If they are manually going through every single hand, yes it would seem strange. But they don't have the manpower to trawl through every single hand. They would need software to detect if a player was cheating so that they could then manually review the hands to confirm if the player was cheating. I don't know how that software could reliably detect if someone was using the exploit. They need to have a completely different set of tools to detect if someone was using the exploit I talk about - the tools they have for normal collusion wouldn't help them.

Karganeth, this would be very easy to detect.

If they wanted to check to see if a player was doing this, then they would look at his opening percentage as a function of how many people have quick folded.

if players have no knowledge of how many people have quick folded it should be pretty constant. I would look at UTG opens only, say. might be 10% or 50% but the issue is over a large sample it should be constant for any amount of quick folding.

if players do have knowledge, it should rapidly increase and would be close to 100% when there are a lot of quick folders.

any lag would get automatically banned for being better post-flop and opening a wider range?

what if my entire table is 10/8 so I raise wider by LOOKING AT MY HUD
and they happen to fast-fold because they're nits and they don't like playing marginal hands

now obviously I have a much higher PFR% against nits
nits also have a higher fast fold % than regular people who play a normal range of hands
so obviously when I exploit low VPIP players they'll fastfold more often and I'll be raising more often, so I'm obviously cheating

but except I'm not, I'm only using the information from my own database

you are talking about a single sample, even though you play on many different table types, you still reach an average, yes?

lets say, after 50k hands, on a standard 6max table your UTG PRF was 15% on average

then you move to zoom, and your stats look like this, with thousands of hands for each.

___________UTG PFR
0 QuickFold___15%
1 QuickFold____20
3 QF 50%
4 QF 100%

wouldnt you think something fishy is going on given that we should have no knowledge of how many people quickfold?


obviously not every player type quickfolds with the same frequency, nits would most probably quick fold a whole lot more than lags, but this wouldnt be hard to control for.

it wouldn't be 100% because the BB is still in the game because the BB has no quick-fold option
it would be like 92% which is my open in heads-up (maybe a little higher because there's more nits in 6max or maybe lower because I don't have the SB in so my raise is more expensive but wins the same amount of money)
now, if I get a table with 4 nits in those positions that are like 10/8 in 6max, I would still open close to the same range, maybe only 82% or something because they still play their aces and stuff

this is further complicated by multiple entries
this is because a player doesn't get sat in to the table the VERY NEXT SECOND, five other players also have to quickfold also, so there's a lag time between quickfolding and finding a full table of players

so if I quickfold on one table and stay in on another, the cheater may see that I quickfolded when in fact I have not
so in reality the cheating hud could only give you "likely to have quickfolded" or something like that
so I wouldn't be opening 72o UTG anyway, because some of those quickfolds are false alarms caused by lack of information and misattributed to the wrong table quickfolding

i know but it serves for my example. the actual numbers are irrelevant, just that there would a huge increase.


yes, but you could easily control for the average vpip of the table as well, especially if you are talking about the converse example when you are sitting at a table full of 50/5 type players. the difference in your PFR depending on the quick fold would then be huge.

i agree with your comments here - it would definitely make a significant difference though, even 1bb per 100 hands would be a huge increase at zoom tables.

i am not saying that it is likely that this would ever happen.

just that i think it could be detectable relatively easily.

exploit: know when certain player(s) appear at a table and share this information
detection mechanism: VPIP as a function of fast folders ahead

stars should distinguish between "regular folds" and "fast folds" in hand histories to make the potential exploit detectable by all players

Uh... At least for Rush Poker, I think FTP stated that you don't get on the same table yet if another hand was still going where one another fast folded.... If you got on an another table with him it was because he was playing more than 1 rush table

Found it:

""Are there any rules in place to ensure the integrity and fairness of a Rush Poker* game?

Yes, the following rules apply to Rush Poker*:

A player who uses the Quick Fold option cannot be seated at his next table with any players still in the hand at the time of the Quick Fold. This prevents players who have more than one entry in a Rush Poker* game from taking advantage of other players.""

If stars didn't make this yet they just should... but I think the difference isnt that big because you can always relevel with another entry like others said lol?

I'm not personally worried about a potential exploit as described by the OP.
However, I'd be interested to know just how the Zoom client interacts with the Stars server, because when you make a raise, the fast folds are often so instantaneous it's as if the information (in terms of bits and bytes) has already been downloaded to the client-end.
I would hope that information is only communicated between the client and the server after I've clicked RAISE. i.e. I click Raise, the client asks the server "Has the next player folded? If the answer is YES, show the folded animation at the client side".
If the client is already downloading the information that players ahead of me have fast folded, then the client could certainly be hacked. A hacked version of the client would effectively tell a player "The guys to your left have clicked fast-fold, so raise it up".
It would be somewhat reassuring if a Stars rep could confirm that any information about fast folds is NOT downloaded until after the user has hit the RAISE button.

A solution would be to make Zoom table anonymous tables. This wouldn't change the dynamic of the game much anyways for the recreational player who doesn't have a hud and isn't going to remember reads from previous hands on the entire pool of players in his zoom pool anyways, so the tables are effectively almost anonymous anyways for them.

+1 - You got da logic.

colluding can work around this rule, just saying

did everyone miss this point since you kept talking?

Ye I get the point now... If you do it with others.... though if rush poker is good in someone's hands it is in pokerstars hands...

problem is that players act before it's their turn and that these actions have an effect that can be observed on other tables (players get seated at different tables). some other player may communicate this information to you. so FT statement, surprise surprise, does not tell the full story.

I`m amazed that OP overlooks the crucial point of his "exploit":
Why would I use such a software by choice? You are aware of the fact that (if you use such a software) you just give away your blinds/pots to other users using the tool and slowing down your own actions if not using the fast fold button at all.

example 1:
1. two of these users are sitting in sb and bb, both FF (fast folding), you steal the blinds on the button.
2. you and another exploiter are sitting in sb and bb, both FF, a third user steals the blinds
=> you are trading blinds for nothing between your pool...
=> if you dont use this tool the btn raiser may or may not fold his crappy hands (assuming he is an average player that would happen very often)
=> instead of eventually winning the blinds/get a walk (+1,5bb) you just trade blinds between each other (+-0)
=> if you dont use FF so that the user exploiter cant use this against you you are in fact decreasing your hands/hr a lot and will play way more hands with normal ring games (as long as you dont play just a few tables)

This is an extreme example but the same goes with other combinations (with more "unknown" players involved the chance to steal the blinds will decrease drastically while the risk will obv increase) AND of course postflop play will affected as well (= slower playing, no FF etc).


It doesnt make sense just give out the info if someone is using fast fold! If you cheat it would be obv that you will also share your hands...why cheat like a clown when you can be the king with more rewards and get the same punishment

That's not actually true. Using the Fast Fold button does not allow other players to exploit you. It may help other players though. If you thought about it carefully enough you would realize this too. Earlier I did make the mistake of saying that players should avoid using the Fast Fold button. It actually makes no difference to your bb/100 if players are using the exploit. What it does do is help them play against other players.

For example, you're dealt 32o in the small blind. You select Fast Fold because no matter what happens you're going to fold. Even if you verbally told people "I'm going to fold this hand" at a live table in the SB, they wouldn't be able to exploit you because you were going to fold anyway. Your EV is the same regardless of players know if you've Fast Folded or not. You will lose exactly the same amount (the sb) regardless of if people know you're always going to fold or not.

The game becomes unfair when some players know who is going to Fast Fold and others don't. The players not using the exploitative software would be at a significant disadvantage.

The big blind cannot fast fold unless there is a raise. And as I explained, Fast Folding doesn't help players exploit you because you've already given up the pot - they cannot win any more money from you.

Edit: You are right to believe that you would be helping other players exploit you if you Fast Folded in the big blind, but that's not possible.

ch/fold will lead to fast fold so its the same - a program would easily recognize this

Me and my buddies have been using this exploit for ages though we don't use software. We just ring each other up every time we recognize a fast folder and we detect multi-tablers by their stack sizes. It's a bit inconvenient but we do pick up our fair share of blinds from EP.

i assume you mean using the check/fold box?

difference is that checking it can not be observed from the outside before it causes the desired effect. fast fold can. quite easy to come up with the design for a network to exploit this. fun fact: the more participants in the network / the smaller the overall player pool, the more positives on fast folds you will get.

The fast fold is a key component of zoom, the idea of removing it for possible collision is lol.

If you removed everygame that could be colluded in you would end up with heads up poker.

HU is the Godfather of chip dumping

i'm pretty sure girah and jungleman found a way to collude in heads up. (and quite a few others in their own ways)

the difference is that fast fold may proove to be technically flawed. that is, the problem with it is not possible abuse of the game but a technical implementation that breaches/circumvents one of the fundamental rules of poker:

- no player should ever act out of turn