Man vs machine update

The fourth and final session of the man vs machine contest which pitched top poker pros against a research robot ended in Vancouver yesterday with a victory for the humans - but only just.

And Polaris was praised as a tough, hard to beat opponent by both Laak and Eslami.

The first match saw a technical draw where the human team limped in at -$70 after 500 hands of play. This was followed by a convincing win for Polaris in the second match as the robot went into a highly aggressive style of play, but then a third match loss for the robot as the humans came back with a fluctuating conservative-aggressive strategy which gave them a clear $850 win.

During the fourth session, the humans racked up another $560 margin win, taking the series by two wins and a draw to the one win by Polaris, which seemed to be playing more cautiously.

The poker pros developed a definite respect for the bot, commenting that they had learned from the bot rather than learning to play it, and that it had been necessary to exercise more flexible and diverse tactics than normal in order to prevail. The two days of play were tough going against the University of Alberta robot - tougher than against most human players, the two pros admitted.

Each winning session netted the poker players $5 000 to split between them, and they also received $2 500 for the session that was determined a draw. Had they had won all four sessions, Eslami and Laak would have received $50 000.