Over the years sites have been giving high volume players less rewards and more recently, even less respect as customers, and I wonder whether this is a prejudice that is costing sites potential profits by not approaching the market from the right angle.

There seems to have been a simple line drawn between regs/winners/leeches and recs/losers/depositors, and I think pokersites are making a mistake somewhere by thinking in these simplistic terms and may miss out on potential profits by mis-treating high volume players.

Poker by it's nature should be an addictive, competitive, stressful, swingy, confusing game, and if the game manages to retain a high level of all these traits, there's no reason why a good percentage of high volume players will not become -EV players and pay back large sums into the games at some point in their poker playing life.

After watching the games for the last 10 years it seem poker catches up with nearly everyone at some point; whether it be being overtaken by the learning curve, or the game changes, or variance and losing control of your own emotions. I think poker life mirrors real life, most will start by ****ting the bed, will shine in their golden years, then finish by ****ting the bed again

Alot of focus is on new players lasting longer but I want focus on how sites could be making more money from high volume players by keeping the following traits in the game.

1. Addictive - Missions, goals, community, flashing lights, jiggle your keys, whatever it takes.

2. Competitive - Random seating, name changes, make it too much effort to hunt bad players.
Incentivise reg warring, mb have some leaderboards where regs challenge eachother for the crown.
3. Swingy + Stressful- Keeping the games high variance. Maybe incentivise long-hour grinds. Also I think players need to be playing their own money, staking takes alot of the emotions and stress out of the game so hidden tables, no transfers etc could help.

4. Confusing - This I think is the most important trait. PTR, Databases and HUDs have got to be eliminateted as much as is possible from the game. Players cannot know their EV, winrate, winnings/losses or have a history of their hands to pick through. Poker has swings that can last for aons for both winning and losing players, so keeping players in the dark about their actual skill level is essential for making money from high volume players.
Reward systems that take a long term commitment like pokerstars' SN and SNE or Partys' old Platiinum Elite should be very lucrative for sites as many high volume players will fall short for many reasons chasing these tough to achieve statuses, especially w/o regular rakeback fueling your bankroll.
But obviously rake should not be so high as to alert players to their skill level.

I know I haven't suggested anything ground-breaking but I think I make a case for sites to still treat their high volume winning players as customers, and to keep the VIP systems healthy and dangled just above most player's skill level.

My view is high volume winning players are being under-valued by the sites, I think the difference between a degen and a winning reg is not that much given some chnages to the game and would like to hear more suggestions on how sites can rock the poker boat rather trying to sink it with rake hikes and reward cuts.

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/29...-recs-1569951/

The smart players dont lose money back to the site when they can no longer beat the game, they just quit and become a part of the whatever happen to,,,,, Thread

I find it hard to believe most grinders could tell when they stop beating the game given:
- no database stats
-no EV line.
- no HH's

Downswings for winning players can last 200k+ hands, winrates are tight, and variance is high these days.

Edit: Im not saying they would NEVER quit/move down, but I dont think after years of grinding/printing money or 8 months in to chasing SNE its as easy as saying 'oh ive had a bad month, must be -EV, I'll call it a day and hit the job centre tomorrow'

Yeah but without huds I doubt theyll put in 200k+ hands(even if they do they wont maintain the same WR) which at that kind of volume your net$ comes from RB and RB is hard to come by these days and you can only drop stakes so low before you begin to loose money, and as far as how they track their losses/or if they're beating the game the cashier history is a good option,,,,

Guess op want sites to be nicer to fish

I think you are posting as someone that is butt-hurt because PokerStars would rather have new money coming in more regularly, and sees that they don't have to cater exclusively to high volume players, because if anything less rake back is going to make it more necessary for you to grind more to keep the same income coming as opposed to less grinding.
I don't think they can lose in this situation. If the current top 2% decide to go get a day job instead of continuing to grind the same volume and accepting that they can't rely as much on rake back, then the bottom 98% is going to rush in to fill their place, and there is going to be a larger volume of players in the long run coming in because they will feel like they have a chance

Reacting off the cuff because you are annoyed that you are going to be making less money by playing the way you are used to just seems like you are not considering your own long term.

Posting a thread about how poker should be "addictive, confusing, stressful and swingy" shows in my opinion that you are only interested in your own immediate short term success and have given no thought to the good sides of opening the player field wider, not catering to the top 1% exclusively, ect.

Wider base audience means more money funnels to the top either way, so?? why try to promote that poker should be a negative experience for new/starting/depositing players?

+1

They can click the balance button

But if the idea is to keep players in the dark about their skill level, surely sites would benefit from them grinding hands at a slower rate. That way even +EV players can have many months of downswinging. This also adds to the emotional strain in the game making them more likely to play -EV poker.

If you were getting it in good all the time but losing over 6 months, this should sufficiently mess with players heads.

Players run 100's of buyins under EV all the time so why would the cashier be a solid indication of skill? Especially if players are forced to play lower volume.

You're incorrect about my emotional stake in poker as I quit playing for a living on 2012 (saw poker nosediving,saw no future, got a computing degree instead), but I still like railing the community and playing for fun. I made this thread because it is sad to see the dream being removed from poker, and I believe there is a growing attitude problem towards winning players that will cost sites lost profit while stunting the growth of online poker.

Obviously sites should be trying to keep new players alive longer and give them a fun experience (hence tableselecting, databasess and HUDs hould be retricted), but to squeeze maximum profit from hardened regs sites need to be turning up the heat and dangling juicy carrots to throw them off their game, not disincentivising them by just taking their winnings.

I don't think its the top 2% that would leave from rake-hikes/promotion-cuts. I think its the breakeven/slightly losing players that jack it in, leaving a more polarised field of tougher sharks and clueless fish, this can only shrink the game as it continues.

To answer your final question I'd say attracting new players is great but if you're dissinterested in retaining those players later in their poker-lifecycle and finding ways to continue making profit from them then the game will still continue shrinking, popularity of poker as a game of skill will continue nosediving, and sites will continue letting large amounts of regs withdraw money from the community consistently.

This thread is far from a whinge from a butt-hurt reg. I'm saying find more ways to put these high-volume poker dinosaur players on ice! They've had it way too easy over the years, but not because of rewards/rakeback has focused on them, but because they've been allowed to do the following to easily:

1. Hunt bad players, avoid other regs.
2. Datamine stats.
3. View their edge. (EV graphs)
4. Overcome variance by mass multitabling/seat selecting.
5. Review their hands
6. Get staked

ahahah what a joke. It comes from putting in hard work. Yea watching my EV graph gives me massive edge lol. Bumhunting is the only thing which is definitely bad.
People who complain should cry in some dark corner because they never made it to significant stakes, what a joke. btw you can still 4tbl zoom with no hud and do 150k+ hands month.

You literally made a post that poker sites should increase everything bad about poker, exploit the "high volume players" more thoroughly, but god forbid they decrease the rake back.


Literally dumbest thing I have read in this thread so far. Not only is it patently false, you don't even have the vaguest clue what you are talking about.

The top 2% are the entire subject of your thread. So wtf are you talking about then?

The breakeven/slightly losing players are not mass-tabling or playing at high volume.
If they are, then they are going to be losing money no matter what the rake back is? .....what???

If their profit is exclusively in rake-back....why are they playing $5-10+ buyin games in high volume?

Wtf are you actually talking about man?

Maybe i'm misreading this post because I haven't read PokerStars one time, but it just seems to me you are making a post that "oh you shouldn't cut their rake back you should just f**k them in every other way you possibly can, anything but their rake back omgzz"

Makes no sense to me.

Pretty done with this thread though, good talking to you.

No! you got it the wrong way around the regs are the disease they want to get rit off, they win and discourage the fish/losers/first-timers to keep on playing.

Don't you get it at all, i am amazed you don't get that, the hs pro's are the examples not those annoying regs with their ton-load of software playing like a bot[and there are enough of real ones around], and have nothing to do with playing poker, just math and systems.

New comers want to have the idea they are playing real poker, with bluffing and strange moves, but all they get is bot like playing the odds/math and fold and/or bet in a second and move on, regs take their romantic view of poker away with their cold calculated and logical mathematical play, so just like the little boy that thought he could be the next messi, and gets hit with reality and trows away his bal and kicks and goes plays rugby, the new players say **** this i am going to play black jack or slots, poker sucks.

Well just my view on things, makes sense to me! right?

While regs generate rake (A LOT) they are also the ones taking money out of the poker economy.

Sites seem to be adopting the view that this is bad and would rather have your average joes on their site constantly pumping money into the system for them to rape at a high rake.

They seem to be more worried about the people bringing the money in than the people generating their rake.

Not commenting if this is right or wrong just seems to be fact to me

Sorry didnt mean to make it sound like 'being a pro' is easy, I meant pros have had an easier time financially, emotionally and with confidence in their game by having acces to tools for anylising their own play and skill level, and house softwares which facilitates playing a huge volume of hands per month.

Good point about zoom. Maybe zoom is a bad idea as its fast and nitty. Thoughts?

'Everything bad about poker' is a relative term, we should be discussing what is good for poker. What grows the playing field and community, and not what is best for each individual's wants.

I believe reducing the software and formats that make regulars feel comfortable and secure in their game and winrates will result in more action, less money leaving the site consistently through mediocre regs while the truly hard-working and talented will achieve a greater success in a game that would probably start growing again.
Maintaining high reward systems are essential for bad/mediocre regs to chase and continue to give action. Regular rakeback on the other hand is just giving a money saftey-net to mediocre players.

Im not sure why you think it would be the top players leaving more as rake is increased or rewards decreased. Surely the ones still making good money will stay while the new losers of the game will leave, creating a widening gap between the top and bottom skill level players no?

This is the growing view which I think benefits noone. It assumes winning regular players rigidly STAY winining players and will never deposit or play like a fish.

Its my belief that with a system that keeps players more in the dark about their skill levels and profit history, and keeps variance high, and keeps players chasing VIP rewards it would actually be incredibly difficult for many grinders to know if they had a true edge or not, and would result in many of them spending a good amount of time as an underdog in the game beofre it sinks in. A high volume underdog grinding for 3-4 months has got to be worth a lot to pokersites.


To clarify, my idea of a utopian online poker experience is one where new players have a fun experience, the most talented and hard-working achieve great success and fame in the community, and everyone in between are in the dark battling it out in a competitive game to achieve success.

the only thing that matters for ecology is the ratio between cashouts:deposits
not rakeback, not huds, not anything else.
You either decrease the cashouts or increase the deposits to make more profit, amay well is doing both more or less...

Their dream scenario probably looks like max winrate ~0.5bb/100 any stake for the best players to keep the dream up and some sunrunner 100k hand graphs and well then mooooore deposits

I agree, and I think online poker's ecosystem has catered for too large-a-percent of the player pool to cash out comfortably and regularly like a wage packet. The sites' answer to this has been to continuously hike prices but this doesn't change the system and alot of mediocre players will still cash out regularly when they add no value to the site, and quit poker/drop stakes immediately when they become an underdog.

When a large percent of players are cashing out regularly, the cream is not rising to the best players, and poker has less big success stories to market. The system encourages mediocre players to avoid the sharks and hunt the weak.

Sites want more competitiveness amoung their players, but increasing rake and allowing players to easily anylise their own skill through 3rd party tools does the opposite of what they are trying to achieve.

Increasing rake or lowering rewards just makes losing players MORE AWARE they are losing players, and when they see their rake stat on HEM or PT4 its an instant wake-up call.

Unibet is freaking slam-dunking it at the moment, Stars take some notes and grow some balls!

Edit: Just to be clear I wanted to discuss ideas for increasing competitiveness and variance, and more strategies on how sites can gain from profits from regs. 'The rake is too high' has been dicussed to death and not very effectively.

Do you have any numbers to back up that a too large percent of the player pool cash out? Or how do you arrive at that conclusion.
I don't know it personally too, but it seems to me that the sites pocket way too much.

The system encourages every player to hunt the weak, that's how poker is meant to be played since forever and that is how you make money at poker. It was just too easy to hunt I agree with that, but it will never change

You don't seem to understand there is nothing which you can change to avoid that your "standard I drink a beer and 1 table NLH" guy is at a massive disadvantage against the young motivated I review 3 hours sessions a day pokermath type guy.
Increase rakeback, forbid HUDs, they can all do that etc etc etc, everything won't change at what rate rec players lose to regulars in this day and climate. There is too much information out there for people willing to put in the work and study. Rec get slaughtered no matter what.. On Unibet recs lose even faster. Invent a new game..

Why do sites need more profit from regulars? And how does this help the rec players ? (this only helps the site huh?) I don't really understand

the content of this thread doesnt seem to match its title

There now seems to be a category between rec and reg, regs being considered pro. But whatever, history has often proved that when regs are getting hits, it is dangerous for the sites, the small rooms going dead, the big rooms getting smaller.

The late surprising successes of rooms like unibet, 888, have so far indicated the opposite, so the sites are interested to follow the same idea. That is bad for the 2% or so, until they get better scores and rb is not cut away too early like at stars it is cut off too early, making it very bad for my future and the current motivation, just having a shot to move up there but it is a dead duck at limit poker to do so for me as it probably lands in no rb where it is still needed. And even if that would not be the case, how long can one hope it stays good?

The 10% of rake is not returned at medium limit levels at stars for supernovas now at non regulated countries. The non regulated countries are actually paying taxes to the regulated countries.

The winners, especially the bigger winners, have never been liked by the poker rooms, possibly cutting out isildur1, who anyway goes up and down like that, though they might get worried he beats the bank. Though stars rakes 100m more every year now and bot type of players took and takes millions, but nowhere as much as stars rakes the games. And even kill my limit poker and plo play, though i just before had them as my majors.

The sites have cut down much high limit action also, even the rake from 5 10 big bet and 10 20 or 15 30 limit poker bets, and they have often liked that players play lower, eg 10 20 limit poker instead of 15 30 even, it seems, and 10 20 is very marginal with a cut in rb now, 15 30 having been significantly the better deal, and 10 20 was almost dead, unbeatable before they lowered limit poker rake at stars, and now they cut rb to 30 max.

But the new rec path seems ideal for the sites, for the 98% and lowering the 2% problem, that though are the semi utopias why most players play, together with the better deals, goals to aim at. In a dream world it is good for all, the optimal poker ecosystem with better games, more players, more rake. And a level playing field is the other word, the 1bb100 being unsustainable as 2% of the players rape the games as so and the sites cant afford them because of the ecosystem and that they actually need to cashout some players also. So, stars cuts that with 100m per year and lowers the motivation of such players, not considering what it already causes at my level. But the better ecosystem is now what the sites want more than ever before, the race is on.

Maybe it will not hurt my nlh, is my only hope. Just would like to play other forms also, and i did work 2.5 years for them, and that is still more for many others, who now just get a worse deal. But how much is variety and 2.5 years worth? 10% of rake at medium limit at sn level, maybe i would like a sure 40 to 50% rb instead than hope for more profitable games that as well can get tougher instead. Though not that one can trust in much rb in these days until the rec plan fails, that there actually are more players under reg or so, like when most of them disappeared from sites that then went busto to many times smaller.

The line is somewhere between a reg and 2%. But considering that i am a reg, and whatever gets me in or out of the site has the biggest impact to sites profits, it is vital to have the rake and the future good for the regs as without them playing as much as before, the site gets smaller. And i am not playing much limit poker at stars anymore, that was what i mainly used it for, and now limit poker on this planet might have been killed. But most play nlh, while the plo rake issue might drop its popularity also, and nlh is the worst game for regs, i suppose.

Is 888 running good with the bonuses, and unibet with no hud, not sure, but the no hud sites used to be nitty, but unibet isnt nitty, they just have succeeded to make it a site for recs and keep the regs like me away though many of them there also, but it and 888 should be more like party, where i also dont play and it has always been a much smaller site than it needed to be, so those two sites have something additional, and the other is a hud site.

888 i am not playing there now because i know how bad the no rb is for me, and could play nlh only there, that should mean the site should have less players than it has. Maybe so many reg to rec players have got fed up and play easier sites only, and there are enough such pkayers to get those sites that much action, so many players enjoying their time less at tougher sites where one needs higher skills to have a good time. It has become a major pain for more and more players.

And a big reason is heavy multitabling, not the higher rb that most active regs deserve and so many players in every way aim to get at, but stars considers it bad for them if they cap the number of tables instead, that would be very good for up to 98% of players, and why would stars be interested to keep the heavy multitabling alive for the players they just dropped to max 30% for what looks like the same reason?. At least they keep it possible for those who still insist, and it should be better for most others, counting out small limit grinders, though the win rates there are above 1bb100 so not sure what is better now, other than when it gets to 24 tabling plo10 with 1bb100 plus rb. At stars there is room for 6bb100 with less tables, when running average.

The rec sites have success only because of some extra and because of the tougher games at stars. In the past they could have failed, and still could if a bigger site goes rec and offers a better deal, then the recs would slowly find their way in there. Stars was never supposed to go more rec, as it was figured it does better staying as reg. How did ftp do when they dropped rb, just the same as party did when they did so and also insisted with a worse vip than at stars. Now amaya is at 4 sites networks, and maybe revolution will merge somehow with ongame, that is amaya as far as i know.

For me, the limit poker case, bad. For plo, i am higly critical. Actually, i am close of staying with nlh only, that additionally to lesser rake issue, gives me more sites to play at. If sites going rec will not be bad for me, it is only with nlh, and i will likely then add more nlh tourney play in also, possibly more formats also. This is the adjustment i likely need to take, just keeping my limit poker skills alive and playing some plo, also as i am unfortunately interest about my latest plo book and will some of the time feel like playing plo, and illogically just hoping all but nlh isnt time wasted, additionally to 2.5 years that i have put in them already, while nlh is my 3rd game or so, one year old, that has only bit by bit with experience and good knowledge become more interesting, but never was my choice, sites just forcing me more and more limit my play to nlh, and the only good is that it has grown in my interest and i have been running good while my plo has been stuck the last year, just holding my own. Also, nlh has been less tilting for me, though not as much as limit poker where i am next to immune to losing pots and it isnt as big deal to make a mistake.

anyone who cashes out more than they deposit is bad for business

I think even with all its recent actions and likely future changes Pokerstars should understand it needs winning players to drive the belief among a wider audience that poker is a game where you can make decent money. Recs need to hear through word of mouth and other advertising that you can win money from poker and sometimes win big. I think Pokerstars thinks it would just prefer if regs just weren't as +ev. Changes which can make +ev players play less, not at all, or be less +ev, or alternative make -ev players play more or pay more rake they will want to introduce. The problem is they can't be games which have no winners at all or raketraps. Spin and gos creates winners and also has the benefit of meeting many of the other criteria. Pokerstars might think banning HUDs would probably meets its criteria also.

If you think about it regs who are +ev after rake effectively use Pokerstars for free, even get given rakeback, to take money from players Pokerstars's see as their customers. In Pokerstars' ideal world all players are -ev (never beating the rake) but are incentivised to play because of the chance of winning a big spin or big tournament or whatever they introduce next.

The only chance +ev players have of putting a stop to changes which bring us closer to Pokerstar's ideal destination is to be very vocal about how Pokerstars shouldn't be trying to make all games less +ev for +ev players. Loud enough that either recs hear and are would be put off from playing (they also aspire to be winning players) or loud enough that pokerstars genuinely thinks recs might be put off from playing on their site. There is no point a reg complaining about the amount of rake that they pay because as Pokerstars sees it, its not the reg paying the rake, but the recs he wins it from beforehand.

In addition, all regs should also realize that when Pokerstars says this will affect only 2% of players they are effectively talking about all +ev players. Pokerstars has 60million registered accounts and I imagine 98% of those players are not profitable, (most likely making 1 or 2 deposits and giving up). So if you're beating the games you should probably start realizing Pokerstars sees you as a competitor for -ev players money. The only reason Pokerstars can't boot you from their site is because it would send a bad very bad message to losing players e.g. the site is designed so no one wins.

It is up to you, if you're +ev player, to make it clear that if you stop playing on pokerstars you'll not be going it quietly.

not necessarily. if you cash out only small amounts but play huge volume and pay tons of rake you are good for business. also if you're a small winner but a big action player you might be fun to play with and then entice more fish to keep playing (obviously one player is not going to change a fish's mind about redepositing, but the cumulative effect of several of these action players might; ie fish don't like nitty games).

Very true. Maybe introducing high antes to all the games would have a positive affect on the games by increasing variance, rewarding looser play, and punishing high-vol nit play.

I was on a very fishy table the other day where a couple of players were raising/calling/3betting 100% preflop. Im a very active player so I jumped in with the 4-5bets and played numerous pots where we were all calling all in postflop light and bluffing off a ton, and for the first time in years, I realised I was having fun playing online poker! And then a thought occured to me:

Regs in my position could/would just nit-up and print money against these players, these fish will lose everytime in the most boring actionless way and probably leave online poker within a month or 2. I'm sure I had a bigger edge on these fish than nits would, but there's going to be alot more variance and fish will have their day for sure.

I think nitting needs to be discouraged to protect new players from boredom and encourage their swings.

Just look at Bovada! They offer no rakeback and limit players to only four tables. That gets rid of most nit grinders and creates games with more action that are good for regs and rec players.