The Risks of Winning at Poker

So you’re doing great. You’re at the $2/5 no limit table and you are ruling. You sat down with $300, doubled up in the first ten minutes when your A-K improved to top two pair. You had someone call you down on your shove on the turn, and the river was a blank. Then just four hands later, when you were on the button, you got to be the fifth one in for a limp, with a suited ace. Two of your suit came up on the flop and you called for $75. On the turn it was checked to you. You semi-bluffed with a $200 bet with your four-flush, got a big stack caller, then hit your flush on the river. The card gave him trips and you nearly doubled up again as he called your over excited bluff-looking shove on the river. In fewer than 30 minutes you are sitting with over $1100, having started with $300. Not too shabby.card cheating

But novice and even intermediate poker players beware. Nice as it is to begin your poker session with a rush like this, there are risks involved. Inexperienced and moderately experienced players can be thrown by the early win in a way that threatens to steal back their gains and then reach into and dispose of the rest of their playing bankroll.

The risk is simple – though not necessarily easy to avoid. It is the risk that the newly enriched stack, large as it is, will affect your judgment by distorting your ability to see what is really important when making critical strategy decisions at the table. Let’s continue the story above and see it as a cautionary tale.

Having started with $300, due to a couple of quick and large wins, you’re now up $800, with $1100 in chips. You are the big stack at the table. You are giddy from your success. A tight player in early position with a couple of hundred dollars raises to $25. Everyone folds to you. You have . Though you would normally fold this trash, you figure you might as well call, with all of those chips in front of you. Who knows, you might catch Q-7 on the flop and take this guy’s stack too.

Sure enough, the flop is helpful. . You’ve flopped top pair. He checks, you slide out a couple of green chips for $50. He shoves in his stack for another $175 more. Even if you lose you realize that it won’t make a huge reduction in your wins. Before you have a chance to really think about things you hear yourself say “call”. He immediately flips over Q-J. The turn and river don’t help you, and you’re stack is now down to $900. You say to yourself that you’re still up $600.

You tell yourself that you have to tighten up – not get too loose, so you’re assured of not depleting your big stack. So you tighten up some – folding a few hands in a row. But your big stack and your earlier rush is still getting to you. You’re impatient. You get , raise to $25 in early position and get re-popped from the cutoff to $75 by the big blind – a very tough player with a big stack. You call, not to be intimidated and hoping for trips. You figure you’ve still got over $500 to play with and still be even for the session. The flop is . You are afraid of the Queen but don’t want to show weakness or give a free card. You bet $75 and get raised to $200. You think that this guy is trying to run you off a hand. You will still be up $325 even if you lose. So you call. The turn is the . You figure you better check, in case he has a Queen. He bets $400. You figure you could still win with another spade or a Jack. You’d still be close to even if you lost. So you call again. You have him outstacked, you realize, with about $100 more than his stack – about $425 to his $325 or so. The river is the , making the board . You’ve hit your flush. You shove, and get called instantly. He flips over his two black Kings, showing his winning flush, and you’re left with $100.

You can’t believe you just went through not only your huge winnings but nearly your entire stack. You’re disgusted, grab your few chips, and rage off.

Of course the specifics may be different from your experience, but I’ve seen this very story unfold in front of my eyes on more than one occasion. Let’s look back and see what went wrong.

The primary error was that the actor in the story repeatedly made decisions based on his stack size – judging whether to call, fold or raise not on his thoughts about the hand itself or on his opponent’s motivation for betting, but rather, based on how much he thought he would be up or down for the session. At first he decided to call with a hand he should have folded – just because he had a lot of chips. Mistake. Then we saw him repeatedly think about his stack size and winnings when deciding whether the risk was worth the cost of a call or a raise. This too was a mistake. infrared contact lenses

While it’s important to consider relative stack size when figuring implied odds – or when pondering the psychological effect of a bet on an opponent – how much you may or may not be up for the session is practically irrelevant. Yet repeatedly, this guy was looking at proper strategy through the distorting prism of his newly increased stack size. This lens magnified the irrelevant, diminished the important, and distracted from the significant, causing him to reach the wrong conclusions.

The way to fight the potentially toxic affect of a large early win is simple – though it may not be easy for you. If you are not yet experienced, thick-skinned, or otherwise mentally tough enough to resist the distractions of a large early rush, I suggest that you leave the table for at least a short while – to consider what has happened and to dedicate yourself to playing solid poker. Leaving the table will give your emotions and good judgment the time necessary for them to reset back to their normally stable condition. So “normalized” you can come back and continue to take advantage of players who, under normal circumstances, are relatively easy pickings.

The Game of Skill, Part I: Historical Evidence

New evidence of the great importance of skill in poker has revived the debate held for several years by legal authorities, scholars and poker experts. The efforts of the poker industry to claim legitimacy of the game has had historically importance that has paved the road for its current popularity as well as for its future settlement as a skill game.
The following is a chronological compilation of the progress made by several representatives of the poker industry and their success at defending their love and passion for the game.marked cards

1986
Professional player Billy Baxter was taken to court by the IRS claiming he was withholding taxes of his poker winnings. The IRS presented to the court two possible ways of taxing Baxter. Considering his poker profession an activity based on time, energy and skill, it would be defined as "trade or business," his poker winnings would be considered earned income and it would be taxed at a maximum rate of 50% for "personal service income." However, if the court ruled that his winnings emerged from a game of chance instead of a career based on skill, then he would be taxed 70%. The judge ruled in favor of Baxter, saying he considered the IRS allegations as ridiculous, and challenging the officials to play poker with the defendant. The court found Baxter's poker winnings as derived completely form his personal services, using his same winning capital as a tool to finance his poker profession, which has multiplied only due to his skills at poker, not due to a professional service or business operation. After this case's ruling, Russia and Denmark have also officially declared poker as a game of skill.
1989
In a court case where the operational fate of California's card rooms was in peril, the judge ruled in favor of the poker industry by saying poker was a game of skill, therefore allowing local gaming venues to remain in business.
2004
Duplicate Poker Inc. launched its duplicate poker variation as a game of skill, which eliminates the gambling law persecution that has been haunting the poker industry during the last 3 years. Therefore, their clever marketing strategy has allowed even players located in the U.S to make credit card transactions directly into their accounts and play at large without any worries.
2006
The U.S. Department of Labour recognized professional poker playing as an official occupation.
Economist Steven Levitt, co-author of the best-selling book Freakonomics, launched a project called Pokernomics, which will analyze the factors that make some players better than others. He and his team decided to conduct the study by encouraging players to submit their poker hand stories to their website, aiming at analyzing more than a million hands overall. Levitt requested a minimum of 10,000 hands per player in order to identify their style patterns. He is still conducting the study without any aid from the poker industry.
2007
A group called the Poker Player Alliance, formed by top poker players and scholars, held an exploratory conference at the Harvard Faculty Club, to which many faculty members attended, including law professor Charles Nesson, who officiated the meeting and hopes, as he said, to someday "legitimate poker."

Statician Jay Kadane from the Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh stated he believed statistics can be used to determine what makes some poker players better than others. Kadane started looking for sponsors to fund the statistical project, which will feature huge hand databases to prove the percentage of skill needed in poker versus the percentage of luck. infrared contact lenses

Greensburg defense attorney Lawrence Burns is defending the legality of his poker tournaments in the Westmoreland County area for some months. Local police had busted one of his tournaments, confiscating personal property related to poker during the raid. Burns claims he violated no state law because face-to-face poker tournaments are not illegal in Pennsylvania and because poker relies on skill, not chance. Police is arguing that Burns did violate the state gambling law that prohibits "any person to collect and assemble for the purpose of unlawful gambling at any place under his control." However, the court would have to analyze the case and determine if the tournament was a friendly poker game, (which is not a crime, if it is based on skill), and if the fact that there money was exchanged for a place in the game does violate state regulations.
A contest named "First Man-Machine Poker Championship" offered a $50,000 prize, and the chosen human contestants were Phil Laak and Ali Eslami. They were supposed to play against a program called Polaris, created by a team of researchers of Artificial Intelligence of the University of Alberta. Even though the poker masters were beat during the first and second rounds, they ended defeating the program during the third round, even thought the research team increased the level of difficulty of the program by introducing adaptability and learning traits to change strategy. Even though they ended victorious both players agreed that the program challenged them more than human contenders usually do.
Florida Rep. Robert Wexler sponsored The Skill Game Protection Act, which will separate games which rely predominantly on skill – poker, backgammon, bridge, chess and mahjong – from games of chance, and protect them from federal restrictions against playing online. It will also prohibit minors from playing for real money online. This would consequently require casinos to report winners and winnings to the IRS, starting next year.
2008
Two Psychology Ph.D. students at Case Western University in Cleveland conducted two studies with 41 college students as subjects. The students were divided into two groups: one receiving poker strategy instructions and the other group only receiving some background on the history of poker. The first study consisted of playing 200 hands of Turbo Texas Hold'em, a computerized simulation of 10-player poker tables. The second study had the same procedure as the first one, providing more strategy instructions to the previously instructed group and more poker history to the other group; the only difference was that in this study the subjects played 720 hands. Overall results showed the group that received tips for improving skill had remarkably better results than the uninstructed group.

Hopefully, the pending outcome for some of these projects and efforts will favor poker's legitimacy as a game of skill. On that day, the gaming industry will finally stop worrying about the regulatory persecution that distracts talented players from fully enjoying their job and potential poker stars from achieving their dreams.

Poker Chips – An Essential Element Of Poker Games

Poker chips are undoubtedly one of the most essential aspects of the wonderful game. They looks like small discs of different colors, which certainly makes them look quite beautiful. Each color represents certain denomination or value, and they are basically seen as substitutes for money. Well, the money is stored somewhere in a highly secured place. The inception of chips as a substitute for real money has its roots somewhere during the phase of 13th to 17th centuries. And, the place was Europe where the chips came into being. With the passage of time, the chips have gone through various transformations and modifications. Now the chips come clothed in various themes and formats, which have definitely added more flavor to the game.poker lenses

Apart from adding flavor, the coloring of chips also provides an easy way to keep the fraudulent away.  Casinos always try to implement new anti-counterfeiting measures to keep scams at bay, and chip coloration is the most basic measure. Along with, chips are also embossed and are molded in certain pattern. Holographic inlays, unique colored marking on the borders, and ultraviolet marking are also helpful in this regard. So, now it will be easier for you to understand the reason behind the high establishment cost of poker rooms.

In case you are playing the game in private, you need to be very careful of frauds, particularly if you are playing with mass-produced poker chips. In this case it will not be easy for you to determine of verify the origin of the chips.

Poker Chips- Composition

Most of the reputed poker rooms use poker chips made from clay, which are definitely of excellent quality. Since, clay is an extremely soft material; for this reason, it is usually mixed with some other elements through secret techniques. Apart from clay, materials like plastic, ABS plastics, and ceramic are also used for making chips. And, they are definitely cheaper than the clay one. marked cards contact lenses

Sets and Themes

In a standard set, you can expect 300 pieces; however, some even contain up to 500 and 1000 chips as well. The theme basically depends upon the casino and its taste. Custom made chips have become quite popular these days, which are used for playing poker in private parties. The more you spend behind them, better the quality will get. So, it is completely up to your affordability factor. In the web world, there are plenty of online stores that deal in poker chips and other stuffs needed for casino games.