Recently one of PokerStars (best) representatives said that they will be adding a weekly SNG challenge along with a new monthly MTT TLB challenge. Needless to say, a lot of cash game players once again feel left out, especially with the current MTT PokerStars Passport promotion.

It seems like all the promotions target tournament play(ers).

I think one of the main reasons that we're seeing so many tournament-specific promotions is because they are easy to come up with due to the fact that your tournament results are pretty public while cash game winnings are not.

Considering all of the above, I came up with a unique ring game promotion that awards players based on:

how many different games they play
how much they play
how high they play

in that particular order.

My idea was to have a monthly leaderboard awarding points by taking the square root of the total number of VPPs accumulated in each specific game and then adding them up.

Does anybody like this idea or should cash game players just accept the fact that promotions are always going to favor the tournaments?

By the way, one thing in particular I like about this setup is that one player doesn't necessarily have as big of an advantage over another. In other words, someone who plays high stakes won't have an advantage over someone who plays a bunch of tables, and that person won't necessarily have an advantage over someone who plays many different games.

In other words, I think many players could participate and do well in this.

A vpp leaderboard for micro/small/medium/high stakes would be good.

Even if there were no prize's

I'm fond of this idea.

I don't really feel left out.
I looked at the passport promo and would have considered playing more tourneys but I didn't think it was worth the time-investment.

The 5 billion and 10 billion hand promos are geared specifically for the cash-game players. One might guess that a 15 billion hand promo might be on the way.
It's free money and a pretty fun promo.

If they wanted to do a cash-game leader-board type promo I wouldn't complain but I'm already pretty happy with what they offer me there.

I also don't understand the focus on the number of different games a player plays.

So even though I never play Omaha or Stud I pretty much have to dive into those games some to have a chance at this?
And/or I have to waste my time at .5/1 and .25/.50 limit grinding out a few hands down there for more points?

This seems particularly unappealing to me. I'm sacrificing VPP's to get more points for the leaderboard.
Of course, if I determined that there was actually value in getting my 5k hands at .01/.02 NL then I guess I would do that. I'm not about to step into some NL1000 games or something like that just for this promo though.

I just don't get why there is some sort of reward for the players who are more flexible and knowledgeable about the variety of games while players like me who are more comfortable in a more limited range of games and stakes pretty much HAVE to step out of their comfort-zone to have any chance at this.

Again though..it would depend on the prize-structure for this promo.

a cash game leaderboard promo would prob just make the games nittier than they already are...

Two reasons.

First we have to do something other than straight VPPs or otherwise the same medium stakes multi-tabling HUD bots are going to win every single month.

Secondly it be nice to reward the player who can play all games pretty well rather than a NLH specialist.

And it gives all players a chance.

Hands aren't awarded. VPPs are, and you won't be gathering many at the penny tables.

Three 50NL tables will probably earn you the same points as a NL1000 table. That's why I said all different players will be able to compete.

In the other thread I named this the All Around Player Award. I think it's good to reward players who are adept at different games rather than the HUDbots like you and me.

If you can only play limit hold 'em, then obviously the All Around Player Award isn't for you.

The same can be said for the new weekly SNG challenge.

I guess PokerStars was bad this year.

SANTA CAME BY LAST YEAR!

???

----------Kitty

well i don't play sngs, so that doesn't bother me lol.

needing validation from people you dont know with a cash game leaderboard, lol

A neat concept but in the end it would be the high volume players getting more value on top of their VPPs as opposed to the tournament promos which are based on a player's best results. Although I don't know what the SNG thing would be all about.

I think that getting more money/stuff is the goal here. Not validation.