Master Poker's Game Study Features
Whether you're looking to buy poker software purely for recreational purposes,
to learn the game well enough that you don't
embarrass yourself in your Saturday night game, to become a serious online
player, or to become a poker pro, Master Poker is the ideal solution to fill
your needs. Here are a few program options that were included purely to
help you become a better player.
"Master Poker is a very unique, challenging and well thought out poker teaching tool. I advise purchasing to any level of skill player---I have even given this as a present! Have FUN with it!"--Jim G., Houston, TX
The Starting Hand Guide
The main hurdle most novice players encounter is in playing far too many
hands. Experienced, but unsuccessful players often fail for similar reasons. The
SHG let's these types of players click their cards to see very specific advice
on how to play any given starting hand under the current table conditions.
Unlike most commercial software, which might give you simple advice such as
fold, call, or raise. MP's SHG will not only help you decide which hands to play
and which to toss, but will give you the precise reasons as to why you
should fold, call, or raise, pointing out attributes of the unfolding hand you
may not have noticed. Here are some examples of actual situations.
When the SHG comments are framed in red, it's a recommendation against
playing the hand. When framed in green, it's a go. When framed in cyan (turquoise), it means the hand is borderline and can be played or folded.
My intention was to present information to the user in easy to read language,
as if an experienced player were watching over your shoulder.
As you can see, each and every comment attempts to help the player with some
type of helpful advice, even when little information is present with which to
work.
I did not specially pick these samples because they seem to be doing
what I promise. The SHG will present comments similar to these on nearly every
hand dealt, except perhaps where you might hold seven/deuce offsuit and the comment simply says,
"Garbage."
Players gain experience by seeing the same situations over and over. This is
why pros often say things like, "Get out there and play as many hands as
you can." It is through the repetition of experiencing similar circumstances over
and over that you remember what worked and what didn't in your play. It is my
hope the SHG can help novice players focus more clearly on these repetitive
circumstances, allowing them to recognize and grasp the related concepts much more quickly.
My original intention with the SHG was to give very brief comments to
inexperienced players so they would more quickly learn the very basics of
starting hand requirements. I quickly realized I had the opportunity to take
these players even deeper into the learning process because deciding on which hands to play is
not just a matter of which two cards you hold. It's all about position, stack
size, opponent tendencies, the current table conditions, etc., so why not help my
novice players learn about these things as well, particularly when I can teach
them both at once?
The development of this construct alone took nearly six months to
complete and aside from the advanced AI is perhaps the most powerful tool
included in Master Poker. For any player unsure of their starting hand
decisions, the SHG alone will be worth the cost of the software.
The Board Observer
Poker is about observation and making moves at the appropriate times (both
offensive and defensive). By activating the Board Observer you're telling Master Poker to keep an eye
on the Flop, Turn, and River, and warn you of dangerous board conditions by
wrapping colored boxes around the board cards. These colored-coded warnings spy
out conditions such as paired boards, Flush and Straight DRAWS, and potentially
MADE Flushes and Straights. It is an excellent tool for helping you to quickly
recognize this important data. Here's an example:
Here the Board Observer is warning you with a purple box that
the board is paired, and a blue box to point out the Flush Draw (diamonds). The purple box is solid since the pair on board is a big pair, much more
likely to have hit an opponent's hand than a lower pair. If a third diamond was
on board the blue box would be solid to indicate a MADE Flush might already be
out there, as opposed to just a Flush DRAW.
This example shows the Board Observer warning of both a Straight Draw (yellow box)
and Flush Draw on board (blue box). If another Straight card were to appear on
the Turn, perhaps a Jack, the yellow warning frame would turn solid to let you
know the danger has increased.
Danger! Danger! The Board Observer was designed to increase the level of
visual warning based on the level of danger on the board. The more frames you
see, and the more solid lines those frames contain, the more dangerous the
board. Here you see a glaring example of danger on the horizon. Sure, you have
Top Pair and a good kicker, but the board is not only paired high, but also has both a big
Straight and Flush Draw to boot. Your Top Pair is in danger. Hopefully you
already knew that, but if not, you've just been warned by your new buddy.
AI Personality Peeking
When you take a seat at a table with unfamiliar players deciphering your opponent's skill level and playing style
should be one of your primary tasks. This
information is so important it can make or break you in any given session. While you set the difficulty level
of your event by
determining the percentage of Dead Money players, you can not
tell who is Dead Money and who is not ... unless you peek. There are two
preferences related to AI player personalities. You can allow yourself the
ability to peek at a player's personality by passing your cursor over their
screen name as shown below, or you can instruct MP to make their personalities visible at all
times.
 
In time, by observing the actions of players around you (both AI and human) their playing style will become
evident as you pick up small attributes from their actions at the table. These attributes add up to a player's
style, and this information can be critical when making a tough call.
I suggest playing with the 'Peek' option enabled. After you've studied an
opponent long enough to build a picture of their playing style allow yourself an educational peek to confirm your suspicions. Over time, this
should help you focus more closely in observing the actions and betting patterns
of your opponents.
The option to always display the AI player personalities can also be
used for good over evil. Novices should use this information to observe how a
tough player handles himself in difficult circumstances. While MP's tough
players may not always make the perfect decision, they will make many more good
ones than bad. Novices should take heed.
Allow Peeking at AI Cards
Ever wished you could flip over an opponent's hand and take a look at what he
seems to be so proud of with that huge bet? This option gives you the ability to
do just that, peek at your opponent's cards
at any time during the hand.
Used properly, it can be a valuable learning tool to confirm your suspicions or to verify your reading of an opponent's hand. To get the most long-term benefit discipline yourself to make a decision on
whether or not to fold your own hand before exposing your opponent's cards. Then
put your opponent on a range of hands based on his past actions and see how
close you come to calling his actual two cards.
Player Decision Timer
This option activates the human decision timer. When it is your turn to act
the timer begins to count down to whatever limit you have set for yourself (as
shown by the shrinking blue line).
If you have not yet acted
when the timer expires, your hand will be folded. This can be used to simulate
online play, where timers are used to push play along.
Deal My Cards Face Down
Typically, the human player's cards are dealt face up, an extra large card
graphic to make it easy to view your hand (as shown on the left below). This option tells MP to deal your
cards face down on the table (as shown on the right below), and is an excellent way to practice for live play.
Why?
 
In a live game, every time you look back down at your cards (after the first)
you risk giving away information about your hand. This is particularly true for
novice players who often have a hard time remembering which two cards they hold
(which tells your opponents you don't have a memorable hand like AK or a big
pair).
By practicing your card recall you won't
find yourself looking back down at your cards after a third flush card hits the
board. When you make this type of peek at your hand, you're signaling to the table that
not only are you wondering if you have a single flush card, but you almost
certainly don't
have two flush cards (since you likely would have remembered that). Playing
advanced poker is about the little things.
Show all Winning Hands
When the hand has ended, this personal preference forces the winner's hand to
be turned face up even if the hand did not go to a showdown. This allows you to see a victorious AI player's holding even if you didn't pay to do so.
While this feature can obviously be used to your advantage, or to satisfy one's curiosity, it is
meant primarily for those players who wish to see if they accurately put their
opponent on the proper range of hands without having to manually peek each time.
It can also be used to reinforce over time the types of good or bad decisions
you're making at the table, as you get to see the hand of the opponent who got
you to lay yours down. Was it a good laydown or not?
The Hand Archive
Any poker player who has more than a casual interest in the game will at some
point wish to discuss a specific hand with a family member, friend or co-worker,
or perhaps on an Internet discussion forum. Instead of forcing you to type
out the details of a given hand MP gives you the ability to manually cut and paste the
running text summary of any given hand directly from the running text review box
as the hand unfolds. But this isn't all ... you also have the option to
permanently save any given hand (with notes) to your own personal hand archive where it can
be accessed at any time in the future as well.
Archived hands may then be viewed at any time between sessions by going to
your history screen and clicking the 'Hand Archive' button. This will give you a
viewing screen like the one below (click to enlarge) where you can cycle through all the hands you
have saved in your archive over time.
If you were inside MP right now, the scroll bar to the right could be used to view the remaining text that is
currently out of view. This will include the entire running text summary of the
hand as it unfolded, including every fold, call, bet and raise that occurred, as
well as the pot results, including all split-pot information. As
you can see in the enlarged view, when a hand is archived, MP also attaches the chipstacks and
starting hands of all players at the table for the recorded hand.
Note: If that still isn't enough for my
hardcore shoppers, take a look at the 'Record Every Hand I Play' option below.
'Record Every Hand I Play'
This option instructs Master Poker to record the running text summary of
EVERY hand in which you're involved during the next session or event.
This hand
data will then be saved in a dated text file in your Master Poker directory
which can be viewed and manipulated with any text editor or word processing
program at your convenience. This is much easier than trying to record every individual hand to your
Hand Archive (for those users who wish to evaluate every move they
make). This is how you answer that common question, "But where did I go
wrong?"
Click the button below to move to the next feature section:
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