No one is forcing you to play on Bovada. If you don't like anonymous tables don't deposit on Bovada. Play on stars or betcoin.

??

IIRC he's a US player. I agree he shouldn't play on Bovada (nobody should...it's insane) but he doesn't have the option to play on Stars if he's in the US, obviously.

You either accept what options are available in the US (bovada anonymous table or betcoin) or you don't play at all. Not much anyone can do with the ways online poker is in the US until it becomes legal again.

So if he's so adamant about anonymous tables and it's bad for the game... don't play! Or move out of the country! Seems most logical to me.

And I don't foresee Bovada eliminating anonymous tables anytime soon. It seems to working fine for them.

Do you have any idea what you're talking about? You do realize there are numerous networks available to a US player right now, don't you? Betcoin? Wtf even is that?

WPN, Chico, and Bovada are the top three US networks right now. Many people play on all three. Check Pokerscout once in a while or the thread here on 2p2 that shows where US players can play. Poker hasn't been better for a US player than it is right now in years.

What skins are on Chico?

BetOnline is the one most often talked about.

The point is u can accept stuff or if most people don't like it we an try to change things. That is all I am saying. It may not work, but then again it may. Why sit back and do nothing if u want to make a change. With that attitude we can never get anything accomplished. And if I like the anon tables the fine don't join the action for change, but many people would welcome a change. This is all I am saying.

^ Betcoin is on WPN, but I wouldn't recommend it. Judguing by the way they handled themselves when they joined, and according to Khan, show pretty clearly that they don't know enough about Poker to be running a site.

Not to mention that you can just use Bitcoin on WPN without needing to use Betcoin.

FWIW Bovada isn't going to and shouldn't change from anonymous. That's coming from someone who prefers having a handle and using a HUD.

Ok. I am going to try them I think.

By all means, if you can gather everyone to boycott Bovada in order to eliminate anonymous tables, I'm not stopping you

But it seems like some are trying to stop me. They don't even want me to get started on it. I was gonna take a poll to see what the results were. Obv if more people wanted to keep them then fine. But if they didn't maybe we could effect some change. Maybe not but it can't hurt to try I guess.

Nobody has stopped you from making a poll (which makes me wonder why you've spent all this time asking if you should start a poll, instead of just starting the poll).

All people have done is tell you that results of the poll will be meaningless since Bodog has no interest in pivoting away from their current business model.

your obv missing his point

Create a new thread in the online poker section with a poll and organize it. Maybe I'm part of the minority who think anonymous tables is beneficial to the game because it allows more recreational players to try out poker. They would be less afraid to bluff or spew chips because they are anonymous. Not exactly sure why that is.... but something about being anonymous, players feel they can be more reckless without being scolded.

And if you think about it, 90% of the time when you go play at a casino, you are at an anonymous table. You won't know the style of all the players at the table until a couple hands in. Even if there's a TV POKER PRO at the table who you seen his style on TV, it's not like you will have his whole HUD stats for the last 100,000 hands.

You can only base your reads off what you gather from the limited time you play with that person for couple hundred hands. Just like an anonymous table on Bovada.

So the question is... how does having a username help the game of online poker? I would just assume it would help regs the most, because they can establish a HUD database of players they play with. Recreational players are more often not utilizing any HUD.

As for collusion, sure it's more detectable with usernames... but how many of you guys are keeping track of how often you see two usernames constantly sitting next each other? And if there were REALLY into colluding, they could just create a bunch of dummy usernames.

x10000000000 +ev

I was a basically a breakeven player on the first two sites I played on (Stars and Carbon). Maybe slightly winning on Carbon. I was a massively winning player my first 18 months at Bovada, although it's slowed down (but still winning) over my last 3 months. So obviously, I'm not in either of your two groups. Am I winning now solely because of anon tables? Probably not, but I definitely don't think it hurts.

Anonymous poker is the NUTS. It protects the rec players which is exactly what poker needs.

Do you think anonymous poker (which is only played on Bovada) is helping prepare a player who's ultimate goal is to become proficient in live poker?

A players ultimate goal is to win money. Anonymous poker helps loosen the players who will provide said money.

Who cares? If you want to be proficient at live poker you have to play live poker. If I was a player with the "ultimate goal" of becoming a proficient live player I would be putting in tons of hours at live tables. And putting in hours of study away from the tables as well. I have done all This before and it works pretty well.

That being said Bovada does have some very closely related aspects to live poker in regards to the game flow at the tables and the softness of the players ime.

Hmmm. Are you saying that in your personal opinion online poker doesn't provide any benefit to a player who is "ULTIMATELY" (yup) looking to become a good live player?

Can it hurt?

Dude, you thought there were two skins available to online players. Do yourself a favor and tie a string to your ass and chase it for a few hours.

How many hours have you put in at playing live poker? You can't really compare online to live. 2 different variations that take 2 different skill sets to crush 'proficiently'.

Sure online could help your live game in certain ways and vise versa. What's your point?

Since you're actually having a discussion and not simply reporting me for offending your precious offshore network: I haven't played live yet. I haven't even been playing for cash very long but I'm playing a ton. I simply see that there might be a problem with getting used to playing "anonymous" poker and completely discounting reads, tells, information, and history and then sitting down in a casino - face to face with other players - where the game seems to be mostly about reads, tells, information, and history.

I mean, if Bovada's model made so much sense - How come everyone isn't doing it? How come we're even having a conversation about it?

I see what some of you are saying about this model attracting the fish but I don't see how not knowing who the fish are when they sit down to the table helps me. As it is now, on the two networks I play on, I can table select and ISO fish because I recognize their username and have notes on them. How does it help me make money off them if I don't have any of this information anymore?

There are ways to recognize fish on Bovada fwiw.

And in regards to live poker you're not always going to be able to pick and choose your seat. Sometimes you may have to play at a table with no fish because other tables are full or if the tables are a must move.

And that's the thing if you want to play with screen names because that's the only way you feel you're gonna get better than go play on one of the other multiple reputable sites that offer that. Bovada doesn't. Period.

Players being able to track and abuse losing players is really effed up and is what poker has become on any site with tracking capabilities. Not to mention you can buy and download hand histories and have 20,000 hands on a player that you've never played a hand with. How is that legitimate?

I for one love the anonymous idea and think it's been huge for Bovada. I have played 3-4000 hours of live poker in the last few years and if you really want to become proficient at live then go play live. That will make you proficient. Study and experience is key here. Not whether the game is anonymous or not.

I started from literally scratch with my poker roll and between building a roll on four sites (two I hardly play on right now) and learning the game, I haven't been just where I want to be at a live table yet. Soon though. There are actually $50, $150, and $250 buyin tournaments running at a place locally now and I may try my hand there. Either that or the plan always was to get a solid $1,000 together and sit at a $1/2 table in Mohegan Sun or wherever.

I agree that hand histories for sale and *some* of the tracking software features have a negative effect on the game. No argument about that here. The thing is that it's like guns in America - The next guy is going to buy one simply to protect himself since everyone else out there has one. It's a never ending cycle. I guess I can be totally honest in saying that if you said to me "Ok - If you ditch your HUD on all sites, so will everyone else" I'd go along with that pretty smoothly. The thing is that PT4 provides so, so much for a newer player like me in post session analysis. It's beyond frustrating to try and do this with sites like BetOnline and especially Bovada.

In any event I appreciate the healthy dialogue and the words of wisdom. As new as I am, it's not terribly difficult for me to tell who on here actually wins $$ now and then.