Posts tagged Games
Kitchen Games Poker
Aug 22nd
Two nights ago, I got a chance to go to a kitchen game poker night that a coworker was putting on. The whole idea for the night was to play dealer’s choice poker from the set of crazy games that people have come up with over the years. We weren’t allowed to choose the casino standbys of hold’em, omaha, or 7 card stud. Instead, we played a series of games like Chicago, 727, Midnight Baseball, Mexican Sweat, etc.
It’s been a long time since I’ve played games like this. I’ve been playing Texas Hold’em pretty seriously for a couple of years, so it’s kind of interesting to revisit some of these silly games to see if there is anything of interest. We played quite a few games, actually, that I’d like to note down for future reference because they were all quite fun. So here’s the rules for some fun kitchen games that have a little depth to them.
- 727: Players get two cards down, and one up. The aim of the game is to be the closest to the total of 7 or 27. Face cards count either ten points or half a point. An ace counts either 1 point or eleven. On each round, players are asked one at a time if they want one more card added face up to their hand, followed by a round of betting. If all players pass on a card, then the game is over, but otherwise another round is dealt. The game can last quite a few rounds! After the last round, players then simultaneously indicate whether they are attempting to win by being closest to 7, by being closest to 27, or to both. Half the pot is awarded to the closest to 7 (who indicated they were trying to win that side), and half is awarded to the the closest to 27 (who indicated they were trying to win that side). To win both, the players who indicated so have to be closest on both sides.
- Auction: Each player is dealt two down cards. Then a card is turned up in the middle of the table for each player in the hand. Players then make a blind bid. The person who bids the most chooses the card they want. The next highest bid chooses the next card and so on. When all the cards are gone, another set of cards is dealt in the middle. This is repeated until all the players have 7 cards each. A round of betting happens after that. The person with the best high hand takes half the pot and the person with the best low hand takes the other half.
- Ten Card Regrets: There are 5 rounds to this game. The object of the game is to partition 10 cards into two 5 card poker hands: one that is a low hand and one that is a high hand. On each round, players get two cards and must decide whether to put them on the left side to be part of the low hand, or on the right side to be part of the high hand. At the end, the person with the best high hand takes half the pot and the person with the best low hand takes half the pot.
- Tic-Tac-Toe Hold’em/Omaha: Players are dealt two or four cards depending if they are playing the hold’em or omaha variant of the game. The key difference is the community cards are dealt in a 3×3 grid of cards. First, the flop is the four cards that form the sides of the grid. The turn is the four corner cards, and the river is the middle card of the grid. Players then make the best poker hand they can from the cards in their hand and any of 8 sets of three cards from the board. These sets are the three horizontal lines, three vertical lines, and the two diagonals. You can play Hold’em, Omaha High, or Omaha High Low.
These were my favourites from the night. Do you have any fun kitchen games I can deal next time?
Heraldk
Playoff Predictions, Round 2, 2008
Apr 23rd
I posted before the first round playoffs started to present some output from my NHL playoff simulator.
How’d it do at predicting the results? Well let’s have a look. I removed the later round predictions from the last post just to clean this up and make it easier to read. Correct predictions are in bold.
Montreal_Canadiens 0.720 Detroit_Red_Wings 0.811
Boston_Bruins 0.280 Nashville_Predators 0.189
Pittsburgh_Penguins 0.590 San_Jose_Sharks 0.634
Ottawa_Senators 0.410 Calgary_Flames 0.366
Washington_Capitals 0.481 Minnesota_Wild 0.468
Philadelphia_Flyers 0.519 Colorado_Avalanche 0.532
New_Jersey_Devils 0.477 Anaheim_Ducks 0.414
New_York_Rangers 0.523 Dallas_Stars 0.586
Not bad huh? In every case, the favourite team of each match was the one that won. Three of the series went right down to the wire though, and I honestly thought Washington was going to beat Philly in game 7. They were a feel good story this year, along with the Oilers late season push to the playoffs that fell *just* short. San Jose and Montreal almost choked in the first round on series leads, but managed to pull through in the end.
So what does the simulator say for the next round? Once again the first column is the probability of winning that round. The second column is the probability of winning the conference final, and the third column is the probability of taking home the cup. This run is one million playoff simulations seeded with the results of the first playoff round.
Montreal_Canadiens 0.616 0.348 0.147
Pittsburgh_Penguins 0.568 0.289 0.114
New_York_Rangers 0.432 0.189 0.064
Philadelphia_Flyers 0.384 0.174 0.056
Detroit_Red_Wings 0.772 0.530 0.380
San_Jose_Sharks 0.483 0.180 0.094
Dallas_Stars 0.517 0.199 0.107
Colorado_Avalanche 0.228 0.091 0.039
Detroit, Dallas, Montreal, and Pittsburgh are the favourites according to the simulator. The only selection that is a bit surprising for this round is Dallas – but I’m not too surprised by that considering some of the numbers they put up this year. If they can shut down Thornton, they’ve got a pretty good shot at the conference finals.
Overall Detroit still has the highest probability of winning the cup, up to 38% now. Montreal and Pittsburgh are neck and neck for second place in probability of winning the cup. Dallas and San Jose are next and the last three have a 6% or less chance.
Now that the first round is out, the last remaining Canadian team is my second favourite team in the league: the Montreal Canadiens. So since the Oil are down and out, I’m cheering for them. Push that 14.7% edge boys!
Heraldk
Stepping Up
Mar 1st
It has been awhile since I last seriously tried to move up in limits at Poker. I’ve only really done it a handful of time. From my starting ground of 0.5/1 full ring limit I moved up twice to 1/2 and 2/4 limit. Then I started playing 6max no limit at 50nl, and moved up once from there to 100nl which is where I’ve been at for awhile.
This past week had been very good to me. I got a Party Poker reload bonus emailed to me, so I decided it was time to go back there and try and clear it. Well, I did rather well playing 100nl. I was up over 7 stacks in 4 or 5 days playing a couple hours per day. I felt confident and on top of the world. So it occurred to me — what about moving up again? I had been playing 6max 100nl for quite a long time and had made a few grand at those stakes.
A few nights ago I gave it a shot. The first night I had 2 tables open and made about half a stack at 200nl. Not too shabby, but it was a short session. The next night was terrible. I dropped 4 stacks, and it just didn’t feel like anything clicked. It seemed like every time I raised preflop I’d get called by people who would call my continuation bets — but I wouldn’t flop anything. I know I made a few errors, and I think I got a bit flustered. But even if I played perfectly, I doubt I’d be better than down 2 stacks.
The next night went quite a bit better. I was down a stack fairly early, but I got pretty comfortable and in the end managed to win a stack and a half or so. That brought me to last night where I thought I played alright, but for the longest time couldn’t dig myself out of the one-stack whole I had got myself in. I had a great table with two incredible fish who were just asking to give their money away. It took me several hours to finally get one of them for about a stack and a half to finally draw even for the night.
It’s interesting — I don’t think the game is that much tougher than the one I’m used to playing. I think it’s just that the size of the swings is a little daunting. Like I said, it’s been awhile since I tried moving up. So far, the experiment seems to be going alright even though I’m down a little bit so far. I’ve got a bit of a bankroll to sustain some loss, so it’s not like I’m risking all that much. If I succeed in moving up, then I think my win rate in dollars goes up a fair amount which was the whole reason to move up.
Wish me luck!
Heraldk
Oiler Pregame
Feb 25th
My friend and roommate was kind enough to give me a spare ticket he had for a recent hockey game between the Oilers and the Minnesota Wild. It was a fun night, and our Oilers managed to win the game! I wish the Oilers had managed to put together a better season this year. It’s looking like they won’t make the playoffs this year 
3-0 Baby!
Jan 31st
I’ve been playing floor hockey with the CS team again this year. This year we’ve got a pretty competitive looking team. Several new additions to the team mean we’ve got some serious firepower on the floor almost every shift, and the players that don’t have that firepower are good solid players. So with last night’s 10-1 win capping off the 3 game round robin, we’re on top of the division for the first time since I joined the team several years ago. Woohoo!
It’s a lot of fun to play and have a shot to win. I haven’t often been on a team that has had a competitive shot to win.
In related news, it looks like I might be able to join a floor hockey team in the Edmonton ball hockey league. I’ve been looking for a league to play in for a long time, so I’m pretty excited about getting a chance to play finally. The short intramural season was just not enough time to play floor hockey each semester.
Heraldk
A Note on Gambling
Jan 16th
I find it quite interesting noting the reactions of various people to gambling. As you probably know by now, I play a “little bit” of online poker, and have once in awhile been known to throw away some money playing blackjack or craps at a casino. I guess part of it is that my Dad’s side of the family (which happens to be Chinese) is a group that loves to gamble. The other part of it is my love for any sort of game that involves some thought.
There definitely is a bit of a thrill when you win at a gambling game. The more money at stake, the bigger the thrill when you win. I experienced this particular phenomena when I managed to get in on Mansion’s $1000 free bet on the Pittsburgh Steelers at the start of last year’s NFL football season. My friend Mike and I sat in front of the TV glued to it until the last play of the game and we were cheering like crazy throughout the game. When there’s a fair amount of money on the line, it’s exciting and fun.
So it’s pretty easy to see how the gambling thing can be a problem. Fortunately for me, I know enough about the math behind the games that I know who has the edge most of the time. I would never slap down a $1K bet without first making sure that I was a) sure that my edge was there, and b) sure that I was okay with losing that money if worst came to worse.
So I don’t really truly gamble in the same way that so many people get themselves in trouble do. I mostly play poker where I have definitely shown that I have an edge for the limits that I play. The couple of times I’ve done other gambling, I’ve either known I had an edge (like that $1K free bet at mansion where the edge was huge since it was free), or I’ve been willing to throw away $60 playing blackjack or craps for a couple hours.
Playing poker so much though has changed my outlook on a lot of things. One thing that is definitely different is my outlook on money is a little different. Once you’ve played poker for awhile, the face value of the currency you’re playing with changes. It kind of loses its meaning in the sense that $100 is just a stack of chips you could lose or win at any given moment. It’s kind of weird, but being able to sit down for a few hours and win a couple hundred dollars playing $100NL with .5/1 blinds makes it possible for me to add to my yearly revenue by a significant amount. It’s only really bounded by the amount of time I have to play (which these days isn’t that much, but I still get in a few sessions most weeks).
I kind of think that that effect of poker on my life has been a bit negative. It’s hard to regain a respect for how much money is worth and how hard it is for most people to earn it after you’ve played online poker seriously for as long as I have (and I haven’t really been playing that long really). The other negative aspect that is less severe for me is a bit of a crisis of conscience when you realize that the money you’re winning is being taken from the wallets of people who may not have the self control to realize that they’ve lost next month’s rent cheque. I deal with that thought with the following argument: “Will those players stop playing if I don’t play? No. Well then I’m not changing anything by playing and being the one to take that money from them”. Think that’s faulty reasoning? Let me know. I’m curious about this issue. Without a doubt, it is a parasitic action, but I’m not sure what I can do about the other person’s problem – particularly if they are an unknown person I’m facing through online poker (which is how I play the bulk of the time).
So there’s some negative effects of playing poker, but there’s a lot of reasons that I continue to play. The financial results certainly don’t hurt, but it’s not just that. I enjoy the competition. Playing these games lets me battle wits with other players and it can keep me sharp. When I’m playing my best, I’m seeing a lot of things happen in front of me and I can tell you a lot of what’s going on.
Playing good poker also teaches patience and handling of tough times. The variance in poker is sky-high, and that means that to play well you have to be able to take the tough luck hands without letting them get to you or you’ll start playing poorly (on tilt as it were). You need to be able to objectively back away from a particular situation and assess whether you indeed made the appropriate decisions regardless of the outcomes. This is a skill that helps a lot with life.
Poker contains a lot of mathematics, some of it simple, some of it quite a bit more complex. There is a lot you can do with math (despite people who will tell you that poker is primarily a psychological game), and learning to apply math to specific situations in poker is an essential skill to getting good at the game. Likewise, mathematics helps you with situations in life too. To tell you a quick story, my mom was telling me about some advice she heard some people were giving in a “learn what to do before retiring” seminar. The advice was that you should replace all your appliances a year before retiring, with the idea being that these appliances would then not likely need replacing throughout retirement saving a lot of stress. This advice struck me as pretty wrong considering that there was no part of this advice that took into consideration how old the existing appliances were. You might be replacing an appliance that is still working great and has an expected lifetime of 5 or 10 more years – effectively throwing away part of your existing investment in the appliances you currently own. And who’s to say the appliances you buy aren’t going to fail during your retirement? The proper solution here is to replace appliances that need replacing, and wait until your other appliances require replacing. Meanwhile, the money you didn’t spend on new appliances gains interest. I fail to see why this is a worse solution.
My life has been affected drastically because of my time spent playing poker. For the most part, I think it has been for the better. I feel like I am able to keep myself sharper and more able to analyze situations objectively, and the monetary considerations certainly don’t hurt.
Heraldk
Christmas Ornament
Dec 5th
Now that it is December, it was now permissible for me to put up the Christmas tree. So Diane and I did so on Sunday. It was kind of fun – I have a little 4 foot Christmas tree that is the perfect size I think for my condo. I sat down to watch the hockey game on Monday and during the intermission I took a few pictures of the tree with the lights on. It’s pretty tricky to take good photos of the tree though, so the best I could come up with was this close-up shot of one of my ornaments.
Game On
Dec 4th
The past three games have been very encouraging for the Oilers. We’re battling through some pretty intense injury trouble, but with last night’s win in LA, we’re now just one game shy of .500, and a pair of points out of a playoff spot.
The two wins against Anaheim are HUGE for a couple of reasons. The first is obviously that wins are important against any team. But beating down Anaheim means that we are more likely to finish above them in the standings – meaning the draft pick we have from them is worth more than the one we gave up for Dustin Penner. The Kevin Lowe vs Brian Burke war seems to be evening out a little more. If the oilers can turn this season around, I think the Dustin Penner offer sheet was a pretty good move for Kevin Lowe – particularly since Penner has been playing better and better over the last few games.
The Edmonton Oilers, in the past couple of years, have been a frustratingly fun team to watch. Even in 05/06 when we made the run to the cup, the Oilers just squeaked into the playoffs. They did so by beating the good teams, and losing to the bad teams … which made no sense. Last year’s season was a terrible disappointment, but the team had so much trouble scoring. Add in the injury troubles that plagued the oilers in the late season, and it really was a recipe for disaster.
I still think the experts are crazy to think they can just write off the oilers as contenders. Anything can happen in the new NHL, and the oilers have a lot of the right ingredients to turn things around. Granted, they have a lot of young and unexperienced players on their team, but there is a lot of skill there, and if the elements click into place, I wouldn’t be surprised to see this team playoff bound.
Heraldk
Rock Band First Impressions
Nov 28th
This past Saturday I had the chance to play rock band for the first time. How was this possible? Rock band doesn’t come to Canada until December?! Well one of my friends managed to convince his friend to bring a copy up from the states with him when he came for convocation last week. So … they had it at the party I was at on Saturday.
I’ve enjoyed most of the guitar hero series. I played through guitar hero I and II and managed to pass all the songs on expert. I bought guitar hero III when it came out, and have enjoyed it to a certain extent, but the game has driven me mad on a number of different fronts. The first issue is the game seems to be hard for hard’s sake. Rather than focusing on making the experience as realistic as possible, it seems to be catering to the people who enjoy showing off that they can pass a wicked impossible section at 100%. What this does is it makes it nigh impossible for a more casual player (which I think I fall into) to pass the game in a reasonable amount of time and at a reasonable frustration level. The other part of GH3 that I can’t stand is the guitar duel mode. To me, the game is at it’s best when it is you versus the challenge of a particular song. It’s hard enough to pass some of the more difficult tracks, so why do you need to throw in a random element with an opponent making it yet harder?! Maybe this is just me being frustrated, but having passed GH1 and GH2 on expert, I have yet to even come close to passing GH3 on hard due to the final boss battle. Ugh.
So what do I think of rock band? It’s awesome! The most obvious difference between the games, of course, is the added instruments. The drums are, in a word, sweet. The guitar requires a larger abstraction to make it accessible to a more general audience. That abstraction comes in the form of 5 buttons instead of 6 strings. The drums, on the other hand, require almost no abstraction. You have things to hit and a kick pedal, and that’s all you need for a basic drum kit. So where skills in guitar hero won’t likely transfer to a real guitar, I have a feeling skills on the drums in rock band will transfer okay to a real drum kit! Of course, there are things about real drums that aren’t emulated, but a lot of the stuff looks like it should transfer. The drums are also a lot of fun, which doesn’t hurt!
The vocals is the other obvious addition to rock band. On this spot, the Harmonix crew took it easy on the people who have trouble with pitch. The easy difficulty level is amazingly forgiving, which means that the biggest barrier to entry for the vocalist is just the potential embarrassment factor – which karaoke seems to have solved in a lot of places (with some help from some liquid courage). After you get over that, you don’t really have to worry about failing your band mates by failing a song. The more adventurous singers can up the difficulty level to get a challenge. The one thing I don’t like about the vocals part of it is the interface is a bit awkward. I’m used to reading music, and that might help me out quite a bit. I found it was almost a requirement to know a song pretty well before attempting a song or I had no hope to figure it out as it went.
There are some tweaks to the game that just feel right. One simple one is the game shows you how many stars your current performance is getting, and how far away you are from the next star. No more wondering how close you were to 5-starring a song! The other biggest change I noticed is you can still collect star power even when you are currently using it. This change just makes sense to me.
Anyways, I got a chance to play a few songs on each instrument, and I was thoroughly impressed. I especially can’t wait to give the drums more of a try at some higher difficulty levels!
Heraldk
Super Mario Galaxy
Nov 17th
Wow. This game is awesome. I’ve been spending every chance I get working my way through the latest Nintendo masterpiece. It isn’t often I have trouble putting a game down, but this is one of those times. The game is fantastic!
I never really played super mario 64, though I may have to at some point since there’s a lot of people who say that it was really well done. I did get super mario sunshine, but I really didn’t enjoy it. The controls were all wonky and I really didn’t like the whole water backpack mechanism. So Super Mario Galaxy is my first real 3d mario title. Before this, my only experience with mario titles has been through Super Mario 1,2,3, and World — all of which are excellent games (I played 3 the most out of all of them).
Galaxy is incredible. The worlds are varied and rich and full of an inventiveness in level design I haven’t seen in a long time. The controls, while a little hard to get used to at times (especially in swimming levels) don’t get in the way of enjoying the fun. There’s a lot of levels, and all of them are simply beautiful!
Besides the main levels, there’s also a bunch of challenge levels and mini games that are a lot of fun. The inventiveness continues throughout all of these games.
One of the things I’ve noticed early on as well is the music is wonderful. I am quite enjoying the whole experience, and this is probably one of those games that I finish way too fast because I play through it too quickly! Oh well, it’ll be fun!
Heraldk
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