This has been brought up many times before but anyways here we go:

Dear Online poker sites & anyone else that will listen.

There has been a long standing issue with players playing MTT's not having synchronized breaks, this means if a player is playing more than one MTT at a time that he or she will not have any breaks at all.

What does this mean for the player?
Eye damage, headaches, permanent damage to their back, RSI, muscle fatigue, varicose veins, etc etc.. I could go on but it is obviously detrimental to the players long term health.

What does this mean for the site?
Playing a long session without any breaks will make a player tire more quickly than if they have breaks, thus players in general will play for a shorter session. We will be less healthy, we will die sooner and you will lose out on rake.

The break time can also be used to look for upcoming tournaments, I have as im sure many others have missed out on tournaments because I didnt get a chance to take a proper look at the line up.

What the sites can do to protect their players and increase profits:
Synchronized breaks! If all MTT's were to pause exactly at XX:55 every hour even during the middle of a hand & then start again at exactly XX:00 everyone would have a clear break for 5 minutes.

We can get up & go to the bathroom, we can stretch our legs, we can smoke, we can make refreshments, we can relax.....

The players in the hand could be given an extra 1 minute timebank when they come back to ensure they do not miss out the hand they were playing.

Some people will reply to this thread telling me I can take a break anytime I want, well at what cost? Sitting out for 5 minutes on 6 tables will definitely hurt my bottom line at the end of the year. Can you imagine if you were forced to work for 8 hour sessions without a break at a workplace? You would be seeking legal advice.

Also I think some of the sites have commented that it would be impossible to pause all the hands at once, I'm not sure why since we have seen them all paused before around the milestone bonuses etc.

If you have any good ideas on how the sites could implement a break please chime in, pokerstars read this forum daily as do many other sites so hopefully something will be done.

Cliffnotes: MTT's players need breaks or we will all die prematurely.

Definitely this imo.

10mins every 2 hours imo, gives you time to make something quick to eat if you get hungry that way. If you can't wait 2 hours to go to the toilet go see a doctor.

If you have a medical condition go buy a laptop.

Please for the love of God yes.

sticky this afaik. and dear god you're so right.

I like the 10 minutes every 2 hours idea

Also if you are voting no can you please explain why as I cant see the downside.

you should've made the pole public so you can out the people voting 'no'


also the only downside i could see is what about the people that only play one at a time? they start a tournament and it goes to break 5 minutes in. or what if a tournament is h4h or playing slowly. one tournament goes to break right away but the other doesn't go to break for 2 minutes because of a long hand. Does that mean that one only gets a 8 minute break?

I voted yes but there is one problem that i think of off the top of my head. When it hits XX:55 and players are still in hands all across other tables for another couple mins, it screws up the breaks/lengths of the next hour for all the other players. The only thing that makes sense is for the break to always end at XX:00 no matter what and your breaks not be exactly five mins.

They could have an extra minute before hand, in order to let everyone finish their hands, if it takes longer than a minute then tough, they shouldn't be so slow or so scared of the bubble.

So if we do the 2 hour thing, we could play for 1 hour 49 minutes, have a 1 minute, wait for hand to finish period, just like a break in a normal tournament. Then the players officially start the break after the minute?

Hope that makes sense

I don't play tourneys but I think this would be a great idea.

love it brilliant

You cant pause in the middle of a hand but apart from that I vote yes

great idea

i lol'd as its true

Where did someone suggest this?

Change we can believe in!

i actually voted no, because I am happy for the breaks to based on when the tournament starts. They aren't designed for multi tablers and it is kind of silly to start a tournament and 5 minutes later have a break. Most sites dilberatly stagger start times for this reason.

If you want breaks all at the same time, just open tournaments that start at the same time every hour.

I think catoring for the pro isn't right when they should be for the casual players who would want the break an hour after starting.

this

So, would the casual player have a problem with a break an hour and 5 minutes after they start?

Voted Yes and rated 5 Stars. Brilliant idea.

Have the extra minute for hands to end and skip the first break if the tournament started less than 10-15(?) minutes ago.

Hell yeah. This > no breaks > current system.

how many tournaments start at x:50 anyway?

that doesn't work because u have to wait till all hands are finished to start the break

tournaments start every 10 minutes or so at stars so some people would have a break 10 minutes into their tournament. Also breaks won't match with blind levels which they currently do, different tournaments have different length levels. So not as easy as just matching up.

I know i am probably in the minority of 2+2ers but i think the majority at least a lower stakes want their break an hour after starting.

this is pretty much the #1 reason that i don't play more tournaments. of course it wouldn't be easy to do this, but it would be worth it imo.

Some adjusting the times of tournaments would work to fix that pretty smoothly.

The advantage by far outweighs the small disadvantages here, of which most are even fixable imo.