Is online poker credible?
Antonio,
Do you honestly believe that online poker is credible?
I have been playing for three years and quite frankly I think it is a joke. I am sure you have heard all of the complaints about the cards being rigged etc... and I won't bore you with that.
What I would like to share with you is the statement made to me by the support staff at DoylesRoom.com when they told me that the reason it seems like you are seeing hands dealt at a probability higher than what might seem normal is because their software is dealing upwards of 6600 hands per hour and that while I might see pocket A's dealt five times in a row in the game I am playing in, they might not get dealt at all for three hundred hands at another table.
In conclusion they claimed that overall the probability of seeing pocket A's (or any other specific hand) was in line with the mathematically correct percentages of the game, if one considers all 6600 hands per hour that are being dealt on their site.
Now, this seems to me to be on the surface an absurd interpretation of game theory. If I am sitting in a game at Bellagio, do I have to factor in the outcome of the hands being dealt at a table across the room in order to determine what the probability is of my hand winning any given game?
If this is the way live poker must be interpreted, then it is really nothing more (or less) than pure luck that determines the outcome of the game. Which is the way I feel about online poker.
Your thoughts would be welcome.
Carson
Carson,
Not sure you'll welcome my thoughts 'cause they boil down to this: The man gave you the answer and you looked him off. He was telling you that luck evens out in the long run, it's just that you're seeing the long run a whole lot faster online. His business about dealing to all those tables was just: look, with all these hands in the air, you're gonna see some funky, funky runs of cards.
So suck it up and deal. You're not luckier than anyone. You're not unluckier than anyone. We all get the same cards. What matters is how you play them. Luck doesn't determine the outcome of the game -- you do.
· Antonio
