I'm cross-posting this in General Strat. I think this forum probably gets the most strat action though.

I've taken the last few days off from playing and I've started to think some about the effect that multi-tabling has on my winrate and my overall variance. I started out playing 6-max about 2 months ago at 2/4 and I played 2 tables at a time. When I moved to 3/6 a couple weeks ago I started 3-tabling and I found that I could get in a ton of hands this way. I was playing around 300 hands an hour and loving it. Then I hit a bit of a downswing, took a look at my PT numbers and realized that there seemed to be something of a hole in my game. I wasn't defending the BB as much as I had at 2/4 and I as losing much more out of it. My overall VP$IP was significantly lower as well (of course, a part of that comes from the SB, but probably not all of it). I think that in effect, playing 3-tables at a time was affecting my ability to play optimally. I was giving up pots that I shouldn't have, because I had action going at other tables. In essence, I believe that 3-tabling probably adversely affected my winrate. So, I decided to drop back to 2 tables at a time and I booked a couple short sessions with marginal wins and felt pretty decent about my play. Of course, I then decided to take a break for a few days because I realized on Monday that my head wasn't where it needed to be for poker, but I plan to go back to 2-tablng 6-max when I start playing again on Friday or Saturday.

All of that is simply thoughts on my own play. What I hope the meat of this thread can be is a discussion of how multi-tabling affects all of us. I see so many posts about massive downswings, and the overall swings of 6-max, and sometimes it gets me to wondering if everyone is playing at their optimal expectation. I know that it's no secret to most that multi-tabling can reduce your expected winrate, and I think that it can also effect how much variance you experience. The question though, is where is the point where your winrate is adversely effected enough to where you shouldn't be playing so many tables? For me, right now, I believe that numbers is 3 tables of 6-max, I believe that my winrate is adversely affected at 3 tables and I should only play 2 tables of 6-max at a time. If that's not enough action I can mix in a tourney or a SnG, which won't require quite as much effort as a 6-max table. As I get more and more experience I may be able to play 3 or even more tables of 6-max at a time without it effecting me as much, but right now I think is probably the optimal number.

My thought here is that I really wonder how many people might be playing too many tables at once and hurting themselves in the process. Using 5/10 as an example, let's say that a player can make 2 BB/100 2-tabling, but only 1.5 3-tabling and 1 BB/100 playing 4 or more tables. We'll say this player can get in 95 hands per table each hour. This player has an expectation of $38/hr. 2-tabling, $42.75 3-tabling, and $38 an hour playing 4 tables. Hence, he maximizes his expectation 3-tabling even though it's hurting his winrate. However, let's say that this also makes his standard deviation higher and causes him to have more and bigger swings. This could adversely affect his phsyche, cause him to tilt or hurt him in other ways, especially if he's relying on poker as a source of income. So, maybe his best bet is to stick to 2 tables.

Taking it even further, I would venture to guess that most people don't have a set, even deviation like that in how multi-tabling effects their winrate and it would probably be almost impossible to calculate. However, I'd say that it probably effects some people even worse than the numbers I've thrown up on the screen. For instance, there may be many players who won't win as much as 2 BB/100 2-tabling and if their winrate goes down with each table, it could get to a point where someone who's making 1.5 BB/100 2-tabling may be breaking even or losing at 4-5 tables. Like the above player, this guy may be better off playing 2-tables at a time or maybe even 1.

Now, throughout this analysis I've used to 2 tables as a likely optimal number and that's probably only becase I personally think that I'd have trouble concentrating on only 1 table and yet I think that I'm not quite keeping up as well as I should on 3. So, while 2 is likely an optimal number for me (right now) that number could change later on and it may be very different for others.

My main point in all of this I think is that we should probably be looking to find a comfort zone where we're always playing the right number of tables. Where our winrate isn't adversely affected to the point where we're actually losing money or something. I'm not writing any of this as a knock on anyone in the forum, and I really have no idea how valid my ideas here are, but I think it's something that at least bears consideration.

What do you think?

2 tables is the most that I can really play too. At 3 my vpip drops to like the high 15s, and I find myself asking questions about the other players when I'm in a hand with them that I wish I knew the answer to. I hear of people playing 6 tables and winning and I'm amazed, I'de be lucky to break even playing that many. One day I'm gonna toss some money back into stars and try to learn how to do it on the .5/.10 tables.

Adding tables is hard. It's very hard work.

I have worked hard at it, though, and been pretty successful. It's taken me about 3 weeks to add a table, linearly, and now I can play 6ish pretty successfully (full ring). I am POSITIVE that I was playing suboptimally when I felt even mildly uncomfortable, but as long as I was still playing winning poker, I was happy with myself, because I was working towards a goal. It's okay to play poorly (or, mpre appropriately, MORE POORLY) when you're challenging yourself by playing more tables than you usually would.

You just gotta do it.

I might be hammered right now (duh, I'm posting at 630 EST), but I'm confident that taking your lumps (and wathching your winrate shrink) is worth it in the longrun. As long as you pay attention, notice the mistakes you make, and try so hard to fix them, you're on the right path.

I dunno if this made any sense, but I'm encouraging you to continue putting yourself in the uncomfortable situations. Until you're playing enough tables such that you can look in the mirror and say, "Look at me! My dick is 12 inches long!," keep adding them, assuming you're playing profitably. Adding hands is always good, even if you give up some equity on each table.

It will get easier, but only if you challennge yourself

Wang

I normally 8 table.
I tend to rely on PT numbers for reads the vast majority of the time, thoug hI do manage to get notes on things still.
I don't know my true win rate playing 8 tables, but I think 1.5 BB/100 is a conservative estimate.
8*1.5 = 12,
so if I wanted to play 4 tables (I can get really really good reads/notes then), I would need a 3 BB/100 WR, which isn't going to happen.
Also I think variance per hands is lowered when playing multiple tables.
It is for me anyway, because when I 8-10 table I miss marginally +EV situations that have a ton of variance which I wouldn't miss if I were 4 tabling.

I 8 table 6-max. It causes me to do a lot of dumb things for time to time, and sometimes serves as a good way to unintentionally mix things up. Also, I find a lot of the tough decisions are so close now that they don't severly impact my winrate. So while I may be able to win at 2BB/100 if I 4-table, my winrate is probalby around 1.5BB/100 when I 8 table. So I take a hit in my BB/100, but my hourly rate increases. The developement of my game also gets stunted, but right now, I can live with that. I find if I study hands, I can figure the stuff out anyway.

when i started out, i only played 1 or 2 tables. but eventually i just found that i was bored waiting for hands. i kept adding tables until i was playing 5 or 6 tables depending on how good the games were.

the thing i found with playing 6 tables is that my mind (and eyes) would become totally fried after about 2 hours of play. i was getting more hands in per hour put i could never understand how anyone could last for more than a 2 or 3 hour session.

so i logically started playing 9 tables. i was timing out on hands, folding winners by accident. it was ugly.

i've since dropped down back down to 4 tables. i feel totally comfortable at 4, i have good reads to go along with my notes and pokertracker stats and im tightening up my game that to be honest was still fairly green. more importantly i have a ton more stamina, im now putting in 5 or 6 hour sessions when possible and getting a ton more hands in.

i think the 3 most important things to multi-tabling are

1) you have a very good understanding of the game. if you're making rookie mistakes and trying to play 8 tables, it's going to get ugly.

2) emotional stability. if you tilt or steam after 1 or 2 bad beats, you're not going to be able to control yourself when your taking 3 or 4 at once. this isn't uncommon if you have 8 tables going.

3) monitor size. i play on a 17" widescreen laptop. its decent for 4 tables but anything more is either too small or overlapped too much. if you're serious about 8 tabling i really believe you need to get 2 monitors going so you''ve got no overlap.

tg