POKI"S Poker Software/ reviewed?

[PokerHorse]

I did a search but couldnt find a review of the recently released POKIS software from the University of Alberta.It was modeled after Sklansky's Poker theory and holdem books.
Anyone with experience with this product?

[Twitch1977]

I have purchased this software and played it quite a bit. When I got it, I was just starting out playing hold'em I had read a few books and whatnot but I was no expert, now upon initially installing this software using their pre-configured 'main' table I was able to usually turn a small profit.

You can tweak all the bots playing all you want and I'm sure if I made a custom table with all 'strong' bots (you can adjust all sorts of sliders for each) they'd be able to stomp me like an orphan.

I won't comment much on the play of the bots because I'm no expert in poker to begin with. From what I read in another review (I forget where I saw it) the individual who sounded more experienced then me said that he thought it played quite well.

Now as far as the interface and stuff goes, it's all done in Java, is prone to crashing and will at times eat all your computer's RAM and processor to the point where you need to reboot. This happens 95% of the time if you lock your computer in 2k, XP etc then come back and unlock it.

The interface itself is good, it's easy to set different limits, preset bankrolls, you can even adjust the type of hands that are dealt, for instance you can get it to deal you only the top 20% of all possible hands etc. You can also set it to deal you a specific hand or specific board. There is a hint function which is basically another 'poki-bot' running telling you what to do.

Now the strength of poki-bot is the modelling of a player over time, the more it plays against you the better it is suppose to get, so the game allows you to store multiple profiles and all that jazz.

(I'm just kinda going through the program now trying to highlight it's interesting points.)

You can set it so you're allowed to 'peek' at opponents cards, play all face up, all face down.

There is a showdown calculator as well that is good for finding out which hand will win in a given situation it can do it either by simulation or by enumeration if you have more time.

A note about licencing, when you order this program you can install it on two computers, it does an online registration, and only lets your product id get registered twice. You can also order a CD based ver that plays on as many machines as you want as long as you have the CD (which lacks any sort of copy protection - go figure) in the CD drive.

Anyways, this post is a mess, I hope something in here helped, if you have a specific question please lemme know and I'll try my best to answer it. If you want any screenshots of a feature, just lemme know.

Twitch

[PokerHorse]

I'm wondering how it stacks up to turbo. Im really not that hot on the turbo. I'm quessing i'm expecting too much from these programs.

[avatar77]

Rolf 'Ace' Slotboom reviewed this product and gave it a very positive review. His review is in the 2+2 archive if you can find it.

I did look into it a couple of months ago and couldn't find any other reviews (other than Ace's).

I did start a post on this a few months ago but didn't really get a good response.

It would be great if Mason would take some time to check it out and gave us his opinion on this.

[Twitch1977]

I purchased Poki in May I think, since then there have been several upgrades which have made the interface of the game better, that was drastically needed. So it's good to see updates coming at a regular pace.

If you want a 'demo' of the poki-bot AI, go to http://www.cs.ualberta.ca/~games/poker/ if you look in the top left area of the main page you can see a section where you can log into a crappy java interface and play vs poki and a few other bots.

Remember though that poki's strength comes from modelling you overtime, so if you go there don't be surprised if you drastically outplay him for the first hands.

Twitch.

[PokerHorse]

Well i went ahead and bought the software. So far Im impressed with the players to a limited degree, but the advisor wants me to call raises from early posisition with
q-10 suited if im in late posisition with no other callers, and a-7 suited with one caller, also k-q off suit in other situations. I just dont call raises with this type of hand.
But on the other hand , over all it plays very similar to my 15-30 game... definately better than turbo. They need to add some bells and whistles etc. I'll update the forum, alittle down the road as i use some of the other features of the product.

[Twitch1977]

If you go under one of the menu's you can edit the 'Advisor' just like any other bot. You can set your pre-flop tightness and all those settings in there.

I was able to customize it to the point where it's pre-flop hand selection was close to mine.

T