Which Game Requires Most Talent?

[Rudbaeck]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

No form of HU poker is going to rank high, as they can actually be fully solved mathematically. (Yes, including deep stack NL hold'em.) It has to be atleast a threehanded game.

[/ QUOTE ]

Could you explain this more please? I don't quite buy it yet.

[/ QUOTE ]

A mathematical discipline aptly called Game Theory can be used to solve problems such as this. Now, GT solutions won't allow you to win, they'll only completely stop you from losing. (Which against an opponent with even a single leak will amount to the same thing in the long run.)

However, once a third player is added to the mix many of the equations are no long solvable.

Poker has to be multiway to be really complex. Now, I don't think any human can do the required equations in their head, but it's trivial to have a bot play flawless HU poker. (It's still very, very hard to make a bot that takes advantage of any leaks you happen to have.)

The Poker Academy Pro has a couple of GT HU bots for hold'em in them.

[x vikram]

TALENT?

OMINOUS!

[HoldemPokerPlyr]

Different games require different skills.

Maybe you should ask, what game is the easiest to learn?

-HoldemPokerPlyr

[rposeagles]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

No form of HU poker is going to rank high, as they can actually be fully solved mathematically. (Yes, including deep stack NL hold'em.) It has to be atleast a threehanded game.

[/ QUOTE ]

Could you explain this more please? I don't quite buy it yet.

[/ QUOTE ]

A mathematical discipline aptly called Game Theory can be used to solve problems such as this. Now, GT solutions won't allow you to win, they'll only completely stop you from losing. (Which against an opponent with even a single leak will amount to the same thing in the long run.)


[/ QUOTE ]

Game theory does not account for tells. The OP specified a B&M game. If Chris Ferguson took off his hat every time he didn't have any hand at all, and took off his glasses when he had the absolute nuts, he'd go broke pretty quick.

I'd still agree that heads-up doesn't take as much poker talent as a game with 3 or 4 players, but anything that is affected by human emotions can't be solved mathematically.

[Snoogins47]

Stop the quibbling over definitions.

"A mathematical discipline aptly called Game Theory can be used to solve problems such as this. Now, GT solutions won't allow you to win, they'll only completely stop you from losing. (Which against an opponent with even a single leak will amount to the same thing in the long run.)"

To put it a little more simply: An optimum strategy, from a Game Theory standpoint, is not going to exploit flaws in the opponent's play: it's not going to win the most money against a human opponent. Thus, it doesn't quite fit the accepted usage of "optimum."

So, if a specific form of HU poker were solved, and a bot programmed to carry it out, the bot wouldn't win the most money, but it would be unbeatable.

[Xellos]

[ QUOTE ]
We know that 1-table SNGs and tournaments can be beat with formulas that would allow a newbie to not be too dominated by a pro. Razz, lo-ball, and jacks or better can also be beat with a near formulaic strategy. Therefore, these don't require much talent, just study and practice.

[/ QUOTE ]

Saying you can beat a game with a "formulaic strategy" is ridiculous. You can beat low limit anything with a "formulaic strategy" - play good hands. Assuming that one wants to move up in limits they will eventually have to change their "formula" and eventually adjust to their opponents as they're playing doing things that will often be incorrect in their formula or the opponent will pick up on the pattern and force you to make mistakes. Unless someone wants to play 2/4 for the rest of their natural lives you cannot follow some magical formula.

There's no way to possibly say what game requires the most talent because it is dependent on a huge amount of variables.

[Hume]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Anything that can easily be taught requires less talent than something where you need to be intuitive.

[/ QUOTE ]
So rock paper scissors requires more "talent" than chess?

[/ QUOTE ]

Are you saying that chess can be easily taught?

[Snoogins47]

The terms need to be much more thoroughly defined, and the question much more specific, before this discussion could actually go anywhere. Are you asking for what game is hardest to teach? Are you asking for what game gives the biggest edge to those who have excellent hand reading skills? Are you just looking for the game where the expert will have the biggest edge over poor players? Maybe, what game would it be hardest to write a successful 'rote strategy' for?

You also have to figure out a way to convince us that poker requires an inborn capacity for intuitively making many proper decisions, that cannot, or is extremely difficult, to learn. Somebody with years of experience and a brilliant mind may be able to recall information more quickly, process it more quickly, and be able to read the hands of other players more successfully than somebody who has this so-called "Cardsense." Does that count as talent?

I don't get the RPS -> Chess comparison either. In fact, here, I'll teach you optimum RPS strategy: do everything one-third of the time.

I think the RPS and Chess example is confusing "requiring intuition" to "requiring lucky guessing" or "requiring gratuitous use of psychic powers." You can't win at RPS if you're breathing through the wrong eyelid.

[SmackinYaUp]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

No form of HU poker is going to rank high, as they can actually be fully solved mathematically. (Yes, including deep stack NL hold'em.) It has to be atleast a threehanded game.

[/ QUOTE ]

Could you explain this more please? I don't quite buy it yet.

[/ QUOTE ]

A mathematical discipline aptly called Game Theory can be used to solve problems such as this. Now, GT solutions won't allow you to win, they'll only completely stop you from losing. (Which against an opponent with even a single leak will amount to the same thing in the long run.)

However, once a third player is added to the mix many of the equations are no long solvable.

Poker has to be multiway to be really complex. Now, I don't think any human can do the required equations in their head, but it's trivial to have a bot play flawless HU poker. (It's still very, very hard to make a bot that takes advantage of any leaks you happen to have.)

The Poker Academy Pro has a couple of GT HU bots for hold'em in them.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm sorry for being difficult, but I'm just genuinely curious about this thought. I guess the reason this concept is difficult for me is because I do way better in 3 and 4 man games than in HU NL games.

Is it really possible to make an unbeatable bot? I'm sure the bot could eventually figure out your bluffing frequency and certain tendencies, but on the other hand a human player is aware of how he is percieved by the bot and can act accordingly in certain situations. And if you are afraid of becoming predictable, then take a dice to the match.

I've always thought that the shorter the game becomes, the less cards matter. And then the less cards matter then the less math matters.

[Rudbaeck]

[ QUOTE ]
Is it really possible to make an unbeatable bot?

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes, but only for HU play.

[ QUOTE ]
I'm sure the bot could eventually figure out your bluffing frequency and certain tendencies, but on the other hand a human player is aware of how he is percieved by the bot and can act accordingly in certain situations.

[/ QUOTE ]

Now you are assuming that the unbeatable bot also plays optimally against you. It does not. A bot that can extract the maximum from you HU is still so far away that it's not credible threat in the foreseeable future.

The math finds a pair of strategies where each player loses the minimum. If one player moves away from this equilibrium point he loses more, no matter in which direction he moves. So unless you play the same strategy as the bot you lose. But you won't lose much, as the bot doesn't capitalize on any specific mistakes you make.

Dynamically figuring out where you wandered off to, and finding a new strategy that exploits you for the maximum based on your new strategy is immensely more complex than this.

Given a long enough sample size Phil Ivey is never going to win against this bot. But Ivey will bust you alot faster than the bot will.

A bot that busts you as fast as Ivey does is just a pipe dream at the moment.

See the difference between Ivey and the bot now?