Other considerations one would need to know to properly answer your question would be things like ..

.. other rules of this game
.. the penetration
.. is the place you are playing sweaty
.. what is your risk tolerance
.. what do you need to earn per hour, day, week, to keep it interesting for you.
.. what is your risk tolerance (mine is probably on the high side)

(Above I suggested a 1 to 15 spread for 6D. MathProf states you can win at 6D with a smaller spread and of course he is right. I'm not a professional and I'm not there because I have nothing else to do. When I play I like to have the possibility of beating them out of some serious money. I'm just not interested in grinding out $10 an hour. I do not play enough -annually -or get around that much -where the pit is going to remember me much year to year, so therefore I like to play as fast and as loose as I can.)

(I admit, this is not the idea I came into the game with a few years ago. Then I was all about the idea of working a small BR up and up and up with a low, low, low ROR, until I was king of the hill! That was surely possible years ago playing good SDs and DDs. It is probably possible today -but much much more difficult I imagine. One must realize their own limitations and play a game they can win AND enjoy.)

I have played almost 6D exclusively in my carreer. I have just recently been playing DD, and a little SD. Earlier I said more info was needed to answer your question properly, but I'll answer it improperly none the less! :)

If I have 30 top bets, I'm really good to go. 50 top bets; man I feel invincible!

I have spread DD 1 to 5/6 when I thought they were watching and as high as 1 to 20 once when the count was way high. I didn't stick around though much after that one. I was on vacation, and there were other casinos in the area to play.

I love to walk around and Wong in. I love to go all-in on those monster counts (well, not literally all in, but you get the picture.)

Of course you can't do that playing DD -usually. But I have found it's a nice way to get on to a table. Walk around, find a quick high count, plop down with a big bet, and go. (You always have a choice .. why start in with the edge against you when you can start in at plus 5? It's only one hand, I know, but hey, you always have a choice.) Would I plop down on a DD game if the table was full; no. But if I'm cruizin' and find a decent game with one or two players, I might just act like a dumb a**, stop right behind them and pretend to watch, start counting .. and then plop! Depending on how things go from there will determine what I do next.

Now, I'm not stupid. Thankfully the people at RGE and this site taught me how to play and to only play decent games. I'm not really a gambler. If the only game I can find is crap -I just won't play. I don't have to. (I'm disappointed, for sure, but I can walk away.)

One thing I didn't have to 'learn' was this .. there is no advantage to playing without the advantage.

So why do it?

Good luck.

If you are responding to the Cajun�s question, then I suggest you post under his/her post.

Now, a 50% DD game is really a poor game. Even with a 1-12 spread, BJRM scores is at about 30. You can find LOTS of shoe games that are better than that.

Moving beyond the BJRM sims, a game like this is very dependent on the number of players at the table. Head-on it can be acceptable. But it becomes really poor when there are other players at the table. I doubt that you will get much head-on play at a $5 table.

Frankly, I don�t like to play H17-DAS games with 60% pen, let alone 50%.

And you can find DD games that are much better than 50%. Even in the Midwest, and in other parts of the country as well. I won�t name them, but if read CBJN you can see them listed.