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Artificial Intelligence in Poker
Markian Hlynka writes "The University of Alberta's research into Poker AI is featured in this New York Times article. There is also detailed discussion of the game of Poker, and the 'new breed' of players who have honed their abilities online. See the U of A's poker project for more information."
Yes and no. For limit hold 'em, there is an (approximately) "correct" way to play based on pot odds, likelihood of drawing the hand you need, etc. Early rounds of no-limit tournies approximate this, with the occasional all-in raise to shake things up, but I'd have to agree with you that in later rounds against clearly competent players, no-limit is very much a social game.
Which leads to the larger issue: poker is a game of incomplete information; you don't KNOW what your opponent holds. You can make estimations based on past play and game conventions (eg, a bet from early position usually indicates AA, KK, or AK), but you don't know for sure, and this raises the possibility of deception.
The problem with that is, game theory generally models strategies to combat players who are playing (rationally) to win. Not all players play like this, or at least not apparently based on the strength of cards. I think most emulators are going to get screwed on bluffs.
But still, in lower-limit games, people are loose enough that bluffing doesn't really help (Lee Jones: "generally, you're going to have to show down with the best hand to win"), so a decent AI could at least maintain a winning margin, and so could an actual human who played tightly enough to take advantage of this. I don't know. You sure can't make zillions playing cards online, and it's definitely a while before the "deep blue" of poker.
Poker is primarily an odds game, that is to say it is all math. There are three places where a decision has to be made. The first decision is, "Should I pay to see the next card?" This is called Drawing. The second decision is, "I have a decent hand, but my opponent raised me. Is he bluffing?". The third decision is, "Should I try to bluff?".
Odds come into play everywhere. When you are Drawing, you must have the correct odds or else you will lose money in the long run. That is to say, if you have a 1 in 4 chance of hitting your straight on the next card, you must have at least 3:1 odds to Draw. (The pot must have $3 for every $1 you pay). There is also the concept of "implied odds" - predicting how much will be in the pot at the end of the hand and not just at the present.
When deciding whether or not to bluff, you must know the odds of your bluff succeeding, and add that to the odds of you hitting your out on the next card. At that point the calculation becomes the same pot-odds calculation described above. This involves some reading of your opponent; you have to know how often he will call, and how often the bluff will be sucessful. Luckily, computers can be pretty good at modeling and seeing patterns, probably much better than humans. It seems that Neural nets and other well-developed AI techniques would be very good at modeling these behaviors and predicting future ones. Calling bluffs will require the same type of knowledge.
Some have asked how it's possible to read patterns on the internet. Some people don't really have patterns in their game, they just call everything. These people will lose because they put too much money in the pot, they don't have the odds for the bets and calls they're making. Mostly, decent players have patterns in how they bet, for example they will bet when they only have 4 out of 5 flush cards. (A Semi-bluff). Computers have an advantage here because they can introduce a random element that humans cannot reproduce.
The recent winner of the World Series of Poker, Chris Moneymaker, had never played in a live game until the WSOP, he had only played internet games. This probably gave him good fundamentals in reading people based on their bets, and good math fundamentals.
Some have also questioned the wiseness of playing internet poker, since it is just "gambling". Well I'll tell you a little secret, poker isn't really gambling, poker is a skill game and especially with so many bad players out there who think it is just luck, hoping they'll get lucky, it's easy to win money. That's why the same players consistently win thousands of dollars online. For more information on poker strategy and reviews of online casinos, see this site: PokerTips.org