• jawa21@piefed.blahaj.zone
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      26
      ·
      20 hours ago

      No, but it is irrelevant. Data could cheat on a scale that none of them could match, especially since he is dealing. He’d be capable of stacking the deck so fast that it is imperceptible - even potentially a few turns ahead. His advantage here is ridiculous.

    • mkwt@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      13
      ·
      20 hours ago

      Card counting can conceivably provide information, but it’s not likely to because the deck is shuffled for every hand and there are usually a bunch of cards you never get to see.

      Card counting works in blackjack when many hands are dealt from the same deck or shoe, and discards are placed face up so they can be counted.

      The more cards you’ve seen, the more information you have about what’s left in the deck.

    • cynar@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      10
      ·
      19 hours ago

      It does, but not in the way it does in blackjack.

      Basically, if you can guess at the cards people have thrown away, you can update your probability map of what is likely to come out.

      Most players use a fixed mapping for calculation, since it gets maths heavy. Data could do it in real time and gain a small edge.

      He could also correlate betting patterns with historical plays to estimate hands. All good players do this, but data would be excellent at it.

      • Thebeardedsinglemalt@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        4
        ·
        17 hours ago

        Counting is also significantly more complex for poker than it would be for blackjack. With blackjack you don’t have to take the suit into account, and each card except Aces have a static value when trying to add up to 21.

        With poker, a single card’s value is significantly different depending on the other cards in your hand. A 4 of hearts is only significant of you have several hearts, other 4s of other suits, or consecutive numbered cards for a straight.

        • cynar@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          14 hours ago

          That’s why most poker players use static probabilities. It gets even worse when there uncertainty involved. E.g. your 40% sure a player had an AK before folding. Along with an 80% they didn’t have a spade.

          The Human mind is incredibly good at doing calculations like this. Unfortunately it has to be learnt, and is in the form of “feels” rather than actionable probabilities.

      • Frezik@lemmy.blahaj.zone
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        4
        ·
        18 hours ago

        It’s also important to note that if Poker were just about probability, we would have had computers beating everyone a long time ago. It’s a much more complicated problem than that.