[1][2][3] These bots or computer programs are used often in online poker situations as either legitimate opponents for humans players or a form of cheating.
[citation needed] One kind of bot can interface with the poker client (in other words, play by itself as an auto player) without the help of its human operator.
RTA is when a human player uses program called a “solver” such as PioSOLVER or PokerSnowie,[4] running on a different computer,[5] to make their decisions.
[citation needed] Another method is to use CAPTCHAs at random intervals during play to catch automated bots, although isn’t effective against Real-Time Assistance.
Both brick and mortar casino shills and online house bots are not supposed to have access to any information that is not also available to any other player in the hand.
[9][10] Poker is a game of imperfect information (because some cards in play are concealed) thus making it harder for anyone (including a computer) to deduce the final outcome of the hand.
Because of this lack of information, the computer's programmers used to have to implement systems based on the Bayes theorem, Nash equilibrium, Monte Carlo simulation or neural networks, all of which are imperfect techniques.
Older AIs like PokerSnowie and Claudico were created by allowing the computer to determine the best possible strategy by letting it play itself an enormous number of times.
In this case, a perfect strategy is one that correctly or closely models those weaknesses and takes advantage of them to make a profit, such as those explained above.
In 2019, Pluribus (a newer version of Libratus)[11] demonstrated superhuman ability at six-player no-limit hold'em, the most commonly played single variety of poker in the world.
Until 2017, a team from the University of Auckland consisted of a small number of scientists who employ case-based reasoning to create and enhance Texas Hold’em poker agents.
Poki has been licensed for the entertainment game STACKED featuring Canadian poker player Daniel Negreanu.
[15][16][17] T. Sandholm and A. Gilpin from Carnegie Mellon University started poker AI research in 2004 beginning with unbeatable agent for 3-card game called Rhode-Island Hold 'em.
[20] The Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) used to host competitions where the competitors submit a piece of software capable of playing poker on their specific platform.
[citation needed] In the summer 2005, the online poker room Golden Palace hosted a promotional tournament in Las Vegas, at the old Binions, with a $100k giveaway prize.
In the summer 2007, the University of Alberta hosted a highly specialized heads-up tournament between humans and their Polaris bot, at the AAAI conference in Vancouver, BC, Canada.
From April–May 2015, Carnegie Mellon University Sandholm's bot, Claudico, faced off against four human opponents, in a series of no-limit Texas Hold'em matches.
The competition was motivated by scientific research, and there was an emphasis on ensuring that all of the results are statistically significant by running millions of hands of poker.
So as of December 2012 the following top groups and individual researchers’ agents could be found: [28] The final poker contest was not public.
When the Pluribus (poker bot) program consistently beat professionals at 6-hand no-limit Hold’em, the result was quietly announced on a Facebook post.