1.) The website is fun at first; you're going to get a lot of nut flushes/etc.
They say that there is no 'rigging' occurring for new accounts, but this is a pattern a lot of people point out; and the CEO was quoted as saying something akin to "The worst thing for the poker ecosystem is if a fish joins and gets stomped immediately; they'll lose their deposit then never redeposit." Not evidence of rigging; just a data point to consider.
The turn/river is disgusting. You will routinely, and I do mean routinely be ahead in the hand, only for them to call insane amounts and get there by river. The kicker? You're very rarely going to see them call and not get there. It's actually spooky how often they fold, until they decide to call station and get there with garbage. You will routinely feel like Garrett Adelstein after the Robbie J4 hand.
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2.) When math stops mathing; I start tracking. (Not using hud, or anything against TOS; just simply writing down select spots and tallying. (This is how you find the tournament 'glitch/cheat/exploit')
I've found one spot that can be abused for tournaments.
Before we go any farther; I'm going to write with the disclaimer of 'They don't allow HUDS/HH, there is no way to be sure without violating TOS. Anything and everything could be variance."
You can check my
tourny results here
I did stop playing tournaments recently; despite being a winning player in them. (For obvious reasons; I want to play poker; not "glitch league of extraordinary glitches").
I've alluded to the exploit in the past as bait to see if anyone would bite. Nobody did; and I do believe it's because of the social atmosphere on this website.
The exploit is based on a 'riggie thread' wherein the player suggested the parent company owned the patent to 'dynamic difficulty adjustment'.
Dynamic Difficulty Adjustment Explained: Imagine you're playing a racing game, and are in first. The person behind you is about 3 laps behind. The game engine gives them a speed boost; and it slows your car down.
If we take that and apply it to a tournament; what would 'position in a racing game' be the equivalent of in poker?
Answer: Your stack size and position on the tournament leader boards. (BTW; I do expect this to be patched very shortly after this post; maybe a few months - I expect to be banned for exposing it; and I also expect that a new glitch will pop up in a different spot. I likely won't be around to see it)
I'll start off by saying I don't know the exact formula; I just know how to confirm it; and how to abuse it.
When you are 1st on the leader board; and there is a few people with you on top of the leader board, you will sometimes be dealt aces or kings. Take these; and hit FOLD. It won't allow you to surpass a certain chip stack size too early in the tournament.
Don't believe me? Go open up any given tournament and watch the leader board. Where are the outliers on sun runs? They're not there. They don't exist. Instead you have groups of people moving up together.
Why are there no sun runners? (Because of dynamic difficulty adjustment).
New position. You're up against one off the tournament top stacks; top stack raised to 10bb, you have 40bb, vs his 130bb stack. You're dealt T7o. T2o. Etc, take these hands and JAM.
The DDA won't allow the chip leaders to progress until whatever criteria is hit. Don't be the guy to Jam when it's time for the groups to move up.
Exceptions: On rare occasion the exact moment you choose to jam, is the moment the criteria has been met to allow the groups to move up. You can lose in that situation, but will win in every other situation.
Here's how you confirm it if you're good: Get top stack; wait for aces/kings and track results. If you track premiums while top stack and their success rate on showdown; you'll get your results. My tracked results for that specific scenario is 0/35. W to L. I stopped tracking my own hands around 0/20 in that position, and instead chose to abuse the 'glitch' by not putting myself in that position....but I watched other people do it; and I tracked every time they were top stack with AA/KK and lost. Added together; it's 0/35 (ish). I stopped tracking it altogether when I backed off the tournaments. (These top stack vs mid/short stack hands were ALL IN PRE if that helps anyone).
How to confirm if you're bad: Go look at leaderboards tab. Look for any of the top leaders (when there is like 4-8 grouped at around a certain chip level). see if one is at your table. Now wait until it's you versus them, as best you can. Go all in versus them with any two cards.
So winners can abuse it by not playing the bait hands; and losers can abuse it by taking unreasonable lines into chip leaders knowing their actual EV is well above whatever their hand says their EV is.
Before you write this off; if you're so convinced I'm a riggie and incorrect; just go try it. Just go open up a leader board and find a sun runner. You're not going to, because there is heavy DDA at play.
This exact advice of 'If you suspect the game is rigged, play as if it is' that made me a winning player in tournaments. (still losing in cash; which we will discuss in a moment).
I get it; so many people lose one hand and say 'rigged'. I'm pointing at specific spots that you can verify yourself.
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3.) How are they funding their tournament guarantees?
Speculation: Through the rigging of cash games. I don't think all bots on this site are external to the website. I think it becomes blatant with the amount of times you go all in with the best hand and get 1 or even 2 outtered on.
Why rig cash games when they can just collect rake?
Do you think the rake they collect covers their tournament schedule? What about the people mailing in dozens if not hundreds of mail in letters for the 5 free SC each letter? Add in free daily login bonus...and all the things they have to do to be considered a 'sweepstakes' significantly impacts their profitability.
I have no horse in this race; I don't have the data on point 3, it's pure speculation based on very odd hands that occurred. The counter argument is playing vs fish; and maybe some of you can extract value; but my experience is that it's tight as can be; which then makes the hands where they blast off with nothing; calling only to hit on river very suspicious.
I'm not going to provide exact hands; as you've all experienced it. At first I did think it was just very poor variance. 1 hand has me not so convinced. I will share that hand. (There are plenty of examples like this; but given all my observations of the player; this specific hand is what moved the needle into 'not fair play'.)
35o UTG villain.
KK CO me.
Flop 2KT.
I raise 10bb.
Villain calls.
turn is a 4.
I raise 20bb on turn.
Villain calls.
River is 6.
Villain makes straight over my set.
Villain started off with 400bb. I had 200bb. Prior to that play; he folded a lot of hands; and was playing tight. At 400bb stack; he's not a bad player.
That single hand made me think there is something beyond variance at play in cash games.
One possibility is bots that are working as a team relaying hole cards. Another possibility is house bots. The third possibility is just insanely unlucky variance, and timing. Astronomically bad luck that is showing patterns that don't actually exist.
To be clear; I have no idea what's going on in cash games. Something wrong with them, I don't know what it is.
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4.) The staff (CEO?) has abused high rollers on these forums calling them 'gold coin greg' during the projectbaby situation.
I don't know what to make of that; but I do know from experience that people who make fun of others are usually hiding something.
IE: You usually don't say to a cashier 'you gave me the wrong change' and have them insult you....if they do insult you; you're probably right, and they probably short changed you.
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5.) The reviews are 50/50 on trust pilot. The experienced users are usually found in the 1 star section; while the new users can be found in the 5 star section.
The complaints all complain about the same thing; broken RNG.
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6.) No HH. No HUDS. No tracking. (Reiteration because it deserves it's own bullet point).
This is supposed to be for your benefit; in effect though; cheaters get a bigger edge; and you have no way of holding the site accountable for any shenanigans. (Yes, even doing what I did and tracking that specific spot (AA/KK as top stack) may be against TOS. You're not allowed to enter it into external programs; that may include excel. [and I think it's because they're not entirely on the up and up])
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7.) When I first joined the site; I could routinely get 3 buy ins for a cash game; then exit. Routinely. Now it's a struggle to get to 2 buy ins. I did not become a worse player over the time playing here; in fact I got much better and studied more and more. Every step I took forward though; it felt like competition matched me. I'm not going to say they're running eco bots; but I can not in good faith tell you that I understand why as I improved so did competition in short order. I can not tell you why I no longer stomp like I did when I first joined. It got harder to extract value; and the bad beats become more regular.
I don't only get bad beats; sometimes I lose by way of bad decisions, genuinely. That said; the bad beats are so common that my poor decisions are being eclipsed by the losses from bad beats (In cash games; which again; i don't know any exploits on the cash games RNG; only for tourny's.)
I do not see a way where these bad beats could be legitimate considering HOW they got there. It'd be different if we were all in pre. There lines are just...they become abnormal during these bad beat hands; and don't reflect there usual play style.
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8.) Aces collect blinds at an abnormal rate; even from bb; even with normal raise sizes.
I think a possible explanation is card sharing by multiple bots at the same table. I don't see the same fold rates on opponents when I get QQ or lower.
(I've also posted a
way a casino can cheat without impacting RNG of the deal here The explanation doesn't explain everything; but it may explain some things. I genuinely think it's a solid way to cheat; I have no clue if any casino is doing it.)
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I know, I know. I'm a rigtard. However; I provided the ways you can confirm. I am fairly sure I've hit the nail on the head on a few of these; and even more sure that in other aspects I'm so far off the ball that I'm playing first base from the parking lot.
My pet theory is that they are making an exit plan for when sweepstakes casinos are held to accord. I think they are churning water trying to fill their buckets before they are outlawed in the USA. Just a pet theory; but if you owned the company;
knew legislation was coming or likely; wouldn't you try to min-max your revenue until D-day?
Last edited by Lucy's Fur; Yesterday at 12:17 PM.
