Poker Art Project: Please Help

[Peter Precourt]

Hello, I am a houston based artist and a poker enthusiast. I am trying combine my art making and poker playing. I am going to make an installation where initially it looks like the exterior looks like an pokerroom- No windows, small surveillance cam, buzzer, and locked door. You ring the buzzer and the door opens. You will enter a narrow circular hallway that has 8-10 doors. The doors lead to small rooms. There will be 8-10 small rooms that overlook a poker table. Each room is going to be a metaphor for the pyschological space for each player.

I want these spaces to truly reflect the thoughts of
of people, as opposed to what I think other peoples' true motivations are:

If you want to participate, please either PM me or answer the questions here in the thread, and feel free to add any other info that you think is important:

Why do you play poker(list as many reasons as possible)?
How Often do you play?
Would you rather play with 9 people whose company you do not enjoy for 5 hours and win 200$ or with 6 people whose company you enjoy and win 100$? Why?
How do you usually do? Can you lose money and still have an enjoable time? Can you win and have a bad time?
What game/limit do you like most? Which do you play most?
Do you watch poker on TV?Read poker books?Which books?
How would you describe your style of play?
IS it easier for you naturally to play tight or loose?
Are you naturally more aggressive or passive?
WHen you play poorly, how would you describe the changes in your play?
Describe what goes through your head when you first walk up to the poker table- if anything?
What if anything, do you look for in your first hour of play?
How do you react when you get bad cards for 2 hours?
Is there a money amoun that makes you uncorformable to get down? If so, what is it?
At a standard table of ten, how many players would you expect to be better than you? Worse?
How do the following things affect both your desire to play poker and the quality of your play: good day at work, bad day at work, fight with significant other, good time with significant other, financial worries, weekend night, being around a bunch of guys, seeing poker on TV, drinking alcohol.
Please tell me anything else that you might think is even mildly interesting , particularly related to your thought/emotional process, while playing. When I finish the project, I will post links. I will also give credit to all of those who provided input.

Thanks in advance .

[Copernicus]

Please note that the following are only 1/2 facetious.

Why do you play poker(list as many reasons as possible)?

The top 5 reasons would probably be money, money, money, money and ego fulfillment that comes from taking other peoples money.

How Often do you play?

Nearly every day, as long as I have....money


Would you rather play with 9 people whose company you do not enjoy for 5 hours and win 200$ or with 6 people whose company you enjoy and win 100$? Why?

Enjoy $20 per hour? I'd rather win $200 from 9 total aholes then waste my time taking $100 from 6 Mr and Ms Congenialities

How do you usually do?

I almost always win in tournaments and lose in ring games.

Can you lose money and still have an enjoable time?

Have fun losing? do you think I have a gambling problem?

Can you win and have a bad time?

Not enjoy winning? Do you think I have deep seeded psychological problems?


What game/limit do you like most?

Hold em tournaments of any limit

Which do you play most?

You would think I had a gambling problem if I said anything but Hold em Tournaments

Do you watch poker on TV?

Only when a new one is on or I'm in the mood to re-watch Varkonyi bust out for the 97th time.

Read poker books?Which books?

I read and re-read S/M. I once read Hellmuth but found it more useful for starting the charcoal in the BBQ.

How would you describe your style of play?

Super tight in tournaments, the wrong style in ring games...no matter what style is appropriate for that game I will find the wrong one.


IS it easier for you naturally to play tight or loose?

Tight in tournaments is easy. Watching my premium hands get cracked by 82s in a ring game one more time will cause deep psychological problems.


Are you naturally more aggressive or passive?

I'm naturally passive, and if you don't like it, lets take it out to the parking lot, mf'er


WHen you play poorly, how would you describe the changes in your play?

If I'm playing poorly I change it by electric shock therapy applied to an unmentionable area. If that doesnt work, I untie her and let her do it to me.


Describe what goes through your head when you first walk up to the poker table- if anything?

The first thing going through my head at a B&M is how nice their racks of chips would look stacked in front of me. The second is how nice her rack would look stacked in front of me.

What if anything, do you look for in your first hour of play?

Besides her rack? Do you think I'm obsessed with gambling?

How do you react when you get bad cards for 2 hours?

As long as someone else is knocking the fishies out of the tournament I can fold with the best of em.

Is there a money amoun that makes you uncorformable to get down? If so, what is it?

Never been there, so I cant answer.

At a standard table of ten, how many players would you expect to be better than you? Worse?

At a typical online tournament, 1 or none better, the rest worse. In an online ring game I'm better than all these idiots that are taking my money.


How do the following things affect both your desire to play poker and the quality of your play: good day at work please explain what that is in more detail , bad day at work is that the opposite of a good day? , fight with significant other depends on how many bruises I got during the fight , good time with significant other please explain what that is in more detail , financial worries let him get an athletic scholarship, I'm playing poker, dammit , weekend night as opposed to week night? They are all the same. , being around a bunch of guys if theyve got big racks (of chips) I will forgive them their gender , seeing poker on TV reaffirms my faith that anybody can win, so suicide after getting my premium hand cracked by 82s again isnt really necessary , drinking alcohol Are you implying I have a drinking problem AND a gambling problem? .


Please tell me anything else that you might think is even mildly interesting , particularly related to your thought/emotional process, while playing. I don't know if this is interesting or not, but to avoid going on tilt after getting a premium hand cracked by 82s again, I take several deep breaths, close my eyes, and relax by imaging something pleasant, like the ahole who just did it spending 3 hours with the white tiger that did it to Roy Horn

When I finish the project, I will post links. I will also give credit to all of those who provided input.

Screw credit, my neteller account is 43271164223, send cash.

[Jezebel]

Good Post /images/graemlins/grin.gif

[PokerNoob]

Why do you play poker(list as many reasons as possible)?

I like the puzzle/problem solving aspect of it.

How Often do you play?

Near daily.

Would you rather play with 9 people whose company you do not enjoy for 5 hours and win 200$ or with 6 people whose company you enjoy and win 100$? Why?

I only play online so the social aspect really doesn't enter into it. I would rather beat annoying online people however.

How do you usually do? Can you lose money and still have an enjoable time? Can you win and have a bad time?

I am a breakeven player. I can lose and enjoy it if I'm learning something from my losing. No, I can't win and have a bad time.

What game/limit do you like most? Which do you play most?

I only play hold 'em .5/1 at this time.

Do you watch poker on TV?Read poker books?Which books?

No.

How would you describe your style of play?

Aspiring to be tight/aggressive.

IS it easier for you naturally to play tight or loose? Are you naturally more aggressive or passive?

I am naturally loose/passive.

WHen you play poorly, how would you describe the changes in your play?

I find myself being too loose and staying in hands too long.

Describe what goes through your head when you first walk up to the poker table- if anything?

I think about my keys to winning poker, go through a list of things I need to do or work on in my play.

What if anything, do you look for in your first hour of play?

Note how/what my opponents are playing.

How do you react when you get bad cards for 2 hours?

Tighten up my play.

Is there a money amoun that makes you uncorformable to get down? If so, what is it?

If I lose 25 big bets, I pack it in for the night. I'm not uncomfortable about the money itself though.

At a standard table of ten, how many players would you expect to be better than you? Worse?

Better - One or two maybe. Worse - four or five. But I play in horrible games.

How do the following things affect both your desire to play poker and the quality of your play: good day at work, bad day at work, fight with significant other, good time with significant other, financial worries, weekend night, being around a bunch of guys, seeing poker on TV, drinking alcohol.

None really. I don't obsess over poker. Its more like a hobby.

Please tell me anything else that you might think is even mildly interesting , particularly related to your thought/emotional process, while playing.

I see it as trying to develop a skill through continuous improvement/refinement. I have always played a lot of strategy/problem solving/optimization games like chess, bridge, simulations, etc. and I find hold 'em poker to be right in line with those games.

[Monty Cantsin]

>> Why do you play poker?

This is a very good question. I've been thinking about this alot in the last few months as poker has begun to dominate a huge portion of my brain and life.

To start with, for me, there was the attraction of discovering that poker was much more interesting than I previously thought. Until I started reading and thinking about it I had no clue how complex and non-trivial the strategic aspect of poker was. In many ways, the socio-mathematical "problems" of poker are much subtler and deeper than the problems of, say, chess, which almost begins to appear like an exercise in crude brute force by comparison.

I also loved the idea that as a subculture poker had become the macho nerd collision site of grizzled roadhouse hombres and geeky probability wonks. The fact that, in reality, there's also a huge contingent of rounders-addled frat boys has only slightly tarnished this romantic notion for me.

Despite the bubble of hype created by the game's becoming a cable tv spectacle, it still feels a little like a secret world that is largely misunderstood by the general public and this definitely contributes to its appeal for me.

I also love the way poker turns real money into play money. On the one hand, it's all about the money, on the other hand the power money usually exerts over us is dissolved when it becomes simply points in this artificial system.

Also, unlike say, Everquest, poker is an addictive massively multiplayer online game that pays you a monthly fee.

The experience itself is the main thing of course. It is hard to describe accurately because it is largely paradoxical.

On the one hand it is about ego-gratification, the lizard-brain pleasure of dealing death to one's foes. Despite my interest in the arcadian realms of advanced poker theory, when I sit down at the table it is my deepest desire to destroy the other players. I want to kill the game. Bets are weapons and the ring is a pit of bloody, atavistic combat.

At the same time, it is an experience of ego-destruction. When you are truly immersed in the game you can acheive a kind of deep concentration in which the noisy mind chatter of normal experience fades away and you are hypnotically, deleriously oblivious. I imagine heroin feels something like this.

For me, this combination of stylized violence and eventual transcendence makes poker a kind of martial art, sort of like Tai Chi with free drinks. And like a martial art poker demands to be approached with serious discipline and humility. Whenever I hear a bad beat story I always think of a whiny monk who hasn't yet figured out why the master randomly smacks him with a stick while he's trying to meditate.

Ultimately, the key to poker is the ability to overcome what is called around these parts "results oriented thinking." Our brains are very deeply wired to link the meanings of action and effect. To overcome this skinnerian stimulus-response programming is a sublimely difficult task. When I am able to do it, when I can disentangle the local effects of an action from its long-term meaning, when I can take pleasure in finding the correct play regardless of the immediate outcome, I feel like I've been given a glimpse of the infinite. I feel like I've become just a little bit less monkey-like. It's extremely gratifying.

Anyway, your project sounds interesting, let us know how it turns out.

/mc

[Peter Precourt]

A sincere thank you to everyone who has replied so far, both here and via PM.

You words and ideas have made this projecy significantly better in just 24 hours.