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The game of poker has evolved greatly in recent years, and the appearance of “solvers” and other software over the last decade has transformed poker in many ways.
While poker solvers are generally considered a useful learning tool that many players these days use to learn how to play "game theory optimal" poker, other tools have appeared along with them that certainly isn't good for poker.
Such tools have led to the growth of "real-time assistance" in poker, a phenomenon related to players using software to help them play poker in real time, avoiding the learning curve altogether.
If you have been reading about RTA in poker recently and aren’t quite sure what it is, keep reading to find out how RTA works, why it’s considered unethical, and why it can get you banned from major poker sites.
The term real-time assistance (RTA) was coined relatively recently, and it encompasses using any kind of help while actually playing poker. While the most grievous breaches of anti-RTA rules have to do with the use of software tools, the use of preflop charts and other similar tools is also forbidden.
Over the recent years, tools were created to strip all information about an active poker hand from your poker client, run a simulation, and tell you your best play in real-time. Such RTA tools are extremely powerful, as they provide you with solver solutions while you are playing poker, making you basically unbeatable.
Even if other players knew you were using these tools, it would be extremely hard to play against them, as GTO poker, in essence, makes plays that are impossible to exploit.
As such, you will have a massive edge if you use any RTA tools, but such tools are banned at all major poker sites, and most poker players consider using them to be cheating of the highest degree.
There are several major RTA tools used in poker these days by players trying to defraud others and cheat the system. These include:
This means there are several ways a cheater can go about cheating in their poker games, depending on the tools at their disposal.
Players with automatic RTA tools would be the most dangerous, as they have instant access to solver-based solutions in every hand they play.
Manual input RTA tools require the player to input data into the tool every time, meaning they would probably not be able to cheat in every single hand.
Even still, such a player can look for solver-based solutions anytime they face a tough decision, which alone is enough to make them nearly unbeatable, especially if their poker skills are solid, to begin with.
Using things like preflop charts used to not constitute cheating in the past, but poker sites have been cracking down on such static tools recently as well.
Operators now want you to make every decision yourself, based on data that lives in your head only, without any help from any charts, software, or other players. While this may surprise some players, using charts and other help while playing can get you permanently banned at major poker rooms like GGPoker.
Perhaps the most famous case of RTA in poker, until recently, was the case of German poker player Fedor Kruse, who was first accused of using RTA back in 2020. The player made an astronomic rise in poker, going from playing NL200 to the highest stakes available online, all in a very short period.
Eventually, his roommates blew the lid on what Kruse was doing. After warning Fedor against cheating in his poker games, the roommates reported him to the powers that be.
Since the roommates provided plenty of evidence, it didn’t take much of an investigation for Kruse to get banned from GGPoker and have his funds, believed to be about $250,000, seized. Other poker sites also locked Kruse’s accounts around the same time, although he apparently got to cash out his balance from other sites at the time.
Kruse's game was subsequently analyzed, and it was clear that he took many unorthodox lines and made plays that went against human intuition on many occasions, leading most to believe he used real-time solver-based software to give him solutions while playing.
Kruse’s case was an early warning to the online poker world, but many other cases came to light since where the use of RTA tools was either proven or suspected.
Since the Kruse incident, a number of other RTA use cases have come to light. Reportedly, even high-stakes pros like Ali Imsirovic have been banned from GGPoker for using such services, although this case never became fully resolved.
To this date, at least 13 accounts at the world’s biggest online poker site have been banned over the use of RTA, and well over a million dollars was refunded to the victims of RTA.
Of course, these are only the cases that have been publicly shared and only the accounts this operator has managed to discover. It is unknown how many other players may have used RTA to cheat at poker on one poker site or another or how many accounts were banned that we don't know of.
What is known is that poker rooms like PokerStars and GGPoker are taking this matter seriously and have been pursuing anyone using RTA in an attempt to ban them and confiscate their bankrolls when possible.
There is one big question when talking about players getting banned for getting RTA. How could the sites possibly know that a player uses RTA in poker?
The operators have developed quite a few methods recently to battle RTA, including both AI-powered and human-handled systems.
To start, the operators look over millions of hands using AI to search for patterns that stand out from population tendencies. Once the AI detects that a player may be playing "too GTO," it will flag the account. After that, it is up to the operator's security team to decide whether the player is cheating.
Furthermore, the operators also have ways of discovering any potential GTO apps that may be running on the player’s device while they are playing. Of course, all these methods may still not detect every player using RTA, especially if they are smart about it and using their RTA tool on another device.
Yet, while RTA tools become better by the day, so too do the detecting mechanisms and the ability of operators to find players using such software.
The terms “RTA” and “ghosting” have been used together in quite a few instances, so it is important to clarify the situation and ensure everyone knows exactly what the two mean.
The term RTA refers to a player using help from software, a chart, or another tool to get help while playing online poker. On the other hand, the term ghosting refers to another player taking over at a certain stage of someone’s play, changing the outcome of future hands and the decisions made.
In both cases, we are talking about online poker cheating, but ghosting does not technically fall into the category of poker RTA.
That said, ghosting is just as unethical as RTA is, and you should report players who use ghosting just as much as you should those who use RTA.
Real-time assistance has become a big problem in poker recently and must be taken seriously by everyone involved. Moving forward, operators will have to invest more time, energy, and resources into the pursuit of cheaters, or the entire online poker ecosystem could be threatened.
What is sure is that many great RTA poker tools will appear in the future, as the financial incentive to create such software is simply too great for any cheater to ignore.
This is why players and operators must come together to pursue any RTA-using players and find ways to detect them and get them banned as early as possible.
The developments of AI and more computing power being made available will certainly make RTA one of the big challenges of the online poker industry, but it's nothing poker operators can't respond to if they set their minds to it.
While real-time assistance in poker is unethical, getting someone to face any kind of legal charges over it is unlikely. While you could, in theory, accuse a player of cheating in an online poker game in this way, it would be very hard for any court to prove it and even harder to get a court to hear such a case.
It is unlikely that RTA users will ever face any charges anywhere in the world, so banning them from online and live poker is the best thing the industry can do.
Remember that any player using RTA in online poker damages your interests, and don't ignore any cases you might know of.
When it comes to you personally, there are also things you can do to help in the fight against RTA use and in an attempt to make online poker safer for everyone. If you happen to know anyone who may be using some form of RTA, even if you consider them a friend, you should report their actions to the operators.
RTA is full-blown cheating, and you should not assist anyone in using it or keep silent about a player who you know is a cheater.
Furthermore, if you encounter a player who makes weird plays that consistently seem to work out for them, you should also report this. While such a player may not be using RTA, reporting them will ensure that someone takes a look at their account and finds out whether or not they are at fault.
The next time you play online poker, especially for higher stakes, you should keep your eyes open and make sure to report any suspicious activity.
RTA is becoming ever more present in the online poker industry by the day, and so is the general trend of online poker operators fighting such practices.
While RTA remains in the legal gray zone, everyone in poker considers it cheating, and you should stay well away from using any RTA tools in your games.
As time progresses, the use of RTA tools in poker will become increasingly frowned upon by poker operators and players, and hopefully, tools will come into existence that will remove RTA from the game forever.
In the meantime, remember to keep vigilant in your games, look out for suspicious activity, and report anyone you suspect using RTA in poker as early as possible.
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