I played in a home game for the first time this weekend. A guy at work had a game with some of his friends and he was light a couple of players. Somehow he heard that I play so he invited me.
It turned out pretty well. It was a tournament a $10 SNG with rebuys. There were 7 of us. I managed to take it down without having to rebuy. I made $70 profit woo hoo! The play was about what I expected at a home game, less tough than $1/$2 NL at the local casino.
I tried to be friendly my first time out [well except winning it of course lol] and I let a lot of stuff go i.e. string bets, people talking about the hand in progress, people checking cell phones for messages while in a hand, people talking and inattentive that it was their turn. I'm not sure if I'll be invited back oh well, maybe as a spare player if the host doesn't have enough regs.
I had a good time. If I play again in this home game I will insist we play with my Kem cards. The host had common cards and after I've been using the nice casino quality Kem cards you'll never want go back to ordinary playing cards.
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Friday, October 15, 2010
PokerStars WBCOOP Blogger Freeroll
All right another blogger freeroll. As usual I'll endeavour to play. I haven't played online much of late and also cut back on live slightly. I've been trying to work on some other projects and get them moved along then I'll be able to play more again.
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
government run online poker
Some bad news out of Washington State recently. Players there can no longer play for money on PokerStars. Not a good development, especially considering similar type developments in France, Italy, Belguim etc. I would not be surprised if most or all of the remaining US states also move to shut out Stars, Tilt, UB etc. to favor local poker monopolies.
Maybe it was inevitable that this great thing we had going, our global community of players, would be ruined and shut down by governments around the world.
In Canada I'm not looking forward to the government taking over online poker. This is what us players will have to look forward to in a government monopoly.
Ontario lotto insiders accused of stealing $12.5M ticket
Ontario lotto insider steals $5.7M ticket and gets 1 year jail
Play with other people's money on PlayNow in BC
I expect government online poker will be exactly the same. Self dealing, lax security, light to no penalties for cheating insiders and their accomplices, turning a blind eye to reports of cheating and abuse, "take a number" DMV attitude to service. I'm not looking forward to what looks like the coming era of government monopoly online poker.
Maybe it was inevitable that this great thing we had going, our global community of players, would be ruined and shut down by governments around the world.
In Canada I'm not looking forward to the government taking over online poker. This is what us players will have to look forward to in a government monopoly.
Ontario lotto insiders accused of stealing $12.5M ticket
Ontario lotto insider steals $5.7M ticket and gets 1 year jail
Play with other people's money on PlayNow in BC
I expect government online poker will be exactly the same. Self dealing, lax security, light to no penalties for cheating insiders and their accomplices, turning a blind eye to reports of cheating and abuse, "take a number" DMV attitude to service. I'm not looking forward to what looks like the coming era of government monopoly online poker.
Monday, August 30, 2010
flush jackpot
At my local card room there's something called the flush jackpot. I never really paid much attention to it. I understood there was a ballot or something.
Anyway the way it works is if you lose flush over flush and both cards play for both players then the losing player gets to put his name on a ballot. Then from Sunday-Wednesday at 6, 8, 10, 12 PM there's a draw and if you are in the room at the time your name is drawn then you win. If the drawn name is not present then the jackpot for next week at that time increases by $50. If the jackpot is won then next time it resets back to $50.
So I ended up with a ballot for the first time. On the hand I limped with 87cc on the button in a multiway pot. The flop was 6c 9c 2c I believe. There was a bet and raise before me. I made it $110 with $80 behind. The original better in EP went all in for his remaining $65. The middle position guy then moved all in; he had me covered.
I thought about it for a bit and decided to call. I figured if I called preflop I have to stack off on this flop and I was always drawing live with an open ended straight flush draw. If the other guy had a set then we would be drawing live to crack the super bad beat jackpot for $80K at the time.
After the money was all in we showed and the EP guy had Kc 5c. The middle position guy who moved all in had Ac 9 for top pair and the nut flush draw. As it happened blanks slid off and EP took the main pot. Luckily EP was short and I still made around $70 profit in the side pot. Plus since I lost the main pot flush over flush I got a ballot.
Looking at the flush jackpot board I noticed the Tuesday 10 PM was $650 and the Wednesday 10 PM draw was $500. The other times were pretty low. So I went there Tuesday and Wednesday for short sessions. As it happened I didn't hit, but I was fortunate to win a bit at the tables while I was there. On the Tuesday the winner was a likable woman regular who hit the $650 so that was all right. I don't think I'd been there on a Tuesday or Wednesday before. It was quieter than on Friday-Saturday but still there were 3-4 tables going.
Anyway the way it works is if you lose flush over flush and both cards play for both players then the losing player gets to put his name on a ballot. Then from Sunday-Wednesday at 6, 8, 10, 12 PM there's a draw and if you are in the room at the time your name is drawn then you win. If the drawn name is not present then the jackpot for next week at that time increases by $50. If the jackpot is won then next time it resets back to $50.
So I ended up with a ballot for the first time. On the hand I limped with 87cc on the button in a multiway pot. The flop was 6c 9c 2c I believe. There was a bet and raise before me. I made it $110 with $80 behind. The original better in EP went all in for his remaining $65. The middle position guy then moved all in; he had me covered.
I thought about it for a bit and decided to call. I figured if I called preflop I have to stack off on this flop and I was always drawing live with an open ended straight flush draw. If the other guy had a set then we would be drawing live to crack the super bad beat jackpot for $80K at the time.
After the money was all in we showed and the EP guy had Kc 5c. The middle position guy who moved all in had Ac 9 for top pair and the nut flush draw. As it happened blanks slid off and EP took the main pot. Luckily EP was short and I still made around $70 profit in the side pot. Plus since I lost the main pot flush over flush I got a ballot.
Looking at the flush jackpot board I noticed the Tuesday 10 PM was $650 and the Wednesday 10 PM draw was $500. The other times were pretty low. So I went there Tuesday and Wednesday for short sessions. As it happened I didn't hit, but I was fortunate to win a bit at the tables while I was there. On the Tuesday the winner was a likable woman regular who hit the $650 so that was all right. I don't think I'd been there on a Tuesday or Wednesday before. It was quieter than on Friday-Saturday but still there were 3-4 tables going.
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Straddle
I recently straddled for the first time.
I was thinking of doing the occasional straddle. The way it works in my poker room at $1/$2 is it is a live straddle to $4 and you can raise if you wish on your straddle.
I was thinking of when to straddle. In general I don't mind if people straddle although I've had to think about how it is different than a $2 blind. It's safe to say that I seldom straddle myself.
So I figured this is about right. If the table is loose and friendly with a good amount of banter; if 3+ people are straddling every round; if I'm up at least $100 then I'll straddle once.
Last time out it was all in place so with some trepidation I put in the $4 from UTG before the cards came out. I was dealt T5. Luckily no raise and 7 of us saw the flop. The flop was ten high. I bet $20 into the $28 pot. 1 caller and everyone else folded.
Then before the turn one guy who was talkative finally noticed that I had straddled. It caught him by surprise and he made a comment. I made a little joke about me being so friendly and talkative and outgoing that I naturally wanted to straddle. That got some snickers.
Back to the hand the turn was a low blank and it was checked through. The river was an Ace. I felt that was a good card for me and I bet $35 into the $68 pot. Opponent quickly folded and luckily I won a nice pot with a trashy hand I'd never normally play in early position.
I was thinking of doing the occasional straddle. The way it works in my poker room at $1/$2 is it is a live straddle to $4 and you can raise if you wish on your straddle.
I was thinking of when to straddle. In general I don't mind if people straddle although I've had to think about how it is different than a $2 blind. It's safe to say that I seldom straddle myself.
So I figured this is about right. If the table is loose and friendly with a good amount of banter; if 3+ people are straddling every round; if I'm up at least $100 then I'll straddle once.
Last time out it was all in place so with some trepidation I put in the $4 from UTG before the cards came out. I was dealt T5. Luckily no raise and 7 of us saw the flop. The flop was ten high. I bet $20 into the $28 pot. 1 caller and everyone else folded.
Then before the turn one guy who was talkative finally noticed that I had straddled. It caught him by surprise and he made a comment. I made a little joke about me being so friendly and talkative and outgoing that I naturally wanted to straddle. That got some snickers.
Back to the hand the turn was a low blank and it was checked through. The river was an Ace. I felt that was a good card for me and I bet $35 into the $68 pot. Opponent quickly folded and luckily I won a nice pot with a trashy hand I'd never normally play in early position.
Thursday, June 24, 2010
randomness in the cards
I've been thinking some about randomness lately and how it occurs naturally.
For example in hold'em there's a lot of randomness just in the cards. I don't mean that the shuffle is clean and your hand is random. I mean kind of within the hand.
Suppose you decide you want to vary your use of continuation betting on the flop. You decide that instead of cbet 100% of the time you'll cbet 75% of the time. ok, now how to determine the 75%.
Well that's where your cards come in. In hold'em there's the two cards. You get one first then the next one. Let's call the second card the "top" card.
In the top card of course there are 4 suits. So you could randomize your flop cbet by using the rule "if the top card is a non-heart then cbet". That's pretty easy and when playing live it's useful because you've already put your down cards into your memory. So you don't have to remember some additional second hand off a watch or something.
It works with the distribution of pocket pairs as well. Suppose you decide you are going to LRR with Aces some amount of the time in early position. ok, well there's 6 ways of course to make AA. Of those there's 1 way to make the black aces. So 1/6 about 17% of the time you could LRR with the black Aces. If this seems high you can cut it in half by using black aces with the top card the ace of spades. Now you're down to about 8%.
In addition to your cards there are other natural sources of randomness. On PokerStars and other sites there's a hand # in the top left corner for each hand. Well you can use the last 2 digits of this number as a percentage random number.
When playing live your seat number is typically random. It's just the open seat at your table when you arrive. So half the time you're in an even seat 2,4,6,8,10 and half in odd 1,3,5,7,9. You could use the hour of the clock time which is also even or odd to determine a match half the time. For example 10:25 in seat 4 is a match. 10:25 in seat 7 is not a match. 11:33 in seat 9 is a match. Using the example above with AA you could use + seat match to cut your LRR frequency in half again black aces + top card spade + seat number match comes out to about 4% of the time if you want to do something pretty infrequently.
For example in hold'em there's a lot of randomness just in the cards. I don't mean that the shuffle is clean and your hand is random. I mean kind of within the hand.
Suppose you decide you want to vary your use of continuation betting on the flop. You decide that instead of cbet 100% of the time you'll cbet 75% of the time. ok, now how to determine the 75%.
Well that's where your cards come in. In hold'em there's the two cards. You get one first then the next one. Let's call the second card the "top" card.
In the top card of course there are 4 suits. So you could randomize your flop cbet by using the rule "if the top card is a non-heart then cbet". That's pretty easy and when playing live it's useful because you've already put your down cards into your memory. So you don't have to remember some additional second hand off a watch or something.
It works with the distribution of pocket pairs as well. Suppose you decide you are going to LRR with Aces some amount of the time in early position. ok, well there's 6 ways of course to make AA. Of those there's 1 way to make the black aces. So 1/6 about 17% of the time you could LRR with the black Aces. If this seems high you can cut it in half by using black aces with the top card the ace of spades. Now you're down to about 8%.
In addition to your cards there are other natural sources of randomness. On PokerStars and other sites there's a hand # in the top left corner for each hand. Well you can use the last 2 digits of this number as a percentage random number.
When playing live your seat number is typically random. It's just the open seat at your table when you arrive. So half the time you're in an even seat 2,4,6,8,10 and half in odd 1,3,5,7,9. You could use the hour of the clock time which is also even or odd to determine a match half the time. For example 10:25 in seat 4 is a match. 10:25 in seat 7 is not a match. 11:33 in seat 9 is a match. Using the example above with AA you could use + seat match to cut your LRR frequency in half again black aces + top card spade + seat number match comes out to about 4% of the time if you want to do something pretty infrequently.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)