^^ That's exactly what I meant in my post, I just forgot to mention that the first 50/100 level should last one hour.
For example, replacing the first five 12 minute levels in the HORSE with 50/100, then simply proceed with the blind-levels as they are in the current structure. That should be quite easy to implement, I think.

Or 50/100 60/120 75/150 100/200 125/250 would be even better than that.

-1

True, I was just thinking of live where you don't have the ability to make such small blind increases, without adding more smaller chips denominations

I'm glad to see this thread created, particularly now, as I have some questions for the folks in here. Thank you for taking the time.

1. We're considering bringing the $215 variants back for the following games very soon: PL Omaha, PL Omaha Hi/Lo, NL Omaha Hi/Lo, FL Omaha Hi/Lo

Now, the question becomes... when do we run these games? Do we restore them back to their original times, right alongside the $82s which are now running in their place, allowing true multi-play for those who wish to play both? Or, do we run them say 15 minutes later than the $82s... maybe 30 minutes later than the $82s? What do you think?

2. We have previously discussed adding a $215+R PLO [6-Max] tournament to the Sunday schedule. This was discussed during the most recent player meetings with PokerStars staff on the Isle of Man. As we've discussed adding this tournament to the Sunday schedule, we're wondering how many players are interested in playing such a tournament, particularly as January approaches. Given that rebuys will be raked for many players beginning on January 1st, is there demand for such a weekly tournament? What do you think?

3. 8-Game structures. As some may have seen by now, we're introducing a new $530 8-Game tournament on Fridays at 14:00. While we've been doing this, we've also been taking a look at the 8-Game structures that we use on the site, which brings up a question. All other things being equal, within a given level, what do you think is the optimum level size for NLHE/PLO? For example, if in a given level, the blinds for FL Omaha Hi/Lo would be 200/400... what would you say (within that same level of play) the blinds should be for NLHE or for PLO?

Thanks again for taking the time. I'm glad to see this thread, and I look forward to participating!

As I have said many times in the past, we don't make such decisions based on rake. The discussion regarding changing many of the $215s to $82s began a long time ago, had nothing to do with rake at any point, and was enacted a short while ago without rake being considered even once. It's a matter of circumstance that there's a rake break at the $215 level which doesn't exist at the $82 level... but that has nothing to do with why we switched the Weekly offering in many of the "niche" games to $82. We want these games to grow, and they were largely failing to do so at the $215 level, so we are addressing that issue.

The minimum number of entrants needed for each tournament has been set to 3. Thank you to the (many) players who pointed this inconsistency out to me.

I have adjusted the opening structure of several of the fixed limit tournaments in an effort to give more meaning to the opening stages of play. We'll see how things go, and then we'll decide if further changes are needed. What I don't want to do is make radical change which will startle new players to the point that they'll look at one of the $82s, see that they're starting at 100/200 without realizing that they'll be staying there for an hour (to use one example, of starting at 100/200 and staying there). I'm open to suggestions, and I assure you that this issue has my attention.

A quick note on the $82s in general. The hope is that the $82s will build the overall fields in general in each of these "niche" games, that there will be more people playing them than ever before, over time. As that takes place, as the fields continue to grow, then the need and demand will grow for another step up... a $215, for example. We're already there in the Omaha variants, and that's why we're bringing them back. Hopefully, we'll get there in some of the other games as 2015 progresses. That's what we're trying to do... grow these games... and we're hoping to do it with your help, feedback, and guidance. After all, you guys play these games... we don't.

Thank you as always for the feedback, everyone!

Bryan I think you have the right idea about the future of these niche games. With a lower buy in I expect more participation and moving them back to a $215 buy in a year from now is quite possible for some. The key to getting the players to even try these games is a more affordable buy ins and a good satellite program.

If I understood correctly is not changing them back to $215 is having both $82 and $215

Why not run the $82 and $215 on different days one on Saturday the other on Sunday, so that there would be either an $82 or $215 of each variant each day.

If it has to be on the same day I don't think 15-30 minutes makes much difference than starting them at same time. I would say start them together.

Also if you can consider doing sats all week for them (specially for the $215) using the new satellites options, I would think would help fill them. Since there are not many daily omahas on those buy-in levels I would think the sats for the weekly would run fine.

Suggestion: I've seen many sats keep getting cancelled just because they don't meet min entrants requirement. For example one of the sats to $82 weekly last week got cancelled because only 4 people were registered to it whereas it required min of 5 entrants. Why not add 3-5 mins waiting period to avoid them getting cancelled? Its very frustrating to see a sat getting cancelled just because it didn't meet one or two more entrants. [Excuse my grammar mistake if I made any]

just make the PLO a $215 6max freezeout on Sundays. Thanks.

Just find a # of big bets you want FL tourneys to start at (I think the general consensus is that 50 is a good number) and make every structure the same. It's so strange that a 320$ 8game wcoop starts at 50/100 limit with 5k chips and the weekly starts with 20/40. Just cut any levels before 50/100 and add them into the tourney somewhere later if you want the total amount of play to be the same. There's no need for repeating levels in online because you can make the increments as small as you'd like. Most important seems to me to have a structure that is the same for every weekly tourney, then if you remember the structure of one you know it for the whole schedule. Just like your bigs, hots, big rebuys, etc.

My personal favorite structure would be

50/100
60/120
80/160
100/200
120/240
150/300
200/400
250/500
300/600
400/800
500/1k
600/1.2k
800/1.6k
1k/2k
1.2k/2.4k
1.4./2.8k
1.6/3.2k
2k/4k
2.5/5k
3k/6k
4k/8k

15min levels. Can even add in 70/140, 700/1400 if you want more play. This structure has the same amount of levels as the one in place, with a lot more midgame play and no timewasting.

# Hands not time for all mix game MTTs. This is 2014, folks.

Maybe I was a little harsh, but dropping the $215s for the three popular games were quite puzzling, the reason I believed rake was a motivator. Your team's desire to bring back the $215s restores some order.

From my observations, the change to $82s overall was great and gives players a chance to play a mini-COOP every weekend due to the better structure and relative high # of runners.

I can't believe you guys are ignoring the cannibalization that will surely take place between the $82s and the $55 PLO/$55 PLO8 6-max and $82 NLO8 PKO. These tournaments take place less than 1 hour apart!! You need to space out both these tourneys so that they are at least 2 hours apart if you want both sets of tournaments to strive in the long run.

To answer your question about start time for the $215s, I think you should start the tourneys no earlier than 1 hour before the start of the $82s. The $82s would act as a "2nd chance tournament" for players that are able to afford the $215 level whereas if you have it the other way around ($82 then $215), a player that loses the $82 will not want to jump into the $215.
Also, you might want to consider some consistency with the structures. The $82s were quite deep with 15 minute levels, giving it a mini-COOP experience which is great for the growth of these games. However, I would argue that the $82 NLO8 went on a bit too long (it lasted over 8 hours!) by changing it from the former structure (10 min levels and 3000 starting stack) to 15 mins and 5000.

I would keep the 15 min/5000 structure for the $215s and change the $82s to 12 min/5000 so that that games will finish around the same time (assuming the $215 gets less runners than the $82) and you create a distinction for the higher buyin players (similar to SCOOP having slower blind jumps for M and H events).

Also: Please change the $82 PLO and PLO8 structure so that the jumps are more like the Omania. This is not the case at the moment.

$215 rebuy seems a bit pricey since the ABI will be $500-$600. You'd only be attracting the top Omaha players and the high stakes MTT regs.

$109 seems like a better number if you want to accomplish a high number of recreational players, but you have the $82 PLO PKO that runs at 15:15, so you'd have to run this 3-4 hours earlier (11:30 maybe?)

Can't help you too much with the structure, but I feel that the Triple Draw, Limit Holdem and Limit O8 play too big. The NLHE and PLO blinds seemed to flow well.

Now that Monday = PLO, Tuesday = Super Tuesday, Wednesday = PLO8, Friday = 8-game, are there plans to use Thursday (and even Tuesday) as an opportunity to highlight another game in tournament format?

If you look at the numbers in the COOP events, NLO8 and Razz come to mind as the next popular variants. FL 2-7 Triple Draw and FL Omaha hi/lo are also quite popular in the high stakes cash games. If the 8-game is successful, you should look into spreading another game on Thursday/Tuesday.

Bryan, can you please fix this inconsistency? This tournament has become unplayable given the new rake and poor structures. If you converted this to it's intended structure (the one on the right side), I would definitely play this and also spread the news of this change to other hyper turbo SNG players.



This inconsistency currently exists for all three $52.50 NLO8 hypers, they run at 0:05, 0:35 and 5:05.

Thanks!

^^ That's racist (seriously, should be a quick and easy fix, imo)

Hello Bryan, thanks for your PM and participation in here


1. It'd be nice to have the HORSE and 8-Game start at exactly the same time, to avoid confusion during the consecutive 3 Stud-variants in both of them, so doing same time for Omaha's now might be the best move, with some far-sightedness.
How long until we see the 215$ HORSE back on?

2. I think it would be better to offer a 1050$ (Super Fun-day) Triple-Chance instead (like the 320$ FTOPS on FT next week). Like this, you would avoid the satellite-problems, when people just win one bullet and most likely unreg, and get all europeans in it, too.
As I have read from several PLO-cash-players, the 2100$ PLO SCOOP's have massively enhanced traffic at PLO cash, and I am sure that this 1050$ MTT would have the same effect, which will very likely gain more rake, than a measily low-prestige 215$+R would, when many europeans would most definintely skip it.

3. You mentioned blinds of 200/400 to start, but we were just talking about 50/100 limits (so just 25/50 blinds) for one hour, and then same procedure as every week. Though, since we can easily have flexible levels online without colour-ups, I think the 50/100, 60/120, 75/150 etc mentioned above would clearly be superior. Start with 50 BigBets, and slowly progressing levels.
Regarding the pl/nl blinds in relation to the limit-games, I think your current 1:4 (=half blind-sizes for pl/nl) is already perfect. The 1:5 proportion, like on Full-Tilt, might scare away a few nl/pl experts, and it is honestly already cheaper to nit it up for 6 minutes in NLHE/PLO, as it is in limit-games. Tightening up should not get even cheaper for the experts who know all the limit games really well, I think.



Now I try to comprehend what you are planning...
You are currently building the variants from the top down (215$ became 82$ - now Omaha's come back), while most of the non-omaha variants have not a single game scheduled in between 5,50$ or 11$ to 82$.

With the given success of the 82$'s, I think that it's time for one daily small-stakes event with a guarantee of each variant. This would allow the same guys that either already play, or want to start playing the 82$ Weeklies, a daily evening tournament to win their buy-in for the weekend, get a chance to get used to the tournament-dynamics of their specific variant without paying 82$ apprentice's premium for every try, and also get them on the PS-client during the week (which likely leads to a few more games being played aside). There were quite a lot of single-tablers in the 82$'s, as there usually are in the Big Game-variant tournaments on FullTilt, so I think that this argument is more severe than it sounds at first, when thinking of PS bottom-line.


With regards to the field-sizes of the new 82$'s, I would recommend something like the following list of daily events, with just a really low guarantee to start with (as with the 82$'s):

33$ HORSE ($1K) is already there
27$ Razz ($1K)
22$ 8-Game ($1K)
16,50$ Stud8 ($750)
11$ NL 2-7 SD ($750)
8,80$ Stud Hi ($500)
8,80$ Badugi ($500)
8,80$ FL 2-7 TD ($500)
8,80$ FLHE ($500)
8,80$ PL 5Card Draw ($500)

Putting all of them in between 18:30-22:30 CET would allow european working people to enjoy all the benefits of their favourite variant I just described above, but I am sure that half the buy-ins and guarantees would be reached 12 hours earlier/later, so that the offering would get even wider, and better for Australia, Asia, New Zealand etc

I've always felt that the ratio should be 1:5 or even 1:6, and if anything the effect of a tournament setting points further in the same direction.

+1 I would also like to see this change made.

I think you're just plain wrong here, as stacks get more shallow nlhe becomes the smallest game in the mix by far. PLO is a bit bigger but still easily trumped by stud/2-7/razz in how swingy it gets. The big bet games need to see turns and rivers and make bets on later streets to get bigger than the other games.

Yeah you have a point when stacks get shorter. I'd still advocate for a higher ratio in the early levels, and in cash games of course! Don't really understand why they didn't follow FullTilt's lead on this - people have been pointing out for years that the ratio was flawed

if you are gonna do a rebuy imo it would be best to do a 100r... i think 200r would price almost all the omaha tournament players out.

$320 freezeout for a sunday sounds good to me.

I agree with the popularity of the 82s, I believe introducing mixes games with guarantees would work.

There is already the 33 horse at 21.40 and the 22 draw at 21.50.

It is the other games that need tournaments added.
For badugi you would turn the 19.50 8.80 turbo badugi into a deepstack turbo with a 500 guarantee.

For limit holdem could turn the 11 6max at 19.15 into a turbo with a 300 guarantee to start off with since limit holdem is least popular now. Perhaps even turn it into a hyper turbo like the early morning which always pass there guarantees.

For 27sd, which is growing in popularity judging by the 5 dollar multi entry regularly getting a 100 players, a 22 with 500 guarantee could be introduced and replace the 18.50 5.50 regular speed.

For stud the 8.80 turbo rebuys need to replaced they never get off anymore. The stud tournaments at the moment will proberly have to be a turbo or hyper turbo as there seems to be no interest in stud hi tourneys at the moment.

For stud8 the 23.50 11 tournament should be turned into a 22 with a 400 guarantee. The stud8 tournament that runs early morning always gets at least 18 players and with an earlier start time should easily get at least 20.

For razz u should bring back the 11 tournament that use to run at 00.50 and have a 500 guarantee, pre black friday, Maybe bring it back with a lower guarantee to start of with.

For lo8 the 22 the use to rum early morning was replaced by a nlo8. This tournament use to run with at least 20 players all the time. There is now only the weekly and the 5.50 rebuy that has a guarantee and the both smash the guarantee. I think a 22 at 21.00 with 500 guarantee could be popular.

For 8game, I think an 11 tournament with 500 guarantee would work well in between the 33 and 16.50 horse at 17.30. Perhaps could introduce 10 game. The ten at ten on full tilt was a great tournament, with great structure.

For triple draw I think a higher buy in would work better, perhaps a 33 with a 1000 guarantee to replace the 5.50 knockout at 15.50.

Thank you all for the feedback.

As for the return of the $215 Omaha variants...

I like the idea of running them a bit earlier than the $82s, using the $82s almost like 2nd Chance tournaments. I think that's a good idea, and I'll be bringing this into the discussion with the other tournament guys who are taking part in this discussion. Thanks for that. As for changing the structures of the $82s to make them faster, however, I strongly disagree with that... we don't need to lessen the tournament experience of the lower buy-in tournament in order to elevate the $215 or make multi-play more convenient for those who can afford the combined $297 buy-in. Regarding the structures, I'll take a look at the Omania variants and see if we agree with the need for change there.

Regarding the prospective $215+R, the idea to make it a $109+R instead is an interesting one. Again, I'll bring this up with the others and see what they think. As of now, I can't promise that a weekly PLO rebuy will appear in the Sunday schedule at all... it has never been a definite.

As for the other comments on the various niche games...

I'll check into the $8.80+R Stud games. If they're dead, as you say, it'll be good to get rid of some clutter... it's always good to get rid of some clutter, in fact.

I have noticed NL Single Draw rising in popularity, as well... and will try to find some spots for a trial or two.

Overall, for the "niche" games, as for a bridge between the micro stakes and the Weekly $82 versions, I have an idea which I'm going to run past the other tournament folks and see what they think, basically to run a $27 at the same time as the Weekly $82 for each. $27 is a nice bridge buy-in between the small stakes and $82, and if it runs at the same time as the Weekly version, well that just makes sense. Perhaps we could also run a $7.50 version... we'll see.

At any rate, thank you once again for your feedback here. Again, I'm glad that this thread is here and that you're all taking the time and effort to help build these games. Thank you very much.

thanks for the post bryan