mutterings from mem: Provable Results vs Provably Fair

[boot52]

However, you at least want to know that the cards you got were fairly given, and provably so.

Any card that isn't specifically mucked by another player could be audited... I think. So that would be: the players own cards, the burn card, the flop, turn, and rivier cards (maybe), any card that makes it to a showdown, plus any remaining undealt cards in the deck. That's quite a few cards that could be audited. The audit wouldn't be airtight, but I see it as a step in the right direction.

[TTBit]

Let me use my favourite game roulette as an example.
I as an operator silently observe the bettors and pick their patterns (red/ martingale/ singles/ whatever).
I pre-generate a huge sample of site seeds and client seeds (remember the client cannot set their own) and then cherry pick the results I want.

Say we had a player martingaling their bets on red, to fucking easy throw out 10 blacks and then insist they were randomly selected where in actual fact there is no proof of randomness only proof of result.

This is exploitable by a sharp player. I don't think a crooked casino wouldn't do this.

[boot52]

Any card that isn't specifically mucked by another player could be audited... I think. So that would be: the players own cards, the burn card, the flop, turn, and rivier cards (maybe), any card that makes it to a showdown, plus any remaining undealt cards in the deck. That's quite a few cards that could be audited. The audit wouldn't be airtight, but I see it as a step in the right direction.

Something else to think about: In a head's up situation, a comprehensive audit of all un-mucked cards would allow a sharp player to figure out the hole cards of their opponent (from the previous round) by process of elimination. Maybe that's OK if both players are privy to the same information, but it certainly changes the character of the game.

[dooglus]

Any card that isn't specifically mucked by another player could be audited... I think. So that would be: the players own cards, the burn card, the flop, turn, and rivier cards (maybe), any card that makes it to a showdown, plus any remaining undealt cards in the deck. That's quite a few cards that could be audited. The audit wouldn't be airtight, but I see it as a step in the right direction.

It looks like you are trying to invent mental poker.  Would you like some assistance with that?

[dooglus]

Yes, and that is a problem when the money of the 'house' is not involved. I couldn't care less if Stunna plays his own game, but dooglus playing JD and I will refrain from visiting that site.

I have played a little Just-Dice in the past.  I make a point of never playing from an account that isn't called "dooglus", so people can see it's me playing.  Using a different name would feel wrong.  And of course I never look at the server seed, since that would allow me to cheat.

I figure if I was dishonest I could use random other accounts and slowly bleed the site dry, so investors have to trust that I won't do that, or not invest.

My stats:

bets:1,614
wins:652
losses:962
luck:101.25%
wagered:36.32049978
(profit):0.89308763

[vlees]

mental poker

Never heard of this. Sounds like quite a challenge to implement properly. Putting this on my todo list to try to create a pokerroom that does this.

[boot52]

It looks like you are trying to invent mental poker.  Would you like some assistance with that?

Sure, I'm in. I've never heard of mental poker before, but it certainly looks like a fun problem... much trickier than I first thought. So let me see if I understand: in a properly shuffled deck, each player would hold a commutative encryption key for each and every card in the deck.  So to 'unlock' a particular card, a player would need to request keys from all of the other players in the game. Do I understand correctly? My first thoughts are:

* Brilliant
* Lag and disconnects could be a problem. Suppose Alice, Bob, and Carol are playing a game and Bob suddenly decides to disconnect because he would rather pick lint out of his belly button. How are Alice and Carol supposed to finish the game without Bob's keys?
* There could be workarounds, but right now I don't know what they are.
* Something must be done. Rampant cheating in the online poker world is killing the game, which is a shame. Let's put our heads together and see what we can do.

 

[vlees]

* Brilliant
* Lag and disconnects could be a problem. Suppose Alice, Bob, and Carol are playing a game and Bob suddenly decides to disconnect because he would rather pick lint out of his belly button. How are Alice and Carol supposed to finish the game without Bob's keys?
* There could be workarounds, but right now I don't know what they are.
* Something must be done. Rampant cheating in the online poker world is killing the game, which is a shame. Let's put our heads together and see what we can do.

Look further down on Wikipedia, it describes an option with 2 or more servers (then one is yours, the others are servers by random people willing to make your game more trustworthy). Or share the keys with the server. Or put a warning on screen: LEAVING WILL RESULT IN LOSS OF ALL CHIPS PUT IN BY YOU + A FINE. On leave: everyone gets their chips back. Losing persons chips get distributed to other players, when someone just made a huge raise and the person left, calculate a fine based on that (assuming the person left because of the raise). I do not suggest the last option.

[boot52]

Look further down on Wikipedia, it describes an option with 2 or more servers (then one is yours, the others are servers by random people willing to make your game more trustworthy).

Okay, something along those lines might work. This is starting to look like a lot of work, though. I'm not sure my programming chops are up to the task.

[Remember remember the 5th of November]

I think this discussion has been here a few times already and I completely agree with you.

http://v20.nl/primedice/

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=253144

[darkmule]

For card shuffling you could let every user enter a client seed. Concatenate all client seeds alphabetically (to make it reproducible), add an own string and use this total as input for a (P)RNG; mersenne-twister for example

Then take a 52 card deck. Apply a shuffling algorithm to it with the chosen (P)RNG and for example the Fisher-Yates shuffle. Concatenate the deck (as in 2s8d9cJs....) and use some cryptographic hash on that string.

And how many people would be willing to do all this every time you got dealt a hand?

Remember, it's not just the hand you get dealt.  Then there's the flop, the burn card (generally not visible to the player), the turn, another burn card, and the river.

On each street, players are going to be dropping out.

You also have the fact that you don't get to see other people's hands unless they show down.  And nobody is going to want to play on a site where everyone knows every previous hand they have played and can basically completely profile them as a player.

[vlees]

For card shuffling you could let every user enter a client seed. Concatenate all client seeds alphabetically (to make it reproducible), add an own string and use this total as input for a (P)RNG; mersenne-twister for example

Then take a 52 card deck. Apply a shuffling algorithm to it with the chosen (P)RNG and for example the Fisher-Yates shuffle. Concatenate the deck (as in 2s8d9cJs....) and use some cryptographic hash on that string.

And how many people would be willing to do all this every time you got dealt a hand?

Remember, it's not just the hand you get dealt.  Then there's the flop, the burn card (generally not visible to the player), the turn, another burn card, and the river.

On each street, players are going to be dropping out.

You also have the fact that you don't get to see other people's hands unless they show down.  And nobody is going to want to play on a site where everyone knows every previous hand they have played and can basically completely profile them as a player.

And if you had read the thread you would've known this has already been pointed out.
Thanks for your completely useful addition!

[dooglus]

[* Something must be done. Rampant cheating in the online poker world is killing the game, which is a shame. Let's put our heads together and see what we can do.

I think you're understand the technique properly, and also its shortcomings.  It requires all players to stay connected until the end of the hand.

What cheating are you referring to?  I don't know much about online poker, but if collusion is the biggest problem, this "mental poker" thing doesn't help at all.  I can still share hole cards with my buddies over IM.

[boot52]

... if collusion is the biggest problem, this "mental poker" thing doesn't help at all.  I can still share hole cards with my buddies over IM.

Here's where I think the technique would work beautifully: high-stakes heads-up poker. Collusion isn't an issue in HU because it's just you versus exactly one other opponent. Your main concern would be a crooked site operator peeking at your hole cards and then sharing that information with your opponent. Mental poker solves that problem nicely.

Disconnects wouldnt' be an issue either becuase you could just forfeit the disconnecting player without being unfair to anyone else.
Woohoo! I think we just invented 'provably fair' heads-up poker! Now back to coding...

[Financisto]

I vote for a sticky thread (article/tutorial/guide) about that topic: Provable Results VS Provably Fair.

That would be a great guide for new gambling entrepreneurs, casino operators, gamblers, recreational players, etc. in order to adopt it and demand it.

Provably fair massive adoption would be good for everyone: entrepreneurs and also for gamblers. That's a natural evolution on gambling business. That's pretty clear nowadays IMHO.

Thank you mem for starting a good discussion about that topic.

Cheers!

[Dabs]

However, you at least want to know that the cards you got were fairly given, and provably so.

Any card that isn't specifically mucked by another player could be audited... I think. So that would be: the players own cards, the burn card, the flop, turn, and rivier cards (maybe), any card that makes it to a showdown, plus any remaining undealt cards in the deck. That's quite a few cards that could be audited. The audit wouldn't be airtight, but I see it as a step in the right direction.

Cards that you never get to see in a real life game of poker should not be able to be seen in an online version of poker. That includes other people's cards if they don't show, the deck, the burns ... if you wouldn't see it, you shouldn't be able to see it.

[dooglus]

Cards that you never get to see in a real life game of poker should not be able to be seen in an online version of poker. That includes other people's cards if they don't show, the deck, the burns ... if you wouldn't see it, you shouldn't be able to see it.

Yes, and that's exactly the problem that "mental poker" solves.  My client knows which cards your client should be allowed to see, and sends just the keys required to decode those cards.  So when I show-down to you, I do so by sending the relevant encryption keys.  And when I muck, I don't.

[darkmule]

And if you had read the thread you would've known this has already been pointed out.
Thanks for your completely useful addition!

And if you had read the thread, you'd have known I was one of the people who previously pointed it out, idiot.

Sorry for repeating myself, but when people ignore what has already been posted and post the same impractical solutions the flaws of which have already been pointed out, and utterly fail to address it, I am forced to repeat myself.

[Dabs]

Cards that you never get to see in a real life game of poker should not be able to be seen in an online version of poker. That includes other people's cards if they don't show, the deck, the burns ... if you wouldn't see it, you shouldn't be able to see it.

Yes, and that's exactly the problem that "mental poker" solves.  My client knows which cards your client should be allowed to see, and sends just the keys required to decode those cards.  So when I show-down to you, I do so by sending the relevant encryption keys.  And when I muck, I don't.

I read the wikipedia article.

I think we want two solutions to this:

1. With a central server that does not need to be trusted (but can generate the shuffling.)
2. P2P version of poker. No need for servers (except maybe to find other players.)

Wouldn't that be something? You'd have decentralized poker, and with bitcoin implemented you could make it like normal gambling in a normal poker table. No house edge too since there is no house.

The one who provides the table and the beer ... uh... well ... that's why I want the first solution, and I think lots of players won't mind paying a fee for a semi-trusted provably fair poker website that allows deposits and withdrawals in bitcoin.

dooglus, go think about it, I will expect a poker site one year from now.. just-poker. hehehe.

[boot52]

I think we want two solutions to this:

1. With a central server that does not need to be trusted (but can generate the shuffling.)
2. P2P version of poker. No need for servers (except maybe to find other players.)

I like option 1, too. Total decentralization is like the holy grail of online poker, but it seems to me that a central server would still be needed to organize the games, keep them moving along at a reasonable pace, and to act as a trusted escrow service to transfer funds back and forth. Maybe you could build a p2p client to handle all that, but then you'd get cheaters building their own clients to get around any constraints.

It's an interesting problem anyway and I'm pretty sure there is a big market for it. My own informal survey of bitcoin gaming sites tells me that the most profitable sites are also the 'provably fair' sites (bitZino, Just-Dice, etc). People aren't fools (for the most part). A provably fair HU poker site would almost certainly get a lot of action from high-rollers ... is my guess. I can see the $$ in their eyeballs now.