Above the Boardwalk
Jan. 10th, 2006 11:34 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
peterbirksAnd so The Boardwalk closes its doors for the final time. Needless to say, despite having stayed there several times, I never bothered to pick up a $1 chip from the place, solely because I don't think that I have ever gambled there.
I have an old affection for some of these down-at-heel won't-be-around-much-longer places, and not just because they are cheap (although that is a factor). I suppose that it's in the British nature of supporting the underdog. As the LasVegasVegas blog states, the new is celebrated, the old can go screw itself. So, who else is to care for the San Remo (now reinvented as "Hooters", I believe), The Boardwalk and the El Cortez?
There are other, less deserving cases (the Luxor, Circus Circus, Stratosphere, Binion's) for which I hold no such affection. But some places, for some strange reason, deserve more.
I think it was partly the Boardwalk's architecture, kind of a ramshackle evolution with different lifts for the two different main blocks, plus the section of ground floor rooms on the way to the pool and, finally, the cheapest of the cheap, the separate motel rooms. Security-wise, these were a nightmare, but they had the plus of allowing you to pop in and out, directly to your car in the employee's car park, without going anywhere near the casino.
+++++
As I read some of the poker journals around today I fear for their future as "poker" journals; mainly because it is quite clear that the writers don't have any clue about how to play poker in a profitable way. Most of them seem to be technically weak (see Andy Ward's recent blog entry for the ultimate refutation of the "why do I always go out of tournaments when I'm favourite???" whinge seen on many a forum) and those who are not technically weak have leaks as big as that on the Titanic when it comes to bankroll management, temperament, game selection, table selection, site selection and all the other myriad ways in which this game can trip you up if you want to be profitable. Pokergrub's (www.pokergrub.com)latest foray into the world of live No Limit poker is entitled "I should've played craps" and, if you see how he played the hand where he went broke, you cannot but agree with him. Good on him for printing it, though.
Jan Boubli and Katja had what Jan described on his site 50 Outs as a Big Red Year. Jan and Katja are based in Hamburg, but, for high stakes players, I don't see much strategy. Perhaps Jan is a technically brilliant player, but he seems to flop about between high-stakes games, tournaments, this and that, without much of a plan.
A few of the bloggers/players have gone broke already, and in no case that I have read would the dispassionate observer be surprised. I think that a few more will come a cropper this year. There's nothing like poker for Social Darwinism and support of the Richard Dawkins theory that survival for any species is a struggle. And Taleb's theory also comes into play. Even if you are good, you might have been lucky as well. When the luck changes, the goodness might not be enough.
+++++
I took another stab at three-tabling last night for a couple of hours on Party, with rather dire results. So, back to the two-tables for another week. While most players seem to fret about moving up in limits, moving up in the number of tables that you play is, to my mind, far more important if you are looking to increase your win rate per hour without risking any more of your bankroll. It's for this reason that I am far more determined to get myself up to quality multi-tabling than I am to beat the biggest game I can afford to play.
A small flaw in the arguments of Taleb, Feeney, and others, that you should not let short-term variance worry you. They write that, provided you know that you make, say, 1BB an hour per table, on average, no loss in a single session should be of much concern.
Where the argument falls down is that you never do know what your long-term average win rate is. Things change (the quality of your opponents, the standard of your play, etc).
As Eric (Three-Bet blog - threebet33.blogspot.com) puts it: I finished December having my second losing month of the year, and the second of the last four months. Unfortunately with poker, it's impossible to tell if that's a trend (ie, I'm starting to play "out of my league" a bit) or just random fluctuation.
So, if at the end of 450 hands of three-tabling I find myself 50 big bets down, I can't just shrug my shoulders and say, "ahh, but I know that I average 1BB an hour profit at the game", because, of course, I don't know that at all. In fact, I suspect that, when I am three-tabling, I don't average any kind of profit. In this sense, those 432 hands that I played last night do not count towards my annual total of hands played, because I know (or, rather, suspect) that, while I was playing those hands, I had a negative expectation. Of course, I didn't know that when I sat down, but I think I do now.
So, not only do I have to knock off those 432 hands, but I also have to add on, say, another 432 hands play to compensate for those, "losing" 432 hands ("losing" in the sense of genuine expected value, rather than the actual results). That's not irritation at short-term variance. It's irritation at long-term pain-in-the-arse.
Basically, when adding an extra table, you can afford to let your play deteriorate only the merest fraction before it ceases to be worthwhile.
Suppose I average 1BB profit per hour per table when two tabling. Now, if I am 10% less efficient when three-tabling, what does this mean? That I make 0.9BB per hour per table, increasing my net earn per hour to 2.7BB per hour from the previous 2BB per hour? Nope, afraid not. Look at it this way.
60 hands per hour of which I play 10 and win an average of 3.5. I put an average of 4BB into the pots that I play, gaining an average of 1BB over the hour. (I simplify the numbers here). That gives me a "turnover" per hour of 40BB with a return of 41BB. If I am 10% less efficient, I'm going to win 4BB less per hour if we refer to turnover, turning a 1BB win into a 3BB loss.
Even if I am, say, 1% less efficient, my return will fall to 0.6BB per hour, meaning I earn 1.8BB per hour three tabling, compared with 2BB per hour when two-tabling.
So, when I move up to three tables, I basically need to play at about 99.9% of my capability as at two tables for it to be more profitable. At the moment, that quite clearly isn't the case. However, I'm getting better. I'm beginning to remember the "flow" of each table; I'm not as rushed as I used to be. In other words, I'm getting there. But I ain't there yet.
That means that every hour that I currently play at three tables I have to ignore that time (and the hands played) when looking at my expected return for the year. I also have to add on the same number of hands again to make up for my currently expected loss when three-tabling (i.e., an hour and a half of two-tabling for every hour that I "invest" three-tabling, just to get back to where I started in terms of expected value).
However, I suspect that it will be worth it in the long run. At the moment I can't play one table - it's too boring. So, the aim is to get to the stage where three tables seems "natural" and two tables seems boring.
Later, where I'm going wrong when three-tabling, and how I can put it right.
I have an old affection for some of these down-at-heel won't-be-around-much-longer places, and not just because they are cheap (although that is a factor). I suppose that it's in the British nature of supporting the underdog. As the LasVegasVegas blog states, the new is celebrated, the old can go screw itself. So, who else is to care for the San Remo (now reinvented as "Hooters", I believe), The Boardwalk and the El Cortez?
There are other, less deserving cases (the Luxor, Circus Circus, Stratosphere, Binion's) for which I hold no such affection. But some places, for some strange reason, deserve more.
I think it was partly the Boardwalk's architecture, kind of a ramshackle evolution with different lifts for the two different main blocks, plus the section of ground floor rooms on the way to the pool and, finally, the cheapest of the cheap, the separate motel rooms. Security-wise, these were a nightmare, but they had the plus of allowing you to pop in and out, directly to your car in the employee's car park, without going anywhere near the casino.
+++++
As I read some of the poker journals around today I fear for their future as "poker" journals; mainly because it is quite clear that the writers don't have any clue about how to play poker in a profitable way. Most of them seem to be technically weak (see Andy Ward's recent blog entry for the ultimate refutation of the "why do I always go out of tournaments when I'm favourite???" whinge seen on many a forum) and those who are not technically weak have leaks as big as that on the Titanic when it comes to bankroll management, temperament, game selection, table selection, site selection and all the other myriad ways in which this game can trip you up if you want to be profitable. Pokergrub's (www.pokergrub.com)latest foray into the world of live No Limit poker is entitled "I should've played craps" and, if you see how he played the hand where he went broke, you cannot but agree with him. Good on him for printing it, though.
Jan Boubli and Katja had what Jan described on his site 50 Outs as a Big Red Year. Jan and Katja are based in Hamburg, but, for high stakes players, I don't see much strategy. Perhaps Jan is a technically brilliant player, but he seems to flop about between high-stakes games, tournaments, this and that, without much of a plan.
A few of the bloggers/players have gone broke already, and in no case that I have read would the dispassionate observer be surprised. I think that a few more will come a cropper this year. There's nothing like poker for Social Darwinism and support of the Richard Dawkins theory that survival for any species is a struggle. And Taleb's theory also comes into play. Even if you are good, you might have been lucky as well. When the luck changes, the goodness might not be enough.
+++++
I took another stab at three-tabling last night for a couple of hours on Party, with rather dire results. So, back to the two-tables for another week. While most players seem to fret about moving up in limits, moving up in the number of tables that you play is, to my mind, far more important if you are looking to increase your win rate per hour without risking any more of your bankroll. It's for this reason that I am far more determined to get myself up to quality multi-tabling than I am to beat the biggest game I can afford to play.
A small flaw in the arguments of Taleb, Feeney, and others, that you should not let short-term variance worry you. They write that, provided you know that you make, say, 1BB an hour per table, on average, no loss in a single session should be of much concern.
Where the argument falls down is that you never do know what your long-term average win rate is. Things change (the quality of your opponents, the standard of your play, etc).
As Eric (Three-Bet blog - threebet33.blogspot.com) puts it: I finished December having my second losing month of the year, and the second of the last four months. Unfortunately with poker, it's impossible to tell if that's a trend (ie, I'm starting to play "out of my league" a bit) or just random fluctuation.
So, if at the end of 450 hands of three-tabling I find myself 50 big bets down, I can't just shrug my shoulders and say, "ahh, but I know that I average 1BB an hour profit at the game", because, of course, I don't know that at all. In fact, I suspect that, when I am three-tabling, I don't average any kind of profit. In this sense, those 432 hands that I played last night do not count towards my annual total of hands played, because I know (or, rather, suspect) that, while I was playing those hands, I had a negative expectation. Of course, I didn't know that when I sat down, but I think I do now.
So, not only do I have to knock off those 432 hands, but I also have to add on, say, another 432 hands play to compensate for those, "losing" 432 hands ("losing" in the sense of genuine expected value, rather than the actual results). That's not irritation at short-term variance. It's irritation at long-term pain-in-the-arse.
Basically, when adding an extra table, you can afford to let your play deteriorate only the merest fraction before it ceases to be worthwhile.
Suppose I average 1BB profit per hour per table when two tabling. Now, if I am 10% less efficient when three-tabling, what does this mean? That I make 0.9BB per hour per table, increasing my net earn per hour to 2.7BB per hour from the previous 2BB per hour? Nope, afraid not. Look at it this way.
60 hands per hour of which I play 10 and win an average of 3.5. I put an average of 4BB into the pots that I play, gaining an average of 1BB over the hour. (I simplify the numbers here). That gives me a "turnover" per hour of 40BB with a return of 41BB. If I am 10% less efficient, I'm going to win 4BB less per hour if we refer to turnover, turning a 1BB win into a 3BB loss.
Even if I am, say, 1% less efficient, my return will fall to 0.6BB per hour, meaning I earn 1.8BB per hour three tabling, compared with 2BB per hour when two-tabling.
So, when I move up to three tables, I basically need to play at about 99.9% of my capability as at two tables for it to be more profitable. At the moment, that quite clearly isn't the case. However, I'm getting better. I'm beginning to remember the "flow" of each table; I'm not as rushed as I used to be. In other words, I'm getting there. But I ain't there yet.
That means that every hour that I currently play at three tables I have to ignore that time (and the hands played) when looking at my expected return for the year. I also have to add on the same number of hands again to make up for my currently expected loss when three-tabling (i.e., an hour and a half of two-tabling for every hour that I "invest" three-tabling, just to get back to where I started in terms of expected value).
However, I suspect that it will be worth it in the long run. At the moment I can't play one table - it's too boring. So, the aim is to get to the stage where three tables seems "natural" and two tables seems boring.
Later, where I'm going wrong when three-tabling, and how I can put it right.
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no subject
Date: 2006-01-10 02:52 pm (UTC)Dom
Farewell Boardwalk
Date: 2006-01-11 07:21 am (UTC)The Flamingo now sucks, as far as I am concerned. The Imperial Palace is too eccentric, even for me (although it is, admittedly, fantastically cheap). We still have the Stardust (for just another year) so I guess that will have rooms at "going out of business" prices. And then there's the Frontier, although I have never stayed there.
Bourbon Street was closed as well. Did I mention that?
PJ
Multi-tabling
Date: 2006-01-10 04:17 pm (UTC)The worry is that my win % after seeing the flop is down from average at back end of last year. Is it weaker play, or worse cards, who knows?
I know I'll never make money at this game, but I more than held my own last year. Possibly Party PLO has tightened up - wish I'd played more at Chrismas when every table seemed to have 2 or 3 Santas sat at them!
JG
Re: Multi-tabling
Date: 2006-01-11 07:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-01-10 06:56 pm (UTC)It gets trickier with pot-limit (and I need to sleep tonight so I'm not even going to think about NL) because you can get pushed out of pots because you don't have a solid read on the raiser. I won't play more than two PL tables above the minimum stakes offered on a site now. Once I've got $200 on a table, it's going to be the only one - mistakes start to get expensive when $200+ pots start to fly around.
no subject
Date: 2006-01-11 09:52 am (UTC)Throw email and a web browser or two into the mix and the only good thing I have going is a rakeback generator....
no subject
Date: 2006-01-11 10:57 am (UTC)Yes, these are the important points that you miss. When someone has posted rather than flat-called, when a couple of players behind you are sitting out.
I plan to do a little bit of research into my play, just to see exactly where the leaks occur when muti-tabling at three tables. That way it might be easier to see if they are curable or unavoidable.
PJ