Click here to Skip to main content
15,867,756 members
Articles / STL

Beating the odds - development of a leak finder for multitable SitNGo Poker

Rate me:
Please Sign up or sign in to vote.
4.00/5 (3 votes)
23 Aug 2010CPOL3 min read 11.6K   1   4
Development of a leak finder for multitable SitNGo Poker

Introduction

I have been playing poker for quite some time, most of the time just for fun and a few eurocents... I especially love playing MultiTable SitNGo's (i.e. small tournaments which start when a certain amount of players have registered).
I am quite successful playing these kinds of games at low stakes, at least I usually manage to get into the top 5% around halfway the tournament. But then the following usually happens (fictitious situation):

  • I get a premium hand (AKs for example) and raise 2-3 BB...
  • I get called by a bigstack on the (BB)
  • Flop, low card rainbow
  • Bigstack checks
  • I raise 2/3 pot
  • Bigstack calls
  • Turn: K
  • Bigstack checks
  • I raise POT
  • Bigstack calls
  • Some lowcard falls
  • Bigstack goes all-in
  • I call (I know I shouldn't, but I'm pot-commited)
  • Bigstack show something like 2-7os, but hits a double pair, where he hits the 2 on the flop, and the 7 on the river
  • I get busted out of the tournament (usually just before the bubble)

It's a Leak !!!

Yes, now that I am reading it, I know what I should do: fold after the all-in.
I also should not have raised after the flop, maybe just a check-call if the investment is not too big.
I know I can't go all-in directly, since it's a bigstack that calls anything with rags (i.e. donk). He usually only folds on the river if he hits nothing at all (and maybe after value betting first)....

In the long term/purely based on statistics, I would probably beat him with AK. The problem is that in this phase of the tourney, in a comfortable position, I should play a whole other post-flop game, since staying in the tournament is simply more valuable then gaining a few chips.
However, most of the time this happens just before the bubble, and I played a whole game just to get busted before the bubble...

And this happens to me a lot !!

So what should I do ?? Fold if the bigstack plays ?? Maybe I should, maybe I shouldn't.... but this got me thinking....

Fix the Leak !!!

What if I could write an app that analyses these things, and gives me (based on statistics) the best possible solution for this situation.

I know these already do exist, but since I am a developer and I love playing poker (even though I am really bad at it), I am going to write my own app for this... And while doing so, I will also blog about it, in order to get the discussion going and find the best possible solution for the problem.

Where to Start?

Since this is a whole new ballgame for me, I will probably need to delve deeply into statistics, fuzzy logic, some neural networking, and probably some datamining tools as well...
I will blog about this every now and then, and also add a link to my task list.

Tasklist

  • Write the initial specs for the app
  • Get a huge MTT SNG hand history for training purposes
  • Find out how the winners got ITM
  • Build some kind of system which matches the ITM players as much as possible using genetics
  • Refine, refine, refine...
  • Can I create a marketable product out of it? How about open sourcing it?? Which platform should I target (i.e. mobile, web, PC, ...)
  • Do something which will result in "World Piece™"

Finally

This is supposed to be the first post of a long series, and since it is a hobby project, I have no idea whether and when I will finish it...

I hope you enjoy it while it lasts !!!

Bookmark and Share

License

This article, along with any associated source code and files, is licensed under The Code Project Open License (CPOL)


Written By
Founder Virtual Sales Lab
Belgium Belgium

Comments and Discussions

 
GeneralMy vote of 1 Pin
Vincent Beek24-Apr-12 3:01
Vincent Beek24-Apr-12 3:01 
QuestionWTF Pin
Nick Van Tassell23-Mar-12 7:21
Nick Van Tassell23-Mar-12 7:21 
AnswerRe: WTF Pin
Tom Janssens23-Mar-12 7:45
Tom Janssens23-Mar-12 7:45 
GeneralI approve your idear! Pin
Alex Oct200921-Dec-10 16:11
Alex Oct200921-Dec-10 16:11 

General General    News News    Suggestion Suggestion    Question Question    Bug Bug    Answer Answer    Joke Joke    Praise Praise    Rant Rant    Admin Admin   

Use Ctrl+Left/Right to switch messages, Ctrl+Up/Down to switch threads, Ctrl+Shift+Left/Right to switch pages.