Quote:
Originally Posted by 4-Star General
Ty for the clarification, I have one more question, if you don't mind.
Last time I checked Snowie hasn't show any proof that is strong and on 2p2 some user said that could be a scam. So since you are using a lot, did you verify its reliability?
I also know a HS HU reg is using it in game, but people don't care and play him without any fear...
Full disclosure: I got paid a small amount of money to make those Snowie videos on their site as well as give them and another company feedback on their software. It was I believe the same amount I get paid for normal CardRunners videos, so it wasn't like extra money to advertise the product (which I wouldn't do anyways and if I did I'd disclose it the same way I'm doing now). But either way, I've gotten to talk to the guys at PokerSnowie a bit (this was several years ago).
My thoughts on Snowie are this (more thoughts in the book):
1. The guys who made it are really, really smart. If I had to make a list of the 5 smartest people I think I've ever gotten to talk to for at least a couple hours, at least one of the guys on their team would make that short list. I just think he was super, super intelligent based on my few conversations with him.
So, when many moons ago PokerSnowie used to advertise itself as "learn to play poker perfectly" or "play perfect GTO poker," (or however it did, please don't take these as exact quotes for what it said) it's hard for me to believe they didn't realize these claims were at least somewhat exaggerated. I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt in general, so my guess is they likely got overly excited with their (IMO) very good software and made some exaggerated claims. I think this may have actually ended up hurting them in the long run, because PokerSnowie faced more backlash than it should of when it was first released for this reason and it even makes a guy like me (who really likes Snowie) now feel the need to go "Guys, this isn't playing GTO and some of the claims its made in the past aren't true" even though that really shouldn't be an issue.
2. I've had at least a few MSNL and HSNL/nosebleed players talk to me about PokerSnowie and how much they like it. If they can benefit from it, then I think most players can.
3. Over the past few years, I've said many times in many videos you can actually find river spots where PokerSnowie has to be playing poorly from a GTO perspective. Spots where it bets/folds 95%+ of its range. I don't know how many of these "leaks" are still there, nor do I really care because I don't think that's the point of the program. But it does stress that this isn't some perfect GTO software, if there were ever any doubts (and there really shouldn't be).
4. Poker is a super part time thing for me right now and likely always will be. That said, I still pay about $200/year to use that software and have never asked them (other than when I was initially working with them) to get to use it for free since I think it's worth the money to me. Most of the people I talk poker with prefer PioSOLVER to PokerSnowie, but it's still pretty common for them to ask me if I can check out how PokerSnowie would play a given situation if they don't already have the software themselves.
There's an entire section of the book that talks about PokerSnowie and PioSOLVER and what I think the advantages/disadvantages of each program are. I think both pieces of software are very impressive.
Hopefully that helps. At the end of the day I really think watching videos/advanced software/books/discussing hands in person or online/coaching etc etc are all useful and you should just use whatever combination of them you think is best. I really don't think there's any super simple and straight forward way to get good at poker and if there was then poker wouldn't exist for very long anyways.
Last edited by Matthew Janda; 04-30-2017 at 08:40 PM.
Reason: BECAUSE I EDIT EVERYTHING AFTER I POST