Which poker variation is less exploitable by pure math strategy?

[chaide]

Nl holdem shorthanded?, draw poker?

[pokervintage]

Paradoxically - Chinese Poker -. It may be the simplest of all poker games but not exploitable in anyway.

pokervintage.

[chaide]

It is the worst game i ever seen

[pokervintage]

[ QUOTE ]
It is the worst game i ever seen

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I know professional poker players that believe it is the best game that there is. I`ve been told that Linda Johnson won a lot of money playing chinese poker but can`t verify that.

pokervintage

[SplawnDarts]

[ QUOTE ]
Paradoxically - Chinese Poker -. It may be the simplest of all poker games but not exploitable in anyway.

pokervintage.

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If you even consider it poker, I suppose that would be the obvious choice.

Of more traditional games, I would put up KCL. The math is dirt simple and not enough by itself to give you an edge against even the most marginal of players. You simply HAVE to learn to read your opponents.

[chaide]

what does kcl mean?

[Nsight7]

KCL = Kansas City Lowball

And as for least exploitable by math, you guys are way off on Chinese Poker. With such a simple game form developing a rigerous mathematical strategy is realtively easy, thus it is VERY exploitable mathematically. Unless by "mathematically exploitable" you mean "use math to gain BIG edge", in which case Chinese Poker would be bad. In the sense that I mean it, it means that you are very unlikely to be beatable while employing a particular mathematical strategy no matter what the other opponent does, even if your edge is only slight and your variance is high (as would naturally be the case with a game like Chinese Poker).

[SplawnDarts]

[ QUOTE ]
KCL = Kansas City Lowball

And as for least exploitable by math, you guys are way off on Chinese Poker. With such a simple game form developing a rigerous mathematical strategy is realtively easy, thus it is VERY exploitable mathematically. Unless by "mathematically exploitable" you mean "use math to gain BIG edge", in which case Chinese Poker would be bad. In the sense that I mean it, it means that you are very unlikely to be beatable while employing a particular mathematical strategy no matter what the other opponent does, even if your edge is only slight and your variance is high (as would naturally be the case with a game like Chinese Poker).

[/ QUOTE ]

The problem is that Chinese poker is arguably not really exploitable at all - sane opponents rarely if ever make mistakes, so you can't profit. It's just a very complicated slot machine - played with a rake, everybody loses.

That said, it doesn't belong in this debate at all really.

My other candidate for games that can't be effectively exploited via math would be no limit 5 card stud. The math's dirt simple, but it tells you almost nothing.

[Nsight7]

I even think about rake. I just said it was exploitable (i.e. an optimal playing solution can be derived).

I think everyone has a different idea of what exploitable means than I. You guys seem to be of the opinion that "exploitable" means "make money". When I think "exploitable" I think "optimal". In all other forms of poker that I can think of, optimal forms of poker don't exist in mathematically soluble form. In Chinese Poker, I can at least envision it being soluble for an optimal strategy. In the sense that you guys are talking though Chinese Poker is not quite so exploitable since (as I did note above) the variance is high and expected value low. However, since the word "math" was used in the thread title I assumed we were talking optimal strategy of the mathematical variety.

However, I would question how sane most players are....

[SplawnDarts]

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I even think about rake. I just said it was exploitable (i.e. an optimal playing solution can be derived).

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Exploitability and the existence of an easy optimum solution are exactly contrary concepts here