Hearts card dealing rigged?

[lawman64]

Well it looks like I'm all alone again. I've just completed another 1,000 games and am now up to 7,000. Didn't quite do as well as last time with the 837 but still came in with a respectable 814 for an 81.4 win percentage. Took about 3 1/2 months for 1,000 games which is a little on the high side but still means I'm averaging about 10 games per day.

Anyway for anybody who happens to read this - Happy hearts playing.

lawman

 

[lawman64]

Well my hearts journey has come to an end. I downloaded windows 10 and hearts was gone with all my games. Played about 7,300 and finished at 81%+.

The End.

Goodbye.

lawman

 

[lawman64]

Well, I'm back. I downloaded the Windows 10 version from the app store and have now played 50 games (82% win percentage). Not a huge sampling but it's already apparent there are a number of obvious differences from the Windows 7 version. The biggest change is that the computer hands are now much more "human." Not always a smart human, but human nonetheless. In the windows 7 version you could guarantee the computer hands would not take a trick unless ridding themselves of the Ace or King of Spades. This is no longer the case and if you play with that in mind you will probably be picking up 20+ tricks as the computer will save something unexpected to trap you and maybe take a trick with the last card. The good thing is that it will also do that to the other computer hands so that (for the most part) they do not gang up against you. On the whole, the hands are not as badly rigged as previous. In the past if you got behind, the computer tended to just pile on giving you horrible hands where your only real choice was to try and shoot the moon to win. Shooting the moon is also not quite as easy because of the previous mentioned unpredictability of the computer but its still really not that hard. In 50 games I have shot the moon 52/53 times (can't remember exactly, but this is one of the new statistics that is now recorded).
On the whole, I believe I like the Windows 7 version better. It was always such a challenge to beat the computer when it gave you what it considered really bad cards. Having said all that, I really didn't like the Windows 10 version at all when I first started playing but it is starting to grow on me.

Anyway at least I've got back some version of Hearts and can keep on playing.

Happy Hearts playing,

lawman

 

[lawman64]

Up to 100 games now. After a bit more time familiarizing myself with the new game, this version is much easier. I made 44 out of 50 on this run and I think with a bit of practice and patience 90% is certainly doable for a 1,000 game set. I am now at 85% for this run and I certainly made a few mistakes along the way. I think the major challenge may actually turn out to be be playing the games themselves since I don't think this is as much fun as the windows 7 version and I'm not sure I can go through the time and effort of playing that many games again when it is not as enjoyable. As an aside, I have now shot the moon 117 times in 100 games. This is about the same as the 7 version but the tactics are slightly different.

Anyway for the time being I'll probably keep on playing (maybe).

Anyway once again - Happy Hearts (Windows 7 version) playing,

lawman

 

[lawman64]

Finally made it to 1,000 games. Now I am more used to the computer tactics I still believe this version is easier. Having said that I went through some real ups and downs along the way. The more I got into it I realized that the computer would often lead its highest cards out at the beginning of a game in the hope that I would throw away all mine and it could shoot the moon since all the computer opponents are set up such that if you lead an Ace it will automatically put a King on it. If a Queen a Jack etc....The one exception is if you lead the Ace of Spades an opponent "might" not always throw away the King of Spades but even that is not always true. Initially this strategy really confused me and I started to lose games right and left, at one point actually dropping to under 80%. However at about the 750 game mark, the light came on and I started using that strategy as my own. For the last 262 games, my strategy was to set up the hand to shoot the moon myself by leading out high cards if the initial deal was remotely set up to do so. I won 233 out of 262 games playing this way at an 88.9% clip. As to the final total on 1,000 games I ended up winning 839 which is slightly above my best 1,000 games for the Windows 7 version (837). I also ended up shooting the moon over 1,350 times.

 

[lawman64]

Well I played another 100 games, shooting the moon every time the opportunity arose. 90% is going to be really hard but doable if things/luck goes the right way. For this first 100 games, I won 89 - not bad since I actually lost game 1 of the 100. More to come...

 

[lawman64]

Another quick entry. Fastest 100 wins ever - took 111 games (90.09%)

 

[lawman64]

Up to 500 games on latest thousand. Won 442 out of 500 for 88.4%. As I said earlier 90% is doable but will need concentration throughout and a certain degree of luck.

 

[lawman64]

Up to 600 games now. Won 538 out of 600 for a total win percentage of 89.67%. Won an absolutely amazing 96 out of the last 100 games. Even I am shocked. Woohoo!

 

[lawman64]

Well I'm there. Not for 1,000 games, but so far have played 630 and have won 567 for a 90% winning percentage. The question is "Can I keep it up for another 370 games?"

 

[lawman64]

Two thirds of the way through my thousand at 667 and have won 602 for a 90.25 winning percentage. Its on.

 

[lawman64]

Well, I'm at 900 games and I've won 813 so far for a winning percentage of 90.33%. I had a really bad run round about the 700 game mark where I tanked significantly, at one point even losing 3 out of 4. I thought I was dead in the water for my 90% goal but slowly but surely I've managed to get back up there. I only need 87 wins to reach my goal so unless I have another meltdown it should be readily achievable.

 

[lawman64]

Well, there's the first record gone. I'm at 840 games won, However, the even better news is that this is from 929 games played, so I currently have a win percentage of 90.42%. Seventy one games to go and I need 60 wins (84.51%) for 90% average over 1,000 games.

 

[lawman64]

Well I made a complete and utter pig's ear of things. I managed to get to 865 games won from 955 games played for an average of 90.57% and then it all fell apart. I don't know if I choked or got bad cards but all of a sudden my "shooting the moon" strategy seemed to be failing. At one point I lost 3 in a row. When I started on my last session I still needed 15 out of 19, so less than 80% so no problem it seemed. Well it got worse. Out of the next 15 games I won 11 so at that point I'm at 896 games won out of 996 games played. The pressure was on. Would I screw it up after all this effort? Well readers (actually just me, but let's pretend) I made it. I won the last 4 to win exactly 900 out of 1,000 games. Hooray for me. Phew!

As an aside, I have now shot the moon 3,082 times so over 1,730 times in this last 1,000 games. Also managed 458 wins out of this last 500 for a 91.6% average.

 

[lawman64]

Well I played another 1,000 and got it up to 91% this time. Once again blew it somewhat towards the end as with about 50 games to go was on target for 916 games instead of the 910 I ended up with. Still not bad though.

 

[lawman64]

Broke my record for longest win streak which was 48 in a row. I am now at 50 and still going. Will post again when the win streak is snapped.

 

[lawman64]

Well it's over. Win streak finished at 53. Ironically was beaten in game 54 when the computer shot the moon to beat me.

 

[lawman64]

This could be my best effort yet. It's not 1,000 games but 96% even over 250 games is pretty darn good. It's also possible I broke my longest streak record but since I didn't keep a close eye on numbers of games won between losses I can't really say. That number will have to stay at 53 for the time being.

 

[lawman64]

Slipped a little bit, but still looking good.

 

[iPot]

Here's a new challenge for you Lawman. Potentially the highest you can knock the computer players over together is 375 (them on 99/99/99 then you shoot the moon). I've got to 372, see if you can better