If the four bots were collaborating, then I agree that this would be a completely different story. I make no argument about the dangers of collaboration (Players sharing knowledge of their hands with one another to mutual advantage at the expense of the rest of the table) - if anything, that is what people should be worried about online. Though again, that is not too hard to detect seeing as how in the end the sites have a record of every hand and establishing certain patterns is not difficult.
There are a huge number of misconceptions about many aspects of this issue clearly apparent in this discussion. I'm going to go through some of the highest-moderated misunderstandings in hopes of reclaiming some of what this whole discussion is about.
I'm relatively sure that all of the online gambling sites use either Flash or Java applets to display cards and such. I wouldn't think they'd make it so easy as to give easy access to card names.
You do not actually need to break into the program in order to use some form of bot. Graphics recognition has advanced to the point where a hand can be analyzed on the fly by a concurrently running program. See Poker Office. Such programs can then immediately provide feedback based on the information they glean.
Could this proliferation of poker-playing bots undermine the almost $1 billion online gambling industry?
The end of the industry is not likely at hand. Poker is just one part of this industry, and the industry will continue EVEN IF bots are the only ones playing. The casino will just take the same percentage of each pot.
if a pokerbot can clean out the 9 other people at the table
Quite frankly it is ridiculous to think that a bot with perfect play can clean out any table. Good poker play results in a slow accumulation of profit at a faster rate than losses. A perfect bot will certainly not be playing more than 1 in 5 hands to begin with, and not win more than one in 3 of those. Good players can't just make the right cards appear, no matter what you saw in Maverick. They get the same crappy cards as everyone else, it's how they play them that differs.
you don't trust other players to not be using bots, but you trust the house to not add their own player to every game and fix the host software to guarantee that the house's player wins?
Yes, very much so. Contrary to popular opinion, most people are not complete retards. It's not difficult to tell when someone is consistently winning - certainly there are hot streaks, but any whiff of foul play will result in a huge exodus of players from any poker site. They have no reason to do such a thing, as profits are huge from both the rake AND the interest they are collecting on your bankrolled money.
_______
Any current bot is very likely for Limit poker - this is the 'easiest' style to play purely by the numbers. The state space required for a bot to make decisions in No Limit poker is absolutely huge- one poorly written part can get your bot cleaned out regularly.
Personally I would LOVE to be at a table where I have positively ID'ed a player as a bot because I could then run circles around it. There are a number of tactics that would play merry hell with a bot that plays the straight numbers, and even a bot that adjusts to my own play style is not difficult to take advantage of.
I play regularly online and I do not fear the bot. What I fear most is the bad player that will put all their money on a 20% draw, where any good player (or bot) would fold- because sometimes they hit, and that hurts.
Once they find a cure for bad players though, that's the end of poker, but I am content that that time is far in the future.
This was covered fairly well in the discussion of part one of the article - they are not releasing the full product, they are releasing most of it. They are holding back a small chunk (or maybe even a large chunk) of crucial files and presumably a key for after payment has been received.
If you do successfully hack it... you have a big pile of audio files and textures. Wheeee. Though I imagine some folks will try anyway.
It was called Hologram Time Traveler, apparently. Created by Rick Dyer, of Dragon's Lair and Space Ace fame (unsurprisingly). I remember seeing this one in California when I was younger. It cost a dollar to play, and the gameplay was very similar to DL. I did play it, and lived through a couple screens- unlike Dragon's Lair which I tried once and saw right through it (even as an 8 year old I hated being ripped off for a quarter). This must've been in '88 or '89.
The play of Hologram Time Traveler (Could it really have had that lame of a name?) involved reflex reactions to a variety of bad guys - turn left, shoot; jump, jump, shoot; shoot, shoot (intersperse random "die" anywhere you wish). It was somewhat more intuitive than DL, in that it was possible to play a full 5 minutes after only a couple dollars. It did a good job keeping the humor present and presented a slightly lower learning curve.
Following is a summary of the Milgram study to clarify misinformation in the parent post; a full explanation can be found in The Perils of Obedience, penned by Stanley Milgram. Additionally, a participant in the original experiment writes his personal account here; other discussion abounds.
The goal of Milgram's research was to see how people reacted to an authority figure telling them to administer electric shocks to a victim in the next room which would then protest in varying degrees depending on the amount of shock (actually a tape recording). These shocks were to be given when the 'subject' misperformed a simple memory task. With each wrong answer, the voltage of the shock was increased, starting at 14 volts ranging to 450 at the high end. The switches were labeled in groups of four, starting with 'slight shock' and the final two switches marked merely with 'XXX'.
The responses given by the 'subject' (who mentions his heart condition at some point) are: a grunt at 45 volts, loud complaining at 120v, an agonized scream at 285v, then eventually silence in response to the highest levels.
If the participant giving the shocks complained, the experimenter (Played by a tall, deep-voiced man dressed very scientist-y) as the authority figure told them to continue. Depending on the number of times a participant complained, they were told something else by the experimenter. These were:
'the experiment requires that you continue'
'it is essential that we continue'
'you have no other choice'
If the participant refused to continue after the final imperative, the experiment was halted. Milgram had predicted that only 4% of the participants would reach the 300 volt mark, and only 1 in 1000 would deliver the highest shock possible.
A full 25 of the 40 participants delivered the full range of shock. The experimenter halted the session the third time a 450 volt shock was delivered. This result generalizes across race, sex, country of origin and social status. Many of the participants did show signs of extreme stress towards the end of the experiment (clenching fists, laughter, squinting, sweating). Many people allege that there were long term effects (a la Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder), though no one seems able to cite these cases. Many of the people in their short-term responses reported that they felt that overall it was a positive experience in which they could learn about themselves. Of course, that could just be a coping strategy to help deal with the trauma. People are built mentally tough, it is a rare person that would have severe long-term effects from this one isolated experiment.
According to the CDC, phenol is a manufactured substance that is used to manufacture nylon, as an antiseptic, or in mouthwash & throat lozenges.
The effects of breathing airborne phenol (Which I assume is what would be coming out of the monitor) are unknown; additionally the CDC lists it as unclassifiable regarding carcinogenity. As such, I wouldn't recommend monitor testers run out looking for a new job, considering that you're likely to run into more heavy doses of carcinogens going to work.
As a semi-pro player, I can attest that unless you are playing with a group of friends you certainly do have to beat the house in addition to the rest of the players.
In casino and online games both, the house will take a given percentage of the pot. In a cheap game ($1/$2 Limit for example) the average pot will be around $20 - The house will probably take $2 of that as part of their rake. This is the price you pay for using their table in their facility. Some card rooms will merely charge an hourly rate, maybe $6-8 depending. It all comes out to the same end- you are paying the house to play.
Novice players may disregard the rake, because hey, if you're winning you're winning, right? One of the more advanced things a player should worry about is whether they are able to beat both the players AND the rake at a given table. You could be playing winning poker, but shooting yourself in the foot by harming long-term outcomes. Though poker is highly luck based in short run (Even in best situations opponent might have a 20% 'draw' on you - this is what keeps bad players playing, everyone picks up a pot now and then), experienced players are concerned with maintaining the flow of chips in their direction, even if they take a bad beat now and then. Pros will play to win about 2.5 'big bets' an hour (In the $1/2 game, that amounts to $5). It becomes easy to see how a rake can eat into that expectation if you don't watch for it.
I have read in multiple places on this thread a few highly moderated but highly uninformed posts concerning this issue,
If anything, online casinos can afford to give BETTER odds to people, and frequently they will.
They do not have overhead on massive structures, they do not have to upkeep thousands of tables and machines. Their staffs are much smaller as well.
I think it's interesting that the issue has focused on the two countries it has- A huge number of these casinos are based in Canada (for US customers) or Gibraltar (for UK).
Their customers are NOT stupid, people will swiftly realise if one casino is giving bum odds (worse than the usual ones anyway...) and give their business to a different one. Reference the old saying about skinning a sheep once but shearing it many times. Many of these sites as well have random number generators that are certified by various mathematical groups.
Hope that this is able to remove a little ignorance of the situation, and remember: The thing foremost in the people running these sites' minds is "How can i get all the traffic away from other casinos". Eventually, this should lead to a better ENTERTAINMENT product for everyone who chooses that route.
We are swiftly delving off-topic here, but let's play a game. We'll call it "reasoned argument" - I'll say the things I liked about SW:CCG, and you give reasons for statements such as "it was awful". Then perhaps others with similar experiences can share their opinions.
1: Variety of gameplay - There was no dominant deck type. Certainly, it could be annoying to come up against the expensive "Main Characters and their Toys" decks, but these were not terribly difficult to combat once you've ID'ed their play style. Each expansion added something new and original, such as capturing rules, Dagobah training, and the Epic events (Death Star/Yavin IV destruction, turning Luke to dark side).
2: Unique game mechanics. Combat was neither clunky nor excessively luck-determined. The universe was well covered and you could do whatever you wanted within the confines of your deck.
Decipher now has the license for an LotR CCG that looks classy as well.
There is a continuing theme in these posts whinging about good LucasArts projects being cancelled in favor of their latest Star Wars project.
Isn't the natural response, then, a Star Wars graphic adventure? This would seem to be right up their ally, and they would have a host of charaters and situations to put them in. Possibility?
On another note, they have not only done this to their "extra" licenses. The license for the Star Wars CCG (Collectible Card Game) was pulled out from under them. Decipher had put out a very high quality AND profitable product; the license was given to a different company to make a game better suited to 10-12 year olds because apparently they are a larger market and could turn more profit at the expense of an intelligent and fun game. And yes, they ARE a company and it IS their job to make money, we've all read those posts- but it is important not to piss off your current consumers in chasing after new ones.
The ESRB rating seems to be increasingly an implementation of CYA policy for the marketers of games than anything else.
If the Ontario Film Board has taken it upon themselves to rate a game, the message carries an implicit statement that the ESRB has become obsolete. It will be interesting to see whether other similar organizations follow in Ontario's footsteps to try to "re-regulate" video games.
However, the problem in that is that it could easily become just a series of ratings on a game that are all equally ineffective. It is a band-aid rather than a cure for the real problem.
Slashdot Mirror
If the four bots were collaborating, then I agree that this would be a completely different story. I make no argument about the dangers of collaboration (Players sharing knowledge of their hands with one another to mutual advantage at the expense of the rest of the table) - if anything, that is what people should be worried about online. Though again, that is not too hard to detect seeing as how in the end the sites have a record of every hand and establishing certain patterns is not difficult.
There are a huge number of misconceptions about many aspects of this issue clearly apparent in this discussion. I'm going to go through some of the highest-moderated misunderstandings in hopes of reclaiming some of what this whole discussion is about.
I'm relatively sure that all of the online gambling sites use either Flash or Java applets to display cards and such. I wouldn't think they'd make it so easy as to give easy access to card names.
You do not actually need to break into the program in order to use some form of bot. Graphics recognition has advanced to the point where a hand can be analyzed on the fly by a concurrently running program. See Poker Office. Such programs can then immediately provide feedback based on the information they glean.
Could this proliferation of poker-playing bots undermine the almost $1 billion online gambling industry?
The end of the industry is not likely at hand. Poker is just one part of this industry, and the industry will continue EVEN IF bots are the only ones playing. The casino will just take the same percentage of each pot.
if a pokerbot can clean out the 9 other people at the table
Quite frankly it is ridiculous to think that a bot with perfect play can clean out any table. Good poker play results in a slow accumulation of profit at a faster rate than losses. A perfect bot will certainly not be playing more than 1 in 5 hands to begin with, and not win more than one in 3 of those. Good players can't just make the right cards appear, no matter what you saw in Maverick. They get the same crappy cards as everyone else, it's how they play them that differs.
you don't trust other players to not be using bots, but you trust the house to not add their own player to every game and fix the host software to guarantee that the house's player wins?
Yes, very much so. Contrary to popular opinion, most people are not complete retards. It's not difficult to tell when someone is consistently winning - certainly there are hot streaks, but any whiff of foul play will result in a huge exodus of players from any poker site. They have no reason to do such a thing, as profits are huge from both the rake AND the interest they are collecting on your bankrolled money.
_______
Any current bot is very likely for Limit poker - this is the 'easiest' style to play purely by the numbers. The state space required for a bot to make decisions in No Limit poker is absolutely huge- one poorly written part can get your bot cleaned out regularly.
Personally I would LOVE to be at a table where I have positively ID'ed a player as a bot because I could then run circles around it. There are a number of tactics that would play merry hell with a bot that plays the straight numbers, and even a bot that adjusts to my own play style is not difficult to take advantage of.
I play regularly online and I do not fear the bot. What I fear most is the bad player that will put all their money on a 20% draw, where any good player (or bot) would fold- because sometimes they hit, and that hurts.
Once they find a cure for bad players though, that's the end of poker, but I am content that that time is far in the future.
This was covered fairly well in the discussion of part one of the article - they are not releasing the full product, they are releasing most of it. They are holding back a small chunk (or maybe even a large chunk) of crucial files and presumably a key for after payment has been received.
If you do successfully hack it... you have a big pile of audio files and textures. Wheeee. Though I imagine some folks will try anyway.
It was called Hologram Time Traveler, apparently. Created by Rick Dyer, of Dragon's Lair and Space Ace fame (unsurprisingly). I remember seeing this one in California when I was younger. It cost a dollar to play, and the gameplay was very similar to DL. I did play it, and lived through a couple screens- unlike Dragon's Lair which I tried once and saw right through it (even as an 8 year old I hated being ripped off for a quarter). This must've been in '88 or '89.
The play of Hologram Time Traveler (Could it really have had that lame of a name?) involved reflex reactions to a variety of bad guys - turn left, shoot; jump, jump, shoot; shoot, shoot (intersperse random "die" anywhere you wish). It was somewhat more intuitive than DL, in that it was possible to play a full 5 minutes after only a couple dollars. It did a good job keeping the humor present and presented a slightly lower learning curve.
Following is a summary of the Milgram study to clarify misinformation in the parent post; a full explanation can be found in The Perils of Obedience, penned by Stanley Milgram. Additionally, a participant in the original experiment writes his personal account here; other discussion abounds.
The goal of Milgram's research was to see how people reacted to an authority figure telling them to administer electric shocks to a victim in the next room which would then protest in varying degrees depending on the amount of shock (actually a tape recording). These shocks were to be given when the 'subject' misperformed a simple memory task. With each wrong answer, the voltage of the shock was increased, starting at 14 volts ranging to 450 at the high end. The switches were labeled in groups of four, starting with 'slight shock' and the final two switches marked merely with 'XXX'.
The responses given by the 'subject' (who mentions his heart condition at some point) are: a grunt at 45 volts, loud complaining at 120v, an agonized scream at 285v, then eventually silence in response to the highest levels.
If the participant giving the shocks complained, the experimenter (Played by a tall, deep-voiced man dressed very scientist-y) as the authority figure told them to continue. Depending on the number of times a participant complained, they were told something else by the experimenter. These were:
'the experiment requires that you continue'
'it is essential that we continue'
'you have no other choice'
If the participant refused to continue after the final imperative, the experiment was halted. Milgram had predicted that only 4% of the participants would reach the 300 volt mark, and only 1 in 1000 would deliver the highest shock possible.
A full 25 of the 40 participants delivered the full range of shock. The experimenter halted the session the third time a 450 volt shock was delivered. This result generalizes across race, sex, country of origin and social status. Many of the participants did show signs of extreme stress towards the end of the experiment (clenching fists, laughter, squinting, sweating). Many people allege that there were long term effects (a la Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder), though no one seems able to cite these cases. Many of the people in their short-term responses reported that they felt that overall it was a positive experience in which they could learn about themselves. Of course, that could just be a coping strategy to help deal with the trauma. People are built mentally tough, it is a rare person that would have severe long-term effects from this one isolated experiment.
http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/tfacts115.html
According to the CDC, phenol is a manufactured substance that is used to manufacture nylon, as an antiseptic, or in mouthwash & throat lozenges.
The effects of breathing airborne phenol (Which I assume is what would be coming out of the monitor) are unknown; additionally the CDC lists it as unclassifiable regarding carcinogenity. As such, I wouldn't recommend monitor testers run out looking for a new job, considering that you're likely to run into more heavy doses of carcinogens going to work.
As a semi-pro player, I can attest that unless you are playing with a group of friends you certainly do have to beat the house in addition to the rest of the players.
In casino and online games both, the house will take a given percentage of the pot. In a cheap game ($1/$2 Limit for example) the average pot will be around $20 - The house will probably take $2 of that as part of their rake. This is the price you pay for using their table in their facility. Some card rooms will merely charge an hourly rate, maybe $6-8 depending. It all comes out to the same end- you are paying the house to play.
Novice players may disregard the rake, because hey, if you're winning you're winning, right? One of the more advanced things a player should worry about is whether they are able to beat both the players AND the rake at a given table. You could be playing winning poker, but shooting yourself in the foot by harming long-term outcomes. Though poker is highly luck based in short run (Even in best situations opponent might have a 20% 'draw' on you - this is what keeps bad players playing, everyone picks up a pot now and then), experienced players are concerned with maintaining the flow of chips in their direction, even if they take a bad beat now and then. Pros will play to win about 2.5 'big bets' an hour (In the $1/2 game, that amounts to $5). It becomes easy to see how a rake can eat into that expectation if you don't watch for it.
I have read in multiple places on this thread a few highly moderated but highly uninformed posts concerning this issue,
If anything, online casinos can afford to give BETTER odds to people, and frequently they will.
They do not have overhead on massive structures, they do not have to upkeep thousands of tables and machines. Their staffs are much smaller as well.
I think it's interesting that the issue has focused on the two countries it has- A huge number of these casinos are based in Canada (for US customers) or Gibraltar (for UK).
Their customers are NOT stupid, people will swiftly realise if one casino is giving bum odds (worse than the usual ones anyway...) and give their business to a different one. Reference the old saying about skinning a sheep once but shearing it many times.
Many of these sites as well have random number generators that are certified by various mathematical groups.
Hope that this is able to remove a little ignorance of the situation, and remember: The thing foremost in the people running these sites' minds is "How can i get all the traffic away from other casinos". Eventually, this should lead to a better ENTERTAINMENT product for everyone who chooses that route.
We are swiftly delving off-topic here, but let's play a game. We'll call it "reasoned argument" - I'll say the things I liked about SW:CCG, and you give reasons for statements such as "it was awful". Then perhaps others with similar experiences can share their opinions.
1: Variety of gameplay - There was no dominant deck type. Certainly, it could be annoying to come up against the expensive "Main Characters and their Toys" decks, but these were not terribly difficult to combat once you've ID'ed their play style. Each expansion added something new and original, such as capturing rules, Dagobah training, and the Epic events (Death Star/Yavin IV destruction, turning Luke to dark side).
2: Unique game mechanics. Combat was neither clunky nor excessively luck-determined. The universe was well covered and you could do whatever you wanted within the confines of your deck.
Decipher now has the license for an LotR CCG that looks classy as well.
There is a continuing theme in these posts whinging about good LucasArts projects being cancelled in favor of their latest Star Wars project.
Isn't the natural response, then, a Star Wars graphic adventure? This would seem to be right up their ally, and they would have a host of charaters and situations to put them in. Possibility?
On another note, they have not only done this to their "extra" licenses. The license for the Star Wars CCG (Collectible Card Game) was pulled out from under them. Decipher had put out a very high quality AND profitable product; the license was given to a different company to make a game better suited to 10-12 year olds because apparently they are a larger market and could turn more profit at the expense of an intelligent and fun game.
And yes, they ARE a company and it IS their job to make money, we've all read those posts- but it is important not to piss off your current consumers in chasing after new ones.
The ESRB rating seems to be increasingly an implementation of CYA policy for the marketers of games than anything else. If the Ontario Film Board has taken it upon themselves to rate a game, the message carries an implicit statement that the ESRB has become obsolete. It will be interesting to see whether other similar organizations follow in Ontario's footsteps to try to "re-regulate" video games. However, the problem in that is that it could easily become just a series of ratings on a game that are all equally ineffective. It is a band-aid rather than a cure for the real problem.