Discussion Thread re PokerStars Player Reps Report. Feb 2012

[badbeatLOL]

awesome way to treat the reps who invested time and energy to try improving things for the community.

dont be surprised if when the next panel is due, only some idiots who want to score a free flight and accomodation will apply.
if the reps came back with more than what stars proposed on december 29th, this is a succes for us.
just because some people were dumb enough to think that just because stars flew out few reps they would be handing out millions and millions in rake money, doenst mean the reps did a bad job.

(hope i could bring my point across, englich is my 3rd language)

[ant___z]

Originally Posted by hypergeometry

It's a mess . . . Anyone could tell me what we won and what we lost from 2011 ?
I'm totally lost now. Some are saying PS is getting less money than 2011 and others are saying that the changes are garbage. Who the **** is saying the true.

Trying to sum it up:

a) VPP distribution changed, tighter players will tend to receive less; looser players will tend to receive more now. Conversly, rewards (rakeback) will go up/down respectively. This can make your rakeback (if you are a reg) drop by 5%, 10%, 20% or even more, depends (recreational players will tend to see rakeback go up). Overall, Stars states (and reps stand by this once they saw data) that it represents an increment of 1.5% gross rake.

b) Rake structures changed and there is a marginal overall cut of 2% gross rake which means even less in terms of effective rake. Let's say that someone has 50% rakeback equivalent; then you will benefit of 1% less rake paid per hand. And if you were paying 3BB/100 on rake, your gross winrate (winrate at the tables prior to rakeback) should improve by 0.06BB/100 not accounting yet for the direct down effect on rakeback of -0.03BB/100. In this example I considered a 2% cut for a given player (matching overall/average figure) but it will not be the same for everyone.


About a) the effect varies widely case by case depending on playing style and variant. About b) the effect is more evenly distributed. Soon we will have estimates and in a few days real numbers from real playing.

[badbeatLOL]

oh and we need data for every game type and stake with the following info:
average rake/100 in 2011: estimated rake/100 from February 2012
ASAP

[punter11235]

Yeah, I mean there is no reason for them to lower the rake anymore.
The SSNL and low MSNL at cap/plo is still almost unplayable but i guess that sucks for players. Maybe someone will make better poker site in the future but I am not holding my breath

[CooperC7]

Originally Posted by badbeatLOL

oh and we need data for every game type and stake with the following info:
average rake/100 in 2011: estimated rake/100 from February 2012
ASAP

+1 but im woried they(Stars) are only going to post the % the rakepressure went down (or up) for each level according to them.

[svj888]

Q for reps:

I don't really believe the 1.5% increase number either, but in the other direction.

Surely PS recognized that for many of their mass-tabling nits, the rakeback accounts for 50-100% of their income. Thus, they knew perfectly well that they would have made a lot of their play-styles untenable with the change to WC, and the amount of hands played had no choice but to decline because a lot of players had no choice but to quit or start losing $$. Thus while the 1.5% increase might apply on a per hand basis, the hands played would have decreased, resulting in a loss for PS over the long haul, no?

So would it be safe to say that PS had determined that the mass-table nits were contributing less rake than PS had determined their detrimental effect in other areas to be? (chasing away players via no action, 9 regs gang****ing 1 fish, etc. etc.)

Was this stated to you at the meetings?

[MikeGotNuts]

Just wanted to say A+ work xPeru, excellent posts ITT.

All, the reps did a decent job of getting the rake structure to suck less. Poker Stars wasn't making a new structure to double your win rate, sorry. If you looked onto these changes with that kind of expectation, the mistake was your naivety.

[vatelie]

Originally Posted by badbeatLOL

awesome way to treat the reps who invested time and energy to try improving things for the community.

dont be surprised if when the next panel is due, only some idiots who want to score a free flight and accomodation will apply.
if the reps came back with more than what stars proposed on december 29th, this is a succes for us.
just because some people were dumb enough to think that just because stars flew out few reps they would be handing out millions and millions in rake money, doenst mean the reps did a bad job.

(hope i could bring my point across, englich is my 3rd language)

Some of us realize we got what Stars intended to "give" from the beginning and the meeting was just a charade. Not to mention the complexity of the changes to make it look like it's a 10% decrease in rake, when in fact they are taking with one hand what are giving with the other. Being taken for a fool is quite tilting, hence the reactions.

I don't think anyone's blaming the reps for the results, we all know they had no leverage, as stated above.

BUT they get a hard time for the change in attitude since they returned. Not one of them said anything remotely bad and they keep defending/praising Stars, like they're incarnations of Steve or something. They don't just present facts, they are fighting Stars' war here and that is not right imo.

For example:

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...postcount=1352

http://www.rakeback.com/pokerstars/n...ade-2076-2077/

Ducy ?

[vatelie]

Originally Posted by Hood

Most of the chatter seems to be just about the opinions of the player reps. I don't really see the relevance.

See above.

[xPeru]

I've been for a curry and am now on my second glass of red wine. Hence delay in responding (but I have spent 8 solid hours responding immediately)

Stars were going to return 2/3 of the value of the changes to the players.

My best guess (and I'm pretty sure this is what PS Steve also believed) was that they would make it 3/3 ie totally revenue neutral

I pitched very hard to exceed that, as did the other reps and laid out solid business reasons why they should overcompensate.

I believe that my arguments resonated with Isai.

They ended up giving us 100% more than they originally planned to.

Plus the opportunity to go back and check the figures in April.

I'm now done for the night, I will reappear fresh faced in the morning, but I am not at my best after even 1 glass of wine - age shall not wither but red wine turns the brain to mush.

I'll answer every post, but I need a break.

Peru

[LunaEqualsLuna]

Originally Posted by Xela

I am really stunned that there are still a few people that do not understand that on average we are better off than last year. I actually feel embarressed for them.

Save your embarrassment for yourself mate...

Originally Posted by vatelie

Some of us realize we got what Stars intended to "give" from the beginning and the meeting was just a charade. Not to mention the complexity of the changes to make it look like it's a 10% decrease in rake, when in fact they are taking with one hand what are giving with the other. Being taken for a fool is quite tilting, hence the reactions.

I don't think anyone's blaming the reps for the results, we all know they had no leverage, as stated above.

BUT they get a hard time for the change in attitude since they returned. Not one of them said anything remotely bad and they keep defending/praising Stars, like they're incarnations of Steve or something. They don't just present facts, they are fighting Stars' war here and that is not right imo.

For example:

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...postcount=1352

http://www.rakeback.com/pokerstars/n...ade-2076-2077/

Ducy ?

This sums it up basically... from saying

Pre PokerStars Pizza: "rake is disgusting... lower rake is our main concern, this is unsustainable"

Post PokerStars Pizza "So we saw sum grafs and players ar beatin teh games after rakeback. its not problem."

-_-

[ant___z]

Originally Posted by vatelie

They don't just present facts, they are fighting Stars' war here and that is not right imo.

This is so unfortunate!

A lot of posters (me included) has been treating this information as it is: it is a corporate decision and information at a 99% degree with some (positive/benefical) input from the reps.

But the practical result of discussing 99% Stars stuff is being accused on arguing against and attacking the reps 99% of the time. That's not true and I even think that the reps standing so much for the deal is a natural and expected result!

I am sorry but it is what it is and i have respect for the reps in general and in the cases I know more about them, I have them in high regard. But, now they are doing the Stars work on presenting something that almost exactly matches what was announced by Stars on 29th December!



I am sick of replies of other posters coming over us. They wouldn't do that on most cases IF it was Stars announcing this very same deal. We shouldnt be arguing with fellow players on an unpaid job/work cause this is so misleading and distracting for the relevant issues!

[Bluegrassplayer]

Originally Posted by starvingwriter82

So, I sent this PM to xPeru. It started as a simple thank you note and kind of turned into a post, so I thought I'd add it here:

Hey,

Just wanted to say thank you for your hard work at IOM and the aftermath here on 2+2.

There's pretty much guaranteed to be fallout and some people are pissed, but stay classy and you'll come out on top.

If you have time, I do have a question (which you can answer in the thread if you want, I think it's valuable).

In what ways is the deal you have now, different than the one given to us on Dec. 29?


From my understanding:

The percentage drop is the same.
True rake has been implemented instead of increments (the same).
The cap has been lowered a marginal amount. The cap has still been increased 80 cents on five handed play.

No rake changes (or detrimental - is FL going to true rake over increment?) for CAP and FL.

Very small relief for the micros, but still obscenely high (relative to other stakes).

Is there anything else other than changes for Supernova/SNE?

I haven't seen a comprehensive list of all the changes yet, but compared to the changes that were implemented on December 29, it looks... the same. The only difference is that they lowered the cap to 2.80, and raised the cap on high stakes games to compensate.

Came back here with a lot to say, but between this and Vatelie's last two posts it's all covered.

[HonteleJ]

Originally Posted by xPeru

If you want to do your own calcs on your own HEM database, you can using Hood's app which he has published on his news site Pokerfuse.

C:\rakestructurecalc>rakestructurecalc.exe
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "rakestructurecalc.py", line 41, in <module>
File "db.pyo", line 20, in <module>
File "psycopg2\__init__.pyo", line 71, in <module>
File "psycopg2\_psycopg.pyo", line 12, in <module>
File "psycopg2\_psycopg.pyo", line 10, in __load
ImportError: DLL load failed: Kan opgegeven procedure niet vinden.

My settings.txt is 100% correct...

[badbeatLOL]

Originally Posted by vatelie

Some of us realize we got what Stars intended to "give" from the beginning and the meeting was just a charade. Not to mention the complexity of the changes to make it look like it's a 10% decrease in rake, when in fact they are taking with one hand what are giving with the other. Being taken for a fool is quite tilting, hence the reactions.

I don't think anyone's blaming the reps for the results, we all know they had no leverage, as stated above.

BUT they get a hard time for the change in attitude since they returned. Not one of them said anything remotely bad and they keep defending/praising Stars, like they're incarnations of Steve or something. They don't just present facts, they are fighting Stars' war here and that is not right imo.

For example:

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...postcount=1352

http://www.rakeback.com/pokerstars/n...ade-2076-2077/

Ducy ?

i don't agree with you on this, sorry

imo the meeting was not a charade but a way of stars to make their figures more "believable" by sharing their data (which they can't share publicly for obv reasons) with a few chosen players who have ( or had?) the trust of the community who than brought that knowledge to us.

Stars than said: we are willing to lower the rake 2% total (with 1% being the number of the original plan) and our reps had the job to decide/ simulate a way that this 2% were spread in a way that would benefit the most players/ was best for the health of games

i have no reason to believe that the info we got from our reps is untrue.
and if the reps had the feeling that stars treated them fair, professional and with a maximum of transparency, they have no reason to say a single bad word about them, why would they?
after all there were 5 of them, stars could have bribed one or two, but all of them?
and the fact that stars agreed or proposed to make this meetings twice a year with probably a different bunch of people each time tells me that they are genuinely willing to listen to the players (without forgetting that they are in business to make money of course) and take appropiate action if need be ( and if its not against their own business interests of course )