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I think I can wrap my head around neural nets being superior at games with perfect information like chess or go. But how would you teach bluffing and randomness

by lawn 10y ago

I think I can wrap my head around neural nets being superior at games with perfect information like chess or go. But how would you teach bluffing and randomness to a neural net?

falcolas 10y ago
I imagine it's mostly just playing the percentages. Bet when it has a high percentage of winning, fold when it doesn't. It doesn't need to read its opponents if it can play the percentages perfectly.
- tomarr 10y ago
  I don't think this is true? At least for small blinds. If you know your opponent is playing the percentages you could heighten your threshold.
- splike 10y ago
  This is a very naive interpretation of the game of poker. Professional human players are already very good at calculating the percentages, and any joe playing from his computer has access to a calculator. The reason why simply playing the numbers fails is that if I know an opponent is playing this way, I'll just fold every time he decides to play.
- reverend_gonzo 10y ago
  This is true for Limit Hold'em, but very much not true for No Limit. Limit Hold'em is a solved game, because as long as you're playing the odds, you can play perfectly. No Limit changes things because the bets can vary wildly. If you play a tight game (just play the odds), and opponent will get out whenever you're in, and will bluff just to see if you call or fold. Bluffing is a major component in No Limit, and there are very different profitable playing strategies.
  - jdmichal 10y ago
    I fell to this when I randomly decided to play some limit hold'em one night. Kept losing to a guy that chased every chance at odds he could, because I couldn't make bets big enough to scare him out. Lesson learned!
  - osti 10y ago
    That's not true at all for limit, the perfect bot's bluff frequency is probably higher than most humans. Play against it yourself here http://poker.srv.ualberta.ca http://poker.srv.ualberta.ca
- ska 10y ago
  No, this is a terrible idea. If you play like this consistently, you are basically telling your opponents when to play against you and when to get out of the way. They can even pick bet sizes (assuming no limit) to refine your possible hands very accurately.
  - jdmichal 10y ago
    I'm usually surprised in tournaments by the number of people willing to play with me after I've sat quietly folding for the first three rounds... By all means, everyone should fold and give me the blinds, but there always seems to be a player or two who bite!
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jspiral 10y ago
At higher levels poker is about game theory, for example, the player bluffs at an optimal frequency in a certain situation so as to be indifferent to whether the opponent calls or folds. Exploitative strategies, based on understanding opponent weaknesses and tendencies will win $ at a higher rate, but are themselves exploitable. For example, almost never bluffing and playing only strong cards crushes beginners who play too many hands and call too much. This strategy is easily beaten though by stealing most pots and then not paying off the infrequent big bets (strong hands don't come often enough). A "perfect" game theory strategy is like armor, slowly bleeding the opponent every time they deviate from perfection themselves. not sure if that helps but maybe some seeds to google at least
- jdmichal 10y ago
  > This strategy is easily beaten though by stealing most pots and then not paying off the infrequent big bets (strong hands don't come often enough). To dig deeper: Or you can try actively punishing the big hands by folding out early. Of course, that strategy opens you up to being bled by your opponent bluffing strong hands. Attempting to actively punish the big hands here is a deviation. This is what jspiral means by "deviations from perfection".
bcassedy 10y ago
Former poker pro here. Top professionals are building their strategy around game theory. They'll attempt to play in such a way that they aren't exploitable and look to deviate when they've spotted a weakness in their opponent's play. Basically, the game theory optimal strategy is unexploitable. In every situation, the best you can do is break even by also playing the optimal strategy. If you deviate from optimal strategy, the optimal strategy will beat you, but it's possible that a strategy tailored to taking advantage of your specific deviations would beat you more quickly. Unexploitable play typically means that you bet a size with a range of holdings that would make your opponent indifferent to all of his options (And the converse is true when facing a bet). For humans, this means that they gravitate to a few standard bet sizes, while a computer could, in theory, balance their range with much more granularity. Last I read, for training the neural net it'll play billions+ hands against versions of itself designed to exploit various weaknesses. It'll start out by performing random actions, for example, say it'll have a 33% chance to call your bet, raise, or fold. It then starts to see that it does better when it raises your bet with the nuts and also as a bluff. Eventually, it arrives at an equilibrium strategy. Since computers are much better at randomness than humans are, they're able to more effectively play these types of strategies and with more complexity of bet sizing. There is what's called a mixed strategy, a strategy where given a situation with the same hole cards you will call, raise, or fold to a bet with some non-zero probability. Doing that as a human is very difficult, but it's something computers manage to do quite easily.
- IgorPartola 10y ago
  Since you are here, I have a few questions about your former job. First, how does one become a pro poker player? Second, does it work like a sport where you get paid from sponsorships, or do you just directly take home what you win? Or a combination of both? Third, is this something that you can do part-time, or does it require full time attention? Fourth, why did you quit?
  - jat850 10y ago
    Not who you're replying to, but I can give a few answers, having also played professionally for some time. 1. Lots of means this can happen. "Professional poker player" is generally taken to mean "derives primary source of income from playing poker" or sometimes "spends the majority of their time playing poker". There's no exact qualification. 2. Not generally sponsorship driven, although there are some modes of sponsorship that do factor in in some ways - the primary means of income is basically by winning money from other players. A secondary component is often rakeback, in online play. In cash games, you can join and leave at any time and your winnings or losses are simply the amount you are up or down in that particular session. In tourmanent play there is a payout structure based on your placement in the tournament (often something like 25% of the total prize pool to 1st, 15% to second, etc.) 3. It can be done part time. There is nothing to say that your bankroll can't be seeded or supplemented by external means, and you can play cash games for short or long periods. Tournaments are typically long (at least if you remain in them a long time, though you can be eliminated at any time, basically). I used to play approximately 40 hours a week (since I was treating it like a job), but now I play 10-15 and it represents about 30-40% of my yearly income. 4. I personally quit because I found the stress associated with having it as the sole means of providing myself too overwhelming. One can have a stretch of negative earnings that can last hours, days, weeks, even months - and it can be psychologically damaging in some ways. I also found that I preferred to keep it as a hobby than a means of income, since I enjoyed it more that way.

by lawn 10y ago

I think I can wrap my head around neural nets being superior at games with perfect information like chess or go. But how would you teach bluffing and randomness to a neural net?

falcolas 10y ago

I imagine it's mostly just playing the percentages. Bet when it has a high percentage of winning, fold when it doesn't. It doesn't need to read its opponents if it can play the percentages perfectly.

tomarr 10y ago
I don't think this is true? At least for small blinds. If you know your opponent is playing the percentages you could heighten your threshold.
splike 10y ago
This is a very naive interpretation of the game of poker. Professional human players are already very good at calculating the percentages, and any joe playing from his computer has access to a calculator. The reason why simply playing the numbers fails is that if I know an opponent is playing this way, I'll just fold every time he decides to play.
reverend_gonzo 10y ago
This is true for Limit Hold'em, but very much not true for No Limit. Limit Hold'em is a solved game, because as long as you're playing the odds, you can play perfectly. No Limit changes things because the bets can vary wildly. If you play a tight game (just play the odds), and opponent will get out whenever you're in, and will bluff just to see if you call or fold. Bluffing is a major component in No Limit, and there are very different profitable playing strategies.
- jdmichal 10y ago
  I fell to this when I randomly decided to play some limit hold'em one night. Kept losing to a guy that chased every chance at odds he could, because I couldn't make bets big enough to scare him out. Lesson learned!
- osti 10y ago
  That's not true at all for limit, the perfect bot's bluff frequency is probably higher than most humans. Play against it yourself here http://poker.srv.ualberta.ca http://poker.srv.ualberta.ca
ska 10y ago
No, this is a terrible idea. If you play like this consistently, you are basically telling your opponents when to play against you and when to get out of the way. They can even pick bet sizes (assuming no limit) to refine your possible hands very accurately.
- jdmichal 10y ago
  I'm usually surprised in tournaments by the number of people willing to play with me after I've sat quietly folding for the first three rounds... By all means, everyone should fold and give me the blinds, but there always seems to be a player or two who bite!

deleted 10y ago

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deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

jspiral 10y ago

At higher levels poker is about game theory, for example, the player bluffs at an optimal frequency in a certain situation so as to be indifferent to whether the opponent calls or folds. Exploitative strategies, based on understanding opponent weaknesses and tendencies will win $ at a higher rate, but are themselves exploitable. For example, almost never bluffing and playing only strong cards crushes beginners who play too many hands and call too much. This strategy is easily beaten though by stealing most pots and then not paying off the infrequent big bets (strong hands don't come often enough). A "perfect" game theory strategy is like armor, slowly bleeding the opponent every time they deviate from perfection themselves. not sure if that helps but maybe some seeds to google at least

jdmichal 10y ago
> This strategy is easily beaten though by stealing most pots and then not paying off the infrequent big bets (strong hands don't come often enough). To dig deeper: Or you can try actively punishing the big hands by folding out early. Of course, that strategy opens you up to being bled by your opponent bluffing strong hands. Attempting to actively punish the big hands here is a deviation. This is what jspiral means by "deviations from perfection".

bcassedy 10y ago

Former poker pro here. Top professionals are building their strategy around game theory. They'll attempt to play in such a way that they aren't exploitable and look to deviate when they've spotted a weakness in their opponent's play. Basically, the game theory optimal strategy is unexploitable. In every situation, the best you can do is break even by also playing the optimal strategy. If you deviate from optimal strategy, the optimal strategy will beat you, but it's possible that a strategy tailored to taking advantage of your specific deviations would beat you more quickly. Unexploitable play typically means that you bet a size with a range of holdings that would make your opponent indifferent to all of his options (And the converse is true when facing a bet). For humans, this means that they gravitate to a few standard bet sizes, while a computer could, in theory, balance their range with much more granularity. Last I read, for training the neural net it'll play billions+ hands against versions of itself designed to exploit various weaknesses. It'll start out by performing random actions, for example, say it'll have a 33% chance to call your bet, raise, or fold. It then starts to see that it does better when it raises your bet with the nuts and also as a bluff. Eventually, it arrives at an equilibrium strategy. Since computers are much better at randomness than humans are, they're able to more effectively play these types of strategies and with more complexity of bet sizing. There is what's called a mixed strategy, a strategy where given a situation with the same hole cards you will call, raise, or fold to a bet with some non-zero probability. Doing that as a human is very difficult, but it's something computers manage to do quite easily.

IgorPartola 10y ago
Since you are here, I have a few questions about your former job. First, how does one become a pro poker player? Second, does it work like a sport where you get paid from sponsorships, or do you just directly take home what you win? Or a combination of both? Third, is this something that you can do part-time, or does it require full time attention? Fourth, why did you quit?
- jat850 10y ago
  Not who you're replying to, but I can give a few answers, having also played professionally for some time. 1. Lots of means this can happen. "Professional poker player" is generally taken to mean "derives primary source of income from playing poker" or sometimes "spends the majority of their time playing poker". There's no exact qualification. 2. Not generally sponsorship driven, although there are some modes of sponsorship that do factor in in some ways - the primary means of income is basically by winning money from other players. A secondary component is often rakeback, in online play. In cash games, you can join and leave at any time and your winnings or losses are simply the amount you are up or down in that particular session. In tourmanent play there is a payout structure based on your placement in the tournament (often something like 25% of the total prize pool to 1st, 15% to second, etc.) 3. It can be done part time. There is nothing to say that your bankroll can't be seeded or supplemented by external means, and you can play cash games for short or long periods. Tournaments are typically long (at least if you remain in them a long time, though you can be eliminated at any time, basically). I used to play approximately 40 hours a week (since I was treating it like a job), but now I play 10-15 and it represents about 30-40% of my yearly income. 4. I personally quit because I found the stress associated with having it as the sole means of providing myself too overwhelming. One can have a stretch of negative earnings that can last hours, days, weeks, even months - and it can be psychologically damaging in some ways. I also found that I preferred to keep it as a hobby than a means of income, since I enjoyed it more that way.