
The Science of Winning Poker - bonchibuji
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323610704578625812355516182.html
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tedsanders
>A few years ago, a young pro named Phil Galfond published a crucial
refinement to Mr. Sklansky's point. He showed that the right way to analyze a
poker decision is to consider your opponent's "range"—that is, the full set of
different hands that he could plausibly have, given all the actions that he
has thus far taken.

I find it impossible to believe that concept of a "range" was (a) invented a
few years ago and (b) invented by Phil Galfond. This article is disappointing.

Edit: In fairness, the article's sentence is literally correct. But I cringe
at its implication.

~~~
Fuzzwah
I have a theorem which I refer to as the Fuzzwah theory, it goes like this:

"The more you know about a topic, the more it will annoy you when it is
covered by the main stream media."

Once you realize this with regards to topics you're knowledgeable about you
start taking coverage of ALL topics with a grain of salt, knowing that someone
who knows all about it is probably cringing and / or yelling at how poorly it
is being reported.

PS: I was obsessed with online poker a few years back and was an avid 2plus2
forum reader. The 1st person which I recall giving excellent advice about
putting people on a range was Cole "CTS" South. He even sold an ebook called
Let There Be Range for (initially, from memory) something like $5,000 a pop
(it still sells for $1400 on amazon
[http://www.amazon.com/dp/0982402252](http://www.amazon.com/dp/0982402252) )

~~~
scoot
Mainstream media? I occasionally cringe at some of the discussion here on
subjects I know something about, seeing how badly wrong smart people can get
it. (Thankfully most of the discussion on HN is on subjects I know little
about, or are that are way over my head! :-) )

~~~
eshvk
What is your point? No one can be smart at everything. Just because one
occasionally writes words that helps computers do things doesn't mean one's
world view is not silly when it comes to other things.

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jackschultz
There's another element in there. The one about relative skill. Let's say that
you're a much better player than the other person, and that you would win 90%
of the time heads up (one on one, which we are going to assume at this point
for simplicity). If this were the case, you would need to have a greater than
90% chance to win the hand all in for it to be a correct move.

This is also easy to understand if you, a novice, are heads up against one of
the pros. It's a much better move for you to go all in on any decent hand and
just try to get lucky to win, since if you try to play their game, you're
going to lose.

~~~
r_s
Many poker players who study theory see this as incorrect. Ill try explain the
other side.

I will avoid the fact that a 90% winrate in a format like you describe (heads
up sit and go) is not even remotely possible vs anyone who knows the basic
rules. In heads up sit and goes 2-5% roi is generally considered great at any
non micro level. Poker (especially online) is more of a volume game. However,
roi is very flawed which I will get to. Generally the most profitable players
are ones who crank out a small winrate over large amounts of volume.

Here is the problem though, we really are not concerned with winning a single
game in a format like this. Our top concern is making money. In a winner take
all heads up tournament chipEV == $EV so we can just call it EV in this format
and not worry about ICM. If we are playing for a living we want to make the
most amount of money, so each session we want to maximize our EV (win the most
amount of chips). Most internet players worry about their winrate in BB/100 or
EV adjusted $/hr.

When we get into a situation which we are a 1% favorite for full stacks vs a
player we have a large edge on, we should still take it, its money in our
pocket long term. If we lose we pray the opponent accepts a rematch. This is
especially true for heads up games which usually only last a few minutes and
its possible to play 100-200 games per day. A 3% winrate at $100 stakes with
this volume becomes a significant amount of money even before factoring in
site bonuses (likely a bit over $1/game) etc.

Not related to your comment, but doesn't deserve another post is that poker
really is a great game and its unfortunate how its perceived by so many. Ive
been playing for 3 years professionally and coached on a popular training
site, yet after transitioning to programming (With a cs degree) I get laughed
at by recruiters and seen as a degenerate.

~~~
mitchi
why tell them you play in the interview?

~~~
llamataboot
why not? It demonstrates the ability to hold a huge amount of information in
your head at once, make rapid decisions in a high pressure environment, and do
what are essentially Bayesian probability calculations in your head. I may be
biased as someone that played poker to put myself through grad school and had
a nice hourly rate by the end of it, but I think that it requires a high
intelligence, the ability to emotionally disconnect from decisions, and the
ability to retain and act on such large amounts of information that it's a
definite positive. (It's also really boring and psychologically brutal at
times and I wouldn't recommend it to many folks.)

~~~
mitchi
Are you still a winning player? Were you playing before Black Friday? I heard
it was easier. I studied the game a lot these past few months and I barely
break even. I'm only winning in live poker.

~~~
llamataboot
Not sure...there is a dearth of games now for US players and I was so
disgusted with my money getting wrapped up in the Full Tilt BS that I went
away from poker for about a year. I am certainly still a winning player at
live poker, but the hourly rate can be a bit dismal and I don't enjoy it
enough to do it everyday, or even once a week.

I would say that by 2008 the average live game was strong enough that I
definitely had to practice disciplined game/seat selection, couldn't just sit
down anywhere and expect my edge was higher than the rake.

I agree HU strategies advanced exponentially once stoxpoker and some other
video sites came on and people started being heads-up specialists.

~~~
mitchi
I'm hoping the US players can come back online soon. I'm not saying US players
are bad but it can't be harder than playing Russians hyper-LAGs all day.

------
tedsanders
>Bluffing still matters, but the best players now depend on math theory

This is a silly byline. If anything, the best and most mathematical players
bluff more than the older generation of typically more conservative players.
Bluffing and math are NOT opposed principles.

~~~
dubfan
That's not what byline means.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byline](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byline)

~~~
foobarbazqux
That just makes it an even sillier byline.

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MichaelApproved
For those interested in more poker discussions
[http://www.reddit.com/r/poker](http://www.reddit.com/r/poker)

~~~
tempestn
Also [http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/](http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/)

~~~
ryguytilidie
Been reading 2p2 for 10 years and was a mod at one point. I would say its
about 500000x more valuable than reddit poker.

~~~
tempestn
That would've been my initial assessment too, but I've never read reddit
poker, so I didn't feel qualified to compare the two...

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newernpguy
There are some references that could be interesting:

[http://statspotting.com/is-poker-a-game-of-skill-or-
chance/](http://statspotting.com/is-poker-a-game-of-skill-or-chance/)

