Video Poker Forum

i'm new to video poker. just want to know what were some of everbody's bankroll.

My rule of thumb is for max play, I take 2,000 times the 1-coin value per day.  If I'm playing $.25 single line, my BR for the day would be $500.00.  For nickels, it would be $100.I tend to put in around 6 hours a day actually playing the machines.I will say that it does depend a bit on which game you are playing.  I use those figures for DB full pay which has around a middle of the road variance figure for the more commonly found single line games I play.  I might be pushing it with 2000:1 per day if I'm playing DDB with it's 42% variance.

There's more than one kind of bankroll. MikeA discussed what's known as a session bankroll, that is, the amount of money needed to get you through a given day or week of gambling. Another kind of bankroll consideration is a permanent bankroll. The amount of money one has to gamble with over time. Many people ignore this bankroll concept and simply continue to use "recreational funds" to bankroll gambling and other leisure activities. While this can work, it can lead to problems where people do not understand the costs that can build up when gambling over time.
 
In addition, if a gambler is trying to make money, it is good to have some basis to build on. There are tools available to understand gambling bankrolls. I'd suggest looking over this website if this is where your interest lies.
 
http://wizardofodds.com/videopoker/anal ... yProg.html
 
 

good answer one should use only what they can play affordably and keep track of their running w/l totals

The rule of thumb that I was always taught was at least 80 hands of v.p. needed to be bankrolled for to intelligently play a particular game. This would mean $100=25 cents, $400=$1 etc.... If you don't give the game a chance to get into this pattern, then expect chopiness to be the rule. The exception to stopping  would be a sizeable hit !!!!---CWA---

2000 coins 500 for quarter games is more reasonable 80 could be gone in 5 minutes

One of the problems with rules of thumb is they don't take into consideration the variance of the games. You need much more money to tackle DDB then you need for JOB. Even variance isn't the entire story. I like to look at the payback of results that have less than 600 hand cycle times (one hour of play). If the return for these hands is better than 95% then one has a much better chance of seeing their bankroll last.  If not then I will probably double or triple the session bankroll depending on the payback of these hands.
 
That said, I normally take around $800 for a days worth of .25 VP with moderate variance. Multiply accordingly for higher denoms and higher variance.

Shadowman,I am an optimist.  You are closer to a safer mark that I am for there have been a few times when my $500 has evaporated and required digging a bit deeper or changing my activity (i.e. going to Blackjack.)

MikeA,
 
I used to go with $600 and had that run out a couple of times. So, I increased it. I do tend to play some moderate variance games which can eat you alive at time.
 
Recently I had a downswing of $4000 playing $ VP of fairly high variance.  The next morning I recovered $2200 of it and the following day I recovered another $1700. After 3 days I was slightly ahead counting the CB I earned but it was a bumpy ride.
 
Fortunately, I had enough money with me.

shadowman and mikea i thank you both for your input. it's good to get two different veiws on this by two experts. i don't have that much to start with but i got to start some where. i realy like this forum. i'll be visiting more often now and hope to find you two around answering my questions. thanks again.