I have been seeing a few different dealer-less poker tables showing up at casinos. I don’t like them but I think that the wrong motivations will bring them into the Live Poker World. Now it is exactly like playing online with similar buttons and a giant screen in the middle of the table for all to see any community cards.
Here is why I don’t like them. They don’t require you to handle chips. How a player plays with, stacks, bets and raises with their chips makes a difference. One tell you will never have is when a player accidentally bets twice the bet on the flop, or half the bet on the river. There is so much information from how players fold cards after a big hand. Players also give tells about if they are going to call or fold after you. Poker should be about acquiring information from watching a player. Taking away half of his actions will take away skill advantages.
Here are the problems I foresee. Casinos are driven by the bottom line. They don’t care about the good of the game and only want to make more money. The electronic table is great for them because for a one time fee they can open a game anytime they want. They no longer need to have extra dealers or try to guess how many dealers they will need during a night. So the house will be financially motivated to bring them into the room.
Now the people who have been playing live all their life will not be quick to move to these tables but the new players who have only played online will easily switch to these games. If a game is full of players who are not use to playing live then its probably a good game. Some Sharks will reluctantly switch to these chum filled waters. Giving the house the impression that players want to play these tables. They then go out and buy more tables.
I love the fact that hands are dealt faster, players have time limits and in general there are less arguments. But I would never want to trade what little good for all the bad. I am sure that a lot of Live players have seen some of these tables out there. My advice is to voice your opinion to floor people and tell them how you feel. Let me know as well, I would like to know if I am the only one with this opinion.