If you're not familiar with Skillbet, it is a US based site that offers a supposedly legal poker variant where players compete against each other by playing nlhe on separate but identical bot tables and then comparing scores to determine winnings. All games are HU, cannot be railed for obvious reasons, and must last for at least 30 hands.

What most people probably don't know about Skillbet is that the majority of live matches played there are not real. They are fake matches between two prop players that autofold all of their hands versus each other for hours at a time. That by itself probably wouldn't be that big of a deal, but it brings to light some other issues that are.

1) Although it can't be proven, it is obvious that there is multi accounting involved with prop players. These players show up in groups of 2-3, at exactly the same time, and play against other members of their group. For example, one day you will see prop players A, B, and C show up at the same time and start matches with each other. The next day, you won't see those props playing against different props, you will see players A, B, and C once again showing up at the exact same time and playing each other. These players do also play non-prop players, so their multi accounting does give them some informational advantage over thier opponents.

2) It is Skillbet's policy that if one player asks another not to play them, then that player must honor that request and may not sit unless it is the only table available for that stake and they also give prior notice so that it can be avoided. By far the most frequent to invoke this policy are in fact prop players. They are being compensated in some way to help bring traffic to the site, and some of them instead deny action to strong players and stick to bumhunting and reporting players that don't respect their request to not play.

3) At least one of these prop players posts on 2+2 as just another player, and as you might expect, he has nothing but glowing things to say about the site. More on this later.

Here are 5 videos that I made to show the amount of time that it takes to auto fold a Skillbet live match. Most of the video isn't important or interesting in any way. They are just there to verify that I am not making up or guessing the times that I use for comparison in this thread.

You can watch them in their entirety if you like, but I would just skip them for now and come back to them later if needed. Also, its probably not important at all, but my opponents in those videos don't have anything to do with me or this thread. They are just randoms that happened to be sitting out on play chip tables that I recorded.







Each match falls within the range of 6:20-8:00. Even though both human players are folding, there is some variance due to the fact that even though the bots play quickly, they do not play instantly. Some matches will have more hands where the bots see flops, turns, and rivers more than others. This time range is much different than the time range of matches that are actually played, which looks more like 10:30-12:30, although obviously human play has more time variance. I looked at my last 20 matches or so and the shortest time was 10:24.

You can also see in the videos that the first hand of every auto fold match always takes 25-35 seconds. This is because in order to sit out and auto fold you must first time out. A legitimately played match will often also have a first hand that falls into this range, but an auto fold match will always fall into that range despite it being very slow relative to all of the other hands and the overall length of the match.

Now here's some lobby recordings that I made of players playing fake matches today. There are a couple of nonprop matches mixed in and they are labeled as such.

Group 1 - EdgeofSeventeen, slothy25, TUFF2BLUFF



EdgeofSeventeen vs. slothy25 $105
Start 0:00
Hand 1 end 0:29
Hand 1 length 0:29
Match end 6:36
Match length 6:36

Edgeofseventeen vs. TUFF2BLUFF $75
Start 4:12
Hand 1 end 4:38
Hand 1 length 0:26
Match end 11:20
Match length 7:08

EdgeofSeventeen vs. slothy25 $105
Start 7:45
Hand 1 end 8:14
Hand 1 length 0:29
Match end 16:00
Match length 8:15

EdgeofSeventeen vs. TUFF2BLUFF $75
Start 11:50
Hand 1 end 12:17
Hand 1 length 0:27
Match end 19:08
Match length 7:18

Group 2 - Aliciousness, Tuff_Fish, Powerslide



Aliciousness vs. Tuff_Fish $12
Start -0:05 (camtasia record delay)
Hand 1 end 0:21
Hand 1 length 0:26
Match end: 8:11
Match length 8:16

EdgeofSeventeen vs. bunnykitty (nonprop) $75
Start 0:20
Hand 1 end 0:41
Hand 1 length 0:21
Match end 12:11
Match length 11:51

Aliciousness vs. Powerslide $45
Start 0:32
Hand 1 end 1:02
Hand 1 length 0:30
Match end 7:35
Match length 7:03

EdgeofSeventeen vs. bunnykitty (nonprop) $105
Start 0:56
Hand 1 end 1:29
Hand 1 length 0:34
Match end 14:17
Match length 12:48

Powerslide vs. Aliciousness $30
Start 1:15
Hand 1 end 1:41
Hand 1 length 0:26
Match end 8:41
Match length 7:26

Powerslide vs. bunnykitty (nonprop) $75
Start 7:51
Hand 1 end 8:08
Hand 1 length 0:17
Match end 21:09
Match length 13:18

Aliciousness vs. Tuff_Fish $12
Start 9:29
Hand 1 end 9:59
Hand 1 length 0:30
Match end 16:17
Match length 6:48

Powerslide vs. Aliciousness $30
Start 10:39
Hand 1 end 11:08
Hand 1 length 0:29
Match end 18:02
Match length 7:23

Group 3 - iBOOBOO, JustCheckin



iBOOBOO vs. JustCheckin $30
Start 0:00
Hand 1 end 0:28
Hand 1 length 0:28
Match end 7:22
Match length 7:22

iBOOBOO vs. JustCheckin $45
Start 0:43
Hand 1 end 1:16
Hand 1 length 0:33
Match end 8:46
Match length 8:03

iBOOBOO vs. JustCheckin $75
Start 1:13
Hand 1 end 1:43
Hand 1 length 0:30
Match end 8:37
Match length 7:24

Group 4 - AcesHigh, MightyMitch, MALLAR, YeahThePro



YeahThePro vs. MALLAR $7.5
Start 0:00
Hand 1 end 0:30
Hand 1 length 0:30
Match end 7:57
Match length 7:57

OMGUSHOVE vs. Oryxbull (nonprop) $15
Start 5:21
Hand 1 end 6:00
Hand 1 length 0:39
Match end 19:06
Match length 13:45

AcesHigh vs. iBOOBOO $75
Start 1:36
Hand 1 end 2:03
Hand 1 length 27
Match end 9:21
Match length 7:45

AcesHigh vs. erichvb (nonprop) $45
Start 7:21
Hand 1 end 7:54
Hand 1 length 0:33
Match end 21:58
Match length 14:37

MALLAR vs. YeahThePro $6
Start 8:43
Hand 1 end 9:12
Hand 1 length 0:29
Match end 15:48
Match length 7:05

iBOOBOO vs. MightyMitch $45
Start 10:24
Hand 1 end 10:59
Hand 1 length 0:35
Match end 17:27
Match length 7:03

MALLAR vs. YeahThePro
Start 18:18
Hand 1 end 18:45
Hand 1 length 0:27
Match end 25:09
Match length 6:51

MALLAR vs. AcesHigh $15
Start 19:54
Hand 1 end 20:24
Hand 1 length 0:30
Match end 26:42
Match length 6:48

iBOOBOO vs. MightyMitch $45
Start 20:24
Hand 1 end 20:59
Hand 1 length 0:35
Match end 27:33
Match length 7:09


There are still many more that aren't in these recordings also...


Although I easily could have missed it, I do not know of any of these players that has outed their Skillbet handle on 2+2 other than iBOOBOO who posts under the same name here and has nothing but great things to say about the site.(The Skillbet suggestion thread is an amusing read) iBOOBOO's most common folding buddy and probable alt account (shown in video 3), JustCheckin, has been involved in a bit of controversy however.

A while back, 2+2 poster knumbnuts4 complained in the Skillbet Discussion Thread about getting a warning from support about sitting players that asked him not to. (The exchange starts around post #660 and starts to pick up on the following pages) This sparked some debate at the time, because most of us didn't even know that was a rule (it was/is) and thought that it was a bad rule.

Also at the time, iBOOBOO, despite having cited the rule in the faq, repeatedly claimed that in order to get a warning from support that there must be more to the story. Magically he turned out to be right and part of the warning referred to using abusive language. Also magically, the player that reported knumbnuts4 to support was iBOOBOO's fold partner JustCheckin. (This wasn't posted in the thread, btw. I asked him myself)

Also worth noting, during a long stretch of time when iBOOBOO supposedly was taking a break from playing on Skillbet (although still posting in the forums daily), another player appeared that played at the exact same times and played the same daily fake matches with JustCheckin. That player was John_Doe. The main difference between iBOOBOO and John_Doe was that like JustCheckin, John_Doe would ask the stronger players not to sit him.

One day I made a post in the Skillbet Discussion thread asking what was up with these accounts, why one would appear whenever the other would disappear, play at the same times, play the same set matches with the same player, etc. I deleted the post after about 20 minutes and before it had been replied to. The next day, for the first time ever, the two accounts showed up at the same time (exactly the same time...) and played each other on 3-4 tables for hours on end. Not long after that, and not realizing at the time everything that was going on, I reported my suspicions of multi accounting and I haven't seen the John_Doe account since. Who knows though. Maybe he'll get rolled out tomorrow just to show how totally not the same person he is.

Anyways, instead of just going on with speculation, I'm just going to ask. What the ****? How do fake HU matches improve site traffic? What is the point of props that practice avoidance? How many of these accounts are legit and how much MAing is there? What exactly is going on here?

sick.
fwiw i can no longer play on SB because i live in NY but when i very 1st started playing,Most of my winnings came from John_Doe.

Wow eyeopening post. Thanks for letting people know op. I remember people touting this site across other poker sites with some really over the top prop deals. The setup of denying players seating by site players and play tos makes this site really unappealing and appear shady.

Are the prop players getting benefits like rake benefits for playing hours long fake matches or is it just to make site look like it has traffic or both?

Inferno,

The shadiness continues. I did a few 2+2 searches. Skillbet's founder is the same guy who founded "The Holy Grail of Poker" training software. He is a botter. They used to have a HGOP support site for the product when it was in beta testing. The guy was there every day or a rep was there every day to hype the product and answer questions. The last time that a rep posted in their support thread was 01/12/2012.
No announcement, they just disappeared and stopped supporting the product. They disappeared from the thread all together. I guess this is when they must have started up Skillbet.
There have been a lot of comments on the Skillbet site focusing on its future and viability, which seems bleak. So guess what? Yep the HGOP seems to be back as of 03/20/2013. And you wouldn't believe some of the posters in the HGOP thread! Its the same Skillbet people that you have mentioned Inferno. And they are now ALLEGEDLY making tens of thousands of dollars using the HGOP software! Unbelievable...........


http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/16...5/index31.html

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/29...botter-904198/

Wow, nice job DCI.
The length of matches definitely shows that these players are just auto-folding.

I always noticed that Aliciousness and PowerSlide in particular were always online at the same times and playing each other.

I played against almost all of these props and most of them used the same strategy against me, which was basically to auto-fold until they started losing a decent amount and then play some hands to try to get back even. I mean I saw some of these guys fold AA preflop.

All of the props you mentioned played a very similar style, except for John_Doe and iBOOBOO who both had a propensity to tilt off randomly after playing no hands (and did so in a very similar fashion).

I'm not playing on there any more either being from NY but this is all interesting stuff. I would also very much like to know the answers to all the questions you posed at the end of your post.

All of these players vanished today.

No comment from site rep or iBOOBOO. (I xposted in Skillbet discussion thread)

Thanks for that. I did a little bit of clicking and posters badbeatspecialist and Pokerdamus are forum shills that only post in the Skillbet subforum, Crushing Skillbet $100 to $10,000 in 2013 (iBOOBOO P&G thread), and.....Holy Grail of Poker.

They have also taken their live chat support offline.

Will 2+2 do anything about these scamsters?

Im astonished the IBOOBOO hasnt jumped in on this yet.
Kinda glad they stopped letting NY players play.

The only positive, is despite the spamming and shilling there is still no interest in SKillbet. Their message boards are like their site, no traffic. I will assume they will be shutting the doors soon and iBOOBOO and his friends will be making a full court press on the Holy Grail of Poker threads to shill the software.
I remember a few months back there was a poster who warned people about Skillbet and the founder being a botter. His posts were taken down and he was run off the boards. It made me leary about depositing on the site. Glad I did not.

Ive made a decent Profit off of skillbet but quickly grew tired of the repetitiveness of the games.
Didnt hear about any of the shadiness until after NY was excluded

iBooBoo was banned for a little, and looks like he has stopped posting as much. I stopped playing on this site a while ago. I was RageMorr. Granted I wasn't the best player, I managed to make a few hundred dollars before cashing out. I'm glad I did now that I see this sick stuff is happening.

ive played with you before.Pretty sure you took some of my earnings

Well its really not clear quite what happened here. Obviously there were a lot of prop players engaging in fake matches, but it makes a big difference if those players were actual site employees or if they were just players that were offered something in return for doing this. If they were actual site employees, then that makes things much worse of course. Its hard to imagine a company employing someone as stupid as iBOOBOO though, but who knows.

Fwiw, most of these accounts I am fairly certain were at least played by humans, albeit humans that were in some way affiliated with the site and played multiple accounts. I also do not believe that they super used or engaged in any of that kind of cheating vs. other players. If they did, there would be no need for them to dodge the stronger players. It is very possible that they had more knowledge available to them about how the bot players work though.

I still have interest in Skillbet, btw. There are a lot of things that I really like about the site, although obviously this isn't one of them. They could help themselves out here by not running away and hiding under a rock.

Hi Do you (or anyone else) happen to know what iBOOBOO was banned for?

Btw, a lot of people have been messaging me in chat on Skillbet since this thread has gone up. I just wanted to let people know that I don't usually have that on top, or am in another room, or napping, etc. and the client makes no sound when you receive a message. If I don't reply, I'm not ignoring you, and anyone is welcome to PM me here or wherever.

In the beginning I made a decent amount of money. My favorite to play against for my first week or so on there was aliciousness, it was like free money. Then all of a sudden I could no longer get a game with her and she pretty well disappeared. I don't know if there is anything going on there, but DCI I lost close to $500 to you on there.

ibooboo is the biggest shill in existence. The guy is a complete fraud and honestly not the good of a poker player. DCI you are much harder to beat than he is. So I laughed my ass off when he claimed on the hgp thread than he made 15000 mtt last month. I am about average as far as skill goes, and in any 10 games that I have played that guy at the very worst he and I break even.

Look at his last posts in NVG. I'm not sure of the whole details, but I'm sure that has something to do with it. Arguments with mods etc.

I'm not really sure what this is supposed to mean. First of all, I don't want to minimize the issues raised here, but I don't recall anyone claiming that they had been scammed. Secondly, I'm not sure what you're expecting - that one day after this is posted, we conclude after hearing one side of the story that SkillBet is no longer welcome here?

We're aware of the thread and will be keeping an eye on it, but I don't know if anyone that's relevant to the allegations is. Has anyone PMed any of the parties in question with a link to this thread? Makes a lot more sense to me than speculating as to when or if someone will respond.

They absolutely know about it. Within hours of the thread going up, all of the prop accounts (there are about 20 that play daily) vanished and live chat was taken offline. There have also been other players that were angry and told me that they left messages for support asking what was going on. I can send PMs for good measure, but there is zero chance that all parties involved don't already know about this.

Also, if site employees are playing against their own customers disguised as average players, that is a scam. It isn't clear that's the case, but their reaction isn't doing much to help to this point.

I emailed SkillBet, and they responded within a few minutes telling me they had posted this:

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/21...-13-a-1323908/

This just went up in locked sticke in Skillbet forum:

So basically they are going to now disappear without answering questions about what was going on, but leave the site up.

It was just a nuisance ban in BBV lasting 7 days from me.