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MIND-READER DICE AND
KITCHEN HOLD'EM
Dear Mark,
A Great column last week on Don't bettors. It
reminds of a game I was
on recently where a guy threw the number seven about
a dozen times
without the point ever being made. He touted that he
had the skill of
willing the number seven. Of course, two hours
later, he was broke.
But that still begs this question, do you think
there is any skill
involved in throwing dice? Eddie P.
The telepathic player on the crap game you describe
possessed no
second-sighted skills, because dice, Eddie, have
absolutely no notion
of who is throwing them. (Just imagine a sleepy pair
of dice suddenly
realizing they'd goofed on Player Z's last roll and
determining to
make up for it next time around.) I will match any
six-year old
Monopoly Jr. player against your crapped-out
clairvoyant in producing
losing (and winning) numbers, with the happy casino
always
maintaining its house edge. BUT, --there's always a
but--my answer
above, Eddie, is based on honest dice, and on a
legitimate game.
Are there any other kinds? Well, yes, shocking as
that may be. A
skillful and crooked player, or an underground
illegitimate casino,
can introduce gaffed dice on the game. One example
would be the use
of "tops," dice that have certain numbers omitted.
Instead of the six
distinct numbers 1-6, each die has only three
different numbers, each
smiling twice from opposite sides of its die. These
defective dice
work like this: One die sports the numbers 1, 3 and
5, while the
other shows 2, 4, and 6. This foul pair cannot roll
the numbers 4, 6,
8, and 10 but the can roll 7s all night long.
Another example would be two dice that have only the
numbers 2, 3,
and 6 on them. This set will roll 4, 5, 6, 8 and 9,
but it would be
impossible to seven-out. The sucker player just
doesn't catch on
because only three sides of a die are visible at any
given time.
Yet another example would be the player who has
developed skill at
sliding one or both of them bones across the table.
But any box
person not napping on the game would yell out "NO
ROLL," and mentally
mark the slider for close observation. Then there
are loaded dice,
also known as weights, that you can buy at any magic
shop. Loaded
dice are "percentage dice," since they do not win as
often as tops
do, but they do tilt the odds in the cheat's favor.
In the years that I boxed a crap game, I never
caught gaffed dice on
the table. To introduce them, the cheats would have
had to match the
color and shade of the house dice, imprint the
casino's name and logo
on them, and, usually, match a three-digit number
engraved on them.
Even working the late swing shift, I was never
sleepy enough to have
missed such painstaking artwork.
Dear Mark,
I played in a Texas Hold'em tournament amongst
friends. All went well
except one hand. Two players held low clubs as hole
cards, and the
community cards were an ace, queen, and jack of
clubs. We split the
pot as both players had an ace high flush. One
player thought we
should count back through hole cards for winner. For
future games,
how should this be handled? Gene R.
The affirmative answer is to include each player's
pocket cards.
Therefore, using your example, if the community
cards were an Ace,
queen and jack of clubs, and player A had a five and
three of clubs,
with player B having a four and two, player A's five
of clubs would
accord him the winning hand. You would only split
the pot if all five
cards on the board (the flop, the turn, and the
river) were used to
make the highest flush.
Gambling quote of the Week: "Texas Hold 'em is not
an easy game to
play well. To become an expert you need to be able
to balance many
concepts, some of which occasionally contradict each
other. --David
Sklansky, author
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