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There is some misconception about the optimal strategy in the article. You can only win in poker if you recognize how your opponent deviates from the optimal s

There is some misconception about the optimal strategy in the article. You can only win in poker if you recognize how your opponent deviates from the optimal strategy and then play a strategy to exploit him. You have to play an exploitable strategy yourself to exploit someone else. Think about playing rock paper scissors agains an opponent who always chooses rock. If you still play the optimal strategy (choosing randomly) you gain nothing...

misja111 5y ago
> You can only win in poker if you recognize how your opponent deviates from the optimal strategy and then play a strategy to exploit him. This is not true. If you play optimal strategy, you will win against any opponent except one that plays optimal as well, in which case you'll break even. But, of course you'll win a lot more if you are able to adapt your strategy to exploit any weaknesses that you have detected. And detecting weaknesses in your opponent(s) in live play is something that humans will remain better at than AI for quite a while. Because it requires not just careful analysis of your opponent's actions but some contextual information as well. E.g., how old is your opponent, is he experienced or not, is he drunk, have you experienced similar players like hime before, etc.
- 3pt14159 5y ago
  > If you play optimal strategy, you will win against any opponent except one that plays optimal as well How does the example you're responding to not win 50% of the time? Rock v Rock = Tie Rock v Paper = Loss Rock v Scissors = Win The optimal game theoretic play of randomly choosing rock paper scissors is inferior play against this particular opponent. All that game theoretic perfect play gets you is the benefit of getting at least a tie. Possibly more, but not always more for non-perfect play.
  - kuboble 5y ago
    Poker isn't like this. Think rock, pair, scissors, crap where rules are that crap always loses. Now uniform strategy between rps will yield profit vs an opponent who plays crap sometimes. It's very easy to play crap in poker
    - 3pt14159 5y ago
      Right, but so what? If the optimal strategy is a 50-50 split against someone else playing the optimal strategy and at least a 50% win against someone who is not, it doesn't follow that if they other player plays crap every game that the optimal strategy is best against them. Identification of the crap player means that you increase your bets vs what you would normally bet for perfect play. Perfect play is bullet proof, but it isn't necessarily maximal yield against a non-perfect player even if thats the rough trendline.
      - kuboble 5y ago
        The point being that in poker and in particular Texas Holdem - unlike in RPS - the optimal strategy will win against good players and completely obliterate weak players. Yes, the good human can win even more against bad human but make no mistake - it's extremely hard to not lose a lot vs optimal strategies. >Identification of the crap player means that you increase your bets. That's not true. There are a lot of different ways to exploit bad players depending on how bad they are. Also a lot of weak players these days have much more subtle leaks (e.g. never bluff-raise the river) and it takes some skill to spot and exploit them.
        3pt14159 5y ago
        I reread the entire chain and realized I misinterpreted the context around what you said and thus came to the wrong conclusion of your understanding and meaning. > > You can only win in poker if you recognize how your opponent deviates from the optimal strategy and then play a strategy to exploit him. > This is not true. You were right here when you said "This is not true." I still think there is more nuance than the discussion as a whole credits, but overall I think you were more right than wrong in our discussion and I was more wrong than right. Thanks for the chat.
- bluecalm 5y ago
  This is almost correct but not quite. Optimal strategy wins against many other strategies and breaks even against others. The ones it breaks even against are not necessarily optimal themselves, they just don't make mistakes vs the optimal one but might be exploitable themselves. To be more precise: you only need to replicate not mixed (pure) plays of the optimal strategy to not lose against it. Your frequencies for mixed actions can be completely off though.
  - misja111 5y ago
    In theory you are right but when talking specifically about poker, I can't think of any example of imperfect play that isn't exploited (to a certain extent) by optimal play. Yes, playing the opponent would win more, but optimal play makes a (smaller) profit as well. Or would you know an example?
    - bluecalm 5y ago
      The imperfect play is in the mixing. Imagine you play like optimal but every time you have a mixed action of bluff or check you bluff. You won't be exploited by an optimal strategy but you will be very vulnerable vs someone who bluff catches a lot.

misja111 5y ago

> You can only win in poker if you recognize how your opponent deviates from the optimal strategy and then play a strategy to exploit him. This is not true. If you play optimal strategy, you will win against any opponent except one that plays optimal as well, in which case you'll break even. But, of course you'll win a lot more if you are able to adapt your strategy to exploit any weaknesses that you have detected. And detecting weaknesses in your opponent(s) in live play is something that humans will remain better at than AI for quite a while. Because it requires not just careful analysis of your opponent's actions but some contextual information as well. E.g., how old is your opponent, is he experienced or not, is he drunk, have you experienced similar players like hime before, etc.

3pt14159 5y ago
> If you play optimal strategy, you will win against any opponent except one that plays optimal as well How does the example you're responding to not win 50% of the time? Rock v Rock = Tie Rock v Paper = Loss Rock v Scissors = Win The optimal game theoretic play of randomly choosing rock paper scissors is inferior play against this particular opponent. All that game theoretic perfect play gets you is the benefit of getting at least a tie. Possibly more, but not always more for non-perfect play.
- kuboble 5y ago
  Poker isn't like this. Think rock, pair, scissors, crap where rules are that crap always loses. Now uniform strategy between rps will yield profit vs an opponent who plays crap sometimes. It's very easy to play crap in poker
  - 3pt14159 5y ago
    Right, but so what? If the optimal strategy is a 50-50 split against someone else playing the optimal strategy and at least a 50% win against someone who is not, it doesn't follow that if they other player plays crap every game that the optimal strategy is best against them. Identification of the crap player means that you increase your bets vs what you would normally bet for perfect play. Perfect play is bullet proof, but it isn't necessarily maximal yield against a non-perfect player even if thats the rough trendline.
    - kuboble 5y ago
      The point being that in poker and in particular Texas Holdem - unlike in RPS - the optimal strategy will win against good players and completely obliterate weak players. Yes, the good human can win even more against bad human but make no mistake - it's extremely hard to not lose a lot vs optimal strategies. >Identification of the crap player means that you increase your bets. That's not true. There are a lot of different ways to exploit bad players depending on how bad they are. Also a lot of weak players these days have much more subtle leaks (e.g. never bluff-raise the river) and it takes some skill to spot and exploit them.
      - 3pt14159 5y ago
        I reread the entire chain and realized I misinterpreted the context around what you said and thus came to the wrong conclusion of your understanding and meaning. > > You can only win in poker if you recognize how your opponent deviates from the optimal strategy and then play a strategy to exploit him. > This is not true. You were right here when you said "This is not true." I still think there is more nuance than the discussion as a whole credits, but overall I think you were more right than wrong in our discussion and I was more wrong than right. Thanks for the chat.
bluecalm 5y ago
This is almost correct but not quite. Optimal strategy wins against many other strategies and breaks even against others. The ones it breaks even against are not necessarily optimal themselves, they just don't make mistakes vs the optimal one but might be exploitable themselves. To be more precise: you only need to replicate not mixed (pure) plays of the optimal strategy to not lose against it. Your frequencies for mixed actions can be completely off though.
- misja111 5y ago
  In theory you are right but when talking specifically about poker, I can't think of any example of imperfect play that isn't exploited (to a certain extent) by optimal play. Yes, playing the opponent would win more, but optimal play makes a (smaller) profit as well. Or would you know an example?
  - bluecalm 5y ago
    The imperfect play is in the mixing. Imagine you play like optimal but every time you have a mixed action of bluff or check you bluff. You won't be exploited by an optimal strategy but you will be very vulnerable vs someone who bluff catches a lot.