I might get to B/E for the day yet... Jeez, as poorly as I've been doing lately I shouldnt even be complaining they're getting rid of the format

Merge does to I believe. (Carbon, RPM etc)

listen up, 5050 is DIFFERENT from DON. If you play 5050 the way you play DON, be prepared to lose money.

Stars security better step it up. These things aren't going to prevent collusion at all. They are going to make colluders harder to catch.

Hmm, really? What's the traffic like on those sites for DONs? And in general?

Traffic is ok. If you are used to 24 tabling you probably will be dissappointed but there's plenty of games going. Also depends on your stakes of course. I only have experience at $2-$10 so I can't speak for traffic at higher levels.

Thanks. I don't know if I'd dare try to play cash again, much less 24 table it!

What is the level of play? I'd assume it's fishier than Stars, but to what to degree?

I love how Steve points out in the 2+2 PokerCast that the introduction of the Fifty50s have nothing to do with the Chinese DoN collusion scandal! Haha! That's a good one! In the meantime he's announcing the immediate removal of DoNs as if it was just routine.

Nah it's a huge blow to Stars and DoN regulars. But of course we'll see if Fifty 50s are popular. I doubt they'll come close to DoNs in terms of popularity so a certain amount of SNG traffic is going to disappear. I'm not sure they'll play like DoNs either, I'll have to try a few to find out but you might have a problem mass tabling them DoNs.

DoNs were gonna disappear anyway after Chinese collusion scandal last year but a week's notice is a joke. Or are the Fifty50s running so bad they have to remove the DoNs as quickly as possible?

Fifty50s are more difficult than DoNs, and because of the rake, you could have to work harder getting good at a game for a similar or even lower winrate and you can't play as many at the same time...

it means rake is going up. greedy bastards!

I think that's part of it. I had never played a Fifty50s and had no intention to. I glanced at the lobby's several times and they always looked barren.

The fact that you will not be able to effectively mass multi-table Fifty50s the way you would DONs is a huge part of it. I had planned to go for 500K VPPs this year. That's completely out the window now. Ugh, a week's notice? Couldn't Stars have just waited until the end of the year to implement the changes? Or, if nothing else why not stop running DONs at the beginning of 2011? Way to pull the rug out from under us...

Why do you feel you won't be able to effectively mass multi 5050s? You mean if the volume of players from DoNs don't migrate to 5050s as is the goal?

PokerStars Steve,

What bothers me most is did this really need to be done in the middle of the shortest month of the year? It's not easy for some of us to maintain VIP status at low stakes but with DoNs I could have had a chance at supernova this year. I also planned out my play to try and get a certain amount of FPPs this month. Would have been nice if you waited at least until the end of the month.

I don't think that's what they're doing here at all. My guess would be that more things looked like collusion in DoNs and their fraud investigators were bogged down looking into bogus complaints.

I don't see how this will cut down cheating compared to DoNs or other SnGs. It does reduce the incentive for implicit collusion (not cheating) which will probably stop complaints from confused players.

I don't know how bad cheating was at the higher stakes but at the 5's and 10's that I've mainly played it seemed pretty rare.

Because the game format is completely different, there are so many more variables than in a DON that would effect your decision making skills. People 24 table 50 or 100NL, yes? How many people 24 table 5000NL deep stacked? Same concept.

Not even close to the same concept. I plan to mass table these the same way I did DoNs and 9 man SNGs, assuming the volume migrates.

Honestly, I plan to mass table too. However I don't know if I'll be able to mass table with a winrate. Be damned if I won't try though.

All sites are softer than stars imo

Agreed. Stars has the best software though. I got the worse headaches trying to play on Cake.

Ye couldn't agree more. I had a good deal on cake a few months ago, but I just couldn't put in the volume because I hated the software so much.

Who is making all of PSs new decisions? It almost seems that someone from Tilt or one of the other sites got a job at Stars to completely destroy the site. Hurt hyper turbos - check, take out half the cash game tables - check, take out the most popular stt on pokerstars - check

Seems like Stars is trying to piss off half their players and lose money. I haven't seen a company make decisions like this since Blockbuster's fall.

Wasn't the demise of Blockbuster an inevitability with the popularity of the internet?

I agree with the noobs, Jecht. Significantly harder to mass multi than DONs (obv easier than 9mans). Playing 9/7 is these is gonna get you: yougonnagetraped.jpg yougonnagetraked.jpg

Someone rich has obviously bought the company and is testing out how far they can push people so he can use the information for his more important business ventures.

Make some PLO8 50/50's ffs, it's a natural split award game, they split friggin pots and like it.