Lakers vs Celtics

Woohoo! Dream Finals Matchup. I am sure David Stern is jumping for joy. Can't wait ....

Sharkscope HUD Update & Pokerbility

After using the Sharkscope HUD for a couple of weeks, I decided to just turn it off. It wasn't that it was not helpful. But it sort of confused my game.

The first effect that I noticed was that it made me play looser against the fishes to the overall detriment of my game. A case in point, I got AQ in cutoff. No action beforehand. So I raised 3x BB. The guy in the SB reraises me. Everybody else folded.

Normally, my play is just to call, take advantage of my position and see the flop & take it from there. I would also sometimes fold if I strongly believe he has KKs or AAs.

This time around, the HUD was there and it shows a flopping fish. HAHAH!! Bluffing, eh. So I put him all-in. Of course he shows AAs and I am a huge underdog. This kind of false tell happened once or twice with different kinds of hands. Hands which I could have easily gotten away from if I had played my normal game turned out to be bust-outs against certified fishes.

So I decided after a while to just turn it off and play my usual game without any enhancements. And surprisingly, my overall results were much better.

So what this does show? Well, for one thing, it shows that just because they're a fish doesn't mean that they don't get lucky. The often quoted "you don't need skill to play them Aces" also come to mind.

The HUD has some value especially near the end game where knowing who is good or bad is relevant to end game SNG play. But at my low limit levels, playing with it especially in a full table just makes me play looser. And that's bad. We all know that playing disciplined ABC poker in the lower levels is enough to keep a good ROI. So I don't think I'll renew it once my free subsciption ends.

Another product which I installed lately is Pokerbility. This is more of a traditional odds calculator which attaches to the main game window and gives you the percentages of hitting certain hands. It also has a hand ranking system for your opening hands with real time advise on whether to fold, check, call or raise. Sounds good in theory, right ? But at the end of the day, I also ended up not using it.

Why ? Well, it didn't give me any information that I already didn't know. After playing more than a year now, some of the odds I already instinctively knew. Chasing a flush draw while the opponent is overbetting is neg EV and vice versa. It doesn't work for multi-tabling as you can only attach it to one table and you also cannot adjust table size while using it. Finally it doesn't take into account implied odds in certain situations. So not much benefit for me.

But I believe this product is useful especially for a beginner. It allows you to be more disciplined in your starting hands and gives logical advice if you end up flopping good hands. So this product I would recommend wholeheartedly for those newbies just learning the game. But for some of you veterans out there, it's kind of redundant. Attached a screen shot in case you are interested to know how it looks

So there. Two "supposed to be helpful" poker products and I end up using not one of them. I guess nothing still beats the human mind. =)

Sharkscope HUD

I don't know if anybody uses the Sharkscope HUD software, but I recently got a free 2 month trial of this thru a promotion with Luckyace Poker.

Instead of opening sharkscope and typing your opponent's name to check his stats. It superimposes the stats like Ave ROI, Total games played, Ave profit etc on top of the playing window. It also tells you if the guy is a fish, a shark or on tilt. See sample below.

Theoretically, it should give you some sort of advantage as you can see who the good and bad players are. You can be wary of the good players and consequently try to take advantage of the bad players who have a tendency to overplay their hands.

I've only had time to try it once on a Full Tilt SNG and I finished 1st in that game. I'm not sure if it was because of the stats I saw. But there was one hand where I definitely used the knowledge given. I was in the BB and I get AAs. Two limpers. I checked out their stats on the display and both were negative profit players. One of them had a -16% ROI. I would usually raise my AAs here around 3x to get money in the pot.

But the HUD showed me a fish so I went all in. The other player folded. But as expected the neg 16 player called and showed 66s. No improvement and I immediately doubled up. As we know, an immediate double up near the start of the SNG almost always assures you of an ITM finish.

Right now, its still in Beta testing and only works with Full Tilt and the Ongame network as well as some minor sites. I will try to get some volume with this HUD and see if it can improve my game. After the trial period ends, I might then be tempted to buy it.

The danger I see is that I might encounter a fish who gets a legitimate hand but you end up thinking its a bluff because of his stats. Oh well, pros and cons for everything. I will give an update after maybe a month of use. This should be enough time to tell if it was helpful or not.

What do you guys think ? It is not an odds calculator but more of an indirect way of reading opponents online. So should have some value one way or the other.

Prepaid Broadband Internet

If you are one of the less than 10 people following my posts regularly, you would know that I recently changed address. It was a move to a much better neighborhood with easier access to malls and commercial establishments , so I'm pretty happy with the move.

Except for one thing. It's taking forever for PLDT to install my telephone line and consequently my Internet connection. It's been weeks of excuses and whatnot.

Finally the other day I just got fed up and got a Smart Bro Prepaid Kit.

The kit will cost you 4,500 which is relatively expensive because you are basically just getting a HSDPA USB modem. But certainly better than getting one of their fixed plans. With my erratic schedule and out of town trips, I didn't want to get monthly bills for something that I wasn't able to utilize fully. The lockin period of 2 years was also bothersome. So prepaid broadband is perfect.

Aside from just loading the amount that I need, now I can take my laptop anywhere there is a Smart Signal and voila, instant wireless broadband internet and you know what that means. Poker Anywhere. Now when my wife drags me to the province to visit her parents, I'll be set. Heheh. Playing poker while lounging in a beach chair in Laiya is now a reality.

The rate is quite reasonable. P10 for 30 minute blocks. The speed is just average. They claim you can get 384 kbps, but actual speedtests give me somewhere on the 200+ range. Good enough to run any poker software. Of course, you will still get better speeds with your fixed DSL line. Also, sometimes the speed drops for no apparent reason. But all in all, I was quite satisfied with the thing.

I am also expecting the usage rate to drop within the next few months as Globe is also gearing up for their own mobile internet thingie, so competition rules. =)

Party Animal

Warning : Brag post ahead.

I posted previously that the games in Partypoker were kind of soft. And I do believe it is just a lucky streak. But before I donk the winnings away, let me just post my Party Poker "shark" status for posterity before it disappears forever in the annals of poker history.

I know its a pretty small set of data and not really conclusive, but heck it only happens once in a while and it's my blog anyway. So I'm bragging about it while it lasts. =)

In semi related poker news, I was in Guangzhou China for the Canton Fair last week and I am now convinced that online poker/gambling is controlled in some way by the government. I stayed in a different hotel from last time and like before, all the poker sites were not working. The only exception was the merge network and even then it was mind-numbingly slow to the point of impossible. Suspiciously similar to the circumstances of my last visit. All the other sites like Google and Yahoo were working fine.

So if the USA wants to control the proliferation of online poker in their shores, they should take a page from the Chinese. I have no idea how they do it, but its damn efficient. I'm guessing the USA can also easily do it thru the ISPs, except they're probably scared of lawsuits and whatnot.... so they're going about it in a roundabout way by controlling the payment processors.

Oh well, I'm glad I'm living in good ol Pinas. Where the government is too busy politicking and leaves online poker alone. =)

PSP vs Poker

Part of the reason why my poker blogging has been non-existent lately is because my wife got me a PSP last month.

I've always been an avid gamer ever since I was a kid. Name the system and I've probably had it at one time or another. Game & Watch, Atari, Famicom, Superfamicom, Genesis, etc. When the Playstation first came out, I think I was one of the first buyers. I didn't care that it was 20K ++ at that time and was only out in Japan. The first time I saw Toshinden (don't know if anybody even remembers this game). I knew I had to have it.

My fascination with video games only waned when I got married and had kids. So my last systems were the PS2 and the Gamecube which I sold a long time back since I wasn't playing with them anymore. Setting it up coupled with work and family life was just too much hassle.

But I more or less kept up with what was happening and knew about the Wii, PS3 and Xbox360 when they came out. But the high price and the knowledge that I wouldn't have time to play with them kept me from buying them.

Last 2006, I purchased a Nintendo DS, but this was for my daughter's sake. She apparently inherited my love for games and plays with it all the time. I play a couple of games here and there. But the games were too cutesy to really catch my attention.

My wife knew about this previous hobby of mine and decided to surprise me with a PSP last month. Mweheheh, now she's regretting it as a lot of my already sparse free time has been sucked up by the device. The list of interesting games is endless, Metal Gear Portable Ops, Grand Theft Auto, Medal of Honor, Negreneau's Stacked and now the sequel to Final Fantasy 7. I don't even know if I can find the time to finish an RPG as I remember how long it took me to play one of these things.

The fact that its a handheld device suits working adults perfectly. You can always just play a few minutes at a time while in the loo or before going to bed. It's sleep feature comes in extra handy as you don't even need to wait for a save spot if you need to do something. Just put it to sleep, finish what you need to do and turn it back on and you just continue where you left off. Add the fact that you can download ISOs for free makes it an even better proposition.

But of course, poker is my new addiction and it's really no contest. I still automatically migrate to the PC after dinner to play a couple of SNGs. The good thing is, during those times I go on tilt, I now have something to divert my attention. Instead of opening up another table at the higher stakes to get back what I lost. I just fire up the PSP and mow down old ladies using my beat up Chevy. Great way of releasing the pent up stress of poker. =)

Online Poker - Free Market or Cartel?

Haven't you ever wondered why the sites seemingly have their rakes pegged at their current rates? In the SNGs for example, its normally somewhere around 10%.

To the best of my knowledge, it has been like this for the past couple of years and some sites like Party Poker even have it higher. If I recall my economics lessons back in college, shouldn't a free market exert downward pressure on the rake as more and more of these online sites battle for a limited number of customers. Consider the fact that US customers are banned from certain sites, then the effort to draw customers should be even bigger. Why aren't the sites killing each other with some kind of reduced rake to get your business?

Well, one could argue that these sites need a big amount for their investment. But think about it, they're basically operating servers in some remote island in Gibraltar or in the mountains of Kahnawake. How expensive would it be to maintain ? Also, they have huge economies of scale. As more and more customers patronize their sites, fixed costs are spread out and cost to serve one customer becomes smalller and smaller. Their monthly costs are basically electricity & other utilities, customer service & IT staff, endorsement deals with the pros and probably the rent of the small office where the servers are located.

I think its common knowledge that the online poker sites are making huge amounts of money from the rakes. So why couldn't an upstart company suddenly decide. "Hey, why shouldn't I compete based on lower price. Let me reduce the rake to increase customer inflow."

Like what Sun Cellular did in the telecoms industry. Before they came in the market, our usage rates for text messaging and calls were high. But Sun competed based on price in their various promotions and at the end of the day, Smart and Globe had to reduce their rates to be competitive as Sun was slowly eating away their customer base.

That is the concept of competition and consumers benefit from it.

So why is the same thing not happening in the online poker industry. Sure, they give out bonuses, rakeback and such which in effect reduces part of the rake. But its all indirect. If you think about it, it should be easy for a newcomer site to make an immediate impact by offering 9 person $10+0.50 SNGs. I for one would jump at the opportunity to play at a site which offers lower rake and even at half the rake, I believe they would still be making a profit.

So again, the question is WHY. And the only thing I could come up with is they have some sort of informal cartel which controls this amount. Parang why kill the goose that lays the golden egg? If the big sites can come up with some kind of gentleman's agreement to keep the rake at a certain level and only compete on promotions. Then every site is happy. Only the players are being fleeced and they're all degenerate gamblers anyway who would still play even if we peg the SNG rate at 20% just to get their thrills.

Heheh... another example is The Metro. Before they came along, the other poker organization was cheating the players during the big tourneys by pocketing the excess buy-ins beyond their guarantees. Now they're forced to "moderate the greed". =)

Just something to think about.