Yes, I know I've said that I don't get into gambling much and in fact the last two trips I took to Vegas, I spent only about $35 total, both trips added together, on gambling. I'm quickly bored by slots or video poker machines and, of course, I'm not swayed by the sorrowful, beckoning evil stares of the zombie table games dealers.
But, unbeknownst to me until I learned it from some YouTube poker vloggers, live poker in the casinos is considerably more favorable to the player in both odds and ability to utilize the benefit of skill. These vloggers, many of them professional poker players, actually don't consider playing poker gambling at all. They maintain that a person with enough skill, patience, perseverance and self-control can make quite a good living at it. But their version of play isn't anything like what's seen in the movies. Though some do play high stakes and do make millions, they probably wouldn't go about it in the same vein as James Bond and Le Chiffre did in Casino Royale. Nor would they be likely to play scary, illegal backroom games as seen in Rounders. No, John Malkovich need not show his grungy-looking, Oreo-addicted, incredibly bad Russian accented self up at these guys' tables. These guys begrudgingly accept that they are simply grinding. Playing hands strictly on the value of their hand's odds of beating their opponents (with the occasional bluff thrown in based on the need to throw other players off or to capitalize on a perception of play style (the range) of other players). The jargon among these guys is way over played, so to speak. They have a term for every little thing about the game and the "science" behind mastering it. Or at least trying too.
Methinks though that they embrace this vast jargon vocabulary as a way to reassure themselves that they have studied the concepts of the game well enough to virtually eliminate as much chance as possible in the outcome of each hand. But in my opinion, even though they consider many of their losses to be attributed to either mistakes on their part, better skill execution on their opponent's part or bad reads, they don't seem to readily admit, on camera at least, that sometimes it comes down to just plain luck.
I've played a bit online, using fake money of course, since, unless you live in Jersey it seems, you really can't legally play online in the US for real money. But games where you and your fellow players are just throwing around virtual chips like they were, well, just virtual chips, I don't think you get the same feel for the it either in a real money online game or a live one. People are awfully silly sometimes with their bets when having no real consequences of losing other than having to wait a couple of hours for the site to award you more free chips if you've blown your entire phony money bankroll.
I've even thought of driving on one of my weekend nights to what's probably the closest casino featuring a poker room to Orlando. The Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Tampa indeed offers this and I've seen video of some vloggers that play there and it looks pretty nice. Comparable to the swanky rooms I've seen from the Vegas vloggers. But then I think to myself...even for a low stakes 1-2 table (playing $1 and $2 blinds) the usual buy-in around $200 to $300. Now, of course, if the heat got too intense and my stack was diminishing rapidly since I may well be quickly detected as the total noobie fish I am, there's no obligation to see it all get gobbled up by the sharks. But I know the subliminal atmosphere of casinos in general and I'd think the poker tables would be no exception. I'd feel driven to try to make back my losses with "just one more hand."
Until I learn a fuck of a lot more about the game, I'll stick to my funny money online games and watching the pros grind it out on YouTube. After all, one of the unspoken goals I'm sure many of these vloggers have is to entice people like me to get psyched, roll on into the casino they play at and sit at their table. They'll be more than happy to show you how the game is played...as they pick you clean.