Re: [ba-poker] multiple rivers

[Larry Stone <lstone19(deleted the rest)>]

On 2/5/04 8:54 PM, James Kittock at james(deleted the rest) wrote:

> I was reading in Ciaffone & Ruben's big-bet poker book that PLO players will
> sometimes deal multiple rivers and split the pot accordingly in order to
> reduce variance.
> 
> It got me to thinking--why don't they do this in NLHE tournaments? For that
> matter, once all the money goes in, why not deal multiple boards for the rest
> of the hand (e.g., if all the money goes in before the flop, deal 2 or more
> complete boards). After watching WSOP, WPT, etc., it is amazing to me how
> often the outcome of a final table is determined by bad beats. I guess
> tournaments are inherently variance amplifiers, so it seems like it would make
> sense to do something to tone down the variance, at least at the end.
> 
> Has this been experimented with? Does it screw up the game somehow? Or just
> slow it down too much?

It's not done because it's a tournament. In a ring game, every hand is
independent. Once you fold, you have no stake in the outcome. But in a
tournament, the hands are not independent. Once you fold, you still very
much care about the outcome of the hand. You want people eliminated and as
soon as possible.

Now that said, you certainly come up with a structure where every river is
dealt twice or three times or whatever you want. But it would have to be
part of the tournament rules and not just something decided when the players
felt like doing it.

-- Larry Stone
   larry(deleted the rest)
   http://www.stonejongleux.com/