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Geeks and Poker?
Best ID Ever! asks: "Poker, a fascinating intersection of math, game theory, and observation of human behavior, is currently exploding in popularity due to televised high-stakes tournaments such as the World Poker Tour and Binion's 2003 World Series of Poker. Many of today's top professional players have nerdly roots such as Mathematicians, chess prodigies, or backgammon champions. A few pros, including 2000 champion Chris Ferguson, even used to play poker in the IRC poker community. This year's World Series final event, which began Saturday and lasts through the week, drew 2600 participants, more than three times the number of participants in 2003. How many Slashdot readers play poker, and what do you think of Poker's upswing?"
I've left to find myself. If you happen to see me, please, keep me there until I return.
Poker, Blackjack or other such games are the only sort of gambling I would be remotely willing to participate in because it involves much more than straight chance as involved in slots, roulette or craps. Sure statistics come into play, but nothing forces the stats to hold consistently.
Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree. -Martin Luther
How many Slashdot readers play poker
All those who aren't posting anymore, because they're too skint to pay the ISP bill now...
The android Data, one of the most popular characters in TNG amongst geeks, is a fanatic poker player. Coincidence? I don't think so.
M.I.T. geeks vs Vegas.
True story.
An amazing read.
La via sola al paradiso incommincia nel inferno
I've never understoood the appeal of standing in front of a video poker terminal*, feeding in cash and pushing the little buttons, when I know that the odds are against me. But I have spent many unproductive hours with handheld poker games, and was inspired to come up with a system to lose less often. At the risk of slashdotting my new host, here's my geeky take on How to Lose Less at Video Poker.
It got mixed reviews a year or so ago when the topic came up in a previous Slashdot story, but it still seems to hold up for me -- at least, when there's no real money involved. The main criticism, IIRC, was that my method is very conservative, reducing the chances of a Big Win. Since I'm not the type to plug fifty bucks into a machine in hopes of a Big Win, I'm still happy with the method as it stands, but I'm receptive to comments.
I was hoping to try it out on a trip to Oklahoma, but when I stopped in the so-called Indian Casino in Okmulgee, I found nothing but a bingo parlor (with touch-screen monitors in place of ink daubers) and a couple hundred video 8-liners. Not one real video poker machine to try my luck. I'll have to hit the truck stop in Louisiana again... last time I was there, I played two 25c hands, lost one, won 50c on the other, and cashed out.
* Spending several hours plugging quarters into Pac-Man, however, is another thing entirely.
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
I just started a new position a few weeks ago. Up until recently, we would play Texas Holdem at lunch. I found it was a great opportunity to get to know my colleagues quickly and integrate myself as a memeber of the team.
Unfortunately, it also lead to extended lunch breaks, so the poker I'm disappointed to say, has ended. But the benefits of playing still remain.
In C++, friends can touch each others private parts.
I'm sure there are a lot of /.ers who play poker. They all downloaded that free strip poker and played for hours to win.
Or, was that just me
Evolution or ID?
Some wise poker advise: "If you don't know who's the sucker at the table, it's you."
no - but it's creative editing -
you'll see only the footage of the best hands...bear in mind, you're seeing maybe 5 percent of the hands actually televised - they'll edit it to keep the good stuff and throw away the bet/fold action.
Bluffs make for exciting poker, so they'll show a disproprotionally high amount of them on TV - just like reality TV will show more drunken outrageous behavior then the people sitting around watching TV
editing, man...
RB
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ah honey, we're all resplendent - Bill Mallonee
First try at this ignored paragraph breaks. Sorry!
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I used to play quite a bit of structured-bet poker in the California card rooms. In California, as opposed to Nevada, the card rooms are smoke free, and the competition is *usually* pretty weak.
At tables up to about the 6-12 or sometimes 10-20 range, almost all deals will see a flop. A lot of people will play any pair, regardless of position, and will often play any face card. In Vegas, more people know what they're doing, and a lot of times the deal will be folded around to the blinds.
So, in my opinion, California is about as accomodating a place to play as there is, and I got to a point where I could consistently win about $15/hr, over the long run. Not great, but not bad. More practice and higher table limits probably would have improved this number.
The problem is that it just gets SO. INCREDIBLY. BORING. If you're playing well, you're going to be folding most of your initial hands because they're just not worth playing. There have been hours where I've sat there and folded all 35 hands that are dealt. For a while you can watch the other players and learn their styles, but when you realize that two guys at the table will play anything to the flop, including 2-7 offsuit, there's not a whole lot else you need to know except that those two people suck and you should be ready to exploit their weakness.
Some poker books have stories about men who cut the pockets out of their pants, so they can masturbate at the tables. Perhaps my boredom threshold for masturbating in public is higher, or maybe I just didn't stick with poker long enough, but my decision was that that lifestyle wasn't really the way I wanted to spend my life.
For $15/hr, there are a lot of other jobs that don't revolve around being bored and taking other people's rent money. (Yes, I know you shouldn't play with rent money. A lot of people do. And those are usually the players who suck, and who are losing their money to you.)
Pot-limit and no-limit are completely different animals, but the risk in those games is enormous. It's trivially easy to lose your entire bankroll in one night.
Todd
Completely wrong.
m l
http://wizardofodds.com/games/slots/slotapx3.ht
NEVADA - Las Vegas
Unlike New Jersey, the Nevada Gaming Control Board does not break down its slot statistics by individual properties. Rather, they are classified by area.
The annual gaming revenue report breaks the Las Vegas market down into two major areas: the Strip and downtown. There is also a very big locals market in Las Vegas and those casinos are shown in the gaming revenue report as the Boulder Strip and North Las Vegas areas.
When choosing where to do your slot gambling, you may to keep in mind the following slot payback percentages for Nevada's fiscal year beginning July 1, 2002 and ending June 30, 2003:
5 Slot Machines
The Strip - 90.32%
Downtown - 91.50%
Boulder Strip - 93.03%
N. Las Vegas - 92.97%
25 Slot Machines
The Strip - 92.59%
Downtown - 94.83%
Boulder Strip - 96.47%
N. Las Vegas - 96.63%
$1 Slot Machines
The Strip - 94.67%
Downtown - 95.35%
Boulder Strip - 96.48%
N. Las Vegas - 97.21%
$1 Megabucks Machines
The Strip - 89.12%
Downtown - 88.55%
Boulder Strip - 87.76%
N. Las Vegas - 89.41%
$5 Slot Machines
The Strip - 95.33%
Downtown - 95.61%
Boulder Strip - 96.53%
N. Las Vegas - 96.50%
All Slot Machines
The Strip - 93.85%
Downtown - 94.32%
Boulder Strip - 95.34%
N. Las Vegas - 95.32%
These numbers reflect the percentage of money returned to the players on each denomination of machine. All electronic machines including slots, video poker and video keno are included in these numbers.
As you can see, the machines in downtown Las Vegas pay out 1% to 2% more than those located on the Las Vegas Strip for the lower denomination 5 and 25 machines. When you get to the $1 and $5 machines the difference is less noticeable but you can clearly see that the downtown casinos always return more than the Strip area casinos. This information is pretty well known by the locals and that's why many of them do their slot gambling away from the Strip unless they are drawn by a special slot club benefit or promotion.
Returns even better than the downtown casinos can be found at some of the other locals casinos along Boulder Highway such as Boulder Station and Sam's Town and also in the North Las Vegas area which would include the Fiesta, Santa Fe and Texas Station casinos. Not only are those numbers among the best returns in the Las Vegas area, they are also among the best payback percentages for anywhere in the United States.
This is one of those exceedingly rare chances where I can actualy post something on /. while at work and consider it work related :-)
I'm the lead programmer for a Poker training package called Poki's Poker Academy.
Poki started as an Artificial Intelligence research project at the University of Alberta, where I did my MSc. We've recently commercialized the AI into the above product.
The UofA
research page is an excellent resource for geeks interested in poker. Our publications look at the math and algorithmics behind writing sophisticated poker AI.
Poker is an incredibly geek friendly game. There is a lot of reward in being able to play analytically. The 'reading' of people is a much smaller part of the game than most folks think -- at the highest levels, the best players simply don't have any easy tells, so there is no point looking for any.
I want to live forever, or die trying.
Almost being the key word, and there's no possible source of "extra information" in craps, so it's a great house game. Blackjack used to be the best - you could count cards when you could find a decent 1 or 2 deck game, but now all those are for suckers, as the blackjack always pays 3 to 2 and the dealer hits on soft 17, which really helps the house and makes it basically impossible to get an edge.
That's why I like poker. You don't play the house, you play the other player. If you know what you're doing, you can have far better than the typical less than 1% player edge that's the best case scenario in blackjack.
I went to Vegas recently to play for the first time, and I ended up winning a little. For new players, you have to know when to play - at the low-limit tables, the locals play mornings, and if you're new to poker they'll likely beat you. Weekend nights is a mix of idiots (your prey) and sharks, many of whom are waiting for high-limit tables. If you have a loose high-limit player at your low limit table, trust me - get out. Even if there are 3 total newbies at your table, the "loose" shark will get more of your money than you will of the newbies. I found the best time was afternoons - the locals are gone, and the sharks are still sleeping it off, leaving you and a lot of really stupid people. That's when I did really well. It helps when some moron will take 2-7 unsuited all the way to the river in Hold 'em. It happened to me, it was great. You can't lose.
As the submitter mentions, poker (especially limit and no-limit hold'em) is a fantastic combination of skills including your ability to read people and math skills (especially your ability to calculate odds on the fly). It truly is a geek game, with many of the game's top players holding advanced degrees in mathematics, statistics, etc.
In fact, I'll be in Vegas starting this weekend to buy in to one of the $1500 tournaments which make up the World Series. Of course I have very little chance of winning, but I figured it was time to roll up a stake, head to vegas and take my shot!
Not a lot of people know there are 33 separate games making up the World Series, not just the grand $10k buy-in No Limit game you see televised on ESPN/etc. Speaking of which, with all the talk about it, it would have been nice for the submitter to include a link to the official WSOP website.
Required poker reading for those interested in getting dealt in:
CardPlayer.com. Poker news, tips and discussions. One of the best of the best. Includes a really good online odds calculator you can use to double check your own math :)
TwoPlusTwo.com. Website run by some of the smartest guys in gambling, David Sklansky and Mason Malmuth. Sklansky has an excellent series of highly-technical poker books for every skill level, including Hold 'Em Poker, Hold'Em Poker for Advanced Players, Tournament Poker for Advanced Players, and The Theory of Poker.
Doyle Brunson's Super System. Regarded by many as the bible on poker. Much of the information is outdated about specific games (the nature of the game has changed) but any respectable poker player knows this book.
PhilHellmuth.com. Phil is a poker geek himself, one of the best players around (and the youngest to win the world championship). His recent book on poker Play Poker Like the Pros is the best "intermediate" book around in my opinion.
PokerPages.com. Best place to find a game, be it a tournament or local game. Great source of poker news.
There are also a great number of high quality poker blogs, including PokerBlog.com, GuinessAndPoker.com and ChrisHalverson.com.
Not to mention of course, the explosion of online poker sites, including UltimateBet.com,
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There is no try at jedinite.com
Interesting stats, but it neither proves nor disproves the parents premise. The stats you mention are for the casino as a whole, the parent was refering to locations within the Casino.
If a Casino has 1,000 slot machines, it might determine that 20 of them are in "LURE" locations, and they payoff at 103%. The remaining 980 machine can pay off at 94.84% and you casino will average a payout of 95%. Now consider the amount of tech and monitoring casinos do, the variety of machines at their disposal, etc. You really think every machine pays off at the same rate?
Heck, this theory even explains why off-strip casinos pay out more, they have a lower ratio of high visibility to low visibilty slots, meaning their average will be higher.
Still doubting? Its not widely disseminated, but the big advantage of electronic Slots is that while their payouts must be the same, its perfectly legal for them to dangle jackpots just off the screen in non-scoring positions. They are carefully timed to show up when you might be getting disappointed, but not so often that you see the line and the stick attached to the carrot.
The corporate Vegas of today is far more cut-throat than the gangster Vegas of yesteryear, Its not Vinny in the back figuring how to lure you, its a crack team of statisticians and behavioral psychologists...
You are in a maze of twisted little posts, all alike.
most geeks play strip uno all the time. it's strip duo that's a little more rare for them.
char *mySig;
Disclaimer -- the only form of Poker I play is Texas Hold'em, Low-Mid Limit and occasionally No Limit tournaments. I can't speak on the other variations of the game and, no, I don't work for or with any of the sources that I am citing.
For starters, Hold'em, like any form of Gambling for real money, isn't for everyone. Gambling is called Gambling for a reason, otherwise they'd call it Savings. But if you're looking at getting into it, here is some food for thought:
From a geek standpoint, I think one of the appeals that Hold'em Poker has is that it isn't so much a game a chance as it is more of a game of incomplete information. The very essence of living a geeked out existance is marinated in the ability to thrive in environments of incomplete information, whether solving problems or creating solutions. Out of those who consider themselves geeks, I'd have to say that those who are Hackers (whether in the genuine sense or cracking into computer/network/phone systems) would probably tend to have a little more of an edge than most. Aside from the logic and reasoning involved in playing the game, there's a certain instinct that develops, very similar to that certain "something" that enables some people the uncanny ability to take a look at a system, see what isn't obvious and find ways to make that system do things it wasn't originally designed to do. Anyone applying the Hacker Mentality to learning and playing the game will probably find that it won't take long for them to become formidable opponents.
Another way to look at the game is that essentially you're putting together a puzzle, racing to put yours together first, and betting that you can put together a better puzzle than everyone else -- all done by assembling the information between the hole cards that you're dealt, the cards that are flopped, the final cards that hit the table, and the patterns of betting/raising/folding around the table. You're not only competing with others at the table but you're also competing with yourself since there are times when you'll have to fold on seemingly great hands because playing them through to the end of a round will only mean getting beat and throwing your money away. Outside of just plain old bad luck, when it comes to most people losing big at Hold'em, generally you can boil it down to either (1) the know the basic rules but being clueless about the game's dynamics, (2) playing with a lack of discipline, and/or (3) letting their egos dictate the way they play their cards instead of doing what the cards and the dynamics of the table during that particular round says they should do. I'm no expert but this is something I've observed way too often. I've competed in some small stakes Hold'em tournaments locally and walked away with the top prize several times. In each case the people that were easiest to knock out of the game succumbed to any one of those three, usually all of them by the time I was scooping up the last of their chips.
The two foremost authors I've read on the subject are Sklansky and Malmuth. Between these three books -- The Theory of Poker by David Sklansky (ISBN: 1-880685-00-0), Hold'em Poker by David Sklansky (ISBN: 1-880685-08-6), and Hold'em for Advanced Players by David Sklansky and Mason Malmuth (ISBN: 1-880685-22-9) -- alot of patience, and alot of practice with both online poker play (start with play money) and stand-alone versions of the game, it doesn't take long to advance beyond being one of the novices throwing their money away at a table and getting beat like a baby seal. The rest comes with time and experience.
Aside from those books, there are tons of sites out there on the subject. Here are a few that I found to be helpful during the learning processs:
http://www.twoplustwo.com/
http://www.learn-texas-holdem.com/
http://www.holdemsecrets.com/
Als
VIDEO poker != TABLE poker.
Lemme explain, as a fairly proficient card shark. (I missed WSOP by eight seats in a 150-man supersatellite this past Feb. Wired 7s, short-stacked, on the button, against a bozo with 9-10 off. He flopped a 9, I go home.)
Video poker is a game of chance. Granted, due to Gaming Board regulations, the chance of any card hitting is in line with actual probabilities, but, in the end, you are, like a slot monkey, looking for particular combinations of cards to get a payoff, usually starting at a pair of jacks.
Table poker, though, is an entirely different animal. Larger amounts of money are typically involved. Play is much more skill-based than in video poker. Knowing when to toss Big Slick (A-K), or when to hold Khan (A-Q) is a tricky thing to master. It's even harder to know what to do on a flop. Some flops it's damned obvious, some the right looking thing will kill you. (Ex: A-9, flop comes 9-3-3 with one caller. Too bad the &*#$ had J-3. Two pair is good. A set is better.)
Add to that understanding the psychology of the game. You have tight players, you have loose players, you have lunatics, you have masters, and quite often you don't know who's who until they've taken some of your precious pieces of resin. VP, you're playing a machine.
Probability is also a major major factor. Big Slick, for example, is a monster hand because (a) it is favored against any other non-paired hand and (b) against any paired hand that isn't kings or aces, it's a coin-flip. (7-3 dog against cowboys, 12-1 dog against bullets. Link to a great poker odds calculator)
But the most difficult part of poker - especially high-stakes tournament poker - is keeping it together when you're so nervous, excited, tense, and anxious at the same time. Keeping it together when you know you've got the nuts (the very best hand possible) and you've got a sucker betting into you.. or calming down enough to see if your set also made your opponent fill her straight.. It's tough.
I love it.
I used to be someone else. Now I'm someone better.
Real life is underrated.
The only way to win consistanty is to play rationally (ie. mathematically) against people who are not playing rationally.
This is misleading. In order to beat people who are playing "irrationally", you must also play "irrationally". Let me explain what I mean by this.
There is no "Optimal strategy" in poker. There is a good strategy for a specific situation against specific players, but there is no single strategy that can always be applied.
If you always play "rationally (mathematically)", then that means you are not varying your game; then your opponents can read you like an open book. Then they can bluff at you when you check, because "rationally", you check when you have nothing. So this isn't a good way to do it.
When players start out, they usually play "rationally", i.e. they are always thinking about math and odds. The truth is that you have to vary your plays, sometimes doing "irrational" things like betting when you don't have a hand or have an incomplete hand. The reason i call this irrational is that, a rational opponent could turn around and exploit your sub-optimal play. However, you play sub-optimally precisely because you know your opponent is weak and will not exploit your play.
I'll use an analogy to explain this phenomenon. In a game of paper-rock-scissors, the mathematically optimal (rational) strategy is to play randomly. And your analysis of random vs random is correct.. no one wins. However, if your opponent plays "irrationally" (exhibits patterns), then you must also play "sub-optimally" to exploit these patterns. In doing so you will exhibit patterns of your own. If your opponent is playing 66% rocks, you would do well to play lots of papers. Now, if your opponent is rational, he would just start playing scissor instead. But precisely because he continues to play suboptimally (66% rocks), you continue playing papers. Poker is a more complex game, which is why people actually make mistakes of this magnitude at poker and why people don't play paper-rock-scissors for money.
The reason you can win at poker is that players are always betting the value of the cards in their hand. To win at poker, you have to take into account more than your cards and the odds of the next card hitting; you have to bet your position at the table, and you have to bet based on the other player's cards. Bad players will tell you what they have with the size of their bets. Now that you have more information than they do, you can eat them alive.
Newbies around the table hold bullshit-crap
Someone is going to get two pair out of the board. You have to hope for another ace or a pair on the board. If that pair does show up, it likely gives trip-bullshit to one of the 7 implacable newbs.
Your question does not have a short answer. AA is not as good as you think. If all 9 of your opponents stayed in til the river card, it would only win 30% of the time! Granted, your odds before the flop are better than anyone elses, but this means that there are on average seven people sitting at the table that would beat you if they stayed in.
You shouldn't think of yourself as entitled to win that hand, you should try to maximize your value when you win it.
In a tournament setting, going all in with AA pre flop can be a pretty good move, but it's not always how you should play it. Just make a big raise to try to get some people out, and if you have a big re-raiser, then consider going all in.
Having a few punters call your big bet is not a bad thing. It means that the times you do win the hand, you will win more money on average as a result.
Of course, it's not that simple in a tournament, because you also must take your relative stack size into account. If there are still 2500 people in the tournament, someone has a stack ten times your size at the table, you might want to think twice about pushing your advantage too hard. You should almost never fold AA pre flop (though there are very very very rare situations where it is a good idea), but AA is only an 87% winner against a random hand.
Your goal in a proportional payout (pays out to x place, as opposed to a winner-take-all) tournament is to survive as long as possible, NOT to press every little advantage to the limit. This means that, while you must be aggressive, you don't want to risk all your chips early on if you can help it.
In some tournaments (particularly online), you could probably outlast half the field just by folding every hand. Realize this, and take some risks, but try skate your way to the final table, not bludgeon your way there.
In a winner take all tournament, the gloves are off, and you *should* play every little edge to the maximum. This means that you will lose early a lot, but also that you will win more often than you should.
WWJD? JWRTFA!
Yes, poker is a game for mathematically-oriented geeks. In fact, the game is undergoing a revolution, with the savvy young players overthrowing the old guard, because they simply have better tools in their toolbox. Understanding how the other player thinks is still absolutely essential to playing at the top level, but there are also many mathematical concepts (beyond simple probabilities) that are very important to poker strategy.
In the old days of the Internet (before AOL), the newsgroup rec.gambling.poker had an incredibly high signal to noise ratio. Good players shared their insights, and many of them went on to be major stars in the poker world. I was just down at the WSoP and met with several of them (old friends and new acquaintances, many world champions among them).
Television has suddenly made poker into a spectacle, and the growth in popularity has been spectacular. Online poker is also booming, with thousands of geeks fleecing the millions of players who have less knowledge about the game.
If you want to learn more about this great game, visit some of the links on the The University of Alberta Computer Poker Research Group home page. You will need to read a lot (especially the books by Sklansky and Malmuth), and practice a lot before you become a good player.
One good tool for providing endless hours of practice is the commercial version of our research programs, Poki's Poker Academy.
Now is a great time to have fun and augment your income playing poker.
- Darse.
( hey look moderators! it's the actual guy! :)
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