Poki to be commercially released!

[Munga30]

www.poki-poker.com

I've enjoyed playing on the UAlberta servers for free, but I don't think I can justify $70.

[Jim Easton]

Looks like a competitor to Turbo. Is it any good? A review from Mason would be nice.

[AcesFull]

Hi Jim Easton and 2+2;

I just purchased and downloaded the Poki-poker software last Friday and I've "only" had the chance to use it about 12 hours or so. It's a little over 20 Megs, so it took about 1.5 hours to download on my dial-up. I was so excited to be able get my hands on something like Poki for quite awhile. I believe having access to a poker sparring partner that is strong enough to be a challenge is the ultimate learning tool to becoming a better player. And it can be alot of fun to try things out on it. We already have such wonderful software opponents for chess, backgammon, gin, cribbage and bridge, etc.

I've been waiting for a Poker software opponent that approached the strategy sophistication and ability along the lines of the strength of JellyFish, Snowie or gnu-backgammon for backgammon. Does this commercial version of Poki meet those tough (impossible?) standards for Texas Holdem? Probably not. Maybe. I can't answer that in 12 hours of playing with it. But remember, something like Snowie can play at near world-class level for backgammon.

However, this commerical version of Poki can play one hell of a tough holdem game! Probably close to near-expert level. It will make some very sophisticated moves and it "learns" how you play from data modeling, so it gets better and better against you. You must create a profile name that uniquely identifies YOU to Poki, just like a handle on a online cardroom. But don't cheat Poki, and let your wife play on the same profile name.

First, a little background on me---just so you guys at 2+2 know that I'm qualified to properly review this commericial version of Poki. As you can see from my "post count", I don't post much here. But, I've lurked here from Day One and read almost everything in the Internet section, Books and Software and sometimes MidLimit.

I'm a full-time professional poker player since 1997. I play both online and B&M and am getting into tournaments a little more recently. I've taken several hours of private lessons from David Sklansky during the last few years to refine and sharpen my game.

I've also played internet online poker from the beginning at Casino Coco and then Planet Poker back in 1998. I played as AcesFull at those two places as well as Paradisepoker. I've also play at other sites under different names that I won't reveal to you Sharks here [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img] Online, I mostly play 15/30, 20/40 and 30/60. At the B&M, I mostly play 30/60 and 40/80.

OK, back to Poki-poker....

I've played about 1,100 hands on it. There's a option for the action to move at maximum speed once you fold your hand. There's also a option to set AutoDeal which automatically clicks the Next Hand button, so you get continuous hand after hand. Just like a online cardroom with just a minor pause between hands. In fact, since the Poki software plays so well, I often feel like I'm playing a paradise 20/40 online game instead of a computer-based opponents.

Based on my limited 12 hours of play, I strongly believe that this Poki software plays tougher than about 80% of the Paradise 20/40 tables. That's using the MAIN TABLE that's preconfigured and comes with the software. You can design your own opponents and tables as well.

Now, it is important to note that in my testing of the Poki software, I only played at the Main Table (which is the toughest table, there's also a Gamblers Table= loose, some maniacs, etc.) which is a full ten-handed game. Also, I don't employ any "bot discriminatory" strategies. That is, I treat each of the bots as they were real humans playing online 20/40 game. I'm not sure if trying to "crack" the bots would work or not. But in this initial testing, I just wanted to check if it could play a strong enough game against me. And later when I have time, I'll challenge the headsup bots. I'm a good , but not great heads up player. So, maybe someone else that buys the software and is a great heads up player can review that aspect.

I have alot more to say about Poki including some of the flaws and the lack of a "setup scenario option". There's also a minor bug in the 1.0.0 version that has the dealer button always returning to the user profile position when you come back to the same table regardless of where the button was last when you left that table. I've already email the support department regarding this matter. They wrote back immediately and said that will be fixed in the update and that options to setup scenarios will be developed soon.

I'm sure this software is going to be a super hot topic once some poker players experience it. I'm going to post more about my progress against Poki in a few days.

But it's getting late now and I have to go to bed....

[Redleg7]

AcesFull,
Can you compare it to Turbo Texas Hold'em?

Thanks.

[bmedwar]

I've played the TTHv5 demo for 10 minutes and 750 Poki hands (mostly 10 player table; some heads-up). The main thing that stands out is that Poki has a much nicer interface. It looks kind of like Paradise poker. The menu's and dialog boxes are easy to access and don't get in the way. And it is FAST. I was blazing through hands. I think this is important, b/c it helps you baseline different strategies quickly.

I am a novice poker player (have read some books, play weekly neighborhood game, on my last trip to Vegas I "survived" the 4-8 games at Binion's and Billigio).

Compared to free games on Paradise and Yahoo!, Poki is a much better learning tool, because it is faster, and the opponents are much better. I definitely noticed that the opponents maximized their winnings when they had the best hand while minimizing my winnings when I had the best hand. Now I've just got to figure out how to reverse that. You can't learn to slow play pocket Aces on Yahoo!; the other players are too wild.

[AcesFull]

Hi Redleg7,

Before this commercial version of Poki came out, I was always a big supporter of Turbo Texas Holdem. Since it (TT) WAS the best holdem software available on the market. I purchased and used TT from the early days using the DOS version. And of course, paid the small charge to get the upgrades to the different Windows version that came out.

I used to use TT to setup scenarios and run some simulations. I also played against the different profiles for some "fun" practice, but they were too easy to beat for me. And then when online poker for real money became available, I pretty much stopped using TT because I rather make lots of real money instead of pounding away at a fairly easy computer opponent.

In fact, as I have upgraded my computers (desktop and laptop) over the years, I didn't even bother to reinstall TT onto my newer machines. I basically did not want to be tempted to waste my time playing dumb bots for nothing instead of dumb humans for real bucks in a online cardroom. When I wanted to run simulations of hand strengths, I used PokerWiz or Prock's PokerStove.

The ability to setup holdem hand scenarios was very useful and powerful on TT. But unfortunately, it was limited to the TT profile strength which was not that strong.

Currently the Poki-poker software does not offer any capability to setup hand scenarios. However, in my recent email to their support department, they assured me that this capability was at the top of their To-do-list.

Basically with the release of this Poki, I can't imagine how Turbo Texas Holdem can stay in business. The Poki people definitely need to get the setup scenario options and some other additional features (hand history replayer, Data exporting capability, etc.) quickly implemented to bring the product into a more complete software package. But Poki actually cost a little less than TT and it's "brain", the Poki engine completely blows away TT's playing ability.

[Redleg7]

Thanks for the info.

Do you know (or can anyone comment) if there will be a Tournament version, or a NL version?

Thanks.

[midas]

AF:

Are you getting a cut of the Poki profits? Your review is posted on their web page.

If you are biased - please disclose.

BTW - serious players should buy all the programs available - if you can't afford the $$$ - poker may not be the game for you.

[spike]

Your review led me to purchase the software AcesFull. It's downloading while I type.

However, only *after* I purchased was I notified in the activation email that my purchase entitles me to run this software on *ONE* machine only. I travel a lot and would like to use a tool like this on my laptop when I'm away.

Seems like a pretty unfriendly licensing agreement to me. I'm disappointed already and the software hasn't finished downloading yet!

Spike.

[spike]

Of course, having felt duped already (as described above) I decided to read the license agreement in full. How many of you ever do that?

The poki-poker web site asserts that this software is only available for download via the Internet.

The license agreement guarantees that "the media on which the Software is furnished under normal use will be free from defects;"

Are BioTools guaranteeing that the Internet is defect free?

Spike.