Does Military Service Incline One to Be a Bad Player?

[Dov]

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In my experience the opposite is true, soldiers have discipline. They have been trained to wait for the right moment to strike and those that are in soldier mode at the poker table and not just blowing off some steam are often Stone Killers.

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There are different kinds of soldiers, but assuming combat infantry and similar professions, this is basically correct.

(I'm speaking from experience.)

[Dov]

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and everyone knows blondes are stupid.

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Are you implying that soldiers are stupid?

Sure sounds that way...

[Digs]

/runs in indirect fear

[PokrLikeItsProse]

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Very interesting thread.

I spent 5 years as an Airborne Ranger. I don't consider myself a fish. PT has me rated as a money bag so I must be doing something right.

Discipline and agression are the two traits that a military person can use to their advantage at the poker table. I can sit and fold for hours and not have it affect me. I am overly agressive though (I'm working on toning it down). At the first sign of weakness, I strike.

I have been told I'm tough to play against but easy to trap (due to my agression). All part of the learning process I guess.

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I think this sort of gets toward what I am thinking. The players I am thinking of tend to be one gear only. This may lead some to describe them as uncreative or undeceptive. When they play loose, they become huge fish. When they have some sense of standards in hands they will play pre-flop or bet/call with after the flop, they still remain predictable (one might almost call them earnest in their betting) that I consider them exploitable even though they might do reasonably well in game conditions where one ought not to bluff very often.

I've never been through military training, but I get the feeling that you are taught highly standardized routines and practices to make coordinated efforts in high-pressure situations more effective and that sort of mindset isn't neccessarily beneficial to most forms of poker.

[poker-penguin]

No, I wasn't saying soldiers are stupid (for the record, I was one for a little while). They do tend to have macho issues, like looking for insults where there were none.

Anyway, the aim of a a lot of military training now is to produce people who can think for themselves under pressure. Yes, there are routines for common situations (like stoppage drills, etc) but the days of blind obedience are long gone. At least in New Zealand, God knows what the Americans are up to.

To a large extent, I think my 8 months at OCS helped me become a better poker player (and person) than I would have been otherwise. I learnt that I wasn't perfect, and that self-honesty was the only valid policy, and that self-discipline was a good thing.

On a tangential note, I am in favour of compulsory military / civilian service like the Germans have.

But no, I see no reason why military training should make someone a bad player, except that perhaps a game of poker is recreation for most military personel (OP could have asked "does law school make people bad poker players?" and as long as he kept rounders references out, he could have made a similar case.

Recreational poker players, no matter what their job, SUCK.

[BonJoviJones]

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When I've asked, it seems (in an unscientific poll) that 90% of players with military service in their background are just abysmal.

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Been to a card room lately? 90% of players with _any_ background are just abysmal.

[Paxosmotic]

Uh, I'm in the Air Force, and I am very, very good at poker. The two are completely seperate, and I was not brain washed by the New World Order into being a guerilla commando at the table, nor did the purple pill we all took in basic training make me into a loose passive moron calling all bets.

[xniNja]

The other night at a 6-12 game there was a guy in a Navy uniform. (Looked like a black Capt. on gilligan's island if you ask me) He was decked out with all sorts of rings and a gold anchor... needless to say he did not know how to play poker.

[Derek in NYC]

Soldiers on deployment have no way way to spend their money. So when they get on leave, they have 6 months of paychecks burning a hole in their pocket. Thus the aphorism: "Spending money like a drunk sailor."

[jedi]

Friend of mine was deployed to Iraq a couple of years ago. He was a regular in our poker game and of course played with other servicemen out there. When we asked how much he took off of them, he replied "Thousands." He normally plays for dollars.