BTW: You also don't understand that if you want to ban something, you should first ensure it is a significant problem worth solving and that you can effectively ban it, to avoid creating other problems, esp. disadvantaging honest players vs. rule breakers.

PokerStars understood this when they decided not to have a "one player to a hand rule", it was unenforceable, and even in the few cases where they could catch someone doing it it makes no sense to punish only one of out many people who would break the rule.

In the case of HUDs, it's a rule that will be mostly unenforceable. So rule breakers will get an even bigger advantage over honest players who choose not to break rules by using a HUD. The rule breakers will be able to play more games, and win at higher rates than honest pros.

Pretty soon anyone that chooses to play full time will be forced to break the rules and use a HUD, or they simply won't be competitive with the guys who can play many more tables. And then one day, of course, the sites will develop means of detecting a popular HUD, and the regs using it will be punished or banned. And now the "cheaters" who use other HUDs will have a big advantage, with fewer competitors, until more people learn to use the "undetectable" HUDs. And it will continue in a vicious cycle.

You want to legislate something that isn't clearly bad, and can't be regulated, and by banning it, you'll give a substantial advantage to players who are most willing to cheat, i.e. the players with the lowest ethics will get the monies.

This thread has been high jacked by those players who really have nothing to say about the regulations being proposed for online poker but have an axe to grind about people who multitabling and using HUDs. You cannot be for free market solution, as long as the free market is picking the solution you support. This conversation on whether or not sites should or should not offer certain options has little to do with security and everything to do with player preferences. The later should not be a part of any bill that looks to license and regulate the online poker market.

Most players where concern with that fact that Full Tilt did not have the players funds in their accounts, then they were concern that they allowed multitabling. The UB scandal had nothing to with the site allowing HUDs and everything to do with the lack of regulation surrounding the online poker industry. Lets steer this thread back onto the topic of security and fair regulation and not player preferences

No, I obv want the handhistory.txt file to be released after the player closes the table.

And people will write screen scraper for bots, so let's not outlaw bots either.

We are concerned with the methodolgy of keeping track of player tendencies. Playing like a bot isn't cheating as well.

That's your problem.

fyp

That's your personal problem, adapt your game. iirc, I had less than 25 hands on half of the people when I 4-tabled Rush part time during college, I did fine, you can too. I later 13-16 tabled 6max, I'll have to cut down to 6-12, but when the -2bb/100 nits are replaced 40/0 fish, HUDs are a luxury I'll easily give up.

"Significance" is pretty subjective here. Botters would be saying the same thing.

And imo people that are HUD-dependent to multitable are going to defend this issue to the death. Anyway, should the regulators not determine whether bots are illegal? (not a rhetorical question)

I am pretty sure NGC has rules against using electronic devices to aid play in casinos. Would the same theory apply here RE the use of HUDs? They are a software based tool that will give the informed user an advantage over those that don't have it.

If you pull out your phone while playing blackjack you will be asked to step away from the table.

But you are allowed to use your phone to take notes, calculate hand equities with PokerCruncher, watch training videos and read strategy guides while you play live poker, so no it's not the same at all.

Then the HUD writer has all the data they need to store in a DB and put into their HUD, without writing a screen scraper. All they will miss is current session data, and again, a screen scraper will provide that.

Fewer games running is everyones problem.


No one is defending bots and they are entirely different things, so stop trying to conflate them. Sites need to fight bots for very good reasons, but they don't need to also fight allowing players to play more tables.


Sites have all the tools they need for ensuring that that mass multi-tablers don't hurt their games. Specifically, if Stars switches to contributed rake as the basis of their VIP program will make a significant difference in the quality of their games. Currently Stars gives players points whether you play or fold a hand, which is a big enabler of the 24 table near zero VPIP grinders. The action players pay all the rake, the grinders get all the points.

And it's a big reason why there is such a firestorm from these nits over the PokerStars changes, the fact they make a good living blinds them to the fact their behavior is making the games worse for everyone else. But like I said, Stars can tweak their program to solve this problem, it's up to them, no HUD ban necessary.

But I have to admit you are starting to win me over with your arguments. Early this year I spent a couple weeks writing a hand history parser in Java because I was frustrated that HEM and PT didn't support certain features and data I wanted. It was fairly simple and pretty quickly I had a floating window that listed all of my opponents at my active tables and their current stats.

If you are able to succeed in getting HEM and PT banned and made criminal offenses, and have all the site apps include code that searches for them on your computer, and the NGC send out squads to arrest anyone using them, it could be the greatest thing that ever happened to me. They'll never be able to to detect my little Java app or know what it is doing, as I'll never sell or distribute it except among close personal friends.

While all the mass multi-tablers are out of business or in jail, me and my friends will be cleaning up! We'll be the biggest winners on the internet. So go ahead, ban the Huds and I'll send you a nice Xmas present every year as a sincere thanks

HUDs and # of tables played should be left to the sites

Gov't should ensure my money is protected and that the sites are legit. They shouldn't be involved in specifics such as this.

If legislation is passed in some form that allows U.S. players to play on sites with a world-wide player pool, it could be very problematic for anti-HUD rules to be part of U.S. legislation.

I agree that HUDs and number of tables allowed should be up to the sites. For the sites that allow them, they are available to everyone, they are useful for pros and it doesn't matter if rec players don't know about them, etc. etc.

Viffer just made a post regarding this. HUD's if possible should be elimanated. Number of tables should really be maxed at 2 or 4. Once poker becomes big again the regs wont be that big of the rake. Insignificant actually if people feel comfortable playing. That should be a regs goal too.

As for setting a table limit, I would like to think about MTT players. You can play 15 - 20 MTT at a time and not be a problem to other players. Would you also implement a limit on Tournaments or just cash games?

Impossible to eliminate huds if there is hand history.
Huds provide good data for players that think certain players are colluding.
Huds provide another element to the game imo.

It should be up to the site for whatever policy they wish to choose.
Hopefully they don't become illegal and same with multi-tables.

What we should be more worried about and focused on, has to be if we can play with Non-Americans.

Surely the most flexible approach is for the regs to delegate to the sites T&C's as in the actual rake structure although caps may be set by the NV regs.

This is the most flexible and allows any or all option(HUD or no HUD or inbuilt site HUD) to be pursued down the line depending on conditions.

The wider question is about prohibited software and how best to legislate whilst protecting innocent players that will occasionally get caught as false positives or by filters narrowing focus for the investigation team.

Warnings should depend on the severity of the breach and evidence. A dispute process that adheres to the open justice principle (with protections for the sites detection methods) would engender trust in the NV oversight process for both consumers and operators IMHO.

'In my opinion, there is a good chance that HUDs and rakeback/revenue sharing in any form other than comps might be barred as regulations progress' - I think regulating the use of HUDS would be extremely troublesome to actually do from a technical viewpoint and legally a nightmare, especially in a country like USA whose laws are applied differently from state to state. not sure why rakeback or revenue sharing would be barred? they are perfectly legal just clouded in obscurity. To make rakeback transparent (not really what reg players want I would have thought) would then require rb partners and sites to be audited and 'open' - a big leap of faith and again a huge task.

I guess we have to ask whether those passing the laws are really concerned about protecting 'vulnerable' new/old punters aka ethics or about the bottom line. I strongly suspect the later and that measures to protect the user will be fairly few and far between - self exclusions etc. But going as far as to question the use of software seems a stretch unless we are dealing with the Tea Party you guys have!

This.


The purpose of Government regulation is not to create a site that Viffer or anyone else would create - the purpose of Government regulation is to set the nut low minimum standards for a legitimate marketplace, and then let the site operators offer a variety of offerings. If you want anonymous tables, play at Site A. If you want a strong program against bots, play at Site B... and so on.

The Government doesn't (and shouldn't) proscribe the exact design of cars on the roads - but they do set minimum safety standards. Ideally, even the free market would set those standards, but I guess it's a reasonable compromise to make for having the situation clearly legislated.

I doubt there will be much regulation in terms of multi-tabling and HUDs in the US. The poker industry is going to be dictating the regulations and everyone is completely aware that a HUD allows people to play more tables, the more tables in action, the more rake and therefore more profit. People like Jon Kyl haven't a clue about HUDs and aren't going to care about people they consider as degenerates "cheating" each other even if they ever learn of them.