Rounders - The Movie

[t1riel]

Ok. I'm sure all of you have seen the film "Rounders" at some point so I'll get to the point. I was watching the film again last night and I've noticed the narrator, which is Matt Damon's character, is continously explaining how to play the game, how others play the game, the different kind of players, and how the games are played in various places. One comment I thought was a little far fetched. I'm paraphrasing but the comment was: "Poker is a skill game. It has nothing to do with luck. That's why you see the same 5 guys in the final table of the world series of poker every year!" I agree that poker is a skill game, luck has something to do with it. Do you agree or disagree with any of the statements in the film?

 

[nateofdeath]

well you certainly don't see the same five guys at the final table at the world series anymore. i always thought that line was kind of silly too. poker players just don't seem to like to call it luck, so instead they call it probability, thay way they can play the odds and not just hope to get lucky. but in my opinion anyone who says luck, or at the very least chance, doesn't factor into the game, thinks way too much of their own skills. i've played too many hands perfectly only to have some dope call with nothing or a dominated hand and catch runner runner to beat me to say that luck has nothing to do with it, but that's just my opinion


-n

 

[THplanes]

Luck is a part of the game. That's why they deal the cards. The amount of luck vs the amount of skill changes with the time frame. Luck is a big factor in one hand. The best player in the world can't bluff someone that has the nutz. But the longer the time frame the less luck has to do with it. Once you start looking a 6 months it's pretty much all skill.

 

[btown32]

skill vs luck...

i couldnt agree with you more nate. yes, poker is a skill game compared to slots or roulette, but you need both skill and luck to survive. especially with the increased participants in all the big tourney fields. it doesnt matter how much skill you have when you have aces and the other person has kings and the flop comes with a king. you did all you could do...but all the skill in the world cant change how the deck is stacked. knowing all the odds and probabilities gives you a good headstart, but poker is not just a mathematical game. we all know that there is a lot of people reading skills involved too. how would you explain varkonyi winning the championship? tremendous amount of luck!!

 

[astuziasbalordito]

Good movie, but the final hand is absolutely ridiculous.

Why would you go all-in if you think your opponent has missed his draw?

 

[Dorkus Malorkus]

The whole film is ridiculous from a poker point of view.

It's good entertainment, but just don't watch it expecting to learn anything useful about the game.

 

[F Paulsson]

Well, compared to Maverick...

 

[IrishDave]

Poker on TV or in the movies is just that - entertainment. One problem with online poker is the amount of players that "learned" by watching TV. They see Gus Hanson win with the 6-7 offsuit and think they can do it also. About 3-4 months ago Fox sports showed an entire tourney on TV and it sure was a learning experience to see how boring a tourney can be. I was fascinated to watch the subtle strategy of stealing blinds and playing "non-action" hands. Wish they'd do this more often as folks might actually learn something from the mass media...

 

[Dorkus Malorkus]

We have a show in the UK, "party poker Den" or something like that which shows a live 6-handed tourney, start to finish. Problem is because they want to condense it into a nice few hours the blinds get silly pretty quickly, so it's only really valuable watching for the first hour or so. That and the quality of play is hugely variable.

The most fun part of it however is watching the occasional online qualifier they have on pooping themselves because they're playing with real cash on the table and not chips.

(Blame IrishDave for this random offtopicness!)

 

[F Paulsson]

Haulin' it back on topic!

There is a very basic (but important) poker lesson taught in this movie:

You know how Matt Damon ("Mike"?) goes broke right in the beginning? Yeah, don't let that happen to you. Don't enter a game where the stakes are too high for your bankroll.

This is, as most (all, I hope!) here knows, one of the most fundamental pieces of advice for playing serious poker. Bad beats happen, bad streaks occur. Your bankroll has to afford it. Unfortunately, Rounders decides to portray it as not stupid but as, first,

a) bad luck that Damon's character lost all his money, and then
b) he realizes that it wasn't bad luck, he just wasn't playing well that night.

Neither of which is completely true. The mistake took place right before he sat down at the table, not several hours later. Jon Turturro (love him!) - Knish? - was the only real poker player in that movie that I spotted.

 

[t1riel]

Yeah, Knish's gameplay was a lot like mine.

 

[Jackfivex]

Luck Luck Luck

Luck is a very huge aspect of the game. Agreements and Disagreements are always going to be there.
There will always be times where you have to take a chance to see what the other person may have, if you hit your cards, that is luck..
Some people try and play the odds.
Some people play with their gut.
Some people play with luck.

Good players play with all three!!!

 

[Dorkus Malorkus]

Jon Turturro (love him!) - Knish? - was the only real poker player in that movie that I spotted.

Hey, Johnny Chan's in the film too!

 

[Cipisor]

Best movie ever about poker and how to cheat at Real Tables !! :icon_geek


Stallone played well to !

 

[IrishDave]

Best movie ever about poker and how to cheat at Real Tables !! :icon_geek

Stallone played well to !

Stallone????

 

[gospadine]

Just to clarify a few things. I dont post often here but was intrigued by all the guessing here about luck or skill. I have worked on backrooms (for security purposes mostly) for more than 7 software companies and have seen the working backrooms (and this included winners/losers) since the conception of online poker. The final result and it continues today is that 7% of the players online are winners. The very same players that I saw in other backrooms were winners there also. This is not luck but true skill.

In my days of running live poker we had a running count of 10% winning players.
Always the same players. Sure some guy could win for a night or even a week but then he would always give it back to the same winning players.

As for tournament play it depends on the time between blind raises in order to put more skill in the game. Most online tournaments do not have enough time between blinds and no way to read an opponent as in a live tournament. When the tournaments were smaller as when this movie was done it was true that a lot of the same players made it into the money. Even this last year a fair amount of pros made it. And look at the overall leaders! All pros every year.

As Chris Ferguson said " Poker is luck 90% in one night but over a year it skill 90%

Gospadine
www.worldpokershowdown.com

 

[XXIII]

Yeah a skilled player will do well in the long run. But there is some luck. Not as much as you'd hope but on a hand you can get lucky. But does luck hold up for a whole tournament or whole night of cards? Nah.