Dear Pleno..........Best Regards, Danny.

[AndrewT]

The mindset of some pros is backwards. You think they need you, when the reverse is true. They would do better as a company if pros didn't play at all.

Pokerstars and other sites need both pros and recs. At the end of the day, they make most of their money through rake. They need the pros that grind 5 days a week, specifically at times when most 'recs' would be at work, else the site would be far less busy. Recreational players are called that because they play exactly that way - casually. Not every day, not 5 days a week. Just whenever they fancy it. Poker sites needs both recs and pros to maximize their profits at all times of the day and I think Pokerstars does a great job of attracting both types of player. So no, Pokerstars would not do better as a company without pros.

This is the biggest fallacy about online poker sites - they do not make their money from rake, they make their money from the deposits of losing players. Rake is simply the mechanism by which it is taken. There is some value from the liquidity that the regs provide (which is most important in SnGs, less so in cash games) but the negative aspects of multi-tablers (slow to act, timing out, no chat/fun) are a turn-off for the more casual player.

He's also right about the VIP scheme - some winning player takes $10k off the site in winnings each month and yet we give them more money on top??

[DMorgan]

As a HUSNG player the introduction of these games has obviously reduced my volume quite a bit, but making a load of noise trying to get them removed is probably one of the most self-absorbed campaigns I've ever witnessed.

Genuinely creases me up that these SNEs and other Supernovas think that they have a hope of getting these games removed. The heads up hypers guys are the best, a lot of them are so specialised that they have no idea what to do now that these games have trimmed a lot of the fish from the heads up hypers games.

For those of us willing to adapt, this may very well turn out to be exactly what we wanted in terms of sending a lot of the mediocre regs broke

[AlunB]

Not quite. I see your point, but it does ignore some of the larger issues at hand. Why are you rewarding frequency of play for example? Is it fair on the people who bring money into the system to reward them equally to those with withdraw money from the system?

Your point regarding the usefulness of pros and regs is well made though and is often ignored in this debate.

I think it is more fair to reward frequency of play, rather than by how much you win or lose. I think it is a smart thing by Pokerstars too, as they offer an incentive of good bonuses for the people who have the time to make SNE etc. whereas they probably wouldn't play anywhere near that volume even if they were playing full time. Or a recreational player might push to play slightly more that month so they make goldstar instead of silverstar and get an extra bonus at the same time. So it makes sense for stars to do it that way cause I'm sure it increases their rake an awful lot.

Is it the most fair way? I don't know, there probably will be a system out there that is better or more fair, but I haven't looked into it. I think it is hard to make everyone happy, whatever system they introduce, someone will disagree with it.

"frequency of play" is a major driver & KPI of a poker site. By "stretching" a player from playing, say, 2 days per week to 3 days per week it makes a huge difference to total Margin. Most sites work very hard to increase this.   

Well the entire industry was obsessed with this for 10 years. And then realised the monster it had created a little too late. Hence my initial question.

[Woodsey]

I say we just stop anyone playing more than 4 tables at a time and for more than 12 hours in any given week, that will make those pesky pros get a job in the real world and stop them nicking our money  

[AlunB]

The mindset of some pros is backwards. You think they need you, when the reverse is true. They would do better as a company if pros didn't play at all.

Pokerstars and other sites need both pros and recs. At the end of the day, they make most of their money through rake. They need the pros that grind 5 days a week, specifically at times when most 'recs' would be at work, else the site would be far less busy. Recreational players are called that because they play exactly that way - casually. Not every day, not 5 days a week. Just whenever they fancy it. Poker sites needs both recs and pros to maximize their profits at all times of the day and I think Pokerstars does a great job of attracting both types of player. So no, Pokerstars would not do better as a company without pros.

This is the biggest fallacy about online poker sites - they do not make their money from rake, they make their money from the deposits of losing players. Rake is simply the mechanism by which it is taken. There is some value from the liquidity that the regs provide (which is most important in SnGs, less so in cash games) but the negative aspects of multi-tablers (slow to act, timing out, no chat/fun) are a turn-off for the more casual player.

He's also right about the VIP scheme - some winning player takes $10k off the site in winnings each month and yet we give them more money on top??

There is a huge amount of value in regs churning that money around. If I deposit £100 and lose it all to Tikay who then withdraws it the site has made very little from me. If I deposit £100 and lose it all to Tikay who in turn was simultaneously losing £95 to lildave who in turn was losing £90 to etc etc. You see where I'm going with this.

[RED-DOG]

Let's wait and see what PokerGal thinks. 

[bergeroo]

I didn't play one yet, but I assume it is just the same format as on other sites, Winamax, ipoker etc. Personally I don't see what is exciting about a three player crap shoot where you are almost always gonna only be playing for 2/3s of the buy ins. Do people really get that excited about the 'jackpot game' where they can make a big win?

And no sympathy for the whining/winning regs obv.

[scotty77]

Congrats to winamax for coming up with the idea.

They're fun.

[baldock92]

I say we just stop anyone playing more than 4 tables at a time and for more than 12 hours in any given week, that will make those pesky pros get a job in the real world and stop them nicking our money  

 

[Magic817]

I say we just stop anyone playing more than 4 tables at a time and for more than 12 hours in any given week, that will make those pesky pros get a job in the real world and stop them nicking our money  

Then hopefully they will start paying some tax!

 

[shipitgood]

Can understand why sit and go regs are annoyed by these reducing traffic to their games.

Overall, these will be great fun for rec players, with a bit of a gambling experience which they'll love.

Anything sites can do to encourage recs, or "losing"  players, is a positive imo.

[arbboy]

Can understand why sit and go regs are annoyed by these reducing traffic to their games.

Overall, these will be great fun for rec players, with a bit of a gambling experience which they'll love.

Anything sites can do to encourage recs, or "losing"  players, is a positive imo.

sorry for asking what is probably a stupid question but why can't the stt regs just transfer to playing these?  Is rake excessively high because its a product designed for fish predominately and the large rake is hidden effectively in the prize pool?

[lucky_scrote]

What is the rake in these things?

[AlunB]

What is the rake in these things?

4% I think

[anthonyl]

These are awesome.

The best spin multiplier I've had though is 20X - probably 85% are the minimum multiplier, i.e. 6 dollars winner takes all in a 3 dollar 3 man.

Played them on winimax too but pokerstars software far more playable.