
University of Alberta in Canada have developed a new algorithm that may put most human players on tilt.
A recent IEEE Spectrum article, Computers Conquer Texas Hold'em Poker for First Time, introduces CFR+, an updated version of a technique called counterfactual regret minimization (CFR) for playing heads-up no-limit Texas Hold'em. Finally, a way to minimize the regret I feel each and everytime I don't fold 7-2 off suit.
Checkers had Chinook, Chess had Deep Blue and Jeopardy had Watson. Now Texas Hold'em has CFR+. A group from the A recent IEEE Spectrum article, Computers Conquer Texas Hold'em Poker for First Time, introduces CFR+, an updated version of a technique called counterfactual regret minimization (CFR) for playing heads-up no-limit Texas Hold'em. Finally, a way to minimize the regret I feel each and everytime I don't fold 7-2 off suit.
"Some people, pros even, won’t play No-Limit. They can’t handle the swings",
Mike McDermott (Matt Damon), Rounders, 1998
From a game theory perspective, heads-up no-limit Texas hold'em is an "imperfect-information game" due to the two hidden cards each player holds. This missing information increases the number of steps required at each decision point and can require as much as 262 terabytes of memory. CFR+, the new hyper efficient version of CFR, eliminates some of the steps and by applying compression reduces the memory requirements to below 20 terabytes.
Learn more...
- An Introduction to Counterfactual Regret Minimization Todd W. Neller, Marc Lanctot July 9, 2013
- A new algorithm for generating equilibria in massive zero-sum games Martin Zinkevich , Michael Bowling , Neil Burch, Proceedings of the 22nd national conference on Artificial intelligence, p.788-793, July 22-26, 2007, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
- Texas Hold'em, an introduction, wikipedia