Stranger in Paradise

[horus6]

Just a beginner playing with play money at ParadisePoker.com
the following hold-em hand was played.

I was dealt JJ in the hole.
The flop came 3,3,3 (I don't remember the suits.)
The turn card and river were (I think) 8,x (I forget the x - it wasn't relevant).

So I proceeded to bet my full house, some other guys were betting enthusiatically back at me.

Eventually, with a large pot the showdown came with 4 participants:
I had my JJ 333
somebody with KK 333 (KK in the hole)
somebody with AA 333 (AA in the hole)
and the winner who had 8,3 in the hole making 3333 8.

This doesn't look or feel like a random deal to me. I asked paradise but I only received a standard ("we are wonderful") response. Am I right to be suspicious?

[Glenn]

Don't put 4 bets in on every street with the fourth best hand.

[pudley4]

1-It's play money, why would they "stack the deck"?
2-It's play money - so what if they "stack the deck"?
3-The odds of those hands and board cards coming up are the exact same as any other 4 hands + 5 board cards.

[Ulysses]

Don't worry about putting 4 bets in on every street with the fourth best hand when you're playing with play money.

[Stu Pidasso]

Since the advent of Pokerstat, a software program that downloads Paradise Hand Histories and analyses them. Fewer and fewer people are making the argument the flop is juiced. I have about 150k hands in my pokerstat database, and although this is too small a sample to know with any certaintity, it appears the flop is not juiced. Others who have the software and sizable databases have come to the same conclusion.

Stu

[Clarkmeister]

I once won a monster pot on a final board of:

Flop: T22
Turn: 8
River: K
Hands shown down were: AA, KK (me), JJ, TT and A2 at a live table. 2 other hands made the river and were never shown Final pot was 51BBs.

So it happens in real life B&M rooms too.

[oddjob]

absolutely. not too long ago i witnessed a hand almost exactly like he described. flop was trips. 4 people to the river. hands? AA, KK, QQ, and the winner had quads. it happens.

[AmericanAirlines]

Hmm...

I once caught a Royal Flush on the river card at Mirage 10-20 7-card stud. The person betting into me probably had me all the way with her full house. (I was a beginner at the time... 1999... still am really... but in recent years... how bad played that hand and got lucky is really clear to me! Had been playing only a few months at the time. Never played poker before I lived in Vegas.)

I caught the card I wanted for a flush I was chasing, the opponent would've bet to the felt... I capped it after 3...

Pot was about $650... she was p*ssed!

Cards were running all over me that night anyway though.

Anyhow, I'm sure she felt it was pretty fricken unfair.

I lost all my winning back anyway though! Case in point that if your not that good... you can lose even catching great cards all night.

So the floor asked me if I wanted the "Royal Flush Prize"...

I said, "Sure, what is it?"...

They said, "A cigarette lighter and money clip"...

I said, "Great!" expecting some Mirage Logo lighter or something...

The brought me a pack of Mirage matches with a rubber band around it!

I made the dealer sign it... "Royal Flush in Clubs... Nov 1. 1999, Beth"

Still have it somewhere I think, packed away somewhere from when I moved out of Nevada.

Sincerely,
AA

[JTG51]

Sounds like a hand I won at the casino a couple of weeks ago. I had TT, my 3 opponents had AA, KK, and QQ. Flop was T high, I made quads on the river and won a giant pot.

It sure is fun when you are on the winning end of those kinds of hands.