galanter wrote:For all I know the other people at the table are on the phone or IM'ing each other. Or are really just one person.

How can you protect yourself from this?

By fighting a war on terror.

russ wrote:

ogami itto wrote:me and my girlfriend play the same tables usually just because we like to plan ahead what we're doing, once we cleaned out a table for like a good 2000 bucks just because of raising and betting

Uh, if I'm reading you right, what you and your girlfriend were doing is called collusion, and it is one of the worst things you can do in poker. You were cheating, and therefore both of your accounts should be banned and your money forfeited.

Please don't do this, and please don't brag about it.

Someone asked me if this is what you guys do during the Alliance games. I told him I didn't think so and that I just suck, but how can I know for sure?

Russ, can you make your guide available again? The link, she no longer work...

thanks, Phil

Here is a poker idea I had some time ago. Surely I can't the only one to have thought of this.

The idea is to use the cards you are dealt to "randomize" your style of play to make yourself less predictable.

e.g.

2 red cards - aggressive play
1 of each - medium play
2 black cards - tight play

And just to be safe before each hand mentally pick which of the 6 possible combinations above will apply to the hand.

Has anyone heard of or read about something like this?

galanter wrote:Here is a poker idea I had some time ago. Surely I can't the only one to have thought of this.

The idea is to use the cards you are dealt to "randomize" your style of play to make yourself less predictable.

e.g.

2 red cards - aggressive play
1 of each - medium play
2 black cards - tight play

And just to be safe before each hand mentally pick which of the 6 possible combinations above will apply to the hand.

Has anyone heard of or read about something like this?

There is actually a pretty strong cadre of game theory specialists in poker. Former World Champion Chris Ferguson has a PhD in mathematics, and he specialized in Game Theory. You may be interested in several of David Sklansky's essays on the topic of using the cards to randomize your play. You can find even more discussion in the Poker Theory forum at twoplustwo.com.

galanter wrote:For all I know the other people at the table are on the phone or IM'ing each other. Or are really just one person.

There are security measures, including recourse against collusion, at every reputable poker site. If you suspect collusion, you inform the site, they investigate the behavior and refund your money. There was an online pro who had several hundred thousand dollars confiscated because he was caught using multiple accounts at a site.

This is a big business, with publicly traded companies and banks involved, and they are as concerned about dishonest behavior as you are. There are a lot of poker sites in fierce competition, and a crooked game would lose all its players to a legitimate one. Besides which, it is genuinely easier to beat bad players legitimately than it is to create an artificial edge, and there are a lot of bad players, so nobody bothers trying to rig the system.

You will hear a lot of inexperienced online players claim that online play is "rigged," but since the sites make the same amount of money regardless of who wins the pot, there is no reason for them to rig it, and most sites provide information about their random-number generators for the nit-picky.

galanter wrote:Here is a poker idea I had some time ago. Surely I can't the only one to have thought of this.

The idea is to use the cards you are dealt to "randomize" your style of play to make yourself less predictable.

e.g.

2 red cards - aggressive play
1 of each - medium play
2 black cards - tight play

And just to be safe before each hand mentally pick which of the 6 possible combinations above will apply to the hand.

Has anyone heard of or read about something like this?

At at the advanced level of poker, randomizing your play is essential, and a little game theory is very useful, especially in heads-up situations.

For instance, if you and I are playing 1 on 1, and I only raise with the very best cards, you will soon pick up on this and fold all but your winning hands. Therefore, in order to ensure that you call my bets with inferior hands, I must play a small percentage of weak hands exactly as aggressively as I play my strong ones. However, they cannot be the same weak hands as you described. They must be played randomly. Once you determine your proper bluffing frequency, it's relatively easy to decide when to play these weak hands. Some players use their watch. (For instance, if they decide to bluff in a situation 25% of the time, they simply look at their watch. If the second hand is between 12 and 3, they bet. If not, they check and fold.)

All of this occurs, however, after logical, multi-level hand analysis has failed, and you are left to rely on pure math to save the day. Whenevery I find myself in situations like this, rather than rely on my rather pitiful math-skills, my watch, or good luck, I just find another game with people much dumber than myself.

But check out Theory of Poker as Steve reccomends. Pretty much essential reading if you are interested in actually playing the game to win.

Thanks Steve and FMajcinek. I'll try to track down the Sklansky stuff starting with the basic text and I'll definitely check out twoplustwo.com.

(Someone mentioned sports betting. I did some fairly serious research into that at one point. Most of the books on the topic are crap, but there are some good ones as well as a small body of published academic research. My approach was number crunching oriented. I convinced myself that I probably *could* support myself that way, but it would require the effort of a full-time job plus a mid-six-figure bankroll. Since I already had the former but not the latter I sort of lost interest at that point.)

galanter wrote:Thanks Steve. I'll try to track down the Sklansky stuff and I'll definitely check out twoplustwo.com.

(Someone mentioned sports betting. I did some fairly serious research into that at one point. Most of the books on the topic are crap, but there are some good ones as well as a small body of published academic research. My approach was number crunching oriented. I convinced myself that I probably *could* support myself that way, but it would require the effort of a full-time job plus a mid-six-figure bankroll. Since I already had the former but not the latter I sort of lost interest at that point.)

You are probably right, re: sports betting. With the poker-software that Steve described above, and near-perfect, soul-killing play, (playing four tables simultaneously for hours at a time, peddling the nuts as aggressively as Tamale Guy peddling his wares at last-call, chasing every bonus and rake-back scheme) you could probably eek out a modest living with a bankroll of a few thousand dollars. It isn't fun, I don't think, but a lot of people are doing it.

Most of the serious, studious, "number-crunching" sports bettors that I've known do not support themselves that way. They are doctors or cab drivers who look at sports gambling like a little hobby. They love to analyze a bet, find an edge, manipulate their bankroll accordingly. Many of them don't even like sports, and never sweat the games. They just like trying to out-smart the Vegas bookmakers.

In my case I was looking to generate an income of 50-75K per year. That takes a considerable bankroll.

One of my constraints was not having to become a sports fan. Because I'm not. I wanted to treat teams and games as numerical abstractions.

I would take issue a bit with the notion of "out-smarting the bookmakers". That's a common notion but it's a bit misguided. In a pure form bookmakers post a number not as a prediction of the games outcome, but rather as an anticipation of the public's behavior in an attempt to evenly split the bets. If equal amounts of money are bet on each side the bookie always wins.

As a matter of practice, however, bookies (even Las Vegas casinos) will "take a side" where they think some massive public misperception is in the air. It can happen. But it's a dangerious path going against what some call "the wisdom of crowds".

But here is a no-brainer that has a historical slight edge. If you visit Las Vegas bet against L.A. teams. On average the odds will be slightly in your favor because the book has to skew a bit against disproportionate numbers of fans who happen to be visiting...and bet like fans.