Are Poker programs (PTracker etc) good for poker?

[maynard]

"Also, the casino's side of a game is fixed; they cannot adapt to a card counter, and that makes his skill an 'unfair' advantage."

Yes, the casino can and does adapt to CC'ers - the rules of the game are far from 'fixed'. Witness the explosion of ripoff carnival games like 6:5, etc. posing as "blackjack". And even a 'fixed' game that starts out juicy can be quickly turned to crap by half-shoeing, restricting the player to flat-betting, and ultimately backing off / barring of the cc'er. The prime example of casinos adapting is Atlantic City: it's the one major gaming market where outright barring of cc'ers is illegal, but cc'ers don't exactly flock there to wage war against 59-deck shoes with lousy pen and constant countermeasures.

I just don't see a cc'ers skill as an 'unfair' advantage because - just like your example with pt, etc. being available to fish - it is based on something LEGALLY available to every last ploppy at the table: simple observation and use of his/her brain. Casinos can offer any game they want, and consumers will vote on what sticks with their gambling dollar. But playing a game in a legal fashion, strictly by the rules set forth BY THE CASINO, with information available to every other player at the table, and using no devices save for his own brain, is far from unfair.

That being said... I switched from BJ to poker partially for a new challenge, but in large part because the cat-and-mouse game got old, and the constant paranoia of heat (whether it was there or not), got really old. Even at the miniscule stakes I was playing. [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

maynard