Many times I’ve written about video poker games that I consider fair. And what I mean by “fair” is that every unseen card has an equal chance of appearing next.
Most people seem to accept my definition — or at least understand what I am talking about.
However, I recently received an email at [email protected] from someone who calls himself “Reno Master.” The email read as follows: Continue reading Seeking Out Unfair Games
On the January 23, 2014 Gambling with an Edge radio show, Anthony Curtis and Richard Munchkin both said good things about American Roulette, a book by Richard Marcus. So I went to the library and checked it out. (Understandably it’s a title that’s easy to find in a Las Vegas library but perhaps not so easy if you live in Peoria.)
Continue reading A Look at American Roulette
This is a continuation article. To revisit Part 1, click here
The winner of the blackjack skills competition wins the Grosjean Cup, named after three-time winner James Grosjean. Runner-up gets the smaller Munchkin Award, named after my co-host, who also won three times but took longer to do so and is also a bit shorter.
Continue reading 18th Annual Blackjack Ball — Part 2 of 2
“Well don’t do that!” the good doctor quips. I have always found this joke entertaining, not so much for the wisecracking humor, but for the subtle wisdom therein. Note that the doctor’s advice is not “I’ll prescribe some medical marijuana for you,” or “You need to learn to live with the pain,” or “You need a thicker skin.” Steeling oneself to endure pain is an unhealthy practice (pain is a message to you), and yet suffering card counters constantly prescribe this regimen to each other.
The Blackjack Ball is one of my favorite events of the year. Blackjack professionals, whether still practicing or not, come together at an undisclosed location in Las Vegas to share information, swap lies, and compare skills with one another. Hosted by wit and raconteur Max Rubin, the entry fee is a chilled bottle of premium champagne — preferably comped.
In addition to blackjack professionals, certain others are invited as well — including several attorneys and one radio co-host. Each invited guest may bring along another guest Continue reading 18th Annual Blackjack Ball — Part 1 of 2
I recently attended the 18th Annual Blackjack Ball — which I’ll write about at length in next week’s column. Briefly, this is a gathering of about 80 of the best blackjack players in the world (some currently out there playing — some retired), and perhaps 20 other gambling professionals of various sorts. Being a video poker expert is not sufficient to get invited, but co-hosting a radio show along with a Blackjack Hall of Famer apparently is. Among this crowd, Gambling with an Edge is “must listen” radio and so I was more of a celebrity with this group than I expected I’d be.
Continue reading A New Realization
I was helping Bonnie learn an advanced square dancing move called “Cast a Shadow.” (I know this is my hobby and not yours, but bear with me. We’ll get to video poker very shortly.) This is a move that starts out with two parallel lines composed of four dancers in each line.
Without describing the move in detail, I was asking her in which direction the dancers on the ends of the lines turned first. First she guessed “right,” (which I told her was wrong), and so then she guessed “left” (which I told her was also wrong.) This frustrated her. She (correctly) knew the only ways to turn were left and right and now I was telling her neither was correct. Continue reading It Depends
A friend recently forced me to watch the movie “Casino” for the first time. You may be shocked that a professional gambler wouldn’t have already seen “Casino” twenty times, but Hollywoodizations of what we do for a living aren’t always so appealing. Besides, we be werkin’ all the time! It turns out that “Casino” is not a gambling movie; it’s “Goodfellas” in a casino (with the same movie director, screen writer, and cast!). So, it didn’t come close to unseating our #1 gambling movie (guess what that is!), but “Casino” still contained some valuable lessons for the modern casino AP:
In last week’s column, I addressed hands which contained both a Q of one suit and JT7, J97, or J87 of another suit — where the correct play depended on the fifth card in the hand. In today’s column, I will discuss some additional hands in that same game.
Consider a K of one suit and a JT7, J97, or a J87 of another. We know that KJ is considerably less valuable than QJ (because of the number of potential straights), so after last week’s exercise it shouldn’t surprise us that we usually prefer the J-high 3-card straight flush to the KJ. Continue reading Some More Fine Points of 8/5 Bonus Poker
A woman recently hired me to teach her the idiosyncrasies of 8/5 Bonus Poker. She knew 9/6 Jacks or Better cold and wanted to know how the games differed — down to the smallest degree. I quoted her two prices — the lesser one was if I could write an article or two about what I was teaching her; the more expensive one was if I couldn’t. Cheaper won out.
There are a lot of players who use 9/6 JoB strategy for 8/5 Bonus. This isn’t a terrible approach. It takes a 99.166% game and reduces it to 99.158%. If you play for dollars at 800 hands per hour (i.e. $4,000 coin-in), the difference between using 9/6 JoB strategy and perfect 8/5 Bonus strategy is 32¢ each and every hour. Some players argue that life is too short to worry about earning an extra 32¢ an hour in exchange for additional study. Continue reading An Interesting Hand in Bonus Poker
