Moving from Full ring to 6max

[Pallebahtep]

I started playing casual poker in March 2006 at microstakes limit tables and did ok. In August I moved to NL and started learning again at the 10NL FR tables. Things went very well indeed and by November I was bankrolled for 100NL. I played a fairly standard TAG game at full ring and probably due to that fact I never really experienced any serious variance in my results, it was just a steady progress.

Well since I came to 100NL variance is my new best friend. Things went well at first but after 8k hands at FR I am at break even. I have realised that nut camping FR has not taught me very much about post flop play, and I am probably ill equipped to play at 100NL and higher. So I have bitten the bullet and have moved to 6max to learn the hard way. Many of you have made this transition in the past and know the hardships.

I think I am doing ok at opening up my play a bit (I was 15VP$P, 8%PR, 3.7AF at FR and am now approx 25VP$P, 15PR, 5AF)

After all this rambling, here are my questions… How worried should I be about variance? Is it common to loose at first when you move to 6max? I have a worryingly large variance and overall I am down about 3 buyins over a sample of the first 3k hands. Shall I consider this my cost of learning to play proper poker? Is there merit in moving down in limits?

Any advice would be most welcome.

[biondino]

Yes, move down in limits, maybe to $25 where your mistakes will cost you less and your opponents mistakes will make you more. Or $50 as a compromise, where the players are a lot more passive than at $100.

It is likely that your losses aren't just variance - it is a different game which requires different skills so you can't expect to play as well until you've picked up its nuances. Equally, don't beat yourself up for not playing an A-game.

[Pallebahtep]

Thanks for the feedback...

I will give 50NL a few thousand hands to see if my BB/100 settles in the black and I get my confidence back.