Ok, so sometimes i get ambitious and decide to observe some games that i know are completely out of my BR. ex. $400NL I just sat and watched trying to make some reads see the play. You see about 3 open seats and the stacks are about all even around 400ish. No huge stacks maybe a stack of $200 or so. Anyways, i saw two absolute fish. I mean i see fish, but raising 8x bb with T6o UTG?!?!? button calls with J7s?!?!?!? and a pair of J's takes the pot of about $170!?!?!?!
How do you stop yourself from sitting in. I know i need to be disciplined but T6o!?!?!
well my good friend Xaston on this board did talk me out of it; and in all seriousness a set over a set with a $400 stack im probably hanging from the ceiling fan. But when does it come down to taking a shot or just being plain stupid?

I think it depends on how much your roll is (how much over your head the game is) and how pissed youre going to be if you lose 2 buy ins to a moron who gets lucky when 2 buy ins is 4-10 times what youre used to losing.

I was watching a $25/$50 game the other night and it was all I could do to not sit down, but I didnt do it because losing $10K would put me in a funk for a month and winning $10K would be really great but wouldnt change my lifestyle or anything like that.

If you have great discipline, then you might decide to spend a part of your winnings on taking a shot at a juicy higher game. For example, you had a great session at your usual game and are up 5 buyins. If you can completely handle losing that in one hand, you can use those 4 buyins to sit in a higher game.

First problem might be that if you lose that money you will be very tempted to rebuy, which would affect your bankroll.

Second problem might be that if you win, you will lose motivation in your regular game once you tasted the big game...

If you do this once (say for your birthday) and you know that you can go back to playing your regular game like you always did regardless of what happens, then I don't see a problem.

Pieter

I'm 100% with iceman on this one. I've got the roll and the ability to play the 1000 and 2000PLO games at party, which aren't particularly rocky (tend to be a lot of hyper-aggro gamblers) but losing a 2k pot would put me in a funk for a week or two also!

Just trying to save you the aggrevation I faced when I played $1000 PLO and that moron called my $651 pot sized turn bet with a flush draw against my set of aces. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRr.

Dear Monk,
Stop being a wuss and play that game and get my money back, you can return it to me in the form of a check, money order, or transfer it directly to my partypoker account. Thanks

I recently took a $2000 shot at 5/10 and lost. I wasn't too upset about it. I decided I would risk 2 grand of my bankroll to possibly move up a litle bit quicker. Sadly I ran into two monster bad beats (set of 7's running into quads on the river, flopped straight losing to FH on river.) But I took my shot. I had more enough in my bankroll to keep playing 2/4..or just move back to 1/2 if i wouldn't.

Yeah, I am a beleiver in taking a shot... A few months back I lost about $10k or so of my bankroll playing 100/200 - and it sucked and hell, im still recovering from that, but the only reason i have any sort of bankroll at all is because I took a shot a while back on borrowed money when a friend of mine was doing really well...

Problem with my 'shot' was that the game was not as 'easy' as it seemed like it was - it was wild and aggressive but it was 3 handed and I ran terrible, and the variance in a game like that is a killer.

But still, if you see a game you REALLY REALLY thinking is good thats bigger than you usually play but where losing a buyin will not really disrupt the normal course of things (even though it'll suck balls), then i say go for it. Moral #2 of the story though is that you should look carefully at the game, and look for reasons that maybe the game wont be as easy as it looks. Sure, it looks easy if someone shoves his stack in with bottom pair and gets called by someone with middle pair, and middle pair takes down a 3k pot, but really, crap like that leaves a non-wild player in a pretty tough spot. Games arent always as easy as they seem, i what i guess im saying. SO be careful, IMHO, ya gotta go for it if its there and within reason.

Definitely take a shot. When I used to play nothing but $25 NL I had some extra roll so I sat down at the $200 NL, folded everything until I got kings, and doubled up. Got greedy and sat down at the same table the next day, folded until I had kings again. Bet pot on flop, turn, and value bet the river and the guy pushed. Final board was T8535. He showed me 45o. And so ended my excursion into that limit for a while.