As if not being able to play legalized online poker in the US in every state wasn't frustrating enough, when we finally find a way to organize large, home game style tournament clubs on PokerStars home games, these morons have to go and find a way to ruin that as well.

They recently took away the home game club administrators ability to run tournaments with 5k-10k-15K starting stacks (3K only now), they cut out blind levels, and defaulted the game play speed to fast.

When the backlash came on twitter and otherwise, they said that these were completely planned changes that had made intentionally and provided no other information.

While it may seem trivial to most, for those of us in the US who were part of clubs that have anywhere from 25 to 450 members, that run tournaments from $25 to $300 dollars, 9 handed, six-max, HU tourneys etc, we had found an awesome escape from not only the wrecked live poker scene (COVID), but also a nice way around the ridiculous laws that prohibit online poker in the US.

Sure - I know a lot of you will say "just play on pokerbros, just play on Pokerrr2" but some of us don't like playing on tablets, phones etc - we'd rather play on computers and utilize what we perceive to be better software with a more legit RNG. Not to mention the fact many people have spent a ton of time building up their clubs on Pokerstars.

The only rationale I can think of for them doing this, is the huge spike in home game play has led them to try to monetize it somehow (which they haven't even explained), or perhaps they have server or capacity constraints. Either way, it's very simple to just pass that cost to us with a simple club admin fee, or increase the play chip buy in requirements so people have to purchase more play chips.

I think my rant here is just as much about how it feels like every time there seems to be a small step forward for online poker in the US, there is 2 steps backward shortly thereafter - just super frustrating. In addition, Pokerstars does suck and they have gone to **** but I couldn't honestly believe this update when it was released.

Yes, yes they can. And they strive every update to show you how much more they can suck.

also they removed certain formats like PLH/PLO combo games. who tf knows why...

i setup a homegame for my bday on Stars with 10k chips and that ^^ format a few days ago. thank the gods they didnt **** with it and kept any pre-made games you created already.

Is there any official link or communication about the HG changes? Saw my club admin couldn't make 10k blinds today.

I don't know what's wrong with the current management. They became the biggest as a reg-friendly quality site, and now they are trying to do the opposite.

I wonder if Isai was a lot smarter than his successors, or just less greedy?

I think Isai was starting his business in the perfect moment (moneymaker boom, broadband internet becoming more and more available to consumers, etc) and he realized that investing in his customers was the key to long term growth and sustainable success.

Nowadays, my inclination is that if there were a profitable way to have lower rake, bigger rewards, a-la Scheinberg style, someone would do it and steal all the market share. Since this doesn't exist anymore, it's my belief that companies have determined that it's not a feasible business strategy. They folded pre

This truly, truly sucks. I can't stand the poker apps on the phone. PokerStars home games have been amazing, as Aussie bars have been shut (slowly opening with poker). Now? I can't see playing online again. $3k starting stack? Fast clock? It used to be a great Friday night staying playing two games - it sounds like games will take 20min and be shovefests almost every hand.

To the apps I go? Sheeeeeez.

+1. If only more regs would realise that poker sites business models do not revolve around them being winning players and making a living, then they can adjust accordingly.

Well the withdrawals are still instant so I think yes they could suck more. Allso they could stop giving special rb challenges to recs. Stop the big mtt series. Allso end the spins promos. I think if they really put the effort in they might suck even more.

This company isn't in for the long-term profit. They want max. money out and then sell it.

They could reduce rakeback from 0.1% to 0.01%

So apparently I am hearing that they are changing this back on June 20th.

I am not sure if that is true, as I haven't seen a screen shot of it but that is the latest buzz on twitter. I really hope that is the case.

what are they changing back? the antes on zoom games i think?

i for one hope they increase the table cap a little bit, 6 tables is so much more fun than 4 tables

This was in reference to home games features

It is funny how they decided to speed homegames up by making the starting stack 3,000 fix. For the last 100 - 200 homegame tournaments I have played, the starting stack was lesser than that.

Re-read the bolded part above.

Why might they have made a change ?

Gzesh, as usual, I see value in your perspective, especially around matters of legal risk. It does make sense that they might want to mitigate risk, especially if they don't want to be a party to someone taking a rake - still, even if we concede that point to them, their approach is awful, and you'd really like to see them take a braver stance and continue to use such happenings as a way to further the agenda of those of us who want online poker.

Generally speaking, as I said in my "rant", I think it's just more a product of overall frustration that it just seems impossible to play legit, reliable, online poker in the US 10+ years after Black Friday

well i hope they do go back to normal june 20th, i imagine the feedback they got was LOL

The software doesn't build itself for free.
They make $0 on your club games and they owe you nothing.

Wowwwwww - great insight brah.

As stated previously, they could charge admin fees which would be fine, and you do have to purchase play chips, so actually yeah, there is revenue opportunity for them to recover cash so while they don't owe me anything, they are just losing potential revenue, customers and just overall, sucking at business and life.

Update for all the serious, non mouth-breathing, non troll individuals who actually care about this issue (not legionballsack):

More important note, the chips feature has been fixed (up to 15K stacks) and the blind levels up to 15 minute levels - game speed still not fixed but I'd say this is win - the backlash must have helped

Yes they are sucking really bad. Unfortunately their software is still the best by far. Are there any other good options for rooms with good software (UI/UX), rakeback and HUD friendly?

Or more like you do have an option to purchase play chips. You certainly don't have to make a purchase to get in a home game, you just have to run up your play chip balance enough. (I'll be honest, I don't remember what the starting stack was. I just know all of our Home Game tourneys have a 20K buy-in, which is pretty much the little chip bonus I get just for logging in.)

Wait so these homegames were happening before Pokerstars PA? how did this work? I'm confused

I had a group back in the day who would all send $20 to an escrow for SNGs and we'd award prizes to the top 2 or 3 finishers. Idk how cash games were done, seems a bit more complicated on that front.