Proof that bots exist!

[striker2550]

winholdem.net

I am Thouroughly PO'ed!
Check out the software and the forum.
At least it doesn't look like they can see other peoples (mine) cards unless they are playing as a team. Then they can see their teammates cards.

They only support a few sites. Party, Stars, and Paradise.

Some months ago I was positive I was in a game w/ a bot. emailed support at that site, and they replied that they never use bots. Couldnt get it into their thick heads that I was accusing a player of using a bot, not them!

Got the winholdem forum link from Johnny Hughes at upf. Thanks Johnny!

Someone using a bot doesnt scare me so much. But being tag teamed might be a diff story.

[tetsuo]

There is an 'all-in' alarm, which goes off when it detects that you have the nuts.

Interestingly, some sites detect this app and take a screenshot of your desktop before uploading it as evidence.

A good idea to stop abuse.

However, I'm no lawyer, but doesn't this raise privacy issues?

What if they snapshotted your screen while you were looking at your online banking site?

[striker2550]

They discuss this in their forum. When u agree to the users agreement to that poker site, it includes permission for them to take a screenshot, scan your hard drive, etc.
Bot users get around this by using two pcs at a time. One to run the poker client and the other to monitor the game on the first pc. That way the poker site has no clue that there is even a second pc involved.
Havent looked yet but party takes the screenshots. Should be in a temp file in party folder.

[tetsuo]

I'm not convinced the 2 PC solution is feasible.

Where did you get that information from?

[striker2550]

Directly from their website. Check it out. You being a pc guy would understand it better than me. I think they use a "window scrapper" on 2nd to read window off the first. They explain it in detail. You should check it out.

Maybe u could permanantly crash their site while there? Just hoping.

[tetsuo]

Yes, they do indeed support a 2 PC setup where detection by the online poker room software is virutally impossible. I hadn't realized they were that advanced in terms of development.

The software is remarkably impressive.

Here are some other 'bots, should anyone be interested from an academic standpoint (I would sincerely hope that nobody would contemplate using them).

http://www.calculatem.com/
http://pokerpal.buzzworkz.com/

It'd be an interesting project to figure out how to detect these absolutely, but like anything underground like virii, worms, trojans, hacking exploits etc. etc. you plug one hole and people will go to any lengths to find another one.

In this respect, the industry will forever be playing catchup with people who collaborate online with either bots or each other.

Certainly one of the most worrying things about winholdem.net is that 2+ people using the same software are teamed-up by the server using an encrypted channel, and the software will take account of the other person's or persons' cards when deciding what action to take.

[excession]

i had always assumed that bots/co-operative play were really onlyfor limit play - where odds can be better calculated and you need help to ramp up the pot when you are ahead

Are any of these playing NL Ring?

[excession]

Had a look around their site - they are pretty up front about it!!

To be honest it seems to be folks programming limit bots at low levels on the most common sites - the best win rate I could see was 5BB/100 at 1-2 Limit Ring - not earth-shattering although obviously if they are running 9 bots across 3 sites 24/7 they can make a lot of money.


I am not at all concerned about whether I am playing a bot or a human to be honest - in NL to get a bot to outplay a human must be a nightmare anyway.

The 'team' play forum seems very lightly used (4 posts) and I think that co-operative swarms of bots are unlikely for several reasons (multplies their chance of getting spotted for one). If folks want to cheat by co-operative play as humans there are already plenty of ways of doing that.

It is certainly an interesting intellectual challenge to formulate a winning bot's strategy - and some of their posts might be very interesting strategically - as after all a bot will play perfectly to a system unlike a human.
They are going to get into an evolutionary war with the Poker Sites though - if Party makes $2bn/year and sees them as a threat they are going to be able to throw a lot of resources at the problem (for example a lot of MMORPG's have bot issues and those that want to handle them quite well). Whilst they know that they are cheating and deserve to get banned and their money confiscated if caught, I don't think it's the end of the world (it reinforces my desire to play NL though

To be honest with the ability to cold-read an entire table before sitting down that I now have at Party NL (30BB/100 for each of my 3 tables since I started using PT observer hand histories and GT+ 3 days ago) I feel that I'm outevolving the bots for a while yet..

[Atorvastatin]

Excession,

Could you expand on the (30BB/100 for each of my 3 tables since I started using PT observer hand histories and GT+ 3 days ago)

Please! I'd like to hear more about this method.

[excession]

Check out the front page of this site - link at the top of teh page by clicking on 'livepokerforum' - there are two PT articles on there that teach you how you never have to go cold into a Party NL table again..


The advantage you have using PT now at Party is that you know exactly how the opponents are playing when you sit down (as PT has been observing them for the last hour) but they are very unlikely to have any sort of read on you.

This is worth a significant numberof BB/100 - how much is up to you (I don't claim 30BB/100 is sustainable but so far so good - made $95 in 71 minutes on the PArty $25's last night for example

[abbym32]

I know, I was SHOCKED when I was winholdem.net they are definetly a bot. You can actualy get the thing to play for you when you aren't there.

The other two, http://www.poker-pal.com and http://www.calculatam.com are just odds calculator. They just assist you with pot odds calculations.

I don't mind the last 2 so much, I tried out their demo and liked them. I been reading pot odds book and I guess you can say I am a "dumb blonde" when it comes to math and odds.(only us girls can call ourselves that by the way). So I find the calculators to be helpful.

Just my 2 cents.

Abby

[swooper_1]

WinHoldem should definitely be banned because it actively promotes team play and is definitely a bot. Even having any window (eg. an explorer window) open with "WinHoldem" in the title bar while you play on PartyPoker is likely to cause your account to be suspended and monies frozen. I've read on other poker forums that the author of WinHoldem has a very dubious background and has a tax lien for over $300,000 (or something like that).

However, whoever said that Poker Pal and Calculatem are bots has obviously never even looked at either product. That's like saying PokerTracker is a bot too! These two [excellent] little programs are simply statistics calculators that provide odds instantly for any hand entered. They do not play poker for you and there is no way to share your hole card information (as in team play).
I think Calculatem is somewhat new on the scene but I know that Poker Pal has been going strong for about 4/5 years now and supports more game types.

In either case, unless you are some kind of math genius who can work this stuff out in your head in a split second, I would certainly say that using such a statistics calculator is no more harmful than having a regular push button calculator on your desktop as you play anyway.