[Snoogins47]

"
I love to hear all of this talk about the perfect Bot and how it could beat any Hold-Em player by playing defensively.

For those of you who are on the border - don't believe it.

First of all Hold-em is not only a game of skill, but also a game of luck. If what these poeple are claiming is true, that there is a perfect bot that will always win, and that players like Phil Ivey nearly mimic the bot, then Phil should ALMOST NEVER lose!"

When used in a discussion like this, the only reasonable definition of "unbeatable" or "won't lose" is that there will be no edge against this bot, regardless of how you play. That's the most skill can do for anybody in a game with an element of randomness.

This, of course, all amounts to how close HU hold'em is to being solved. I don't know, but from what little I have seen/read, it seems that a HU game with no betting after the flop could probably be solved, or very close to it. The game tree branches out to an astounding number of branches if we make any considerations after the flop. I can't comment further, because I don't know how developed bots are in.

Another way to think about how a GT approach would work, but wouldn't be perfect, is to think about a simple bluffing play.

An optimum bluffing frequency against one player would be such that regardless of the frequency that your opponent calls you, your results do not change. It's a strategy that is unexploitable.

But would this strategy win the most money against a player who makes fundamental errors? Like say, an opponent that will call every single time? I think this example shows both the power of an unexploitable strategy, and the very, very prominent shortcomings.