Thx for the reply Benny

Firstly I'll reply to the poker section.

bennymacca said: secondly, a very important concept you forgot to mention in your post is that we shouldn't calculate our equity against our opponents cards, but against the RANGE of possible cards that our opponent can have. in your example with KK against AA, we should never ever calculate that equity and say we were only 20%, because it is very rare that we can ever put our opponent on a range of exactly aces, and if you are the type of person to put your oppoent on only aces then most likely you need to work on that.

You obviously have missed my concept completely, and yes maybe I'm wrong, and if so, will be more than happy to be corrected.  Poker is very complex and has alot of dynamics besides pure maths. I mentioned right at the beginning of my post about pokerstove, which is what gives you values of opponents ranges. The ability of a good poker player is to put your opponent on possible ranges and then come to the conclusion that you're ahead of his range and act accordingly. I assumed that you would understand that in my post.

After that, if most of the time your chips (or more to the point your big pots) go into the middle as a dog then I don't care who you are, there is no way you can be a winning poker player. Again if I'm wrong then please explain your positon. If that is what is happening then I think you need to work on your ability of working out your opponents hand ranges. (I'm not directing that at you, it is a general comment)

The bottom line is, once you've worked out the ranges and if the chips go in behind then it is negative turnover. I'm not talking about bluffing and making your opponent fold a better hand, or making a play and getting caught with a worse hand. Of course those plays will affect your bottom line, and depending how bad or good you are at doing that it will be profitable or not. 

What I'm talking about is once the chips are in the middle, and the cards are opened, then the equity or turnover is dependent on the cards. Your turnover or EV is not dependent on what you think the equity is. Yes, that is what makes you take a line of action but once that action is taken then the cards will determine the turnover and equity not your opinion. What you work out the equity you have against your opponents range means nothing to the turnover. The cards, the maths will work that out. There is no way around it. If there is then please explain it to me.

When you watch the pro videos, and they talk about players ranges and work out whether they have the correct odds to call, whether they realise it or not, they are working out if they will have positive turnover or the poker term +EV. Your hand can still be a dog, ie: you have 87 suited and you put your opponent on a range that is ahead of you ie Ax Kx etc but the pot has 4k and it will cost you 1k to call, your getting 4 to 1, but your opponents range is 2.5 to 1 against you then you have a positive +EV call. Now once the cards turnover you will know whether your read was correct or not and whether you actually turnover your chips with positive expectation or whether you don't.

The example of KK vs AA was just that, an example. I used that example because it is a clear cooler we all walk into. I could've used AK vs AQ or 10 10 vs JJ or A 10 vs KJ or whatever other hand you want to use. How you came to the conclusion that I always put my opponents on AA is beyond me. Maybe you want to call me a donkey or a fish (because as we know weak players always put their opponents on monsters), I'm first to admit I'm a donkey and probably still a fish, that is why I joined this site, but thx for reminding me. By the way, I was involved in a hand the other day early in a tourney. I had 14K UTG with KK so I raised to $125 (Blinds 25/50). The SB 8K 3 bet me. I 4 bet and then he 5 bet me. I thought to myself this line stinks of Aces. It is the only hand that is ahead of me. I wanted to fold, I really did, but I shoved, I can never fold KK there. Do I always think that? No of course not, but the line he took, smelt of aces. Not respecting my UTG raise, not respecting my UTG 4 bet, being so deep, but I still shoved. I did put my opponent on other possible hands, AK, KK, QQ or maybe even JJ or just an aggro donkey. But the line he took leaned towards Aces. Oh and just quietly he did have Aces and I lost the pot.

bennymacca said:firstly, can i ask a question – why did you stop playing blackjack if you were doing well at it? i love blackjack, and play it recreationally with basic strategy,  but i was under the impression that blackjack was always -EV when there are more than 6 decks in the shoe, even if you can card count (not to mention some of the scummy 6/5 BJ tables around now).

I began playing BJ when all the new casinos opened in Australia in the mid nineties. Crown, Starcity, Treasury. They were very raw and the staff were just not to savvy towards card counting. They eventually woke up to it and made the game almost impossible to beat. It was fun while it lasted.

It does not matter how many decks there are, what matters is the rules: doubling any two or just 9, 10 & 11, whether the dealer hits soft 17 or not, how many times you can split and then double etc and most important where the cut card is placed. If there is 8 decks then you need to get at least 7 decks dealt. The best action and biggest edge happens at the end when it get rich in 10s and As and the less spread you need from your minimum bet to your max bet. If you're playing an 8 deck shoe and they put the cut card 2 decks from the back, yes the game is still beatable, but the variance increases and you need to spread more. Your min bet being 1 unit and your max bet being probably 40 units compared to 1 to 10 if it was cut 1 deck from the back.

The less the decks the better, because the frequency of getting rich counts happens more frequently. If you played a 20 deck shoe (does not exist but for an example) you can still beat it, it will just take longer and the frequency decreases which of course affects your hourly rate.

So why did I stop playing? Well basically once they suspect there is a card counter they cut the shoe in half. If it is 8 decks they put the cut card 4 decks from the back. The spread you need to beat that game now is 1 to 200+. You would need a huge bankroll and the volatility and variance would be horrendous. Most of the casinos introduced automatic shuffling machines, so that is now impossible to beat.

There was a card counter named Zelko, can't remember his surname, he was a professional sports bettor and a well known card counter to Star City. They let him play but would only give him 4 decks out of the 8. He had a huge bankroll so he took the game on. He played on a $50 min $1500max Blackjack table. He bet the min in 1 box until the count got good. He then opened 7 boxes and bet the max $1500 on each. After about 3 months he was apparently down 300K. After another 3 months he was up about 500K. He then got banned from Star City. I watched him play several times and he was very good.  But that is the sort of volatility you would go through in such a game.

Yes, exactly. Results oriented is the here and now the “actual” You want to be expectation oriented, the long run.