Internet games, AI, poker, chess and the illusion of making it look for real

NLOP has caught on to me. The new five player game is impossible to win, at least for someone like me that they've tagged as a troublemaker and onto the fraud. No such thing as winning the first couple of hands. Play short stacked and watch the preprogrammed game/AI play. My tried an true method of folding every hand until it's a three player game doesn't work anymore. And more bad beats than I've seen on playing on Pokerfrauds.com. I can lose these quick games, or play anti-poker for an hour and pick up points. Doesn't matter to me. Even if I qualify for the weekly big game, I won't play.

Playing on Ultimate tonight was also fraudelnt. I had to fold for more than an hour before the game almost resembled real poker. After they watched me fold a ton of hands, the table settled down into non-constant re-raising and I doubled my small chip stack - which was actually pretty impressive a couple of nights ago. Nuked just like on Ultimate to prove that raising and/or calling every hand is a losing proposition. I had 1.5 million play chips on Absolute, nuked more than 300k doing the same thing, and this last weekend I sent them the message, "BRING IT ON..." Now I have less thasn 1.3 million chips, I recognize I'm playing against rigged AI, I have no need to play to win.....

I can play to watch other "people" do stupid things and lose tons of chips. Which, I know you don't care about since you're a server with an infinite chip stack.

When I get bored on getting cheated at poker, one of my first options is chess. The same rules apply. It doesn't matter how good you are, playing against AI you lose far more than you should.

What the idiots on Internet Chess Server still don't get is that I'm actually a pretty accomplished chess player. I've acheived an official USCF ranking of expert...not too far away from master. Occasionally, I play my Grandmaster 3000 software for giggles, and even though I've lost a step due to rust, I'm still a low class A/high class B player. And I continue to get into these game where I play with someone rated no more than 1400 that at times plays like a grandmaster.

ICS offers "Observe a high rate game" as an option. This translates into "Watch AI play AI". I often use it as a mechanism into getting my game going versus a supposed chump... and lose....because the guy running the game hates losing.

So, the points of the screen shot -there is an observer to the game suggesting the completely impossible QA3. Ridiculous and no way even plausible by a slip on the keyboard suggestion. And, why are you even watching a game against two bad players?

Because you want me to think it's for real, put real money into tournaments I can't possibly win.

NLOP - you think you're clever, but you're not

OK, I was wrong about the free points. The question of the day is worth 500 instead of 100 now.

There's a new player in town. The 5 person game that you have to finish first or second to get points. I played two 5 player games sandwiched around a 10 player game. Using my tried and true folding like crazy strat I won second in the ten player game.

The five player games were both...ridiculous.

In here, the players that can't possibly lose get great cards and win every hand. Except for one or two key hands where the leader folds or even dumps some chips on a second poition to assure that they take second. I haven't seen so many bad beats in two hours over a month of internet play...naturally every decent hand I did call was rolled.

And as for the being clever thing...

This site, when the 10 player game options were the only choice was extremely slow. Now all of a sudden in 5 player games "everyone" plays at a normal rate of speed instead of thinking forever.

OK, let me think about this...ten player game, the previous player folds and you think for ten seconds efore you act. Five player game, you react instantly.

This will, of course, be proven over the course of this next week or two. Since I don't even care if I qualify for the big game on Sunday I'm willing to nuke lots of chips on playing the bogus five player tables.

Are you suspicious of internet poker being rigged?

You should be. I had a long holiday weekend to play tons of hours and confirm everything I've already known.

First of all, this is supposedly an interface to have real people match their skills. Secondly, the site should supposedly present a decent experience by their hosting software not allowing others to do things that can't be done. Especially if you've been around for years.

So, Absolute Poker decided to vault into the lead of bad poker sites when I played a Hold'em sit ad go when a player was removed because "they didn't enter the game in the first round" or some such nonsense. Oh, come on, please. The game wouldn't have even started without him being one of the table players. And the chat at the table was...weird for the very least. Two fisherman friends hooked up at the same table. They were kicking everyone's butt to kingdom come. Chatting away like this was the greatest experience they've ever had. I'm determined to fold and watch the bad movie...one of the fisher's wife/significant other messages him as an observer on getting him coffee.

Coffee? Let me get this. She doesn't live with you, and she's watching you play. OK, not out of the realm of reason. Even though you could probably sit out one freaking hand and brew yourself a cup. Or she's in another room of the house and you're playing on separate computers and she's going to brew you a cup. That's a freaking close relationship.

And, since I'm long ago suppossed to be dead, I'm not supposed to see that these two fisher chip leaders just stop talking to each other. Weird. And stupid.

NLOP want's a crack at the worst, too. Login -2000 points, survey 500 points, question of the day 100 points. For a total of 2,600 points that becomes 3000 when I sit at the table. And after already being suspicious I fold every hand until it's a three player game watching the "player that can't lose" clean up the table.

Think about it. How do you get in a sit ad go and fold every freaking hand and win second? Unless.......

the cards were rigged and the chip leader virtually could't lose and you were smart enough to avoid it.

And on Ultimatebet....things are just the same old crap. I nuked my huge chip stack and continue to play on the lame blacjack tables. Where I don't care about my chips. I just like to watch you lose your chips.

And watch my bad dog sleep. And....bored now. A little bogus chess would be good. Because that, like every internet game is rigged.

My first report on playing Full Tilt Poker

A mixed bag. It wasn't too awful. I'll need more than my two and 1/2 hour test to be sure.

On the plus side - in comparison to Absolute and Ultimatebet, the speed of play is pretty reasonable. Whatever chat there was wasn't stupid. They're weren;t any obiously rigged hands - (Ultimate loves to make you lose with a full house versus four of a kind.)

And that's about all I can say for the good.

I'm awfully surprised I only won 250 chips in two and 1/2 hours. The kiddie graphics and playing on a 10-20 Omaha high low table for so long. This site must appeal to 10 year olds. Surely I can get some cards and take advantage.

No way. I haven't seen this much slow play on a killer hand in years. And it's not that the slow play beat me. (Too much.) Instead, it was a constant feeding of incredibly bad cards, what marginal hands I did call on were universally met with a flop that didn't match it, and suspicious raising.

As always, the raisers don't win too many hands. They're just feeding the pot. This site has the best excuse I've ever seen for explaining the constant raising on nothing - you can refresh to 1000 chips once every 5 minutes. Perfect excuse to have no motivation to be competitive and try and win.

So, now I'm thinking....I targeted this site after watching WSOP on ESPN, Scotty Nguyen (sp?) self destructing and playing with his Full Tilt Poker hat on. And...what kind of professional poker player would play on a site with these kiddie images? And what kind of non-professional poker player will play for several hours and slow play a hand on a 10-20 fixed limit game, only to make sure that I don't get any traction in case my bad cards aren't good enough?

Hmmmm......

AI again, just a different program than Absolute and Ultimate.

Mixed bag - nope, changed my mind. I don't have to play a single hand again to know Full Tilt is totally busted.

Scotty, enjoy your $$ you made for promoting yet another bogus poker site.

Full Tilt Poker

I'm sooooo tired of busting on Absolute and Ultimate and NLOP. Time to find a new site.

Usually, I reserve my Mythbusters style "totally busted" message after playing some hands. In minutes without playing a hand this site has proven all that I expect without playing cards.

Again, I try the user name "Vanadium", my personal favorite element on the periodic table. Can't do it, currently in use. Yeah, right. I try "Mooter"... nickname for my bad dog. Already in use. Yeah, right.

Mooter hates that I'm playing on the computer all the time. But, he'll just have to live with it. I found lots of new "people" to play cards with.

And monkeys fly out of my butt.

Absolute Poker - reverse psychology

By now, they should be more careful around me. But, they still just don;t have a clue.

Since I'm not concerned about the size of my near 1.5 million chip stack or improving it I have the luxury to play on free money limit seven stud high low and just watch as they embarrass themselves. The embarrarasment in a fixed limit game is almost always the tried and true "everyone has a reason for raising (except the real human player.)" I only have the minimum 200 chips. I'm going to raise and try to get lucky. I'm just really loose, and even though I have 1 million chips I don't care if I win or lose. It's only play money, I don't care if I win or lose.

Long, long long ago playing internet poker on free money tables and discovering it was rigged and they wanted me to just go away I learned to fold cards that I should play. When they want you to go away you are met with raising by every other "player" with the typical excuses. And when you don't buy into it the admins get insulted. Their job is to make me lose as many chips as possible, I get frustrated and go away. Or even lose it all since I've proven I'm not willing to break out the checkbook.

And, oh yes, it's admins running a database, not a player interface. To believe it's a player interface one must suspend belief in reality and assume that people just don't care about winning or losing. Let me through all my chips in the pot, I had fun raising and losing, goodbye.

The screen shot is anonther weird message excusing bad play, and simultaneously taunting me since I had the nerve to play on a table they ordinarily can let the bad AI police.

Dudes, it's the opposite. The raising is what makes the game slow, not slow play making the raising. At least when you are dealing with me. The AI reacts instantly. Real humans have to think. My brain is fast enough to do the math and I can call or fold pretty much instantly. When things get too annoying and you post the "ZZZZZZZZZZ" messages, it only makes me want to slow down all that much more.

Considering the cards I received tonight and breaking even through your impossible bs, it was another major victory for me. So many hands. So statiscally impossible. This weekend, for a change of pace....try having your bad AI play agaisnt me with truly random cards instead of killing me with bad beats.

Ultimatebet - keep trying.

Keep watching me and I will continue to train you on what you are doing wrong. Just like tonight things were so bad and obvious I should be on your payroll so you can re-program the AI to play a little bit better.

Omaha high low tonight.

As always, the player to my immediate left is the crazy raiser that ends up losing tons of chips. Until two consecutive hands when he caught a straight flush and then 4 kings and one them both (raising pre-flop, naturally.) Add another crazy raiser to feed the pot, the next hand had another player winning with four of a kind. Winning high hands in Omaha are a heckuva lot better than Hold'em, but as always suspicious this was a bit unnatural.

So I went into auto-fold mode and watched the other players beat themselves to death. They finally caught on and after thirty or so hands consecutively folded the realized this cheat wasn't working. So they switched to the tired old, let's give the real player stastically crappy, but marginal cards and bleed him slowly.

Well, it's really a little too late. If the first 30 hands aren't for real I've got no reason to believe the next 30 are. I continue to watch as way more than a reasonable numer of four of a kinds win the high hand. Players that can't lose leave the table and/or sit out. I win a couple chips - enough to linger and fold some more (and break even for the night.)

And finally, they do something stupid.

When you first sit in on table your seat is reserved and you get to set your ante posting/blinds. Annoyed that I was still lingering, not just one but two "players" entered the table without reserving a seat. They just popped up. Freaky. Time to fold some more, which works for the chip stack as it was another "raise the human into losing to the bad AI" thing.

And when that didn't work it became blitz. After almost two hours of almost reasonable speed of play it was, "Let me set my AI to get great cards, you fold or call, I have an infinite chip stack and I'm sick of you being better than me and being so patient."

Hey, butthead....why not let me play agaisnt your bad AI and let's have random cards starting from when I first log in?

You can't, because I'm better than you, smarter than you and I have the patience to fight my way through your bs and still be alive when you finally give up.

And you don't care about me embarrassing you because your bad AI has fooled enough people into playing for real money and they don't get to see the rule breaks and bullshit that I see. Or maybe I'm just the kucky one that sees the obvious bs because my login has flagged me as a trouble maker willing to fold way too many hands that I should. And you still can't make it look statiscally for real and want to get rid of me.

Please stop with the 4 of a kind beating my full house cheat. It's......ng obvious.

You couldn't write a better script...

Here I am, sharply critical of the lack of real people playing on Ultimatebet, and they go and do something stupid.

I wasn't in the mood to get cheated at poker. A little blackjack would be fun. Especially to watch players splitting tens and such. Within the first ten hands I found just such a "person." Jester06 splits tens every chance. One hand against a dealer card of a ten value he split pairs of tens into four losing hands. And doubled on a seven count. And the screen shot is his masterful play of two fives with a dealer up card of a 3. The right choice is to double, but of course he split.

Just because the rules allow you to do something doesn't mean you should. And I won enough chips early to linger around and watch other "players" do the same splitting tens nonsense. Just like the instant rasing in a fixed limit game, I'm supposed to believe the entire gambling community plays the same way(which is very aggressive), except me.

But the real gem is from the same screen shot. Just like ANTJE on Absolute that never sleeps and always keeps popping up, I meet a player "4realitis" by name. Granted, this was the first time I saw him. This screen name is at the minimum a strange choice. No doubt in my mind this was a personal message to me.

When I do post infrequently on the bogus fixed limit games, it's usually something like, "You said 'people', that's funny!" Or, "Thank god this is for real." And just like Absolute when I had two consecutive new players taunting me with their screen name with 'chicken' in it I meet a person who's screen name suggests it's for real, even as the rest of the table self destructs and I have to suffer through statiscally unreasonable card play.

I definitely think I've solidified myself as a completely unwelcome guest. This is because I'm willing to not play for real and adjust my play...and play and annoy the admins in charge of the table for as long as possible.

Which is exactly what I did on NLOP this week. Big weekly tournament starts in an hour. I'm in the top 1000 by playing bad poker and folding watching the AI beat itself to death. And when they threw me a first place on Saturday night to make sure I'd qualify (oh, yeah...wish I could record a whole game so you could see how obvious it was), I'm determined not to play in that game. I prepared for it. Changed my screen name to something fairly innocent, but unflattering and vulgar if you think about it. It's eight letters that say, "Screw you, I'm not into your bs. Thanks for the hacking, which I cleaned up, not going to stay on your site long enough for you to do more of that so I can win a lousy keychain, if you deem I worthy of that after struggling through impossibly bad poker."

Ultimatebet self desturcts, yet again

After so many hours you should know me, but it looks like Ultimate really does not get it.

I don't care about winning the chips. I care about you embarrassing yourself into doing stupid things that a sane person would never go for.

But artificial intelligence is not a sane person, so I must fight against impossible odds just to win one freaking hand.

Every thing was wrong thisd morning. So many stupid "players" raising on nothing and feeding the pot. I've seen this bad movie sooooo many times. You're supposed to get upset and distracted by the bad raiser that you forget that another "player" wins the chips. And while I fold, you do stupid things like bring out someone with an impossibly high chip stack to impress me.

If the free money tables aren't for real, by logical extension the real money tables can't be. I knew this site was bogus before I logged in. And to prove it I lost some chips at "poker" and switched to blackjack. Kind of like switching to a observing a low limit real money game on Absolute Poker. I did win a lot. I don't care about that. I care about that ridiculous play of the other supposedly live player. 55 dealer has a low card, and you split instead of doubling. Splitting tens every time. And losing.

I wish I was a server with ani infinite chip stack that I could play every hand.

Before you ever break out the checkbook and play for real money, play 20 hours on the free games and witness the bs I've seen.

Ultimatebet.net...totally busted.

This site is so bad on so many levels. As I expected when I logged in at 4:30 am and folded my way through the bs I scored major amounts of chips. I continue to watch how "people" with no skill don't just call, but raise. Where the f*** did you get the chip stack to play like an idiot?

Oh, you are a server with an infinite chip stack.

This morning wasn't too bad. I had to fold more times pre-flop than I would have liked to, but going from 5,000 to 18,000 chips was cool.

Time to turn my scanner on something I haven't done on this site before. Play on prime time instead of 2:00 or 4:00 in the morning EST.

As always, the results were amazing. I used my ill gotten gains from the morning to fold and linger. And when I finally did get a decent hand it was universally bad beaten. (Is that a word?)

I can live with that for 20 hands and accept that it just wasn't meant to be my night. When it happens for more than 100 hands it's just the game admins rigging the cards. Winning or sharing a pot in three or four hands over a hundred in Omaha hi-lo.

Tonight's admin was probably the worst I've ever played against. He should be fired. As always, the player that raises is not the eventual winner. He/she is just a pot feeding whore. Until the admins change the active positiom to another slot.

Yep. It's not an interface for live people to get together and play poker. It's a database with a server with an infinite chip stack. Bad AI rigged to get better than average cards, pretend to chat once in a while, constantly raise (like AI cares about losing against AI) and give yourself excuses for bad play and raising.

Sorry Ultimate. You are a big crap stain on the underwear of the internet poker world. You had your chance to make it look for real tonight, and you frigging failed miserably.

NLOP - another ridiculous game

Very suspicious. Even though I backed into third place. The "live" player in the upper right was in post and fold mode most of the game. He popped in for a quick visit on a hand that I was in for a quick raise and fold. This didn't surprise me at all since the whole game was loaded with ridiculous cards.

After last night, I was already in my "spider sense is tingling" mode. Fortunately my cards were bad enough that I got to fold a lot. No surprise that when I finally do get a decent hand I flop top pair and the previously aggressive player finally decides to slow play a pair of kings and beats me. Extremely short stacked, I go all in on 7-4 off suit to try another table, two players call and I catch winning two pair on the flop. Guess you weren't done teasing me yet.

Several more bad hands followed. Finally, as the blinds are rising and I get AQ suited I go all in on short stacked guy to my left that has KJ and flops the winning pair of Ks. Again, just wanting to end it I go all in on 54 off suit, two players call and I flop the winning two pair.

After that, they couldn't possibly have made it look worse. I had a string of 4 out of 5 callable hands that would have been worth a raise on the flop. Like 4-2 hearts catching a flush...and of course another heart pops up that makes my flush look silly. But I was happily folded.

Entrenhed in a pretty solid third place position I was met with the friendly chat recorded in the screen shot. THE ONLY CHAT DURING A 1 HOUR 15 MINUTE GAME. "What's up with all the folding?"

Ummm...maybe if you weren't a cheating piece of crap bastard I wouldn't have to fold so much. I'm still trying to score points, because I'm competitive by nature. I've figured you out that I need to play unsound poker to do that.

And this reminds me why they let me get away with folding hands I should play and squeak into winning points. Now, when I make it to the big money game on Monday night they are training me to play bad poker. Then they can have an excuse so they can say, "He folded KK pre flop! What an awful poker player!"

I don't buy it. As has happened since my first two months of playing here I plan to qualify, register, and the not play in your tournament. At least until you reprogram the game to actually distribute random cards and people don't raise into other positions that win so much. Oh, yeah. I get to see the cards you bet with often. A flush draw on the river with two pair showing isn't even worth a call, much less a raise. But it happens.

NLOP - I love busting on you, even when I win

Do you really want me to play in the big Monday tourney? Is that the explanation for these past four nights? Well, maybe I will. I'm pretty close to a lock for finishing in the top 1000 without playing another hand. Busting on Absolute and Ultimatebet has been rather boring lately. And although the early week went like "real poker" the past few days has been rather suspicious.

Problem #1 - Too few hands with anything resembling half decnt cards.
Problem #2 - Too few flops that match my decent hands.
Problem #3 - The minute few times the flop and my hole cards look decent, I get a bad beat hit on me.
Problem #4 - the aggressive raiser on the first hand is never punished. People always call and he always wins.
Problem#5 - I've seen it all before, and you can't stop me from folding. You should just let my stack dwindle to nothing and let three positions finish ahead of me.

Was a yawning "it wasn't meant to be" something like a sixth place finish. I tried to play for real instead of my bogus poker mode. I lost with AJ to A8 on the flop that caught two pair AA88. Not too weird, except that one very strange hand made my bogus radar fly off the screen. The table was already down to 7 out of 10, or so. One of the two chip leaders that should have been content to just call started big time raising. Caught an inside straight A to 5 on the river. It just reeked of knowing what the community cards were going to be. I nuked my AJ to the two pair on purpose, because as always I'm short stacked and not going anywhere...and I wanted another try at playing "bogus poker mode."

Yes, there were a couple of hands I would have won on if I stuck with it. And there were some hands worth a call pre-flop I folded that would have been worth a call post flop and I would have won. Bogus poker mode does not allow me to call anything until I finish in the money. Which should never happen. Add a third place to the two recent seconds on folding every hand.

Suddenly, after a snotty message about not playing (and two more hands where the post and fold player was ejected) I finally started getting good cards. I ended up eliminating snotty messenger position #2. 2 people left - I win one big hand. Essentially even chips. We fart around for awhile, he raises with pocket fours and I go all in with QT and catch a Q. With 115 chips left I win.

I should be excited about this except:

Problem#6 - Why do you insist that I have to play short stacked? I've played enough hands and seen so many bad cards - then all of a sudden at the end of the game things turn around. For a change of pace...let me catch a nut winner on the first two or three hands and let me bet instead of just fold or call.

It's a pattern that's been far too established this week. One, maybe two nights I can live with it. More than that it's starting to get into the realm of the statiscally unreasonable.

NLOP- the bad movie continues

I played a fourth tourney last night and actually managed to win. I'm in the top 1000, down near the bottom...started tonight at #835.

After playing so long on this site my suspicion is that real human player cards and how they match the flops are linked to where you are at in the ladder. If I'm at position 2,378 I can expect some decent hands. Let's let the guy get close to the top 1,000, cut him off short, then maybe he'll click on an ad and buy something to get 5,000 points to qualify for the weekly tournament.

With that in mind Tourney number started off with me expecting to be pretty much screwed over. And I was not disappointed.

Again, my cards were really bad. I didn't have very many callable hands. The few I did my spider sense told me to fold.

The final count:

Hands I folded that I would have obviously won, including staying in on big bets and hoping to catch on the river - 0.

Hands I folded that I might have won since the winner mucked their cards - possibly 2.

So I get the joy of folding 30 hands and just letting the powers that be decide my final rank, which should have been a big goose egg in regards to points and finish out of the top three. For the second time in 5 tourneys I backed into second place.

The final four were myself with low but not impossibly low chip stack. Two players with huge chip stacks. One player with ultra low chip stack that I was hoping to wait out for third. Instead, second highest chip stack that was Mr. Big Bluffer mixed with getting great cards (who raised on 90% of the hands) self-destructed. With my last 50 chips and no blinds, I folded and kept my fingers crossed as sitting out guy lost to the chip leader on his last $5 all in.

I can pat myself on the back for not being impatient and scoring second. And it really wasn't even bad poker like I normally play - I didn't have to fold a pair of queens pre-flop like I've done many times when I recognize the position that simply cannot lose. But, other than tourney #4 out of the last five it's been pretty obvious that statiscally things are not real for me. (E.g., not outrageous, but in tonight's tourney, no pocket pairs in 30+ hands.)

I'm sorry, this is not the way poker is supposed to be. There's no way someone should take second on a table of ten twice in five tries without winning a single hand. It just smacks of AI programmed to play a particular way and sticking to it since it's too late to re-program once the game has started.

And I've seen this before. The screenshot is the massive chip leader congratulating himself with an "nh". This is either:

1) Careless and not paying attention.

2) Extreme narcissist.

3) AI programmed to respond automatically with a message.

My money's on #3.

NLOP, I've seen this movie once before

Story about some broken hearts. Or something like that. I think Y&T had a song with lyrics like that.

You did so well for a couple of days. Bu then you had to screw me over with the old tried and true let's give the guy unreallistically crappy cards thing.

Tourney #1 -since they had been so nice I play on the up and up and all my nice little pocket pairs eventually end up to be losers. In 20+ hands I have no winners and didn't fold a single hand that would have been a winner.

Tourney #2 - time to play by the bogus rules. I fold virtually every hand. In a 30-40 plus hand tourney I back into second place without winning a single hand by watching the bad AI beat itself to death. To their credit, I often complain about the lack of playing to win and playing to make me lose. The AI played to win and I backed in.

Tourney # 3 - yet again, more ridiculous cards. Lots of patient folding on my part. Short stacked as normal since there's no such way as winning the first hand and getting off to a big chip lead.

The cards you get seem to be related to your rank for the top 1000 and playing for the big money game. I wasn't suppossed to finish 2nd in tourney #2. I was suppossed to be so depressed on my loss that I'd move on to another bogus poker site. But, I was still hungry to see if they would continue the bs.

Tourney #3 was very strange. Lately I've caught how you can see players sitting out and waiting to make it work to my advantage (players in post and fold mode are not bold print.) After tonight I'm pretty sure they know I know since players "wake up" to call or raise. There's no reason to go post and fold. You can stay active and just fold like I do. It's just another tiny little thing they can do to trick you into calling or raising when it's rigged to make you lose.

I didn't have to worry about that. My hands were so statiscally crappy bad I got to enjoy folding almost all of them.

Actually, I enjoy folding on poker sites more than anything else. The admins love to screw you over, and the wild flame-out messages are one of the few perks they get. I don't do that anymore, and from messages posted this week it just annoys the hell out of them.

Ultimatebet.cheat

Oh my god.

You've already proven you can't make a silly little Omaha hi low game look for real. How aout a little seven stud hi low? Nope, gotta cheat in that,too.

How about ---- blackjack. Surely the card must be random and everything's fo real.

And monkeys fly out of my butt.

Ultimate - you are a blemish on the scar that it is internet game cheating. You don't play to win. You play to make me lose. So, when I avoid your crap how about a little respect and just TRY a little to make it look for real.

Human nature does not make you think you automatically have to kick it up a notch to score. And you constantly do that. Maybe folding, or even checking just once in a while would almost make it look for real.

My blackjack skill - solid. And I don't care about the losses, I'm in it for the long haul. I care about:

Every single "player" other than me automitically splts with no regard to the dealer up card. I've never seen a player split two 10* cards in Atlantic City, but here it is almsot a given. Because you are a server with an infinite chip stack. And....they even tried to chat with me. Lighting fast play, maybe I am suppossed to forget about the prior crap.

And I can pet my good dog and slink away into the night and know that I should be upset, but I'm not. Watching bad AI verus other bad AI is a speciality of mine.

ISABEL ROCKS!!!

Babies, puppies, kittens, and chicks oh my!

This really is getting a bit too easy.

My sitch is that they really don't want me around any more. I'm playing on the free money tables, generally kick ass against the AI because I'm willing to fold constantly.

Baiting.

How do we get a conservative and strong poker player to put chips in the pot? Babies, puppies, kittens and chicks. (Nothing personal chicks.)

To prove ir's not for real you really only need to spend about 20 hours on free money tables. Be patient. Fold. Don't buy into the constant raising. And don't give up and leave the table. Eventually the bad AI will burn itself out off of the other bad AI.

Ah...but how do you spot the AI? Well, they raise a lot. On the drop of a pin. I need the miracle card to show up on the river, I'm not just going to call, I'm going to raise! "They" don't care since it's a server with an infinite chip stack.

Every once in a while they have to deal with someone like me. I'm not ever going to break out the check book and put real money on it. I've been lingering around for months. You're tired of trying to make it look for real. If I kill you, then you will go away. Nope. Not me. The more you try to cheat me the more intense I get because I'm insanely competitive by nature. You would have been better off with your bad AI and random cards just letting me win a normal number of hands. But everyone keeps raising with no regard to their chips, except me.

My spider sense always tingles when I'm playing against babies, puppies and kittens. Poker sites let you load an image and there are so many cute infants out there. Aw....Valerie...you're little dacshund is so cute! How could anyone believe anything other than that you're a real person that has nothing better to do then click on raise (before the menu option to do it comes up!)

NLOP has had games where I've played against tables filled with chicks. Again, nothing personal I realize that lots of strong women poker players are out there. There are millions better than me. Apparently as a male I'm supposed to call your ridiculous bet because I must be a better player because of my gender or I'm supposed to try and impress you with my skill and we hook up and have a night of infinite passion.

Or I can just fold and watch the bad AI.

No distractions here. When I play, your babies, puppies, kittens and hot slutty women are wasted.

NLOP - things haven't changed a bit

For most of the week I was fed to win. And they weren't very subtle about it. One tourney last night and two tonight. Played (and folded) an astounding numer of hands over three tourneys.

Marginally on the edge of qualifying for the big and impossible to win weekly tournament, as always I refused to click on adds to get points. Now, with two days left there's no need to feed me anymore.

So, they resorted to the lame old tried and true stastically unreasonable cards for me. Over one tourney, I've had a bad night, it happens. I can't begrudge that. In the second tourney when I play (fold) and see 30+ hands and don't get a single ace, that gets a little weird. And when you get in the third tourney and the few hands you have called on are met with flops that don't match, it gets to be a little bit bogus. Out of more than 60 hands in the last two games, I should have won more than the goose egg they gave me. The hands that I would have won with crappy hole cards facing big bets and lots of players on the table were amazingly few, like 3 or four. A professional player in the same situation as myself would have made the same decision I did in most of those four hands.

And the mere fact that again I can't win any hands in the first deal around the table and I have to play short stacked all the time - big edge - to your AI and/or preprogrammed game.

Grade on making it look for real these past two nights - D minus.

NLOP grade for the night

The very first thing I noticed was that the 3 minute wait was 22 seconds short. The "The game will start in xxx" clock hadn't expired and we were rolling.

Interesting, and different from normal. The player with offsuit J4 all in on the first hand caught a 2 pair J4. Then constantly raised pretty much every hand. Mostly really big bets, not just the minimum. He did a great job of knocking out many positions. And he got caught bluffing a bunch of times. He was also willing to call almost every big bet by others. And others called his big bets often and were the winner.

He pretty much called or raised everything. One teeny tiny problem. Or massive depending on your perspective. While I was still a small fish in a big pond with pocket aces I called his minimum raise, the flop had an ace, I bet the minimum and he folded. Whoa, a little respect. I was pretty much the only person that made him fold before the showdown.

And with my great memory and powers of observation I'm certain we've never played together before. Why am I the only player that you know you can't bluff out?

As was the case for this entire week my cards have been way above average. I eventually knocked him out when it got down to a 3 player game when I got great or above average hole cards versus his marginal hole cards. Went on to take first for the tourney. I'm in the top 1000 for the weekly game.

And.....I'm still a bit paranoid and suspicious. When I'm obviously being cheated at internet poker I get to sit back and smile and laugh at the weird things. When I win because apparently on a roll....is it me? Or am I being fed? In a two player game I called the slightly higher stack leader's all in with pocket KKs with my AJ offsuit and caught an ace on the flop and within a few hands won the game.

I can't give this a really high grade for the night. Let's call it a C plus.

NLOP grade for the night

It's apparent on NLOP that when a player goes into "Post and Fold mode" that their chip stack is normal typeface instead of bold print. When I tried to take advantage of that the admins "woke up" and put a real player in control. And they continue to have this "Network Latency" delay message that pops up that just smacks of "wait while my real human takes control of a bot position."

And you have to wait three minutes before the game begins after all the players have joined the table. What the hell is the sense in that? Peeps are supposed to go pee, grab a sandwich, get some beers ready for a 1 hour game? You can do that before you sign up to join the table. The real translation -

Please wait while we rig the game.

Tonight I had a ton of hands I folded that would have eventually won. Trying to train me to play bad poker to catch on a marginal hand so that when I play in the big weekly tourney they can explain away my loss that I'm a bad player. If I called every hand that was marginal I could probably be described as the luckiest SOB on the planet. Happily folded and not concerned about winning chips, I still took third and scored some points.

Grade for the night on making it look for real - C plus.

That's lame

http://www.poker-king/poker-king-articles.php?article=296


Poker Bots Are Everywhere: Do you Care?
If you are playing certain low level limits on certain sites, then there is a good chance that there is at least one poker bot sitting at your table. To take it even further, there is a good chance that the majority of the players on your table are "bots", depending on the site and the limits. Even in the face of overwhelming evidence that bots are infesting low limit tables, some sites just don't seem to care, and they aren't doing anything about it. Do some sites just value rake over everything else, or do some sites just not have the technology to identify and eradicate the bots?Some "bots" operate for 12-14 hours per day, utilizing extremely similar push/fold tactics on the low limit tables. They will always buy in for the same amount, and they will always have the same general numbers when it comes to pre-flop action, aggression, etc. Now some sites aggressively seek out and shut down the "bots." These would include Poker Stars and Party Poker. Full Tilt Poker is in the middle ground; they famously shut down a well-known high-limit bot a number of months ago, but bots still operate at the lower limits (from what I have been told.)A few of the sites where bots seem to run rampant are Pacific Poker and Ultimatebet. If you are playing at the lower limit on Ultimatebet, for instance, there is a very high likelihood that at least one bot is sitting at your table. So the question is: do you care that there are hundreds of bots, grinding it out on these low limit tables on some of your favorite sites? Do you want the sites to do something about it? Or do you take the opposite viewpoint, and feel that playing about a bot is very exploitable and will make you more profitable? Would you ever consider leaving a site that did nothing about their bot problem?

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I am offended and astounded at the casual way you explain that life on the low money, and free money tables, are invadaded by "bots."

You try to make it sound like the site is all holy and on the up and up, but programmers have figured out a way to place artificial intelligence on the site. No, it isn't outsiders invading your site with bots. It's the site's own AI doing what it normally does. Trying to make it look for real when it isn't.

The first and foremost benefit of bots is that you log in and see that 20,000, 40,000, 70,000...whatever "people" are playing. When I see a site claim that 20,000 "people" are playing I figure it's more like 500-1000.

As with most posts about online poker on the net, Poker King defends, even if indirectly, that it's on the up and up. Spend 20 hours on the free tales and you can obviously see that this isn't true. Because the other 19,000-19,500 other players have big chip stacks and simply don't care if they lose them.

Majority of players are bots? I play against full tables of bots all the time. Just me against the server. The typical pattern is that that finally acknowledge that I'm doing my old trick of playing non-real poker to survive, watch and wait while the admins finally desperately do something to make it look for real. And they always fail miserably at that.

Insane chat sessions start.
Taunting me for folding because I don't buy into the bs.
Rigging the cards to get my full house to lose to four of a kind (Ultimatebet just loves this one.)

Sorry guys. You own the bots, not outsiders. Because you think it helps make your site look for real. And now between this and the Absolute scandal I realize that there are tons of others that see what I see and you are in full damage control mode to try and defend yourself.

NLOP = doesn't self destruct, yet again.

And I also have some exciting new from the world of interent poker about "bots." First, NLOP. For a long time I've complained about how it's impossible to win the first hand and cruise to an easy 1st or second. And I've complained that it's been pretty obvious that others where playing to make me lose instead of to win.

First hand, pocket fives. Too low of a pair for me to get serious on. The player with pocket aces, well, I can entirely understand the big raise. What I don't understand is why so many positions (4 or 5) called it on fairly marginal hands. No better than my pocket 5s. There was a 5 on the flop. And eventually, my three of a kind would have won the whole kit and kaboodle.

Things got a little more normal for my expectations after that. I folded a lot more than a normal person would. It became a four player game where two had healthy chip stacks and two were strugging for third place. Then, magically, player in second place with chips calls the leader's all in and loses, and it's down to three. Hey buddy, you were supposed to save your chips to make me lose....what's up with that?

By now the blinds are insane, and I out wait position numer three to take second. And I'm still in the top 1000. Do you really, really want me to play on Monday night? Or do you just want me to keep close thinking I'll click on an ad to qualify? Only time will tell.

But I'll give them this - I actually got to raise and bluff successfully a couple of times. For me, that's unheard of on Absolute and Ultimate - fold or call all the way. It almost seemed like.....(gasp) REAL POKER.

But not quite, because as I'm always vigilant I did see a few strange calls and raises. One guy going all in on a flush draw and such and winning. It can't be explained off as a bad player that got lucky.

Grade for the session on making it look for real - A minus

Let's do a new post for the message on bots.

NLOP = doesn't self destruct

I'm so disappointed.

As always, I expect to play short stacked. No such thing as winning the first hamd on this site. And they actually made it kind of tolerable. I'll take my second place and go to bed knowing that I'm still in the running for the big weekly game. That I can't possibly win at.

Come on guys, give me a stupid key chain or something, and I'll leave you alone.

Grade for the session. B*

Absolute Poker screws up again

I played against Valerie35 somewhere around 6:00-7:00 pm yesterday. Showing up again at 1:30 am was a little weird.

My guess that this was another ANTJE style fictitious position was confirmed. Valerie35 is not in the card room. And is sitting at the same table as I am.

Also, while bored and folding I observed a 2 cent 4 cent real money game. Complete silence for the first several hands. Then they must have realized I was there and everyone had something to say. Very amusing. In general, since I don't chat I am met with the same. I expect real people on a real money table not necessarily to have these huge deep philosophical dialogues, but an occasional "nh" and "ty". Like, maybe before I sit and watch 10 hands.

Grade for making the session look for real - F

Ultimatebet screws up again

I think the message about sucking was meant for me. Maybe that's just because I'd like it to be meant for me. I did fold the first ten hands or so. At 1:00 am in the morning not buying into the "I'm so bored I must play every hand" philosophy they expect on low limit free money tables.

Regardless, the message did set my spider sense tingling. Within a few hands, another outright rule break. Message poster boy sat out his turn at big blind. You're supposed to post dead the following hand you play. He didn't have to.

After another dozen or so hands, including where I won a nominal amount of chips he psoted something like "Where you all at?" Surprisingly, the AI did not respond. I, of course, felt no need to respond.

Grade for the site for this session on making it look for real - D minus

Absolute Poker - a little to late

I've been buttin' heads with you guys for months. And you've been great for this blog. Rigging the cards, idiots going all in on nothing and feeding the hand winner.

Lately things have been....real poker. Other than waiting you out this morning,

You can't win. It's too late. That is you can't win on making it look for real.

Maybe they think I'm a bot. I do tend to fold a lot. And play it "by the book" when I do call. So, if I'm a bot and I'm cheating, do I really need to wait two hours before I can score some chips? Well, that's what goes on for me. I am constantlty met with irrational raising by the lame player feedig the pot. Occasionally I get a friendly message that I'm an idiot for folding habds that would eventually turn up to be......losers.

And for those that love to feed on my paranoid version of reality, here is my spin on the Absolute Poker scandal where Marco caught being cheated in a real; money game.

It's all a cheat. It's all rigged. It's just another lame site where the peeps in charge hate the way that someone with skill might ruin their income.

When I play Diablo 2 and things get tough I hit {esc} and reload in town. When I play Civ I toggle cheat mode and look at the things the AI is doing.

And when I play internet poker it becomes fairly obvious that I'm playing God in cheat mode. They're not playing to win. Thjey're playing to make me lose.

And since I know how to fold I'm golden and catch the bs regulary.

Night and day on internet poker

It's really pretty amazing how easy this is getting. Tonight's target was Ultimatebet. They still haven't adjusted on what to do with a person that has some skill, is willing to wait out the cheats and will play for more than two hours on a low limit free money table.

I played the first 5 hands or so with my A-game on, naturally lost a bunch of my 1,000 chip stack to the usual bad beats and constant AI pre-flop raising before they settled down some. And like night and day, suddenly "real people" switched from automatically raising to build the pot to being a little more concerned about their chips.

I wish I could have recorded it. You'll just have to take my word for it. The only two times the pre-flop raiser didn't raise where when I had AK diamonds, that would have lost to a heart flush and when I folded a 62 offsuit that should have been folded when 2 sixes came up on the flop. No need to raise and cheat me some more.

And, since it's a limit game I get to see a ton of showdowns where the player raising has crap (betting into the winner) and I get to see that my good hands would have lost to great hands.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't. If I sit a table, even a crappy 10=20 limit table, I expect to see personalities. For the first half hour everyone's personality was raise, raise, raise, let God sort them out. The next half hour was raise and try to bait me into calling into hands the raiser was feeding. After that, I had proven I wasn't going away and I turned around my 500 chip loss into a plus 1,000.

Because of patience with their tell. No, I'm not going to call your "sweep" hands where everyone goes all in. Regardless of my cards.

And the "personalities" were even more ridiculous last night on Absolute. After months of pre flop raising I went to a 100-200 limit seven stud high low game and not only were the pre-flop raises absent, the player to my left called virtually every bet whether I won or another won.

There's just absolutely no way that people will login into a poker site, play to lose their chips, even if free money chips, and not be worried about it. Unless you are connected directly to the server, have an infinite chip stack and can refresh and/or buy as much as you need.

Obeservations this past two weeks -

Bad beats - omaha hi-low, I always lose to four of a kind with my boat. Never win. Very stastically unreal. I get A-2, I win, but two or three others have A-2 and splitting low I lose chips.

And the chat is always one of my favorites. After playing for 2 hours, longer than a normal person would being willing to sit for, on a silent table there was suddenly a flurry of comments.

You can do this, too. Just be patient. And don't put real money down.