Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
At 02:58 28/07/2007, Arend wrote: On 7/26/07, chrilly mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED][EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: This is a remarkable result. I think poker is more difficult than Go and of course chess. I am as surprised by this statement as everyone else. Of course you have to develop some mixed strategies, try go guess implied pot odds, folding equity etc. but assuming you have access to a large database of high level poker games to analyze, why should it be that hard, esp. in 2-person limit Hold'em? Arend It seems plausible to me that poker should, in some sense, be more complicated than go. I'll ignore the massive savings from clever search tricks in both games. In order to get optimal play in go, it is necessary to search over all legal positions, of which there are fewer than 3^(19^2). In order to get optimal play (ie a Nash equilibrium) in poker, it is necessary to search over all strategies (of both players). A strategy is a map from your knowledge (the cards you can see and the opponent's bids) to an action. Even if we assume a single round of bidding, the number of strategies for a single player is roughly (no. of actions)^(no.hands * no opponents bids). This is massively higher than the number of go positions. ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
I'm not familiar with the tournament poker. So I may be wrong. shouldn't the 'no.hands' in your formular be replaced with a single number that is the probability that oppenent's hand is better than me? If so,it factors out. The only scenarios left to be considered becomes (no. of my actions)^( no?my bids). Further, 'no. my bids' is an analytical function. It does not need to be treated as a discrete space. Otherwise to maximize a function in the interval [0,1] becomes infinitely complex.? DL -Original Message- From: Tom Cooper [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: computer-go computer-go@computer-go.org Sent: Sat, 28 Jul 2007 6:42 am Subject: Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros At 02:58 28/07/2007, Arend wrote:? ? ? On 7/26/07, chrilly mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED][EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:? This is a remarkable result. I think poker is more difficult than Go and of? course chess.? ? ? I am as surprised by this statement as everyone else. Of course you have to develop some mixed strategies, try go guess implied pot odds, folding equity etc. but assuming you have access to a large database of high level poker games to analyze, why should it be that hard, esp. in 2-person limit Hold'em?? ? Arend? ? It seems plausible to me that poker should, in some sense, be more complicated than go. I'll ignore the massive savings from clever search tricks in both games. In order to get optimal play in go, it is necessary to search over all legal positions, of which there are fewer than 3^(19^2). In order to get optimal play (ie a Nash equilibrium) in poker, it is necessary to search over all strategies (of both players). A strategy is a map from your knowledge (the cards you can see and the opponent's bids) to an action. Even if we assume a single round of bidding, the number of strategies for a single player is roughly (no. of actions)^(no.hands * no opponents bids). This is massively higher than the number of go positions. ? ___? computer-go mailing list? [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/? AOL now offers free email to everyone. Find out more about what's free from AOL at AOL.com. ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
At 12:42 28/07/2007, you wrote: At 02:58 28/07/2007, Arend wrote: On 7/26/07, chrilly mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED][EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: This is a remarkable result. I think poker is more difficult than Go and of course chess. I am as surprised by this statement as everyone else. Of course you have to develop some mixed strategies, try go guess implied pot odds, folding equity etc. but assuming you have access to a large database of high level poker games to analyze, why should it be that hard, esp. in 2-person limit Hold'em? Arend It seems plausible to me that poker should, in some sense, be more complicated than go. I'll ignore the massive savings from clever search tricks in both games. In order to get optimal play in go, it is necessary to search over all legal positions, of which there are fewer than 3^(19^2). In order to get optimal play (ie a Nash equilibrium) in poker, it is necessary to search over all strategies (of both players). A strategy is a map from your knowledge (the cards you can see and the opponent's bids) to an action. Even if we assume a single round of bidding, the number of strategies for a single player is roughly (no. of actions)^(no.hands * no opponents bids). This is massively higher than the number of go positions. ___ Sorry, this isn't what I meant to say. A sensible strategy in poker has to involve bluffing, so it is a map from knowledge into distributions over actions. The point about it's being bigger than the space for go is right though. ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
Let's recalculate the game space size for poker. For a given hand there are N possible actions. For a given hand and a given action, there are m posssible bets. Then the game space size is N*M*(no. of hands). DL AOL now offers free email to everyone. Find out more about what's free from AOL at AOL.com. ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
(no limit hold 'em example) if no. of hands can be taken to be # of distinct 2 card hands, mod suit isomorphism for the first action, and no. of hands is taken to be # of distinct 3 card hands given the first two cards for the second action, etc., then it's easy to see that the vast bulk of the decision making game space has to do with actions that my opponents have taken simplifying a little bit: for each opponent, actions they may have taken are: i) folding ii) raising iii) calling there aren't that many categories for ii), and there are only 5 possible initial decisions to make, along with possible reraising, calling or folding if at least one opponent chooses ii) and we haven't yet folded. a good bit smaller than go, even if we allow the number of categories in ii) to be as finely discrete as the size of the smallest possible bet. s. - Original Message From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: computer-go@computer-go.org Sent: Saturday, July 28, 2007 12:11:21 PM Subject: Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros Let's recalculate the game space size for poker. For a given hand there are N possible actions. For a given hand and a given action, there are m posssible bets. Then the game space size is N*M*(no. of hands). DL AOL now offers free email to everyone. Find out more about what's free from AOL at AOL.com. Boardwalk for $500? In 2007? Ha! Play Monopoly Here and Now (it's updated for today's economy) at Yahoo! Games. http://get.games.yahoo.com/proddesc?gamekey=monopolyherenow ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
- Original Message - From: Tom Cooper [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: computer-go computer-go@computer-go.org Sent: Saturday, July 28, 2007 3:42 PM Subject: Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros At 12:42 28/07/2007, you wrote: At 02:58 28/07/2007, Arend wrote: On 7/26/07, chrilly mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED][EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: This is a remarkable result. I think poker is more difficult than Go and of course chess. I am as surprised by this statement as everyone else. Of course you have to develop some mixed strategies, try go guess implied pot odds, folding equity etc. but assuming you have access to a large database of high level poker games to analyze, why should it be that hard, esp. in 2-person limit Hold'em? Arend Decision theory is trivial, apart from computational details (just like playing chess!). From David J.C. MaKay, Information Theory, Inference and Learning Algorithmus, Chap. 36, Decision Theory. Thats exactly what I wanted to say. There are some nasty computational details to solve, but it is conceptually clear. One can discuss, if the same holds for Go. For me the details are somewhat more nasty, but I can see no conceptuall difference to chess. The concept, that Go is sooo special and sooo different was one roadblock for progress. Suzie is on 9x9 clearly better than traditional programms and on 19x19 in the second-league. We would just have to wait for further hardware progress (or parallize it) that it catches up also on 19x19. UCT is even more successfull than Alpha-Beta. UCT is - apart from details - also trivial computation. But it is not clear what the best concept in Poker is. Chrilly ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
On 7/26/07, Jeff Nowakowski [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Ah, an opponent model. Where's the poision? http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093779/quotes#qt0250635 Too much rock, paper, scissors in poker for my tastes. BTW, there's a rather sophisticated Rock Paper Scissors player named Iocane Powder. http://ofb.net/~egnor/iocaine.html - Brian ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
- Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: computer-go@computer-go.org Sent: Friday, July 27, 2007 3:26 AM Subject: Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros I don't understand this. For a given hand the odds of winning can be easily calculated for poker and the best play can be formulated accordingly. It's like to program a com[uter to win a coin toss. I would be surprised if any side win big. The only thing a computer can to is to model opponent's behavior, which may deviate from the best play. What did I miss? DL A lot. The chance alone is meaningless. It can be very profitable to play a hand with 20% chance of winning and it can be a desaster. If you have pot odds of 10:1 the 20% are a good deal, with pot-odds 1:1 its a desaster. The direct pot odds are easy. Whats in the pot and whats the money I put it. But the interesting figure are the implied-pot-odds. What money do I have to put in in all betting rounds and what's the pot at the end. This depends of course also on the actions of the opponents. Another point is: The winning-chance depends on the action of the opponents. If one raises and the opponent folds, one wins with every card. Chrilly -- AOL now offers free email to everyone. Find out more about what's free from AOL at AOL.com. -- ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
On 7/26/07, chrilly [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: This is a remarkable result. I think poker is more difficult than Go and of course chess. I am as surprised by this statement as everyone else. Of course you have to develop some mixed strategies, try go guess implied pot odds, folding equity etc. but assuming you have access to a large database of high level poker games to analyze, why should it be that hard, esp. in 2-person limit Hold'em? Arend ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
This is a remarkable result. I think poker is more difficult than Go and of course chess. My hypothesis (its just a hypothesis) for the success is. There is someone - Dave Billings - who worked for many years very consequently on the topic. And he is able to motivate a lot of other good people to go along with him. And he gets probably also a lot of support from his boss, J.Schaeffer. And of course, there is some prospect to win fame and money. The conditions for solving a problem are always at least as important than the problem itself. Maybe are the conditions in Poker better than in Go. As said above, I think the problem is in Poker harder. They have of course not solved the whole problem. Heads-Up limit Hold'Em is the - for computers - easiest game. But its nevertheless remarkable that they are on-par with the Poker-GMs. Chrilly - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: computer-go@computer-go.org Sent: Thursday, July 26, 2007 6:02 AM Subject: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- Hash: SHA1 Humans beat poker bot ... barely: http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2007/07/25/289607.aspx - -- *** FULL-SPECTRUM DOMINANCE! *** * In advance of the Revolution: * Get facts get organized * * Fight the Man! * thru these sites movements * * Critical endorsement only Most sites need donations * * http://www.buynothingchristmas.org Buy Nothing Christmas * * http://www.aflcio.com/corporateamericaExecutive PayWatch * * [splitURL] /paywatch/ceou/database.cfm Database * * http://www.africaaction.orgAfrica Action * * http://www.msf.org Doctors Without Borders * * http://sweatshopwatch.orgSweatshop Watch * * http://www.maquilasolidarity.org Maquila Solidarity Network * ** Revealed Truth pales in comparison with the method of Science *** GPG fingerprint = 2E7F 2D69 4B0B C8D5 07E3 09C3 5E8D C4B4 461B B771 -BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE- Version: GnuPG v1.4.1 (GNU/Linux) iD8DBQFGqBzQXo3EtEYbt3ERAhQzAJ9GxAD38q8K1pU8Qp7o5Ok6mi3k3wCdHwc4 8w17aqALXM/oib5umPdBDRo= =VmGC -END PGP SIGNATURE- ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/ ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
If one makes e.g. something like Hydra, one has already almost all at hand. There is the work of Ken Thompson, of the Deep Blue team, the work of Frans Morsch, Ed Schroeder... There is an industrial quality infrastructure, databases, interfaces, there are people who have already learned their lesson One is a dwarf standing on the shoulders of giants. The Polaris team had not such an infrastructure, but they build it over many years and with a lot of effort for themself. The effort is comparable to the big chess projects. Not in money terms, but from the man-power investments. In Go their is neither. There is no infrastructure, one is a dwarf standing on the shoulders of dwarfs and their is not such a team like the Polaris one so far. Maybe the INRA group succeeds to make something similar. I have no idea, but I can't see at the moment nobody who works like the Polaris or Deep Blue team. One can discuss, if Go or Poker is harder. Its definetly harder than chess. But I am also convinced, that Go is not that hard, its this poor state of the affairs which makes the problem that hard. Chrilly - Original Message - From: Harri Salakoski [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: computer-go computer-go@computer-go.org Sent: Thursday, July 26, 2007 11:44 AM Subject: Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros think poker is more difficult than Go and of course chess. I have only studied poker AI basics and coded game rules, learned play slightly winning net poker. But however dare to say my opinion that I totally disagree. Sounds like somekind of poker hype that it is as tough problem than Go game AI 19*19 table. It is offcourse very complex interaction problem but my opinion is that it is still lot of easier problem. It is maybe even possible that it can't be proven and that theory you are right, because poker can be iterated forever and that in theory propably there is _no_ best strategy. I see it very same/similar thing than in super simple iterated prisoners dilemma problem. There just is no best strategy, any strategy has some other dominating strategy, so I have understanded it. But there is very good strategies, every bet when you but your money in table you play even stronger(bluff), play normally or slow play present weaker hand than you actually have. That thing iterated, remembering what opponents have done earlier (like in prisoners dilemma) it is tough problem, but saying it harder than go game is not true at least in practise. In practise I see it so that computers have advantage in poker other things than this complex interaction, where advantage is in humans. As computers can actually calculate odds and propabilities exactly, that advantage is maybe slight, but something which similar don't exist in go-game. But yep just started poker AI in my project http://sourceforge.net/projects/narugo, coded there SimpleActionGenerator, in estimated couple years work it is gonna plays better poker than starter player :| So imho if somebody states that poker is harder AI problem than go-game, it sounds poker hype. t. Harri - Original Message - From: chrilly [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; computer-go computer-go@computer-go.org Sent: Thursday, July 26, 2007 10:32 AM Subject: Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros This is a remarkable result. I think poker is more difficult than Go and of course chess. My hypothesis (its just a hypothesis) for the success is. There is someone - Dave Billings - who worked for many years very consequently on the topic. And he is able to motivate a lot of other good people to go along with him. And he gets probably also a lot of support from his boss, J.Schaeffer. And of course, there is some prospect to win fame and money. The conditions for solving a problem are always at least as important than the problem itself. Maybe are the conditions in Poker better than in Go. As said above, I think the problem is in Poker harder. They have of course not solved the whole problem. Heads-Up limit Hold'Em is the - for computers - easiest game. But its nevertheless remarkable that they are on-par with the Poker-GMs. Chrilly - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: computer-go@computer-go.org Sent: Thursday, July 26, 2007 6:02 AM Subject: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- Hash: SHA1 Humans beat poker bot ... barely: http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2007/07/25/289607.aspx - -- *** FULL-SPECTRUM DOMINANCE! *** * In advance of the Revolution: * Get facts get organized * * Fight the Man! * thru these sites movements * * Critical endorsement only Most sites need donations * * http://www.buynothingchristmas.org Buy Nothing Christmas * * http://www.aflcio.com/corporateamericaExecutive PayWatch * * [splitURL
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
On 7/26/07, steve uurtamo [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: There is certainly more money to be made in poker than in go. Yes, but its also more difficult. do you mean this in a casual, unsubstantiated way, or in an exact way? My feeling is that there are a lot of people making a lot of money in online poker by having a bot play for them. They don't like to talk about it because they don't want their situation to change. I myself made a go at it. My bot was able to play fully automated 7 card stud on ParadisePoker.com. It had to read the graphical screen to understand what was going on and when it was it's turn, etc. It played decently, but it was too easy for the other players to catch-on to it's strategy. Eventually I lost interest. That was about 4 years ago. ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
- Original Message - From: steve uurtamo [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: computer-go computer-go@computer-go.org Sent: Thursday, July 26, 2007 7:29 PM Subject: Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros i think that you might be confusing two important things: i) the difficulty of a problem. ii) the amount and kind of effort that has gone toward solving a problem. No, not at all. But my point is: For progress in any field the difficulty of a problem is less important than the urgency/interest of society to solve it. Science and technology is not driven by the internal logic of the science, but by the interest of the society. Once there is a very high social demand, there is big progress in a field. There is the proverb war is the mother of all things. A lot of innovations are made related to war. In times of war the social urgency is highest and costs do not matter. E.g. the atomic bomb was build within a short time, jet-propulsion, computers were developed .. In medicine progress is made, if it is a rich-mans sickness, and almost no progress is made if its a poor-mans fate. E.g. There is considerable advancement in AIDS-medicine, because it was at least initially a rich-mans sickness, there is almost no progress in Lepra. This can not be explained by the intrinsic difficulties of the deseases. It is also quite a hard problem to generate realistic 3D effects in real-time. There is high social interest (the kids have enough money), so one develops special purpose massive parallel hardware like the latest graphics cards or the Cell processor. The action players and not anymore the D.O.D. are nowadays the driving force behind hardware-development. If there would be the same interest for Go, one could develop special purpose Go-Hardware with an impressive speedup. But Go is like Lepra. Chrilly ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
I don't understand this. For a given hand the odds of winning can be easily calculated for poker and the best play can be formulated accordingly. It's like to program a com[uter to win a coin toss. I would be surprised if any side win big. The only thing a computer can to is to model opponent's behavior, which may deviate from the best play. What did I miss? DL AOL now offers free email to everyone. Find out more about what's free from AOL at AOL.com. ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
Every hand has theoretical winning propability but if you bet exactly according winning odds you tell too much about your hand, other players fold and call and raise according your bets, only when they think they have better cards, that is bad, obivious book play works only starter levels. In poker you example should not raise too much, very often opponent has for example nuts, such cards that they can't lose, so it is stupid to but all your money in if there is very little money in bot. If you raise too little that is bad either as you not get full value of your good cards and turn or river can give better cards for opponents. I don't think have you mist anything, but _modeling opponents behaviour_, that is quite much ask from bot. So what is best play, it depends also how you play, but how bot plays, humans are good for observer simplified behaviour and find weak points from bot. Other hand I think that it should be possible easily measure bots quality, even lot faster and easier than in go game as one hand typically can be played very fast. You could play in one 300 turn go-game 300 poker rounds, so quality of poker bots should be easily evaluated, in 1 rounds small differences start to show up, but that is maybe out of topic. So following things should fafor bot in poker: Exact mathematic. Exact memory is possible. In Prisoners dilemma, atleas if you remember longer opponent moves than your opponent remembers your moves, it does not quarantee your win but it makes it easier if you can use your data right. Bot don't lose temper, and don't care if it is losing or not, attleast starter levels thats not case in humans. Also like money poker is quite much waiting for opportunity and bot should have time to wait. Practical issues are imho much more demanding in go-game AI than in poker AI. For example generating random table in go-game and poker was nice to notice how easy it is generate random flop in poker... t. Harri - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: computer-go@computer-go.org Sent: Friday, July 27, 2007 4:26 AM Subject: Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros I don't understand this. For a given hand the odds of winning can be easily calculated for poker and the best play can be formulated accordingly. It's like to program a com[uter to win a coin toss. I would be surprised if any side win big. The only thing a computer can to is to model opponent's behavior, which may deviate from the best play. What did I miss? DL -- AOL now offers free email to everyone. Find out more about what's free from AOL at AOL.com. -- ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
As I understand it, bots can try to estimate and play at the Nash equilibrium. In some sense, that is optimal. Alternatively/additionally the bot can deviate from equilibrium play based on opponent modelling. Finding the NE is hard. I think that is why the rules are restricted, to make it easier to find the NE. - George On 7/26/07, Dave Dyer [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The only thing a computer can to is to model opponent's behavior, which may deviate from the best play. What did I miss? No, you didn't miss a thing. I look forward to meeting you at a poker table, preferably with high stakes. ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/ ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
In message [EMAIL PROTECTED], Chris Fant [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes On 7/26/07, steve uurtamo [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: There is certainly more money to be made in poker than in go. Yes, but its also more difficult. do you mean this in a casual, unsubstantiated way, or in an exact way? My feeling is that there are a lot of people making a lot of money in online poker by having a bot play for them. They don't like to talk about it because they don't want their situation to change. I myself made a go at it. My bot was able to play fully automated 7 card stud on ParadisePoker.com. It had to read the graphical screen to understand what was going on and when it was it's turn, etc. It played decently, but it was too easy for the other players to catch-on to it's strategy. Eventually I lost interest. That was about 4 years ago. Commercial poker servers forbid the use of bots, and invest some effort in detecting and punishing them (by confiscating their funds). To encourage human customers, they boast of how effective they are at this. People who use poker bots generally keep quiet about it. So when poker bots are discussed, both sides have an interest in downplaying their prevalence. This results in a consensus which IMHO is likely to be some way wide of the truth. Nick -- Nick Wedd[EMAIL PROTECTED] ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
Both. Its probably not so difficult to make a simple bot. But it is also not difficult to make a simple UCT player. But I am sure, that reaching the level of Polaris is more difficult than writing the best Go-programm. I have the feeling, that Polaris is a very serious project. Its certainly not possible to beat it out from nothing like Crazy Stone and MoGo have beaten the Go programms. There is also a lot of work in these 2 programms too and it is not really out of nothing. But its nevertheless not comparable to the work the Billings-group has done. There is also a very large gap between Polaris and the rest. Without Polaris, everybody would say: Oh, its as difficult as Go, the programms are in relation to humans at about the same level. And now Polaris is strong and the argument is: This is because Poker is much easier. No, they have done a better job. i think that you might be confusing two important things: i) the difficulty of a problem. ii) the amount and kind of effort that has gone toward solving a problem. people have been playing go for (depending upon how you judge the gaps) a few thousand years, and yet some of the biggest advances in opening theory have happened in the last fifty years. probably there are many more significant advances that can be made in the opening and the middle game. can the same be said for poker? aside from the (arguably interesting, but perhaps not complicated) fact that your opponent is allowed to misrepresent his situation, a computer program really just has a few simple inputs to deal with -- those cards that it can see, and those bets/folds that people have made. the total number of complete games that a poker program might be expected to play is based upon the number of different cards that it can be expected to see, the maximum number of choices that it may have to make, the number of different bets (or categories of differently-sized bets) that its opponents can make, and perhaps the total number of different opponents that it might be expected to play and where each of those players are seated at the table. i think that it's clear that the size of the problem is smaller (and that our ability to measure being good at the game is less clearly defined) than go. imperfect information does not necessarily mean that a problem is harder. (just as perfect information does not necessarily make a problem hard). if you (say) flip a coin ten thousand times and keep track of the number of heads and tails that you get, i can guess that number to reasonable accuracy even though i have absolutely no information about the actual value other than the process that you used to generate it. if i were to place bets after each and every flip, i could lose all kinds of money playing this game, but that wouldn't mean that i didn't have a perfect strategy. one confusing thing about measuring the ability of a computer poker player play is that even if it loses ten times in a row, it might be the best player at the table. the very best poker players in the world do not consistently win championships, because (as i believe someone else (jacques?) said) the variance is so large. imagine trying to set up ELO rankings for poker players and what would happen to everyone's ranking after each tournament. you could probably establish some broad categories (poor, good, better, best), but it would be difficult to establish exact rankings inside these categories. this doesn't mean that the game is harder, it means that our ability to determine skill is very impaired. go, on the other hand, has, arguably, over 35 independent skill levels, and determining which of these your program is at is a quite simple task. so it's quite easy to measure how successful modern computer go players are. how would we do the same for computer poker players? what's a good measure? what would perfect play look like, and what would the variance in win/loss rate look like against human players? for that matter, what would the variance be among a table composed entirely of perfect computer players? s. Shape Yahoo! in your own image. Join our Network Research Panel today! http://surveylink.yahoo.com/gmrs/yahoo_panel_invite.asp?a=7 ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
On Thu, 2007-07-26 at 18:14 +0200, chrilly wrote: Chess/Go... can be played in an autistic way. There is no need for an opponent model. Ah, an opponent model. Where's the poision? http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093779/quotes#qt0250635 Too much rock, paper, scissors in poker for my tastes. Can there ever be a best player? At least in Go the differences in strength are very clear, and some guy off the street who learned the game a year ago is not going to win a tournament. -Jeff ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
- Original Message - From: steve uurtamo [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: computer-go computer-go@computer-go.org Sent: Thursday, July 26, 2007 5:17 PM Subject: Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros There is certainly more money to be made in poker than in go. Yes, but its also more difficult. do you mean this in a casual, unsubstantiated way, or in an exact way? Both. Its probably not so difficult to make a simple bot. But it is also not difficult to make a simple UCT player. But I am sure, that reaching the level of Polaris is more difficult than writing the best Go-programm. I have the feeling, that Polaris is a very serious project. Its certainly not possible to beat it out from nothing like Crazy Stone and MoGo have beaten the Go programms. There is also a lot of work in these 2 programms too and it is not really out of nothing. But its nevertheless not comparable to the work the Billings-group has done. There is also a very large gap between Polaris and the rest. Without Polaris, everybody would say: Oh, its as difficult as Go, the programms are in relation to humans at about the same level. And now Polaris is strong and the argument is: This is because Poker is much easier. No, they have done a better job. In the exact way its comparing different things. The state space is in Go larger, but Go is from the mathematical point of view in the trivial class: Finite, Full-Information, 2 Players, Deterministic, Zero-Sum. Poker has a random-player and hidden information. In the general case its an N-player. Chess/Go... can be played in an autistic way. There is no need for an opponent model. Just play the best moves. In poker one needs an opponent model. The game-theoretic optimal strategy is only in special cases sufficient. The Polaris-Human match played also the most simple version. Heads-Up Limited. Non-Limited is already much more complicated, because the implied odds have a much greater variance. Or in other words: The opponent-model is much more important in non-limited. In the N-persons version, the state-space explodes too and in this case its not even clear, what a perfect strategy is. I assume Polaris would not be able to be top ranked in the Poker world-series. It would never come in the final round to play Heads-up. The humans would also form a coalition to kick it out at the beginning and real competition would start only afterwards. Chrilly ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
There is certainly more money to be made in poker than in go. Yes, but its also more difficult. do you mean this in a casual, unsubstantiated way, or in an exact way? s. Moody friends. Drama queens. Your life? Nope! - their life, your story. Play Sims Stories at Yahoo! Games. http://sims.yahoo.com/ ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
[computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
The only thing a computer can to is to model opponent's behavior, which may deviate from the best play. What did I miss? No, you didn't miss a thing. I look forward to meeting you at a poker table, preferably with high stakes. ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
Already invented. There is the Alberta Poker-Server. Chrilly - Original Message - From: Chris Fant [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: computer-go computer-go@computer-go.org Sent: Thursday, July 26, 2007 6:16 PM Subject: Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros Someone start a CGOS-like poker server for bots. ~10 person tables, No Limit Texas Hold-em. ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/ ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
Someone start a CGOS-like poker server for bots. ~10 person tables, No Limit Texas Hold-em. ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
I think you mean Darse Billings. Yes, sorry, I can not remember names. There is certainly more money to be made in poker than in go. Yes, but its also more difficult. Chrilly ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
On 7/26/07, chrilly [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: This is a remarkable result. I think poker is more difficult than Go and of course chess. My hypothesis (its just a hypothesis) for the success is. There is someone - Dave Billings - who worked for many years very consequently on the topic. And he is able to motivate a lot of other good people to go along with him. And he gets probably also a lot of support from his boss, J.Schaeffer. And of course, there is some prospect to win fame and money. I think you mean Darse Billings. Playing internet poker used to be accomplished only by using shudder IRC /shudder, and Darse was one of the first to automate IRC poker, at first with aliases that folks just shared with each other, informally, then later with gui front-ends, but the back-end was still IRC. I had the privilege of being on the IRC poker server when Poki made its first appearance. Poki was the first incarnation of Darse's poker bot, and it not only played a respectable game of Texas Hold 'Em, it would also respond to chat requests such as Poki, quote Steve, wherupon it would reproduce a joke by comedian Stephen Wright. Darse was not only smart, he was very friendly and helpful to folks, even those who, although they lacked computer knowledge, wanted to play online poker. Such was the infancy of internet poker. Then along came the world-wide web, and now there are dozens, if not hundreds, of poker servers and their associated clients; it has become a multimillion-dollar industry. The conditions for solving a problem are always at least as important than the problem itself. Maybe are the conditions in Poker better than in Go. There is certainly more money to be made in poker than in go. -- Rich ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
Re: [computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
This is a remarkable result. I think poker is more difficult than Go and of course chess. for people, or computers? poker is a much smaller game than go. s. Fussy? Opinionated? Impossible to please? Perfect. Join Yahoo!'s user panel and lay it on us. http://surveylink.yahoo.com/gmrs/yahoo_panel_invite.asp?a=7 ___ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
[computer-go] U. of Alberta bots vs. the Poker pros
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