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The Importance of Record Keeping in Poker
Poker players are good liars, which is helpful when you’re trying to bluff someone out of their shorts, but not as helpful when you’re trying to honestly asses how profitable you are as a player.
Let’s face it no one likes to lose, and if you have the ability to fudge a session here or a bad night there so that, in your mental ledger, you come out a winning player, then there’s a good chance you will.
While this will make you feel better, what it won’t do is help you to become a better player. The fact of the matter is that good players have to be brutally honest with themselves when it comes to the results of their play. They need to track every win and every loss, because without that knowledge, they have no foundation for analyzing their game.
Think about it let’s say you play poker online a bit, and you also play some live. You mostly play No limit hold’em, but you’ll play Omaha or limit online from time to time, and throw in some tournaments as well. That’s a lot of different games, and it’s very unlikely that you are equally good at each. What is very likely is that one or more of those games is costing you money (or, if you’re superb, one or more of the games is costing you money not because you’re losing money, but because you could be making more money playing another game).
You’ll never know, however, unless you keep good records. Without those records you have no clue what game is your most profitable. You might have a guess, but that guess is probably based on very biased data; as humans, we tend to remember the positive and downplay the negative. That strategy makes it easier to get through the day, but it really undermines our ability to accurately gauge results.
The counter-strategy to this inherent human tendency is simply to keep good records. You’ll find yourself surprised at how the data shakes out, as the written record tends to differ pretty wildly from the remembered one. In fact, it’s not even accurate to call it remembered, as it’s more imagined than anything.
Once you start keeping detailed records, you’ll find yourself in a much better position in terms of being able to analyze your playing trends, and in terms of being to better select the games and formats that are likely to generate the most profit for you as a poker player.
Yes, record-keeping can be a bit of a bore, but losing money unnecessarily certainly isn’t any more exciting. The devil is in the details, as the saying goes, and if you aren’t working hard on those details, one thing is for sure you’re going to have a devil of a time getting your game to the point of profitability where it deserves to be.
How to Play it Safe with Online Casino Slot Machines
Whether or not land casino slot machines meet standard fair-gaming practices has been a subject of much discussion for some time and continues until today, particularly in light (or darkness) of the advent of online casino slots games.
The way in which land casino slot machines work allows for many “variations.” Naturally, this can easily deceive players. And while these machines and the overall practice is utterly illegal, it is safe to say some naive luck-seekers shall wind up getting screwed by more one-armed bandits, unless – mind you – they shift to playing online casino slots where there’s less risk of foul-play.
Random Number Generators (RNG) Online casino slot machines are based on electronic “random number generators” (RNG), which operate within large computer programs that control the game graphics, the players’ accounts, statistics of each round played, plus loads more.
The random number generator is made up of hard-coded software protocols which remain consistent and are rarely altered. No “magic button” exists that can be switched on & off in order to change a gambler’s odds
for better or worse. The results appear randomly and the pattern of randomness is never changed. In this sense software-based online casino slots definitely enjoy an important advantage.
The pay-out percentage rates for slots at “brick & mortar” casinos will vary from place to place. These rates can be as low as 82. In other words, the casino – or “House”- takes in a profit averaging around 4 per cent.
For the most part online casinos provide generous pay-outs ranging around 97 and 98 per cent. Providing players with better pay-out rates is simply due to the fact that Internet-based operations function with considerably lower overhead costs than “brick & mortar” casinos.
To demonstrate this point even better, imagine you are playing online casino slots with a $100 bankroll while the average pay-out percentage is 97%. Theoretically, after a few of hours of play, on average you would lose three bucks.
Hence, to answer the million-dollar question of whether online casino slots are truly fair or not, you bet they’re fair; even more so than those traditional & aptly called “one-armed bandits” packed inside land casinos.
Furthermore, a rising number of online casinos (those with the business insight to serve players better than other sites) ensure that their games are tested on a regular basis by independent, third-party inspectors and laboratories akin to Technical System Testing (TST). Any online sites truly on the up & up will gladly place a testing firm’s logo on their homepage. It simply instills confidence in their prospective clients.
Obviously, no casino, Internet or otherwise, will guarantee players that they’ll score some winnings. That’s just the nature of gambling and the major thrust behind the excitement. But gamers wishing to play online slots- or any other game via the Net – can rely on receiving two significant advantages: greater odds and consistently fair games
So, the next time you’re in need of a slots fix, even if there is a brick & mortar casino right across the street from your home, if you’re betting cash for the single purpose of winning more cash, you’re better off staying home (with the family) and playing slots at any of the more than 2,000 online casinos. The odds that you’ll come out a winner are considerably greater.