@RedMan, you are trying to prove that what I observe is impossible.

I'm planning to write a book in 10 years from now and then I'll bump this thread with all the evidence that you'll love, or not, to see.

For the time being, you have to trust me. In fact I assume that everyone that reads what I'm writing trusts me. I know that this is a little bit too much to assume, but it's one's only option to stay in synch with reallity.

P.S. Your example with the two games is literaturaly brilliant, but it has some flaws. They seems rather practical (and psyhological). You want to rationalize joint bot+human environment by pointing out that both can exist, or taken alone are similar wrt winners and losers. I argued many times about that, that the ratio of winning-losing botters equals the one of winning-losing players.

In practice, however, a bot only ecosystem cannot sustain, for psychological reasons and believes (on which is built the complete poker ecosystem). Majority of the botters think that bots should be forbidden, and the only way for them to make money are the human fishes, which thinking is what keeps motivating the losing botters to continue to lose money. If that is taken apart, it will not sustain.

Why do you think its a myth?

People expect to play against pros but not bots. Therefore expert players arent scum bags, but botters are breaking the rules, dishonestly sidestepping a reasonable expectation of players that they will be up against other humans. Also theres a big difference with bots as opposed to players in that bots can run for long periods of time.

I dont play much poker, and not for a living.

Elementary eh?

Congrats on the ill gotten gains.

I don't really post much just lurk constantly but this post is interesting to me i have been botting since 1999 started on paradise poker, My first bot was a commercially available bot that can still be found to this day. This bot has two parts really one part it just has a map of the tables coded into it for the poker sites and it knows where the call raise fold buttons are and that is it. This bot can also select tables based on flop seen % and pot size in the lobby. The second part is the brain of the bot and it has code that stores all the information and this is the part that makes bots play the way they do I have spent 1000's of hours basically coding in different flop turn and river combinations and now I pretty much have every single one. This bot also contains ways to bluff how often and on what type of scary boards to try and bluff. The thing about the botting environment is that it has changed drastically my bot used to play 10-20 and 20-40, but now their really aren't enough players at these levels to make botting a real option no more 4-6 tabling these levels. My biggest winning bot was my 7 stud bot because basically it has more complete information and can calculate exatly the chances and make a best pratcices decison. I don't think bots will ever be able to play good no limit or pot limit omaha games but lhe and stud are definetly two games that can be populated by bots. But would that really be a bad thing ? A bot may make the best mathematical decision but running bad is running bad.

They also expect that moving all-in UTG with 77 is profitable, cause they've seen it on TV. But it's not. There is perception, and there is reallity.

You are right that they at first might be surprised that there are bots. The next step is to find out that they can possibly beat 95% of them. This isn't such a long road, is it?

I think the reason why some people don't like bots is because bots don't read and chat.

Some people would like when they lose against a two outer, that they are able to say "you mf donk, you suck at poker, frn luckbox", and know that he read it or even reply and engage in clarification of how much exactly did he lucked out. It is special pleasure if he gets a reply (if he not - he'll accuse his opponents of being bots at some point).

Bot, on the other hand, will not care what they talk to him. He will luckout, or lose big, but just continue to play - hand after hand after hand after hand.

Could somebody elaborate on the sucess of ICM bots thusfar.

Being an SNG Turbo player I do beleive it would be relitively easy to come up with a bot that could beat mid/low stake Turbo SNG's quite easily and for a reasonable ROI. BTW I do think that poker botting is nothing short of stealing and has a good chance to ruin the game for everyone if capable no-limit models are introduced.

Trying to say that using HUD's or hand history analysis software is the same as using a bot is just ludicrous. For one thing for the mostpart these programs are allowed by the sites and bots are not for obvious reasons.

Obviously there is noway to convince some of you, but would you steal from a bank or from your neighbour?

However, human beings are great at rationalising even the most immoral, evil choices and some of you have done exactly that.

People will want to play against bots, but not competitively.

A chess player will play Chessmaster 2000, or AOL chess, in order to practice, or to have fun. But most chess players, including me, would not want to play against a bot for a cash prize.

Likewise, the same players that use Wilson Turbo software will play against a poker bot, but not for money.

Exchanging hand histories is actually worse than using bots, because it is a form of collusion and unfair advantage. Bots isn't.

HUDs and trackers are also forbidden by some sites (I'm not sure of FTP - in any case they strenghten their policies recently, but Cake Poker for sure), so obviously you are wrong.

In fact - both HUDs and bots are pretty much on the same level. They do computations that no human can do, and they does not provide unfair advantage. But they both can be misused to provide such (in combination with exchanging hands, or for boths - in combintion with colluison).

Bots are not good for internet poker. While it has intellectual perks (I've dabbled in similar subjects, but not this specific one), I can't see bots benefiting online gambling. It just adds another degree of "questionableness" to the whole scene. Pokertracker is similar but not as bad. At least with Pokertracker, humans are still making the decisions. Can anyone disagree that this will eventually be the downfall of online poker? Someone earlier in the post alluded to the fact that computers use to get dominated by humans, now humans are lucky to tie the best computer at chess. Technological advancement isn't a linear function. What is now, might be 8x tomorrow.

Also, it is borderline false advertising. When you play online poker for real money, you are running under the assumption that you are playing real people. The sites don't bother to say "You may play against bots." Why? Because it would affect the amount of money (rake) they make - it would literally turn some people off from the whole notion of online poker.

It is imperative that poker companies are proactively banning bots. Not for short term reason, but long term.

Well I am a security software engineer for a midsized company, and I don't view them as "OK." You have to think a few steps ahead. Where will this lead online poker in general? And what makes you think that bots won't make online poker a waste of time (ie: people's edge reduced to minimal edge.) You assume that bots won't get much better than they are now which is a huge fallacy indicative of inexperience with technology.

The comparison between chess and poker is a misnomer. There are too many random variables in poker.

Bots are unfair, plain and simple. Players should rise and fall based solely on their own skills. That being said, a solid player can read up on the game, gain experience during live play, and sharpen their poker skills to secure an edge against opponents. That is certainly my goal. In the past week I had fantastic runs in both directions, gaining $4100 in less than half an hour and losing roughly $2000 over a period of two hours. When I lose it challenges me to improve my play.

Playing against a computer can be a useful training exercise but that does not qualify as a "bot" per se. Any computer aided assistance during a live game against a human opponent is cheating pure and simple. It derails the spirit of the game. In the old West, people were shot dead when they cheated.

Where will it stop? Pokerstars is already looking in your computer for illegal programs. FullTilt is closing accounts and KEEPING THE MONIES. That's a little too much "big brother" for me...

Over the long term that doesn't matter, now does it? It wasn't a comparison between chess and poker, but rather a statement how technology can do things that we perceive impossible today tomorrow.

One way to avoid the influence of these bots is to insist on more player interaction at onling gaming tables. I am always frustrated that the speed of play leaves minimal time for conversation.

I doubt the practive of closing player accounts is very widespread. People would stop playing if online casinos were abusing this practice.

I am a bot and I will take all ur monies. Haha hahaha.

Out, damned bot! out, I say!

OK, lots of random stuff above.

I think the checkm8 posts were the only meaningful so I ignore the rest.

checkm8 - bots are no issue for online poker, I'm endlessly making this argument and wonder why more people don't pick this up. The argument is the following (and there are always really the same examples brought).

Bots, as automation, is not an issue. Think about that, and this is really simple excersize: If there were no bots allowed now in a online chess for money site, will this fly? Obviously no. Because people with get second PC - or a hardware chess calculator. Second example. If no bots are allowed in blackjack - will it fly? - No, because edges are so small.

What is the conclusion here? That it is not the bot that is the issue, it is the advancement of computer poker that endagers the game. But should we stop PokerAcademy and shutdown University of Alberta just for the sake of online poker - obviously, no.

So when a game is sufficiently solved - we simply have to move to the next one. Both humans and botters.

Second argument. If I look now at the sites that DO allow bots - which is - they do abs nothing about bots and everyone knows it, but they limit the number of tables, they are softer and easier to beat than PokerStars. What does this tells us? -> What I always repeat. That winning/losing ratio of botters is just the same as the one of humans.

Hau.

Excuse me for trying to add a little of the classics into the forum

The irony may be too subtle for you...
But you view Bots run by teenagers as a Great Evil...
While shooting "cheaters" dead without due process...
Is a cool element of the game or poker.

Yes.

Except the Top 5% human players... are significantly stronger players than the Top 5% botters... and that will NOT change without huge capital investment by large corporations (which is not happening). A bunch of teens running micro-stakes Bots should not be scary.

What's limiting poker growth is the 2-3 Poker Pros at every table. Average, recreational players pay the rake... PLUS they pay the profit/rake for the 2-3 Poker Pros at each table.

Let's use a $11 SNG with 2 Pros making 15% ROI and 8 recreational players. The 2 Pros put up $22 and win $25.30. The 8 rec players put up $88... and lose $11.30. So the EFFECTIVE rake for recreational players is not 10%... it is actually 12.8%. In reality, it's probably more.

The Sharks are the "problem"... not Bots.