Not sure how legit this source is but came across it in the internet poker forum

http://pokerfuse.com/news/poker-room...s-high-stakes/

As I've said in the Galfond thread I think this is a great idea.

One thing I think might be good is to have the player list anonymous. This way you have to play several hands to get an idea of who is in the zoom pool, making it very unprofitable for a bumhunter to "have a look".

Another thing to remember is that we're using Zoom not for the original purpose it was built but for the de facto elimination of bumhunting that its lobby structure creates. In other words, we still want to be able to see the end of the hand so I would suggest two fold buttons:

"Zoom" = fold and move to next table
"Fold" = regular fold, move to next table when hand finishes

Wonder what they consider "HSNL", probably 10/20+ ?

Not sure if I like it overall, the railing aspect is a big downside imo, fish love HS action.

Assuming they don't make the lists anonymous, I don't see a reason it couldn't be programmed in to "track" a certain player, where the rail birds would see everything from a certain player's point of view.

ctrl+fold does exactly that already

Ah ok I've never played rush/zoom beyond 100 hands when rush first came out

if they did this I would come back to stars with a boner twice no THREE times my size!!!

what would be more advantageous of this compared to anonymous non-zoom tables?

I think this could be a really good idea. If I were in charge, I'd personally test it out first as a "Zoom Only Thursday" type thing.

No observing would be a potential issue.

Is this situation possible / relevant (now or ever):

You are 4 tabling zoom. You're in a 3 way pot. Player A bets, you're next to act with player C behind. Player C is 1 tabling zoom. You see him at a new table as you get a new hand dealt while still playing this 3 way pot. That means he folded. You can now call player A without worrying about Player C behind.

there must be a delay between actions and observable actions

The source is legit. It's based on what a Pokerstars represenative said on a 2+2 pod cast.

I don't think they will put you on tables that will let you do this. You would need to collude with others for this to work.

The test run idea sounds good to me. I agree with zoom in concept, my concern is how it affects volume long-term.

Or even when you're doing something a lot more common: debating a preflop raise on one table, and see a player who is still to act on that table join a new one.

you'd need to be playing multiple tables and be tracking how many other tables the player in question was at, but it seems quite plausible with a small enough pool?

Preface this post with: I'm not a high stakes player

You have to question the motive behind a move like "Zoom ONLY HS" games from the pokersite. As other posters have alluded to this would seem to be aimed at curbing bumhunting.

I agree bumhunting is terrible overall for the state of poker, but you are on a slippery slope when you try to stop it. I think the majority of HS players agree it is bad for the games, but then again these elite players are at the top of the food chain and against any randomly selected "peer" are either slightly -EV, breakeven, or slightly +EV. However vs high stakes fish they are all WAY +EV and vs midstakes players who will take shots in good HS games and HS regulars who will take shots in good NoseBleed game they are also VERY +EV.

It seems that the HS and NB players advocating moves that "curb bumhunting" are in a way encouraging moves that keep the HS and NB fish more inaccessable to next step down the rung of winning players. I won't elaborate further as I may be wrong but it's certainly something to chew on.

I will say this:
The greatest opponents of online gambling's (and regular gambling, alcohol, marijuana, porn, etc) moral center lies at limiting the freedom of what the majority of taxpaying adults do with their free time and aftertax money in order to "protect" some minority of that population from their own self destructive habits and tendencies. I don't think anyone here will disagree that
a) I'm pretty right on about that and
b) it's absurd and infuriating.
Yet we feel the need to "protect" fish at the highest stakes from being preyed upon. I'd say the people we consider "high stakes fish" are winners in the game of life, in most cases intelligent (or very lucky to have inherited the wherewithal to be playing these stakes), and probably need less of our "protect them from their tendencies" measures than the people putting $50 of their $300/week after tax income to play the sunday 250k or whatever. If we make moves to "protect" fish from losing too fast then we are giving credence to our legal opposition's desire to ban it all together in order to protect all fish from losing anything. Also: the fish lose no matter what eventually, it makes no difference to them who they lose it to.
In the case of eliminating "predatory" tendencies in the online poker world (bumhunting) I'd say we should be careful because although "curb bumhunting" sounds noble the main proponents have the "added benefit"
of
a) fish last longer and more games go around them generating more rake (pokersite benefit)
b) next rung down winning players don't compete with reg at HS or NB level for fish's money (reg benefit)

In almost every poker book or advice thread you read respected players advise taking shots at the next level when you see "a good spot". This invariably means one or more terrible players in the game. This has always been the advice of veterans and successful players and can be translated:
"bumhunt the next stake or two up" from your current level.

I totally agree with moves that eliminate or discourage bumhunting of a player's "current stake"...but you have to be careful not to to deny legitmate players the right to "take good shots ( bumhunt next stake up)" otherwise you are prohibiting moving up in stakes and cementing the current food chain.
(and be careful---this is great for the pokersites as well if they can lock everyone in where they are and let them lose to the rake in bad games)

Afterword: I do not play high stakes

We definitely talked about this during the meeting earlier this year. They seemed hesitant, because they did not know how the player base would react. We talked about always having "table 1" from the zoom pool as observable, so railbirds would not be missing out.

I'm not sure you're right about this. Why do you think it's true?

If there r not enough people for a standard zoom game u can just make it so that no one can quick fold if the player pool is less than a certain number. Once big enough then as normal. Should get rid of zeejustins worries. I'd actually think most ppl would want regular fold and not get moved till end of hand fold as standard, only reason to keep quick fold would be to attract the recreational player to these games

currently the pool for zoom 200 6max is around 90 people, and i saw it going up to 150, not more.

i think they will have a hard time getting enough players for 1k zoom or so.

not if it's the only 1k available. You think everyone will move down to 3/6 just to avoid zoom...???

the number of players is seriously not an issue, so long as u get rid of quick fold and just break the table once the hand is over.

say there are 6 players. this is just a normal game with rotating seats.
8 players = one table, but 2 people have to skip a hand every now and then. better than 2 ppl waitlisting doing nothing forever.
12 players = 2 tables, played effectively hand for hand (new hand wont form till both tables have finished)

the more people, the more tables, the smoother it is and the less waiting time. but theres nothing wrong with only 6 people forming the entire rush pool.

sounds like a funny dynamic.

pretty sure the preflop aggression will ramp up even more than currently, as soon as there is a fish on the table.

Yup, it's exploitable:



Text from the image:

Hand on the left was dealt first (as you can assume by the time bank). Look at the lobby. You can deduce that KiwiVic and sw27 have quick folded as they are only 1 tabling. I raised the hand to confirm this. MrMrX and JNandez87 both played while they other two [and oz] insta folded (as they had already quick folded).

HUD stats are blocked out, but my HUD doesn't work properly fwiw. Still using a HEM beta release.

Edit: I had contacted Stars about this yesterday, and have sent the screenshot just now as well.

Should be a relatively easy fix, although it will decrease the rate of hands dealt in smaller player pools.

This analysis doesn't factor in players playing more than one table, but the basic conclusion is correct.

i guess ud just have to specify how many tables u want to play, up to 4, but the client will only let u play as many as the current player pool allows.

Its the fact that the vast majority of the games are built around recreational players at this point in time and unless you are on the table within 15 seconds of the game starting you will not play in it. All the money in high stakes hold'em goes to guy who can find the fastest way to get the Jesus seat on the recreational player. There is very little shot taking going on at this time because impossible to get a 6-max game unless you are staring at the 25/50 lobby (hopefully with the table open, because by the time it refreshes you aren't going to have a seat).

Seems like a great idea, especially for people that want to be able to dip in and out of playing and aren't necessarily logging onto stars every day but can quickly get a seat w/o having to start a game with good HU players.