Originally Posted by
MisterV
Originally Posted by
kewlJ
The basic premise of these voodoo -EV, losing players is that you can beat -Ev short-term (which you can), and then just do that over and over and over again.
When does "the short term" end?
I ask this because I have been on a winning streak for several years now.
I mainly play high limit slots, a very -EV thing to do; I keep accurate records of all my session wins and losses and keep a running total.
A few years ago my life time losses were about $68K: this followed many years of regular loss, which I expected.
But then ... I can't explain it, but the losses turned to wins and now I am about $9K ahead of where I was a few years ago.
Not that I'm complaining.
The only explanation I have is that I've been taking more "shots" than I used to, i.e. I make big bets more frequently.
Yes, that should not skew the math but a surprising number of the bets were winners, some even hand pays.
So I sit here puzzled yet pleased: I'm heading to Chinook Winds tomorrow hoping to hit "the big one."
Ah, what fools these mortals be ...
This is a legitimate math based discussion to have MrV. Long-term has to measured in number of trials not time like months or years, because one persons play over 6 months can be night and day what another persons play is. And it is going to be different for different games and house advantages.
In reference to blackjack only:
In the book
Bringing down the house about one of the MIT blackjack teams, which later led to the movie "21", one of the math professors referred to this as "the law of large numbers". For blackjack card counting he concluded that the number was 50,000 rounds. I don't really like this conclusion because it is going to be very different for different games, number of decks, rules,
player's spread. BUT I have sort of used this number loosely in my own thinking and it somewhat fits.
For in my own experience I have had many somewhat extreme runs in both directions that have lasted 4 or 5 months, which for me used to be 30-40 thousand rounds, but all but two corrected themselves or came back into line with the math as I got near 50,000 rounds (or trials). And I play in a manner that purposely increases variance, so my own personal number is probably higher that 50,000 trials. On the two occasions that my results did not fall within the mathematical "loosely" expectation of returning to normal within 50,000 rounds (One was covid year) the results had returned to "normal" when you expanded the sample size to 100,000 rounds or trials. So my personal number is probably closer to 100,000 that the 50,000 used by the MIT professor. But again, I specifically do things that increase variance.
So getting back to you MrV, I don't know what you play (slots?) or what the house edge is, and even if I did, I am not smart enough to know what would constitute "long-term" is such an instance, but I suspect if you are playing a -EV game, as time goes on and you get closer to whatever that number is for long-term in your situation, your results will again drop into the red and land somewhere close to expectation for that -EV situation.
I hope not. But I beleive in the math. In the meantime, you have had a good run and some fun, so congrats.