Friday 20 February 2009

Should We Be Betting All This On a Pair of Queens?

Competent poker players, rather than Angels, will be able to assess the odds. But surely more than 100% of GDP requires a better hand?

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Of course, it depends on the actual rules of the game. A bad hand if you are going low, not low enough to bet on it at all.

If you are going high, not a very good hand either. The hand is stronger the larger the deck you are playing with, and the larger the number of players. It is stronger if you are playing without replacing any of the cards you are dealt.

You may bluff with two queens, hoping that the other players will see the bluff with even weaker hands. But to bluff you will have to have some capital in reserve, relatively to the other players, not bet everything on an all or nothing bet.

All in all, I would not feel too happy if my final hand was two queens, without lots of chips, against a few players with a small deck... And never would I bet 100% of my yearly income. If you look at it from this angle, the odds on two queens are wildly against you, for any bet higher than 1% of yearly income.

Anonymous said...

The problem is that the cards are stacked against us at the moment. Time for an honest dealer.

Sen. C.R.O'Blene said...

Fifteen two, fifteen four, fifteen six, fifteen eight, and two pairs makes twelve.

You get one of these hands in a blue moon, but it's cloudy this morning, and getting worse...

Sackerson said...

Pair of queens... at first I thought you meant Mandelson and A.N. Other, but I couldn't work out the other.

Elby the Beserk said...

Sackerson - you're kidding, of course? Yes? !

Brown's the other queen. You know, the Prime Mincer.