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Andy Bloch is a long-time professional poker player and computer programmer who was one of the pioneers at the intersection of these fields. He was also a member of the MIT Blackjack team that was the subject of Bringing Down the House and Twenty-One and an owner of Full Tilt Poker. His current project is ESC Games.
Bloch discussed Full Tilt Poker and Black Friday at length with Diamond Flush Poker. We discussed the subject, and The Lederer Files, with Matt Parvis on Episode 7.
Timestamps
0:30 – Hello & Welcome
11:48 – Strategy
34:40 – Andy Bloch
Great interview. Some of the discussion of other variants reminded me of the discussion with game designer Alex Weldon in episode 135. His theory was that Holdem is more popular than Omaha because Holdem hands have very different “personalities” leading the player to do different things “e.g. now I’m set-mining” “now I’m protecting against a draw” whereas Omaha hands are often “a bit of everything”. Probably something like that needs to be taken into account in finding the next big game.
Also can we have the hand history as part of the show notes? I find it hard to follow if I can’t see it.