That's Lock pretty much throwing up the white flag to colluders, saying come on down. 6 max DONs need to CONSTANTLY be monitored....Like have 2 people on your payroll who part of their job is devoted to policing these games.

It's just hilarious that they still don't even seem to be looking @ the problem from their response. It does NOT matter about how much history they have. Do you realize how easy it is for cheaters to play from their main account but have access to 5 or 6 more?

Whatever though, I used to be able to bang out 100+ of these a day, now I probably won't be at all. Putting half my money on Merge so I can have some options.

Que the moneyball scene where Brad Pitt tells his room full of old moron scouts that they can't solve the problem because there not even looking at the problem.

Trying to not freakout with what I'm about to say but....

I agree with Greear. har har.





6-max DON are just going to be a collusion-magnet if not properly monitored a heckuva lot. I think it was a safe assumption before that they were not being properly monitored to that extent. And that email to me does indeed spell that they may have collusion detection guys who don't even know what they should be looking for.

Sure, history of games against each other, etc is worth looking at too. But there are some hands that are pretty crazy. Are they misclicks? Mega-multitabling and not paying attention to stacks? etc.

And looking at "they have the same affiliate so PROBABLY know each other" (probably?!?!) is kinda weird. And the solution of not allowing them to play together is not terribly satisfactory.

Would need to look at it more closely. But that doesn't seem an appropriate response to me. And I definitely would recommend players stay away from the 6-man DON's unless you are comfortable being cheated against AND the possibility that Lock might not take appropriate action and compensate you if/when it happens. I mean, if you can still profit on them even given those qualifiers then that's up to you and go ahead and go for it.

But playing in such games usually involves the player to rely on really sharp security to police them, catch colluders and provide compensation in cheating situations. I just don't trust Lock to be strong enough at that to make me comfortable playing such games.

Previously, I would have said Stars IS strong enough. But they were really disappointing in their DON ring collusion scandal stuff I thought. And even they threw their hands up in the air at that format of tourneys partly because it was simply too difficult to police as effectively as they wanted.

Just a couple of points here:

1) I cut and pasted just a portion of the response. In hindsight I shouldn't have done that, but the rest included personal information I really couldn't post (including the exact nature of the relationship between the two players). I should have just summarized rather than cut and paste and really I know better than that. FWIW while I agree that 6 max DoNs are REALLY difficult to police, I've seen security ban accounts in some instances as well as take actions similar to this. Based on the responses I get I'm confident there is detailed examination of the HH files going on. TBH I don't know the details behind what exactly they look for, how many people monitor, as well as what the automatic flagging software looks for.

2) I know the plan is to implement Fifty50s (or something similar), but for reasons that are probably somewhat obvious, there are other things higher on the priority list than that.

Thanks

-Rizen

Before I launch into another critical observation I want to sincerely thank you for your response and the frankness in that reply, etc etc. Definitely am appreciating the improved dialogue around here the past few days.



Which means that you being confident of the detailed examination of the HH maybe is a little over-reaching? Good that there was more to that email to you then what you pasted though. Because it left quite a bad impression.

But if they are looking at the HH's did they find possible collusion or not? They saw enough to ban them from playing at the same table together? Yet the affected player isn't going to be compensated? (I believe?) See what I mean with that?



Do you mean IN PLACE of DON's? Or just as another SNG-type alternative to be added to the lineup?

I think your players deserve to know if there are plans to eliminate DON's from your site/network.



Not really obvious to me actually.

First, if it's going to be a replacement then one assumes this is because there is a loss of faith in policing the games properly (contrary to what you said earlier in the post). And I can't see how having safe and secure games that aren't super-duper easy to cheat in aren't a top priority.

But I assume you are referencing the continued improvements of customer-support and processing cashouts and other things that Lock is taking care of, etc and that little things like adding new tourney formats just can't be done until after that.

I very genuinely do not understand how cashout stuff or updating the promos or making other decisions relates to implementing a new tournament format.

I'm not trying to be snarky here. I've just seen this kind of logic before from Lock and it still makes no sense to me. Granted, I'm not on the inside at the site. But it always has confused me and I don't recall seeing this kind of excuse from other sites:
"We can't get to that right now...give us a few weeks...after we finish the update of the cashier we will have time to get to the other things. Sorry we haven't been able to answer your emails...but that cashier thing keeps us super-busy" or something like that. Different things that to me shouldn't seem like they are inter-related.

If my ticket/financial department at my employer is having problems and is putting in overtime trying to fix it that still has nothing to do with me updating a promotion or content on our company's website. In fact, I probably don't know anything about it. Just an example there to show you how it seems to me things SHOULD work.

Also, I note that you aren't making the claim that "sorry, all the other stuff that we have to do is going to take away from our awesome ability to police the games." In fact, you make it sound like you've got it all taken care of and everyone is looking at the games and potential collusion the appropriate amount and it is no sweat to pull that off.

Yet somehow all that other stuff actually IS preventing something else that is kind of unrelated (to my observation) just because you have to do all these other things first, etc etc.

Cliffs:

Collusion/Security stuff = Don't worry. We've got it taken care of. We've got plenty of man-power here and monitoring something like this is absolutely no problem.

Getting to something else = We're swamped. Sorry, but there's no way we are getting to that anytime soon. Please be patient with us. We're trying really hard to catch up.

Just putting my 2c in here:

I fully realize that the *potential* for collusion is greater in DONs than other SNG formats, and for 6-max DONs perhaps moreso than 10-max. I accept that risk when I play.

With that said, I voted to bring back 6-max DONs to Lock (because they were dropped on Merge but 10-max were kept) when Lock moved to Revolution. Cake actually never dropped them anyway so not sure what the vote was about unless it was to *keep* them on Revolution, but anyway I voted to have them.

6-max DONs were incredibly profitable for me on Lock/Merge, and I was sorely disappointed to see them go. Rizen, I remember playing them with you quite a bit back in those days, along with a number of other Lock pros. When Merge dropped 6-max, 10-max DONs just weren't nearly as profitable for me, primarily because of the limited amount of time to fit the volume I was getting, the fact they filled slower, and that variance was higher. So I drifted away from DONs. Now that the 6-max games are back at Lock, I'm once again ramping up my volume and my profits are taking off again. Despite the greater *potential* for collusion, I'm not seeing regular and obvious evidence of it, and it's apparently not affecting my bottom line very much.

Sure, I do okay in regular SNGs and MTTs (especially the extremely soft MTTs on Revolution) and even cash games, but my love is the 6-max DONs. My winrate/ROI is simply higher in those given the volume I can play in the time I have to play them.

So, cliffs: Unless there is clear evidence that collusion is running rampant at Lock, and not just speculation based on some isolated reports (no doubt some of which are just sour grapes or wtf plays based on misclicks, bad players, etc.), I oppose a knee-jerk reaction to once again kill DONs (or 6-max DONs). Fifty50's are fine as an alternative, but not as a replacement IMO. I didn't like them on Stars, I'd rather just play a regular SNG.

I don't want them gone either, just policed.

It just sucks when it's semi obvious that they don't even really know what to look for.

I'm in a little bit of a rush, so I apologize in advance if I don't address everything in here directly.

1) I'm confident in the detailed examination of the HH because some of the comments in the e-mail made it pretty obvious they had looked at the play in detail. That being said, you're right in the fact that I'm the Poker Room Manager and a poker player and NOT a security expert, so saying I'm confident in a security person can only reach to the results of the work I've seen them do. Much like my confidence in my financial advisor has to do with the results I've seen from him but little to do with my expertise in finances.

I guess I kind of assumed people could make that connection, but I can see how it could be misleading.

2) Yes - Fifty50s will eventually replace DoNs is the current plan. That being said I don't have ANY sort of time frame on it, and to be honest I'd be really surprised to see it happen in 2012. The plan could even change. I do see what you're saying about things being not related, but the same software team that works on client upgrades also codes new games. Even if the team worked exclusively on developing new games, I would guess the implementation of stud games would take priority over this, although this is simply me guessing.

3) Implementing Fifty50s and saying that it says we can't police our own games is a bit of a reach. Catching colluders is kind of like writing anti-virus software (not a perfect anology). Anti-virus software only gets updated AFTER someone gets impacted by a virus and is a very reactionary approach. Similarly you catch colluders AFTER they collude. It's not a zero sum game as you have to compensate those who lost and were colluded against as well as leave funds with players who didn't do anything wrong and won. Let me be clear that this doesn't mean there aren't things automatically in place to try and prevent this sort of thing, but for the most part it's hard to anticipate players will collude before they actually do so.

There is also a 'stigma' around DoNs that doesn't exist with Fifty50s (or at least not to the same extent), therefore many players who won't play DoNs (because they feel like they are being cheated, even if it's not true) will play those.

I'm running short on time, but in short saying that implementing Fifty50s in place of DoNs says something about our ability to police DoNs is probably a bit of a reach. The games ARE harder to police, and having to have more security staff spend more time on it is certainly a part of the issue, but mostly it's just a bottom line thing. There is both less collusion and less perceived collusion (I guess the former I can't prove although it is widely accepted) in Fifty50s.

The counter point is, well if not why wouldn't you run both games, and for a site of our size the issue is mostly cannibalization, in that if both are offered, it is likely that both games will fire off much more slowly and less overall games will run (if you want to go into more detail on that we can, but it's the same sort of reason why smaller rooms shouldn't have multiple NLHE tables available until the games reach a certain saturation point).

-Rizen

Hello!

A week ago i left Revolution Network because of possible colluding in 5 - 10 $ normal speed 10 man DONs. I am a long term 8 % Roi winning player on other network, went to Revolution just for lowest rake they offer... played two weeks and stoped with ROI under ZERO and even rakeback deal didn't compensate lost money there! It was impossible to beat the game, i play DoN about a year and i know what i am talking about. Total colluding and wasted time and money there.

Now i went to Merge Network, 5$ DoN's seems ok, but not inuff games to make a good profit. At 10 $ DoN's i found imposible to play. Nobody plays, just waiting for the big teamplay to start when bubble comes. It is like a game between one goalkeeper against whole football team! I am making cashout and leaving Merge network as well. Actually Merge is one of the best networks around, so maybe i will be back some day to play there some other game formats.

DoN's are broken format of poker, and like LockRizen said, it is a big pain to police them for security team. I am very sad about it, but DoN's in near future will be history, for as and for colluders. It is a push/fold game with mindless grind and nothing new to learn in there. ROI is not very big in them and colluders make it even less proffitable. I am allready looking for a new game format, maybe will go to cash, maybe 180'man SnG or something. Actually maybe it's time to open new post for DoN players where to switch before DoN's are history?!

About "Fifty50" format i am sceptical, because there in Fifty50 will be nothing left from DoN's, and as a DoN player i can guarantee for lot of DoN players around here including me will be hard to adjust! This game will be more for those players who mostly take last and first paces, no middle ones, so more gambling for me there. But i didn't said that they will be not profitable for someone. And yes, collusion there will be a lot less than in DoN's, thats for sure.

Actually i am happy that i fount this post, it makes me and others take actions before something already happened with DoN's. So i want to thank everybody who cares and are interested in fair games.

Sorry, but you're wrong here. Maybe you're on a downswing or you're just not as good as you think you are. I play the 6-max DONs on Revolution almost every day, and am beating them at a ~17% ROI. Granted I think there's less variance at 6-max vs 10-max -- I was never as profitable at 10-max as I am the short handed games. My experience with Merge DONs was virtually identical, i.e. beatable at a decent ROI with 6-max being more profitable (while they had them) than 10-max.

I play with a number of regs who are also winners at the DONs, so they are most definitely beatable and as I've mentioned here before, despite all the hype I rarely see any obvious explicit collusion (outside of the implied "dynamic softplay" intrinsic to DONs that I think a lot of people confuse with the cheating type of pre-arranged collusion). Maybe you play different stakes than I do and see it there, but I can assure you the 33's and 60's on Revolution are very beatable and are not rampant with organized collusion.

i understand the reasoning for replacing dons with 50/50s, but still would prefer the don format with better security.

+1, if 50/50 does come, they need policing as well

MicroBob or DrD should be DON Czar

+3 ... Dons > 5050

Not for all the tea in a land with a lot of tea or all the colluders in colluderville.

I've played in Bovada double-up tourneys and am seriously concerned about collusion. Every game I've played has consisted of the same 10 players! No matter when or how I reg it is the same 10 players in the sng. Scary stuff.