Hi all,

I’ll be using this thread in 2016 to primarily discuss our main tournament schedule, but also anything else PokerStars tournament related you’d like to kick around.

I’ve created a new thread so that I can request to have the title and OP updated. I’d like to keep track of my current posts so they can be easily referenced.

So, what did we do in 2015?

• Introduced Bounty Builders, our daily progressive knockout series.
• Reduced the size of the main tournament schedule by over 25%.
• Reduced the volume and improved targeting of tournament messages.
• Gave all non-satellite tournaments guarantees.
• Reduced the volume of MTT satellites while substantially increasing guarantees and the overall effectiveness of new satellites.
• Adopted new approach for setting guarantees in daily tournaments. Guarantees now vary by day of week rather than being set according to the lowest performing day.

That said, there is much work to do in 2016:

• A main schedule “reformat”. The schedule is still too large. It will be further simplified and altered in 2016.
• The implementation of dynamic structures. I am seriously excited about the implications of this functionality! Imagine a typical freezeout but the levels are eight minutes in length, then 10 minutes once the money is reached, 12 minutes at the final three tables, and 15 minutes at the final table. The ability to lengthen the excitement of going deep in a tournament in a dynamic way has a lot of potential.
• A focus on micro-stakes players. This is tied into the first bullet, but overall I believe this stakes level needs particular attention. This does not translate to additional promotions or branded tournaments, but simply a commitment to considering these players in more main tournament schedule decisions. This began with the updates to the Bigs/Hots and the addition of Bounty Builders.

I look forward to another year of debate and discussion with all of you!

Thanks,

Luke


PokerStars Luke Posts
2016-01-07 - Answers to queries
2016-01-09 - Answers to queries
2016-01-11 - Answers to queries
2016-01-13 - Answers to queries
2016-01-15 - Answers to queries
2016-01-16 - Software Bug
2016-01-16 - Software Bug Fixed
2016-01-19 - Answers to queries
2016-01-20 - Bounty Builders
2016-01-25 - Answers to queries
2016-01-28 - Answers to queries
2016-02-05 - Answers to queries
2016-02-15 - Answers to queries
2016-02-19 - Answers to queries
2016-02-21 - Phase 2 Cancellation
2016-02-23 - Phase 2 Update
2016-02-26 - Answers to queries
2016-03-04 - Answers to queries
2016-03-08 - Answers to queries
2016-03-08 - Upcoming Changes

Do you have anything to say regarding the minis, Luke?

@ pokerstars luke......making a new thread isint gonna solve yur lag issues is it?

....when the thread gets tough....make a new 1 and hope nobody mentions things you cannot fix?

why do u not use 1 of the millon$ freerolls you took from the sne's and put money to fix servers?


+1 to the minis

still no negative feedback thread for stars.lame

Need more info!

No doubt there will be plenty of nonsensical aggro rants like this, but I'm sure Luke can handle it.

gl Luke! We don't agree on everything and I'm not stupid enough to expect you to give more than a passing consideration to anything I or anyone else on here suggests, but I look forward to following and contributing anyway.

The Mini versions of the majors were such a roaring success that you must surely be tempted to try them again, right? Running them every Sunday would dilute the appeal for sure, but why not once a month?

Awarding tickets in the Bounty Builders is a fun extra (though not really an extra at all, since they're taken out of the cash prizepool), but is it really worth doing when you consider the downside? Are the tickets awarded at the FT actually driving people to the games? If you believe they are, what do you base this on? And will you be rolling more of this out across other games? Personally I think the software issues are costing you rake as a decent number of people who might be attracted to the games either can't see the amount of money in the pool or have satelites filtered out and don't see the games at all, which is likely to outweigh any benefits, but I don't have access to your data.

Once again, all the best for the new year.

subbed

can we have less question dodging this year? and could you improve your communication and visibility? take example from Keith or Matthew.

Can you also consider what a lot of us said about the 3+r structure? 2+r also... Just make it the same as the 11+r one

Everyone, make sure you send in refund requests. It takes 2 minutes.

I was hoping for a rake refund at best from Sunday and got my $215 million buyin refunded.

Of course it was my fault and nothing to do with stars but I guess the refund is at least some admission.

Did you have any particular hands folded because of lag because I didnt get my million buyin refunded?

No, which is why I'm quite surprised.

Aaaand massive lag at 47-49 past yet again. Can't have anything to do with those 20k zoom freerolls going off though right?

Yep ****ing awful lag, including lobby lag (as in taking 15+ seconds to reg) around timeslot for one of those stupid ass FRs; I'm missing first hand dealt some portion of the time in the cash hyper sats when these lags are happening so not just affecting MTTs

lol I got affected by that lag last Sunday and this is the answer from stars:



Fack off stars

Sent my request on monday and haven't got a response yet. ****ING BULL****

Hey Luke. For the daily $2.20 PL Badugi, could you please consider adding the 60/120 and 125/250 blind levels? Thanks.

can we put all lag stuff in the software thread? pretty sure luke isnt a master coder or in charge of refunds.

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/28.../index244.html

I think the best MTT for micro players recently was a sat to the PCA.
You could win a whole PCA package for just $2.20 playing 3 phases of a nlhe game WITHOUT A BLOODY REBUY PERIOD. These were being run everyday with the final on Sundays.

They were excellent value for money and attracted a lot of players.

I think Pokerstars should think of running these for all major live games that Pokerstars runs or sponsers. EPT, UKIPT, LAPT etc.


In regards to reducing the MTT schedule please leave the Omaha8 games alone as there is barely a days schedule as it is.

Thanks.

subbed

Make 8r structure same as others rebuys, pls. Also the 3r

3r and 8r structures for easiest change +1

Luke, I'll ask again: would you please consider implementing the 320 6max on saturdays?
Also, any news on an upcoming WCOOP challenge or monthly high stakes tournament (2k 6/8 max would be nice)?

or any news on the ridiculous rake on saturday bounty builders?

Micros?

Bring 0.50+0.01$ Hyper
Bring back 1$R Big Ante Turbo with a way better structure and GTD, old gtd was 750$ and 1k chips for starting stack and rebuy stack. I mean, c'mon.
People love the 3xr-Turbo and blow it up to 40k. They love the hypers with their big antes and get 1k entrants. give it a chance.

• Edit pay tables so that an even number of tables -1 player is paid and hand for hand is played w the same number of players on each table. Makes quite a big difference in smaller fields (320 6max, 200r, etc). Change was already made to Stars live tournaments quite a long time ago.
  
• Run all satellites in the same currency as the target tournament (HKD, BRL, AUD, etc), auto converting at daily rate upon buying in instead of using a guess at an exchange rate months beforehand.
  
• Run EPT player's choice satellites during SCOOP.
  
• Make a majority of PLO tourneys 6max, especially Omania. Short handed PLO should be the standard given how poorly the game plays full ring.
  
• Use 4x turbo sats to all HS tourneys especially the weekly 1ks, they were excellent in WCOOP and haven't been seen since.
  
• Earlier antes in million and warmup.
  
• Semi sat to super tues on a monday.
  
• Improve structure on 1500 chip turbo sub sats, they are basically unplayable atm given rake level and field sizes.
  
• More emphasis on rebuy, turbo rebuy, 4x turbo and reg speed deep satellites. They are some of the best satellite formats and hardly any exist.
  
• Early antes in 55r turbo sats.
  
  

All reg speed rebuys should be changed to the new structure, from top to bottom of the schedule. I think it is safe to say this new structure creates the biggest prize pool, where we are forced to rebuy

subbed for continued disappointment