To clear something up about Martingale System

[alrelax]

I read and hear how some apply the Martingale to their wagering. 

All fine and good until the great shoe comes for some and the most horrible shoe that will wipe you out.  5's, 6's and 7's that you will lose on, no matter what they are, does not matter.  Repeats, Chops, 1s and 2s, etc.  It is not that hard to lose 5-6 or 7 wagers in a row or spaced out, not at all.  For those of you that never did, you sure have not played very long at all.

At a beginning wager of only $50.00, it would look like this. 

$50.00
$100.00
$200.00
$400.00
$800.00
$1,600.00  <<<< 6th wager
$3,200.00

For 7 lost wagers/  Just say 6 were lost.  You would have put up and lost $3,150.00 over a $50.00 wager.  It would take you 63 flat wagers of $50.00 wins, to get your lost $3,150.00 back!  Huge downfall, IMO.

Say you started with $150.00 wager and lost, it would look like this:

$150.00
$300.00
$600.00
$1,200.00
$2,400.00
$4,800.00 <<<<< 6th wager
$9,600.00

For 6 lost wagers, you would have lost $9,450.00.  It would take you 63 wins at a flat $150.00 to get your lost money back.  Huge once again!

Personally my limit on a Marty attempt would be 2, possibly 3 in rare circumstances.  I am a firm believer in, when it is losing time, it is losing time no matter what you try to do.

I am so tired of seeing the false spread of rubbish concerning Marty wagering to get it all back or even make money.  Even with small amounts, under $25.00, there are huge amounts to make up once the Marty fails after like 7 to 10 wagers, etc. 

Good cheap talk for those selling systems and false hopes to the newbies, etc.  I guess?

Also, I would only perform a Marty with 'win' money currently in front of me, not risking my buy in further than I have to.  It is too negative IMO to keep losing in that style and manner with chips from your buy in.   

[AsymBacGuy]

Mmmhhh yes and no. It's just a matter of time and number of bets and not about money wagered. And of course about bet selection.

Put it mathematically.

People wagering $50,100,200,400,800,1600,3200 are risking $6350 to win $50 each time they wager. They have just 1/128 probability to fail. Thus they are more likely to be ahead after say 40-50 bets for a $2500 total.
People not using this martingale are a lot less likely to be ahead of $2500 (admitting a $50 basic unit) or even anything after 40-50 bets.

Positive progressions work in the same way. True, when you start losing you lose just 1 unit, but when you lose after a win you still lose and so on. That is positive progressions transform all WL situations into mere losing events.

Of course in order to win without a martingale we need to cross positive homogeneous patterns of different lenght depending upon the strategy.
Thus the problem remains the same seen by an opposite angle.
Martingale lovers need to skip a rare homogeneous losing pattern, others try to be ahead by crossing a rare homogeneous positive pattern or rare clustered short positive patterns.
At the end the only thing that changes is the frequency of wins and losses. And of course the probability to be ahead or not after x number of bets.

Actually a strong evidence about the power of some progressions is when we find a so diluted bet selection capable to restrict the variance impact.
This should be considered as a limited random walk movement.

Say we have found a process of W/L situations that just moves from -5 to +5.


----------------------------0--------------------------------
-5    -4    -3    -2    -1       +1    +2    +3    +4    +5

If we are betting after the +5 level had been reached at some point, we know that we could cross an unlikely but possible losing sequence bringing us to -4 or -5 level, meaning we lose 9 or 10 hands in a row.
Notice that the opposite action is still very unlikely and therefore it shouldn't be attempted.

Thus, the best opportunities to put progressive bets in such heaven plan come when the WL ratio is at zero or very close to zero, as we need only 5 progressive bets to cover the most unlikely occurences.
And naturally when the W/L ratio jumps on the extreme left side (-4 or -5) we are virtually certain to win.

As Jimskie correctly pointed out, what counts for a method are WIAR and LIAR values, a thing slightly different than a pure W/L ratio assessment.

In my -5/+5 random walk scheme, the only way I can lose BY MARTINGALING 7 hands in a row (for example) comes when W/L ratio is at +2 or more.
Every other situation is covered.
On the other hand, starting to bet when W/L ratio stays on negative field guarantees me winnings 100% of the times without using progressions deeper than 5 steps.

IMO, there's no way we can guess which direction will take the deviations, we only play probabilities.

Now the problem is to find out which patterns/situations should form a -5/+5 random walk; actually it's not that difficult as we're working to restrict the variance to a -3/+3 random walk, meaning that every trigger will be good no matter how is actually placed.

It's Christmas, be positive!

as.

[alrelax]

My ideal and best positive progressions go something similar to this, either starting with $75.00 or with $150 or with $250 for the initial wager, the rest the same parlays and strategy to rack it in.

First wager of $75.00, won and pressed up to $150.00, won and pressed up to $300.00.  The next 3 wagers are vital of winning 3 which will then produce the player to really winning or just losing the initial risk of $75.00.  Win 3 more wagers at the $300.00 and pull down each win in case of a sudden loss.  If the player won all three, he sits with $900.00 and a net profit of $825.00.  The 7th wager will be the game changer for that player.  A $1,200.00 wager and if won, he then sits with $2,400.00 off that first initial $75.00 wager, with a net of $2,325.00.  Then that player should wager (I would) $250.00 for the remaining wagers of that "Section" he is currently within.