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November 5, 2008
Day Three Recap At The WPT North American Poker Championship
October 16, 2008
Yesterday was election day in Canada and at the WPT North American Poker Championship the Canadians voted out all but one American poker player.
Day three started with 27 players in the field and was played down to the final six yesterday and the Canadian’s who only have one opportunity each year to win a WPT event on home soil didn’t disappoint grabbing five of the remaining six seats in the tournament.
The day started with 27 but quickly reached two tables with nine players being eliminated the first being “Miami” John Cernuto whose pocket eights fell to Gavin Smith’s Ace Queen. The biggest surprise of the day had to when day two chip leader Vivek Rajkumar was eliminated when his pocket Aces were defeated by the flopped flush of Marc Karam. Read more
Advanced Counting Cards
October 10, 2008
The idea behind counting cards in blackjack is that a deck of cards with a high proportion of high cards (ten-valued cards and aces) to low cards is good for the player, while the reverse (a deck with a high proportion of low cards to high cards) is good for the dealer. A deck rich in tens and aces improves the player’s odds because blackjacks (which offer a higher payout than other winning hands) become more common, the dealer is more likely to bust a stiff hand, and double-downs are more successful. This is also portrayed in the film 21.
Contrary to the popular myth, card counters do not need savant qualities in order to count cards, because they are not tracking and memorizing specific cards. Instead, card counters assign a heuristic point score to each card they see and then track only the total score. (This score is called the count.) This myth was portrayed in the movie Rain Man, where the savant character Raymond Babbit counts through six decks with ease and a casino employee comments that it is impossible to count six decks. In the movie 21, however, card counting is portrayed as an intellectually difficult task which can only be undertaken by high-IQ top level students.
Basic card counting assigns a positive, negative, or null value to each card. As each card is dealt, the running count is adjusted by each card’s assigned value. There are multiple card-counting systems in use, but a plus-minus count — such as the Hi-Lo system proposed by Harvey Dubner in 1963 and later refined by Julian Braun and Stanford Wong — is one of the more basic and illustrative systems.
In the Hi-Lo system, the cards 2 through 6 are assigned a value of +1. Tens (and face cards) through aces are assigned a value of -1. Cards 7, 8, and 9 have a value of zero, or are called neutral (so they can be ignored).
The Hi-Lo system is an example of a balanced card-counting system. This means that there are an equal number of +1 and -1 cards in the deck, so a count of all 52 cards would result in an end count of 0.
Once you’ve got the hang of the basic idea, try to keep up with our trainer to sharpen your skills
Beginner Counting Cards
October 10, 2008
This tool will introduce you to the Plus/Minus system of counting cards.
The idea behind counting cards in blackjack is that a deck of cards with a high proportion of high cards (ten-valued cards and aces) to low cards is good for the player, while the reverse (a deck with a high proportion of low cards to high cards) is good for the dealer. A deck rich in tens and aces improves the player’s odds because blackjacks (which offer a higher payout than other winning hands) become more common, the dealer is more likely to bust a stiff hand, and double-downs are more successful. This is also portrayed in the film 21.
Contrary to the popular myth, card counters do not need savant qualities in order to count cards, because they are not tracking and memorizing specific cards. Instead, card counters assign a heuristic point score to each card they see and then track only the total score. (This score is called the count.) This myth was portrayed in the movie Rain Man, where the savant character Raymond Babbit counts through six decks with ease and a casino employee comments that it is impossible to count six decks. In the movie 21, however, card counting is portrayed as an intellectually difficult task which can only be undertaken by high-IQ top level students.
Basic card counting assigns a positive, negative, or null value to each card. As each card is dealt, the running count is adjusted by each card’s assigned value. There are multiple card-counting systems in use, but a plus-minus count — such as the Hi-Lo system proposed by Harvey Dubner in 1963 and later refined by Julian Braun and Stanford Wong — is one of the more basic and illustrative systems.
In the Hi-Lo system, the cards 2 through 6 are assigned a value of +1. Tens (and face cards) through aces are assigned a value of -1. Cards 7, 8, and 9 have a value of zero, or are called neutral (so they can be ignored).
The Hi-Lo system is an example of a balanced card-counting system. This means that there are an equal number of +1 and -1 cards in the deck, so a count of all 52 cards would result in an end count of 0.
Once you’ve got the hang of the basic idea, try to keep up with our trainer to sharpen your skills
Basic Blackjack Strategy
October 10, 2008
Simply enter in your cards, and the dealers “up” card and it will advise you on which action you should take.
Because blackjack has an element of player choice, players can reduce casino advantage by playing optimally. The complete set of optimal plays is known as basic strategy. There are slight variations depending on the house rules and number of decks.
Darus Suharto
October 10, 2008
Originally from Indonesia, Darus Suharto works as an accountant in Toronto, Canada. He’s been playing poker online for three years, and qualified for the World Series of Poker* Main Event via a PokerStars satellite tournament.
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Calen McNeil
October 1, 2008
CGN: Where do you call home?
Calen: I have lived in Victoria BC for the past 18 Years and consider this my home. I was born and raised in Northern BC in a small town called Terrace. . Read more
Scott Montgomery
October 1, 2008
2008 has been referred to as Scott Montgomery’s “breakout year” as a poker player, and with good reason. He’s amassed over $1.3 million in tournament earnings this year alone, and the biggest opportunity is yet to come.
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