I am more than 90% certain that all poker rooms are rigged

[ThodorisK]

Thanks for your thoughtfull reply.I tried to correct the initial text by my next message posted before your reply:
"(sorry, of course the number of losses will be less than the number of wins since there are more than 2 players playing. I meant that the win/loss ratio is much lower than the expected. )"

but I expressed wrongly again. I should had said:
(sorry, of course the number of wins will be less than the number of losses since there are more than 2 players playing. I meant that the win/loss ratio is much lower than the expected. )

So, what I meant by saying that I lose "80%" of the time, is that when the probability of winning with e.g KK is about 50% with 4 players, (see http://www.westonpoker.com/pokerInfo/preFlopOdds.php),
I observed statistically a probability of winning 20%, and losing 80%.
And this keep happening for all the best 20% of the best preflop hands.

As for the matter that the casinos have no interest to cheat the best players in favour of the fishes, you are wrong, and I explained it unmistakenly in my initial text. Read it again. If the good players have an edge of e.g. 30% against the fishes, then, in simple words, they will take the deposited money of the fishes BEFORE the rake does. That means that most of the deposited money of the fishes will end up to the good players and a smaller share will end up in rake. But if the good players are cheated in favour of the fishes, then ALL of the deposited money will end up in the rake! Meditate on it.

But I am pleased with your remarks. You attempted a deep analysis in the matter, but i want deeper counter-arguments from you and the others. Something I havent thought of. All things you mentioned I know them.
I am not trying to proove that they are cheating. I am trying to get more logical proofs that they are cheating OR THAT THEY ARE NOT CHEATING.
But my so far analysis indicates that the first indication is much more probable.

Two more questions:
1) Are you winning?
2) what are these "brick and mortar" casinos?

[Keyser]

Originally Posted by ThodorisK

Thanks for your thoughtfull reply.I tried to correct the initial text by my next message posted before your reply:
"(sorry, of course the number of losses will be less than the number of wins since there are more than 2 players playing. I meant that the win/loss ratio is much lower than the expected. )"

but I expressed wrongly again. I should had said:
(sorry, of course the number of wins will be less than the number of losses since there are more than 2 players playing. I meant that the win/loss ratio is much lower than the expected. )

So, what I meant by saying that I lose "80%" of the time, is that when the probability of winning with e.g KK is about 50% with 4 players, (see http://www.westonpoker.com/pokerInfo/preFlopOdds.php),
I observed statistically a probability of winning 20%, and losing 80%.
And this keep happening for all the best 20% of the best preflop hands.

As for the matter that the casinos have no interest to cheat the best players in favour of the fishes, you are wrong, and I explained it unmistakenly in my initial text. Read it again. If the good players have an edge of e.g. 30% against the fishes, then, in simple words, they will take the deposited money of the fishes BEFORE the rake does. That means that most of the deposited money of the fishes will end up to the good players and a smaller share will end up in rake. But if the good players are cheated in favour of the fishes, then ALL of the deposited money will end up in the rake! Meditate on it.

But I am pleased with your remarks. You attempted a deep analysis in the matter, but i want deeper counter-arguments from you and the others. Something I havent thought of. All things you mentioned I know them.
I am not trying to proove that they are cheating. I am trying to get more logical proofs that they are cheating OR THAT THEY ARE NOT CHEATING.
But my so far analysis indicates that the first indication is much more probable.

Two more questions:
1) Are you winning?
2) what are these "brick and mortar" casinos?

I dont understand. How does rigging a poker game so that bad players win affect the rake of the casino? The rake is the same no matter who ultimately wins each hand.

"Brick and mortar" = real, NON-internet casino (i.e. all those fancy buildings in Las Vegas)

[ThodorisK]

I will formulate it again in a new thread as I made many misformulations in my initial text. I will not make it any more clear for you to understand. Actually, it might be even more difficult. Perhaps you do not know the mathematics which explain why an edge, i.e. an advantage, produces certain profit in the long run.

[ThodorisK]

I have to formulate again what I said in the initial text of the thread "I am more than 90% certain that poker rooms are rigged", as I made a few mistakes-misformulations (e.g. I said that I know I have been cheaten because the number of times my strong hands lose is higher than the number of times that they win, something which is bound to happen if more than 2 players are playing).

The proof that casinos give out fixed cards is not that I am losing, nor that I lose because of my strong hands, (strong hands which happen at the 1% of the games, and I fold anything else), as this could happen because I do not generate more profit when these strong hands win than the loss I have when they lose. Perhaps a very good player could make me fall into this trap.

I don’t notice that much the profit-loss balance stats of the strong hands, but mostly the NUMBER of the strong hands that they simply lose, and the NUMBER of the strong hands that they simply win. The proof that the casinos give fixed cards is that THE NUMBER OF TIMES these strong hands lose, is much higher than the expected NUMBER OF TIMES that they should lose (of course I have to rarely fold to observe this, to complete my experiment, and that is why I say its irrelevant if I win or lose). E.g. when the probability of winning with KK is about 50% with 4 players, (see http://www.westonpoker.com/pokerInfo/preFlopOdds.php),
I observed statistically a probability of winning 20%, and losing 80%.
And this keeps happening for all the 1/4th of the best preflop hands.

Now why would the casinos cheat since they have this huge rake of 5%?
Greed? They want it all? There is a strong counter-argument to this argument: Since the rake is a sure 5% of the pot, then they’re gonna have it all anyway, as they would slowly crop and accumulate all the bankroll of the depositors for sure, so they don’t need to cheat with cheating software and bots, ie, fake players who are working for the casino. Well, this counter-argument also implies the reason of why they would cheat: No, they are not gonna have it all for sure, they are in danger of not taking even the half of people’s deposits IF there are a lot of very good (high-skilled) players AND a lot of very bad (low skilled) players i.e. fishes. They would take every last penny of everyone for sure, IF the skill level of all players was about the same, and this is not the case. Why all this?

if the good players have an edge of e.g. 30% against the fishes, then, in simple words, they will take the deposited money of the fishes before the rake does. More accurately, the good players will accumulate the money deposited by the fishes with a much higher rate (e.g. 30%) than the rate of the 5% of the rake. So most of the deposited money of the fishes will end up to the good players and a smaller share will end up in rake. Or more accurently, the bankroll of the casino will grow more slowly than the bankroll of the skilled players. But if the good players are cheated in favour of the fishes, then all of the deposited money will end up in the rake!

You might argue that the good players rarely have wins compared to the total number of the games played, so this 30% applies only for a small percentage of the games played, whereas the rake wins at every game (except the games with no flop dealt), so the rate of accumulation of the deposited money that rake has, in comparison to the rate of accumulation of the deposited money of the skilled players, is much higher than the ratio 30% against 5% explained above. I answer that yes, indeed, and because of that, the more probable case is that this rate of the rake is higher than this rate of the skilled players.

But the counterarguments of this, are that:
1.) why should the casino let the good players bankrolls keep growing and growing with a huge rate, money that could end up in the casino, simply by cheating them? We have seen cases that reputable casinos found excuses of not paying small profits players made, e.g. the “bonus abusers”. This is because small profits multiplied by many players, becomes much money for the casinos.
2.) and most importantly, the statistics of how many times do the strong hands (not just regarding preflop hands) win, and how many times they lose, indicate cheating.

As I said in my previous thread, I am not trying to convince you that casinos cheat at poker. I cannot be 100% certain, anyway. But my so far clues indicate that the most probable case is that they do. Dont some casinos cheat at blackjack? I know some that they do, with 99% statistical confidence, but am I allowed to say which they are in here? One of them was revealed in a post in this site a year ago.

Perhaps the most of you will find it impossible to understand all this if you are not familiar with the mathematics which explain how much certain it is that the one who has an edge, an advantage over the other, is bound to take all his money. This is an oppurtunity to give a simple fact which will wake up the common gambler:

The probability that a roulette player will lose a bet e.g. at the red or black, is 19/37=51.35% and the probability that he will win it, is 18/37=48.65%. So if he makes 100 bets, on average he will lose 51.35 bets and he will win 48.65 bets. Therefore he will lose 51.35-48.65=2.7 bets on average, for every 100 bets he wagers. That is what the "2.7% edge" means.

Simple so far. But the astonishing fact is this: Suppose a player has a 10,000$ bankroll and goes to the casino, and he is desperate to double his bankroll, and make it 20,000$. If he bets the whole 10,000$ at once, in one bet, on red or black, then he has a 48.65% probability of achieving his goal of doubling his bankroll to 20,000$. BUT IF HE TRIES TO MAKE HIS 10,000$ BANKROLL INTO 20,000$ SLOWLY, BY BETTING E.G. 50$ PER BET OR 100$ PER BET, THEN THE PROBABILITY OF REACHING THE 20,000$ IS NOT EVEN 1%!!!!!!!!!!! The common gambler ignores this fact, and thinks that the probability is again about 48%! If players knew this simple fact, then they would stay away from roulette, dont you think? Start web-searchin with the title "gamler's ruin" or "risk of ruin" etc to find the corresponding formulas if you unfamiliar with the subject.

[ThodorisK]

Sorry again, I mis-expressed what I meant by the phrase "certain profit". Not only profit is certain, but the elimination of the whole bankroll of the opponent is certain, if one has even a slight edge over that opponent

[ThodorisK]

So if this low edge of 2.7% of roulette is so much certain that will eliminate the whole bankroll of players, you can imagine how certain it is that the skilled player will eliminate the bankrolls of the fishes, if he has an edge of more than 10% against them. So, do you understand now, how the skilled players can compete the 5% rake?

You must also understand that my arguments are irrelevant to whether I myself am a good poker player or not.

[kimss]

I am pretty much sure you are right on this one. A friend of mine has played alot of Texas Holdem on the net (mind you, Im a slots player and not a card player). He told me of all the intence plays on the net, with all those great hands (And still didn't win - as you say) - but all others seemed to get those darn greater hands the same time.

I asked him - do you get all theese great hands in real life? The ansewr is ofcourse no. My gut feeling for asking this question, just as you expect aswell, is that the software presents faulty cards to the players giving them extra strong hands (while infact not having it).

I havn't looked into the stats on this myself, but as noted above - I know from my poker playing friends that they love online playing since you almost get those crazy hands...

[winbig]

Come on, keep it in one thread. If you want to change wording, your view on it, bring up another point, or whatever, just reply to the thread already going about this exact same issue.

[Keyser]

Originally Posted by ThodorisK

I have to formulate again what I said in the initial text of the thread "I am more than 90% certain that poker rooms are rigged", as I made a few mistakes-misformulations (e.g. I said that I know I have been cheaten because the number of times my strong hands lose is higher than the number of times that they win, something which is bound to happen if more than 2 players are playing).

The proof that casinos give out fixed cards is not that I am losing, nor that I lose because of my strong hands, (strong hands which happen at the 1% of the games, and I fold anything else), as this could happen because I do not generate more profit when these strong hands win than the loss I have when they lose. Perhaps a very good player could make me fall into this trap.

I don’t notice that much the profit-loss balance stats of the strong hands, but mostly the NUMBER of the strong hands that they simply lose, and the NUMBER of the strong hands that they simply win. The proof that the casinos give fixed cards is that THE NUMBER OF TIMES these strong hands lose, is much higher than the expected NUMBER OF TIMES that they should lose (of course I have to rarely fold to observe this, to complete my experiment, and that is why I say its irrelevant if I win or lose). E.g. when the probability of winning with KK is about 50% with 4 players, (see http://www.westonpoker.com/pokerInfo/preFlopOdds.php),
I observed statistically a probability of winning 20%, and losing 80%.
And this keeps happening for all the 1/4th of the best preflop hands.

Now why would the casinos cheat since they have this huge rake of 5%?
Greed? They want it all? There is a strong counter-argument to this argument: Since the rake is a sure 5% of the pot, then they’re gonna have it all anyway, as they would slowly crop and accumulate all the bankroll of the depositors for sure, so they don’t need to cheat with cheating software and bots, ie, fake players who are working for the casino. Well, this counter-argument also implies the reason of why they would cheat: No, they are not gonna have it all for sure, they are in danger of not taking even the half of people’s deposits IF there are a lot of very good (high-skilled) players AND a lot of very bad (low skilled) players i.e. fishes. They would take every last penny of everyone for sure, IF the skill level of all players was about the same, and this is not the case. Why all this?

if the good players have an edge of e.g. 30% against the fishes, then, in simple words, they will take the deposited money of the fishes before the rake does. More accurately, the good players will accumulate the money deposited by the fishes with a much higher rate (e.g. 30%) than the rate of the 5% of the rake. So most of the deposited money of the fishes will end up to the good players and a smaller share will end up in rake. Or more accurently, the bankroll of the casino will grow more slowly than the bankroll of the skilled players. But if the good players are cheated in favour of the fishes, then all of the deposited money will end up in the rake!

You might argue that the good players rarely have wins compared to the total number of the games played, so this 30% applies only for a small percentage of the games played, whereas the rake wins at every game (except the games with no flop dealt), so the rate of accumulation of the deposited money that rake has, in comparison to the rate of accumulation of the deposited money of the skilled players, is much higher than the ratio 30% against 5% explained above. I answer that yes, indeed, and because of that, the more probable case is that this rate of the rake is higher than this rate of the skilled players.

But the counterarguments of this, are that:
1.) why should the casino let the good players bankrolls keep growing and growing with a huge rate, money that could end up in the casino, simply by cheating them? We have seen cases that reputable casinos found excuses of not paying small profits players made, e.g. the “bonus abusers”. This is because small profits multiplied by many players, becomes much money for the casinos.
2.) and most importantly, the statistics of how many times do the strong hands (not just regarding preflop hands) win, and how many times they lose, indicate cheating.

As I said in my previous thread, I am not trying to convince you that casinos cheat at poker. I cannot be 100% certain, anyway. But my so far clues indicate that the most probable case is that they do. Dont some casinos cheat at blackjack? I know some that they do, with 99% statistical confidence, but am I allowed to say which they are in here? One of them was revealed in a post in this site a year ago.

Perhaps the most of you will find it impossible to understand all this if you are not familiar with the mathematics which explain how much certain it is that the one who has an edge, an advantage over the other, is bound to take all his money. This is an oppurtunity to give a simple fact which will wake up the common gambler:

The probability that a roulette player will lose a bet e.g. at the red or black, is 19/37=51.35% and the probability that he will win it, is 18/37=48.65%. So if he makes 100 bets, on average he will lose 51.35 bets and he will win 48.65 bets. Therefore he will lose 51.35-48.65=2.7 bets on average, for every 100 bets he wagers. That is what the "2.7% edge" means.

Simple so far. But the astonishing fact is this: Suppose a player has a 10,000$ bankroll and goes to the casino, and he is desperate to double his bankroll, and make it 20,000$. If he bets the whole 10,000$ at once, in one bet, on red or black, then he has a 48.65% probability of achieving his goal of doubling his bankroll to 20,000$. BUT IF HE TRIES TO MAKE HIS 10,000$ BANKROLL INTO 20,000$ SLOWLY, BY BETTING E.G. 50$ PER BET OR 100$ PER BET, THEN THE PROBABILITY OF REACHING THE 20,000$ IS NOT EVEN 1%!!!!!!!!!!! The common gambler ignores this fact, and thinks that the probability is again about 48%! If players knew this simple fact, then they would stay away from roulette, dont you think? Start web-searchin with the title "gamler's ruin" or "risk of ruin" etc to find the corresponding formulas if you unfamiliar with the subject.

Preface: I have a computer science degree with a minor in mathematics, so please dont attempt to use the line "you don't understand mathematics" at me.

It sounds like your argument is that if good players win at the normal expected rate, then they will clean out the bad players and the casino will only get a pecentage of that money. Therefore, the casinos want to cheat in order to get all of the money brought to the table.

The implication is, without using bots or shills, that the casinos would have to set up a system so that the bad plyers win at an equal level as the good players. Otherwise, if the bad players win, then you have the same problem, in that the good players would be cleaned out by the bad players and the casino would only get a percentage.

Essentially, the casino would have to set up a system so the cards are fixed just enough to even the palying field. I think this would be practically impossible.

Even if it was possible, your basis is flawed anyway. You are implying that players come to the tables with a set amount of money, strict goals for making money and limits to how much they lose, and they stick by them. The fact is that most people, when their stack is gone, will reload. So, any money eaten by the good players will be reloaded by the bad players.

The fact is that the casino rate of income for poker is determined by how much money is being wagered at all of their tables per unit of time. There is no reason to believe that this can be positively affected by slanting the outcome in favor of poorer players.

As for your 80% loss rate with pocket kings, have you tracked and recorded every hand you played with this hand? Have you played these hands out to the river every time? Have you tracked enough hands to be able to distinguish between accepted variation versus a true anomaly? I am guessing the answer to these questions is no.

As for me, I have only played at Bodog for real money. I have seen a lot of bad beats and weird hands. However, I have seen the exact same bad beats and wierd hands at real live games, both at casinos and at home games. People tend to remember the bad beats and not the normal hands. Furthermore, since the number of hands that are played online is much greater than live, people have more bad beats to remember.

[Kenny Lingus]

On this topic, I agree with both ThodorisK and Keyser to some degree. While I do believe that some card rooms do not fairly deal the cards, I don't think that it has anything to do with helping certain players over others.

As Keyser has stated, the total amount of money bet is the key to how much the house will win, not who wins the pot. Even if a couple of sharks dominate over a bunch of fishes, the cardroom knows that the key is to have enough players around to keep that money in play. A winning shark is probably not going to leave the site, and, as poker can be streaky, they will likely put some of their winnings back into play.

On the other hand, I have played way too much online poker not to have witnessed some very peculiar tendencies. By far the biggest is how often the river will hit and give some fish three sixes to beat my aces up, or something to that variety. There just seems to be way, way, too many good hands, and "lucky" river hits.

All considered, my theory of how cardrooms cheat players is simple: the hands that are dealt are "juiced". In other words, the better hands come up much more often than they should, to encourage more betting, bigger pots, and to keep the fishies hanging around until the end.

This tactic would greatly increase the room's "take", especially on the lower limit tables (where most of the players are); by inducing more betting & less folding, the bigger pots would ultimately mean more rake.

This type of an arrangement would probably be neutral; i.e., it wouldn't favor any particular player(s) in terms of getting good cards, but the number of good hands would increase, and it would also follow that the number of times a hand would improve would also increase.

This would explain why it would seem to some that the poorer players are getting the benefit. Good players might wisely (assuming a legitimate deal) fold 2 pairs to a made flush if the bet is too much (like a $50 bet into a $5 pot); a fish would chase the full house, and if the draw is skewd to favor better outcomes, they will probably hit the river more often than one would think possible.

If anyone out there thinks that this type of thing is BS, and that all poker rooms fairly deal the cards, just look throughout this web site; if casino operators by the hundreds continually try and cheat the average Joe out of his bankroll, what makes you think that a cardroom would never try it? All it would take to make my theory happen is a slight alteration of the deal when the site is put into use - just a simple algorithm to slightly affect the deal - and who would know? Poof, the cardroom could raise their profits by 50% or more, in a way much more difficult to detect (and almost impossible to prove)than most of the ways that casinos cheat us players.