How Crossover Gaming can Make you a Better Player

Posted by Harry Kane on Wednesday, November 15, 2017

If you were asked to name the two most popular online casino games, what would your response be?

While you may be swayed by personal tastes, those who answer from an objective perspective would probably say poker and blackjack. At first glance, these are two very different games, but the unique way in which they combine skill, opportunism and strategy continues to boasts enduring appeal in the digital age.

Once you delve beyond appearances, there is no doubt that there is a great deal of crossover between online poker and blackjack. This is an interesting concept, and one that potentially enables you to develop transferable skills that make you a more complete player.

Such development can separate good from truly great players, so it is important to understand how this crossover works and how you can use it to your advantage.

Let’s Start with the Fundamentals

Both online poker and virtual blackjack have endured rapid growth during the last decade, with these games both perfectly balanced in terms of the challenge that they pose to players. These games demand a unique appreciation of numeracy and strategy, for example, while players must also showcase an understanding of psychology if they are to succeed.

This is due to the element of direct competition, as poker players compete directly against one another while blackjack participants must strive to beat the dealer.

When combined, these elements showcase the subtle similarities that unite poker and blackjack, while helping us to understand the fundamental, transferable skills that can be applied to master both. With players of both games also requiring considerable levels of composure and determinism (particularly when looking to consistently deploy a long-term strategy), it is little wonder that successful poker players can also turn their hand to blackjack and vice-versa.

Delving Deeper into your Philosophy and Level of Numeracy

Regardless of which games you choose to play, your chosen strategy will reflect your outlook and individual appetite for risk. This means that if you are a poker player who likes to play aggressively and deploy relatively risky strategies such as bluffing, you will seek out similar philosophies when trying your hand at blackjack. More specifically, aggressive poker players will often adopt negative progression betting systems like the Martingale, which requires them to incrementally increase their betting unit with every single loss.

By maintaining a consistent outlook, you can make an easier transition between poker and blackjack while focusing your attentions on learning about the individual nuances that distinguish the games. Interestingly, it may initially be easier for accomplished poker players to transition to blackjack rather than the other way round, simply because the latter has a relatively limited range of strategies for you to master. There are also more variables when playing poker, due to the fact that you will be forced to compete with multiple players during each game.

With your playing philosophy refined, you must next focus on developing, honing and applying your numeracy skills. Every successful poker or blackjack player must have an appreciation of numeracy and mathematics, while they should also be able to apply practical skills in real-time. This is particularly important when calculating live odds in order to identify the right strategy move, while it also allows you to evaluate the value of your hand as it is dealt. In both games, this is crucial if you are to play each hand successfully, and in a way that minimises risk and optimises long-term gains.

Although it can be argued that a quick and fluent grasp of numeracy is even more important to blackjack players, there is no doubt that poker enthusiasts must also be able to appraise the value of each hand as it is drawn. Remember, the course of every single poker and blackjack game can change with every card that is drawn and every event is dependent on the one that preceded it. By calculating the value and potential of your hand as it is drawn, you can make informed strategy moves that enhance your chances of success.

There is no doubt that playing blackjack can sharpen and improve your numeracy skills considerably, however, making you a more effective decision maker and a better player as a result. This can also improve a core poker skill, and one that is especially important to those who play in live tournaments.

The Art of Decision Making

The concept of decision making is important, and a transferable skills that is crucial to both poker and blackjack players. Whether you are playing in a live tournament or not, the quick and relentless pace of poker and blackjack gameplay puts participants under a huge amount of pressure. This can cloud the mind and convolute your thought processes, forcing you to make ill-judged positions that compromise your chances of winning.

Coolness and composure are characteristics that all great poker players share, however, as they learn to make rational, informed and quick decisions while under almost constant pressure. Although this is also important in the game of blackjack, the pace of this game is marginally slower while the fact that players are only competing against one rival (the dealer) also allows for less pressurised decision making.

As a result of this, experienced poker players often have a huge competition advantage when playing blackjack, and one that they can leverage to often devastating success.

Leverage Crossover Gaming to Become a More Successful Player

As you can see, the core similarities between poker and blackjack are hard to ignore, while they also demand a set of transferable skills that can sustain success. Mastering these can turn you into a more complete player, and one that has a far better chance of winning regularly when gambling online.

So whether you are a novice or a relatively experienced gambler, playing both poker and blackjack is an excellent way of building your skill-set and gaining a competitive edge over your rivals. This could prove crucial, particularly when competing in live tournaments where pace of the gameplay and the available stakes create significant pressure.