It causes the economy to crumble by making the mid to high stakes games dry up.

If everybody can wait for that -20% loser to sit high, you'll get a lot of guys that can beat that big loser and nobody else that will just wait it out at the $100, instead of grinding $30 in the current setup.

That's terrible for the sites because they get less rake.

It may or may not be worse for the fish, I'm not actually sure. If they are guaranteed a shark already (like at 1k+) then I guess it's no worse than it is now.

But at the $100-200 levels, where a fish can still sit and not get sat by a reg 100% of the time, it would mean the fish is now playing 100% sharks. If you think that doesn't apply to the $100-200s, then just change my #s to $33-55, you'll get the same result.

That system also takes away a lot of incentive to improve your own game and challenge yourself and just the general progression of creative skill in these games.

Everybody wants it to be like the shark scene in rounders, just lining up to take some casual fish money. Makes poker players look like glorified thieves to me. Skill levels vary so much in so many areas, way too much to for a system like this to be appropriate in my mind. If we were playing checkers for money, I could understand, you have people that will "get it" and people that are just spewing around. Then it would make sense for the people that get it to all avoid each other and wait for the clueless guys to come. NL husng isn't like that though. It's like a game of 1 on 1 basketball or a race. There's a clear winner and loser, and even with the vig somebody usually adjusts well enough or falls apart fast enough to make a real edge possible long term. If there were really no edges between good players they would avoid each other a lot more than they do.

roflmao@being able to refuse action at HUSNGs. So change them in Sit and Maybeifyouhavepoorstatsgo?

And i think some people assume Nemo was just stalking a fish,when g1shot has like +200k in sngs alone.

claiming nemos offer was extortion is like claiming repeatedly sitting in with the fish was assault.

dunno how it fits into the TOS though, which is the only relevant issue imo.

BURRRNNNNN

and im with nemo on this, where is the skeleton email?

I'm just guessing but if he is spite sitting at the 45mans, I am guessing there was some serious chat harassment going on as well.

Goin back a page. How is timing down unethical at all if u didn't want the person to play u. I have never done this but how is that unethical in the least. Its annoying and openly douchey but nowhere near unethical.how about slowrolling someone who u asked not to sit u, is that unethical? No its douchey but I would 100 percent do it to piss the person off. Nemo did nothing wrong besides maybe his chat but no one has seen that. Following him to the 45s is funny but probably -ev for Nemo and the fact ftp is involved in this beyond a chat ban is ****ing ridiculous.

I think FTP are spot on here, and they've kind of gone up in my estimation because of this. I never thought much of their customer service but I'm really impressed with the ban.

Sorry OP but its just lame and completely against the spirit of poker to try to bribe someone so you will leave them alone.

Sure I agree anyone should be able to sit anyone, but I also agree with FTP that they should take all factors into consideration. It's unacceptible to be asking for money from players just not to play them. What you're basically saying is, I know you don't want to play me but I'm going to play you anyway, which is kinda questionable in my book anyway but ok, that's poker - but it's the introduction of the 'if you don't pay me' aspect which just makes you bang out of order imo.

SO... yeah well done FT in my opinion, shame on you OP.

so everyone who says nemo is ok to make the player to pay him, does that mean that the best HU sit and go player in the world is within his rights to make every other HU sit and go player on the site who doesnt want to play him pay him?

Remove the money aspect.

Say "johndoe223" is the best husng player online.

He still can sit these players until no end and there's nothing they can do about it except avoid him.

Now, throw in a money solution, where perhaps johndoe223 asks a player for 3 months of his estimated income at these games vs this specific opponent in return for not sitting the guy. It could be a good deal for both parties. Maybe johndoe223 doesn't feel his opponent will last at the 1-5ks much longer. Maybe his opponent disagrees (common occurrence) to these players this is a mutually beneficial deal and it actually cuts down on the chat flaming and whining.

But if you want to say exchanging money for not sitting somebody is not OK, that's fine. Just make sure you also say that sitting anybody that sits first is absolutely ok, even if they don't want to play you.

While I disagree with some of the reasoning here, and I can't believe more people on both sides don't really pay attention to the fact that FTP told him he couldn't play this guy months ago and there was no issue at that time, I think it's irresponsible to say that this opponent "didn't have a choice" and that Nemo was extorting him or something.

For those unaware, this happens. Both parties are happier in many cases than they would be if money couldn't change hands. Weaker players don't want to play stronger players usually. If you're the 2nd best player in the world, what is it worth to you to have the only player better than you leave you alone? It's worth something.

Placing value on decisions and situations is what we do all day, both with playing poker and analyzing poker. Don't scream murder when people naturally place a value on something like a better player sitting them.

moral of the story imo: if you want to sit whoever you want whenever you want, it would be wise to not try to extort money from them, probably not even speak to them. I don't see how FTP could object if nemo never tried to extort money and never even spoken to the guy.

In practice it's totally different, like has been said there probably was a good amount of chat abuse going on, and in practice we humans tend to get a great deal of satisfaction from spite sitting someone, and making snide comments as the match progresses, but you've gotta reap what you sew.

From what it sounds, nemo made an atmosphere that was not enjoyable for his opponent, and whether or not he is a reg or fish is really irrelevant. What if nemo does this to the next guy that pisses him off? And the next? At some point FTP is going to be losing money because nemo's enemies would eventually move to another site where they won't be aggressively stalked (that point is obv when nemo's rake paid is overcome by the amount of rake he has alienated from the site) I'm not saying this is 100% how it would play out, but in FTP's eye it is.

Without the money aspect it's a very different situation.

If I am a winner at the 1Ks, I might find player A. Player A is decent, but I have an edge. I sit him and sit him and sit him. Player A is frustrated, he moves down in stakes to avoid me. I keep sitting him.

He gets so frustrated, we strike a deal. Now my time is freed up, and I have passive income. I could continue this with player B, and even move down in stakes until a huge portion of the ALL the HUSNG reg players are paying me a fee NOT to play them, because everytime a player pays, I have more time to pick on someone else.

It's very bad for the games and very bad for the site.

Taking away the money aspect doesn't allow me to free up my time, so if I want to play player A, I need to figure out if it's worth my time.

Hince, I think a high % of players, no matter how bad a top player is beating them, will always choose to move down or avoid that player over paying them anything.

Otherwise you would see a lot of guys offering top players money. It doesn't happen all that much unless I'm really oblivious, but it happens enough that it's not some new and crazy thing.

If it happened the way you state in your post, I would agree.

You have to remember though, in most cases, a guy like Nemo or Dean or whoever will stalk you for two reasons:

1) You offended them in chat (not saying it's eye for an eye, but there is almost always evidence of instigation by the whining player).

and/or

2) You are a much poorer player compared to the average "regular" at the stakes you play.

I've yet to see a situation where the whining player that is sat over and over didn't say something really emotional/immature/instigating to the "stalker."

You have to remember, guys like Nemo and Dean and others are very competitive people. Part of why they are successful is because they get pumped up and can heavily motivated themselves and take things personally in order to achieve that. Yes, it can result in over the line chat. No, it doesn't mean in every instance they are being nice people, but it's a reality.

If I'm sitting $500 tomorrow and Nemo sits me and I don't want to play him, my task is simple: Play well and don't give him any reason (usually through chat or timing down) to make it personal.

You see a lot of guys first reaction is to berate the guy sitting them or time down on them. Does that usually do anything except piss of the guy sitting? I've never seen it do anything else. If that's the goal, that's a great move by you. Otherwise, it's a misstep that could cause you a ton of headaches, as we see in this situation.

(And I'm not defending Nemo necessarily in this situation, just saying that it's not one sided, there's reasons guys like him go "so far" in these situations and protection for players being sat is a bad idea)

still pretty obv you shouldnt have to pay someone to make them not play you. absolute JoKeS. its a poker site, its peoples money, they can use it to do whatever the fk they want not use it to pay people better than them for freedom to play the game.

You're implying that nobody has any choices.

I agree, you should be able to do whatever you want.

That includes sitting anybody you want, offering anybody money to not play you, sit any stakes you want at any time and so on.

I don't care much if people think the money paying thing is wrong and should be disallowed (and judging by FTP's reaction it is likely not allowed), but you look dangerously close to implying that people should be able to avoid other people in a way other than not sitting first.

Not only is that against FTP and Stars policy, it's against most common logic out there.

This is your quote I'm most referring to:

If you take away the pay option the player has no way to get somebody to stop playing them if that person doesn't want to stop. If you're advocating the money thing is wrong, but the person should have no protection/real recourse if somebody sits them a lot, then fine. But if your argument is that players should be allowed to sit in lobbies and deny others action, then please state so and expand your post.

I disagree completely, you're not offering because by definition you are insisting you will play them if they don't pay you (or there'd be no point in them paying you) which means you are forcing them to pay you so you don't play them, its a very different category of transaction to exchanging poker chips at the poker table.

If it's got to the stage where you are offering the bribe, they obv don't want you to play them anyway, It's just wrong. It's bribery plain and simple.

Just sit them and take their money, and play poker.

under the current T&C, there is nothing you can do in a husng to "someone to make them not play you," except for an agreement between the two players.

if you disagree with the T&C, ok, then you think the rules should change and people should be able to bumhunt husngs, which will just lead to the current utopia that is HU cash where you have an entire continent's worth of people sitting out and two games going (above 100nl).

What? "I will continue to do this thing that I am allowed to do, unless you pay me," is not bribery.

Is your landlord bribing you when he tells you you'll be evicted if you don't pay your rent? He's offering you a deal that will benefit both of you.

i think it's ok that this shouldn't be allowed. to ask someone to pay you . On the other hand i think it SHOULD be allowed that someone asks someone to leave them alone and pay them in return.

i don't know if you see the difference but essentially means that the person simply has gotten fed up and realized that it is more profitable for him to pay you to leave him alone. If the other way happened , it would appear as if player A was stalking player B so that he could achieve this kind of deal which is def something that we should be against.

Since you are so fond of pointing out everyone elses bad analogy i will hop on the bandwagon.

No, your landlord threatening to evict you for non-payment of rent is someone that has a legal right, per a legal contract, to cancel the contract due to non-compliance to the terms by the other party to the contract.

They should have removed him from FTP for extortion. Your original offer is classless and ridiculous to their business model.

If it is bribery to give someone a choice between paying up or dealing with something they'd rather not deal with, but the law says it's okay, then all you have is legally-sanctioned bribery. The analogy stands.

Saying it's not bribery because some authority lets it happen would pressure you to admit that Nemo's action was not bribery if FTP condoned it. Are you prepared to admit that?

I'm beginning to see that while Nemo's payment proposition is not empirically equivalent to a real-world, mafia-style act of extortion in any way, many people (including posters in this thread) still perceive it in such a light, are in fact still using the word 'extortion' when referring to it, and that in itself is sufficient to cause FTP to quash the practice. From a business point of view, they surely don't want their reputation and the image of their site to suffer if players hear or complain about payment propositions like Nemo's and FTP does little or nothing about it.

Which means that paying a good reg not to sit you, which as ChiRy points out can be a creative solution for some people, is something that will have to be done privately and offsite, and that will probably be initiated by the target more often than the hunter.

I call dibs on the scummy new website facilitating such transactions!!! PlayOrPayDOTcom for the win, ladies and gentlemen.

This is ridiculous.

I support you 100% Nemo.

forget the whole bribery think. offering someone the option not to play them in return for money is against the game's spirit. if someone is better than you then get better and give him a reason to stop sitting you .if you can't do that then just join games after other people have already joined thus not giving him the option to sit you.

very simple. I would never ever pay someone not to sit me even if that was phil ivey. admittedly perhaps i could never beat him but it would hurt his hourly and waste time by keep stalking me. And since i would be playing at a level that i am comfortable at in terms of money, yes i'd be losing to him but at the same time i'd be improving and actually getting the batter of it because it would cost so much more $$ to get coaching from the same guy , instead i can get to play him all the time by him following me , that would be awesome

If you just don't like it, I can accept that. My gut reaction is to dislike it, too. I just can't agree with it being a scummy thing when I consider the whole situation.