It would be nice if an online room offered the game with antes instead of blinds. I can go either way on a Jacks-or-better requirement, or a joker, but it seems to me that draw was designed to be an anteing game. It seems to play better that way. There are numerous problems/imbalances in playing the game with blinds, and though blind games have existed in casinos, they were never the standard.

Just curious why PokerStars et al have the game set up with blinds, and if people would prefer the more traditional draw structure.

Do not know why PokerStars sets its game up the way it does but it is similar on Boss Media Network.

Even back in the day it was not unheard of to have blinds instead of antes. Albert Morehead (a prominent games authority) wrote a poker book in 1971 (?) that analyzed draw with blinds.

For myself, I would like eight-handed tables to be able to limp a few extra hands and hell why not a Joker used as a Bug. I believe such a game is available somewhere on the Internet.

I played draw for years in Gardena and then at the Oaks and AJ's in the Bay Area, back in the 80's.

As I recall, Gardena only had Jacks or Better with an Ante, and of course a bug. The games were a nit fest.

The Oaks had a 2/4 game with blinds and a bug, guts to open.

AJ's had No-limit games with a 10c ante Jacks or better to open $1, and a 90c a half hour time charge. Most players bought in for a hundred. Now that was sweet!

Moral of the story... The B&M had different formats.

Personally I like the bug.

The biggest problem I see with 8 handed games is that the deck run out of cards and the need to shuffle discards, especially at the low limit level where everyone with a pair limps in.

In a six handed game, I have yet to see the need for going into discards on the draw.

I suspect that it is a minor(?) programing problem. And heaven forbid you get one of your discards back on the draw.

In the live games we all dealt (i.e. no dealer), and if it looked like we were going to run out of cards the CO and the dealer put their cards under a chip, and the dealer shuffled up the remaining cards so that you would not end up drawing your discards.

Surely, the dealer was given a chance to draw from the CO's discards, that is, they were added to the stump of cards before dealer drew?

I first learnt draw poker as a child in the 80s when poker meant draw poker, so I have a fondness for it and probably an over romanticized view of Gardena: California Split, Nick The Greek, John Fox, etc. I cannot but envy you a little.

Pokerstars has prepared for this situation, since 6 handed it is possible that all the cards can be used and more needed. They have programmed it (allegedly) to allow for reshuffle where it is not possible to redraw cards you discarded. Which really would be extremely simple to program.

Yes the dealer would shuffled in the CO cards for himself. Actually it was pretty rare that cards would run out by the time the CO asked for cards, but it did happen. Usually just the dealer was short.

Gardena: Little old ladies with blue hair chain smoking. Well if you call that romantic go ahead.

As for John Fox. His book was The Bible of draw poker. More so than Caro IMHO.

I can confirm that this is correct. It is not possible to draw a card which you have already discarded at PokerStars, even in Triple Draw.

Incidentally, having the ability to spread games with both a blinds and ante is on our wish list. Obviously if we get it developed, draw is one of the prime candidates for such a structure.

Regarding 8-handed - I remember supporting that when the decision was originally made (quite a while ago now), but research and a great deal of discussion led to 6-max being chosen (hey, at least we didn't go with 5-max, ugh). I believe graphics issues were a factor in this (it can be difficult to fit 8 lots of 5 cards on the table screen without overlapping something important).

if there's anybody to ask, I guess it would be you!

What's the consensus on the possibility of an ante-only game, maybe even Jacks-or-better (with a re-ante/re-deal if nobody opens), and do you have any insight as to why a blinds structure was chosen initially?

I suspect using a SB/BB structure and guts-to-open, rather than antes with Jacks-or-better to open, was done for two main reasons:
1) The blinds structure is more familiar to people who learned to play poker on flop games (holdem, omaha).
2) I believe that the Jacks-or-better/antes structure is primarily American and possibly was even largely limited to California when draw games were the only legal game in town. I think players from Europe/South America have always played draw with blinds and that is a large portion of the draw player pool. If someone from Europe/South America can tell me if I am right or wrong on this point, let me know.

I think 6-max is just right for online draw. PlaNIT Poker had 8-max with blinds, which was too many players. 8-max would probably be better in a game with antes I didn't care that much for the 5-max that Paradise and PokerRoom offered.

I learned 5CD about 20 years ago and always played with antes, pass and out, no joker. However, unlike most of you, I only started playing it seriously 1 year ago, at Stars. I had never played with blinds befores, but now i like it more than with antes.

Doyle's Room and Gnuf both run 5CD with antes, five handed, pass and back no joker. I tried it a few months ago at Doyle's for a period of 2 months and it was the most boring experience I ever had. The action in the game is mostly: check, check, check, check, check, draw, draw, draw, draw, draw, check, check, check, check, check, crap pair wins the pot.

If the game is running short-handed, the total ante will be so small you'll have to tighten to a extent that makes it almost worthless playing.

IMHO, 5CD with antes can only be interesting as a pass and out game, and with a total ante that is worth catching.

Blinds were introduced in poker to induce action and they surely do, specially at heads-up. I read more than once that in the old Gardena times, the game with blinds was mostly played in private clubs. After my experience at Doyle's, and for what I've learned since i started playing it online, I understand now Pokerstars choice.

If it was 5 or 6 Max then this sounds right but with 8 players Gardena Draw seemed to have worked well enough. Good post.

I agree that an anted "pass and back in" game would be awful online, but I'm thinking about the variation where, if nobody opens before the draw, everyone must fold, re-ante into the same pot, and a new hand is dealt out (and so on until the pot is opened, which I can't imagine ever taking more than three deals).

THAT would be an interesting game, and dealing speed online wouldn't be the problem that it is live.

Guts, by the way. Jacks or better (as I understand it) is nothing but fish protection.

I think having an online limit draw game with antes, a "bug"
and Jacks+ to open would be fine:

1) It's "worked" before in a B&M environment.
2) It could bring some draw players that don't play "flop"
games to online poker or other draw players that have played
this popular form from the past.
3) It's different enough from most of the limit draw games
that currently exist online.

Having a "Jacks-or-better to open" rule is not necessary,
and maybe even a relatively large ante structure could be
much better to generate some action. For example, if the
total ante is simply equal to the size of the first round bet,
players would have to play slightly looser in comparison to
the almost ubiquitous "two-blinds" structure.

On the downside, the game could also be somewhat
"trappy" if it is "pass and back in" and frequent sandbagging
will probably drive away some recreational players. Also,
eight-handed will probably result in somewhat "nitty" tables
as some have mentioned, so probably six-handed or even
five-handed will work out better than eight-handed.

This form of draw could also work well for PL as long as it
is "pass and out" or the "minimum openers" is lower than JJ.

If it is "pass and out", the button automatically wins if
nobody opens, right? Then, the next-to-last player should
open with AK+ and some semibluffing hands if the total
ante>=opening bet. To have pots that are "re-anted", a
rule for minimum openers makes sense and perhaps a pair
much lighter than JJ will work out better in practice.

Also, for online play, if there is such a "minimum openers"
rule, the site simply ignores deals for which there isn't a
hand that meets the requirements. Online play also avoids
a common problem in a B&M environment: that somebody
is "light" (didn't ante).

If true, in Triple Draw this is an error. As in draw, it should not be possible to draw a card you have discarded in the current round. However, in TD it should be possible to draw a card you have discarded in a previous round.

This seems like an important point. I await the response to it.

Eight handed draw with antes and guts to open would work online.

It's not an error - the decision was made after much discussion and consultation with Team PokerStars (in fact, the original suggestion came from one of the most respected pros on the team). The theory is that no player would want one of their previous discards back, but there is no way to achieve that in a live game. Online, it's easy, so why not do it?

There are some things that are done in the live game that are either not needed, or can be improved upon, for the online game. We don't burn cards online, for example. We don't have to round up the blinds or antes to the nearest chip. Why imitate a flawed live system when there is a superior one?

As a draw addict myself I wish more places did something similar.

Blinds are most useful in highly positional games like lowball draw and Hold'em/Omaha. Without blinds, early position would tighten up much more.

However, it seems that draw high is not as positional as the other games, thus moving to an ante-only won't be as detrimental. And it would have the added advantage of allowing players to jump into a game immediately.

Of course, it would seem like a pain to implement for a negligible advantage.

On the other hand, having antes and blinds would be great.

When people want to see hands turned up in NLHE games, you go on and on about how you're recreating the live poker experience. What the hell? And that's a minor thing, not messing with the card frequencies! This attitude isn't so far up the slippery slope from rigging flops because people like more action, IMO.

Anyway, you don't do it because it isn't fair. Knowing that your opponent is more likely to get your discards than random cards is a small advantage, but an advantage nonetheless. Since the vast majority of players will assume the game is played like a live game, those of us who now know otherwise have an unfair edge.

For instance, suppose I start with 22227, and all six players come along, so I go ahead and draw to the hand knowing that if I make a hand, it will be good and win me a huge pot. Now if it goes far enough for a reshuffle, all my opponents who are drawing at a deuce have better odds to hit one than they ought to! Even if I'm pat they must if I'm in position, because the software doesn't know if I'm going to draw or not. You've essentially rigged the game so I get sucked out on more!

All of poker is based on the odds of a standard 52-card deck. To violate that in any form is utterly unethical IMO. I'm giving serious thought to leaving Stars over this, and I'm going to repost this in the Zoo, because people deserve to know.

I'm glad the debate has begun, because I'm sure there are people on these forums who are sharp enough, mathematically, to figure out exactly what the effect on the odds is. My instinct says that the effect will be very small.

To clarify, the algorithm for the reshuffle itself is no different to the normal shuffle (the deck isn't forced into a preset order, or anything like that). What happens is that, at the point at which you are dealt new cards, if you are going to receive a card that you have already discarded, that card is simply skipped and you get the next one instead.

Yes, but your odds of improving your hand in the first place are also better, because you cannot pair deuces and are less likely to pair sevens. It's a benefit that everybody shares.

This is no secret, of course, and anyone who were to write to support asking about how the reshuffle worked would get a full explanation. However, I wonder if we should be making it more clear, on the website perhaps, that our system is slightly different from that typically used in live poker.

At the end of the day, our goal is to make players happy, so if there is widespread discontent about this, we will of course listen and consider changing the system.

Let me rephrase this. You're saying "yes, we're changing the odds, but not much so it's ok."

Just in the interest of being clear, that's your point in the above paragraph, yes?

Also, I think we should move this discussion to the Zoo thread and let this one get back on topic.