Better experience than cows milk

Yeah I’d assume that getting milk straight from the cow doesn’t measure up

Poker is what I was referring to as requiring thought, yes. But more complicated games like craps can also be too much if you’re hammered, especially at a busy table.

Blackjack is pretty formulaic about the best move to make depending on what cards you get and what the dealer’s up card is. You can look it up, it’s a chart. Memorize it, walk in, and you’re in business. A lot of casinos will even give you a card to have at the table with all the moves on it if you ask. The only real variance is that casinos use multiple decks so it messes with the probabilities, so you’re always at a very slight disadvantage even if you play “perfectly.” Counting cards can swing that last couple% points of probability in your favor.

So there’s no thought or strategy to it. If X, do Y. It’s pretty easy to learn, so it’s very beginner friendly. Also great for when I’m hammered and can’t play anything that I need to have mental skills for.

Craps is gambling. There’s infinite numbers of “strategies” but they’re all just different ways to bet, just more complicated versions of “put 100 on black” at a roulette table, and none of them will beat the house over time.

Poker requires tons of thought to play well, and there’s no skill ceiling. I wouldn’t necessarily call it a strategy game but there are strategies. It’s an adversarial puzzle game of broken information, it’s not gambling.

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No judgement, I can see how it came off that way though.

I like crazy 8s and rummy and stuff like that, but they’re in a different category of fun.

Poker is a game of broken information, where you try to decode your opponent’s hand based off of their actions in relation to the board state and future possibilities, and what you know of their own personal style.

Wild cards introduce RNG that throws the entire core game loop of poker out the window. People are free to enjoy it but it’s extremely rare for people who play the game regularly to want wild cards in their games. I can’t think of anyone in all my years of playing to be honest but I’m sure they exist. I would never play a game with cash with wild cards, what’s the point? And I can’t imagine wanting to play a free game with wild cards with anyone but kids.

Wild cards+cash, I might as well play craps or any other gambling game in the casino, and then at least I get the fun of watching crazy superstitious people. Poker is NOT gambling, but there is an element of chance of course.

Hope that helps clear it up.

It’s dumb af if you like playing poker. If you like playing card games with a 52 card deck like crazy 8s or whatever, it can be fun.

Hey if it works for you, go for it. Blackjack used to be my fallback game in a casino when I was too drunk to think straight enough for real strategy.

Not all, no. DNS level blocking gets a lot, but not all. I use a pi hole at home and it didn’t manage to get a lot of in-app ads, but once I rooted then things got a lot better.

Could possibly be block lists, but I’m not sure.

Correct, blackjack is pretty much the only way you can make money reliably at US casinos, if you study and learn how to do it, which takes a lot of time and practice, and being in the right parts of the country.

But it’s so BORING. I don’t understand who can just grind grind grind blackjack for a living.

What kind of nonsense poker has that many wild cards

Rooting your phone is generally the only way to get rid of those types of ads.

Tangible loss is a big part of it because it helps keep betting sane. If there’s no stakes you can just do whatever you want and there’s not really much strategy to it.

Cash games solve the problem of how long it takes. 20 years ago or so I’d play nickel, dime, quarter max bet cash games, dealer’s choice of the poker game, round robin dealing. On a real bad night you’d be down $15, or you’d be up $20 on a great night.

It was a blast. $5 was the price of a premium fast food meal back then, if that helps to level expectations of stakes for the younger crowd.

All the best parts of having stakes in the game without risk of losing your shirt. We’d hang out, make food, drink, etc. It was the best of all worlds.

Periodically we’d do a tournament, usually hold em, stud, or Omaha. Then it was a $10 or $20 buy-in with maybe a rebuy depending on how long we wanted it to go. Usually top three were the money, depending on how many at the table. The early drops would start playing dice until there were three people to start a regular cash side game at the table (we’d just shift chairs)

So there’s ways to address your points, but most people these days only know what they see on WSOP, which is no limit holdem. There’s SO many poker variants out there that the old dawgs played back in the 80s and 90s that didn’t come into light with the poker revolution. Red/black, no peek, guts, hi/low split, etc.

They’re not the same.

Hiding an unlocked treasure chest in the forest is obscurity. Sure, you might be the only one who knows it’s there at first but eventually someone might come across it.

Having a vault at a bank branch is security - everyone knows there’s a vault there, but you’ll be damned if you’re going to get into it when you’re not authorized.

Good passwords, when implemented correctly, use hashing (one way encryption) to provide security. It’s not obscured, people know you need a password to access the thing (in our example)