Did I say I was worried ? What does HU cash have to do with this ? I'll stick to my usual games but thanks for the suggestion anyway.

If you don't mind I'm putting you on ignore. If the rest of your 74 contributing posts itt are like this I won't miss a thing.

If you haven't read any posts in this thread and then just post something random about HUSNG cartels AND can't connect the dots between HU cash (which are dead at high stakes because of relentless bumhunting) and HUSNGs (which are very dynamic at high stakes because you can't bumhunt) then I would much prefer you would put me on ignore.

You ignorant ****wit.

lol someone is tilted hahaha.

Have to say cartels etc have a negative psychological impact not only with the bad choice of name.

Most ppl don't want to be reminded that they are fish/recs. Especially players who have half a clue about poker (and thus some ego). Even though with or without cartels these ppl will face basically the same opposition anyway when regging a husng, cartels reinforce the fact that they are fish and they don't like it.

And then there are people who are winning regs from other games, who hate the idea that they can almost never be playing fish unless they are planning to play husngs seriously with high volume. This is my current situation, but I'm not so massively against cartels mainly because it tackles bumhunting, which is imo a greater evil for the health of online poker.

Yes - agree with all your points. Nice post.

Van 3rd parte software and cartela and se are good to go.

+1000

An over reaction from Stars because they don't understand the scope of the game they sell. An over reaction from people who don't want to put work into understanding stats, and how to use them. An over reaction by the future partner that Stars will be working with (ie, read Indian gaming tribes).

I've held back saying anything in this thread because it's just beyond ridiculous. The people who want to ban HUD's and everything else clearly haven't thought out their position, and it's a perfect analogy of why those same people don't succeed at the games.

Anything Pokerstars bans here will just go under ground. Pokerstars has zero chance of stopping any of that, and the pricing on all of this software will just increase dramatically. And if you think that you are at some unfair advantage because people have a HUD or notecaddy or anything else, they will have an even bigger advantage when they aren't available to you and only to those in the true online poker "know".

This whole thread is just plain silliness. If you want to protect your customers Stars, then shut down all the massive bot rings.

If you can only get a game against a cartel player then you are being cheated. Poker is supposed to be an individual game not one where players band together to cheat the others to profit themselves. That's called collusion. If Pokerstars support cartels then I would question whether they are in breach of their gaming licence which requires them to offer a fair and equal game to ALL their customers.

You aren't a software seller by any chance are you?

Theoretically if we remove all cartels atm- you would still only get a game with current cartel members at hu hypers at virtually all times.

Fwiw 100s turbo husngs created a "cartel" this year but it's not been mentioned, and for a rec it's been the exact same. They are playing who they would be playing with or without the so called cartel there. It's telling that no one has been complaining about this- even buthurt regs.

You could say that there is a cartel at 5ks on pokerstars consisting of wcg, ike, vbv, fortheswarm, baron, old time gin and maybe some others. Now I would love to play you at 5k husngs, but unfortunately I don't have the same chance as those "cartel" members since if you sit the lobby they will sit you, and same for me.

I'm sorry you don't get a fair chance to play anyone in husngs due to the nature of the lobby system. Most perceived "good" players won't sit another "good" player, but if an unknown were to sit husng lobbies they would be insta sat by one of the "established regs" at mid-stakes+.

If you don't like the lobby system (which is a fair point- I don't like it much either), go and play on ftp where there is no "cartel" due to infinite lobbies just like hucash. I have to warn you tho that you cannot deny action in husngs once you are regged, so you shouldn't be bitching here about how you want to play someone else when a reg sits you as you open sit 300$ husng lobby.

Yes and it doesn't even matter if it's within TOS or without unfair advantage. This negative psychological impact was the point I tried to make.

I'm a small stakes winning rec reg in other games. While looking for new games I discovered these cartels only a few months ago here on 2+2 and was very disappointed this was not commonly known.

Thanks for better explaining my post, I'm dutch

But I don't get this part ? Could you explain please ? There are 6m SNG cartels to right ?

Nope- afaik there are no 6max sng cartels officially. But I'm pretty sure that if jorj95 joins a lobby a game doesn't instantly run. This is just how poker works.

I agree that the current system is unfair to newcomers to the game for husngs- since you have to work waaaay harder to reach higher levels than before. But if you have read my posts ITT- cartel members currently are almost completely different to what they were to start- so pretty much everyone had to work really hard to get their spot or indeed- keep their spot. The only ones who benefited from the formation of cartels are the original founders (and most of them are no longer in cartels).

Now we come to the reason that they were formed in the first place. Before- it wasn't worth it for a better reg to sit a weaker reg in the lobbies. This encouraged bumhunting and waiting in queue for your time to sit a lobby helped by a program called sharkystrator. People decided that husngs shouldn't go down the route of hucash and other forms of poker, so decided to from these groups- where action is forced between some trying regs and current member regs. Ofc members of cartels are still free to sit other members should they wish to- just to get rid of the notion that these ppl are colluding with each other sharing notes etc (it's pretty stupid to do so in such a competitive environment on top of it being cheating).

This is strictly better for the health of the husng economy as it rewards the best regs and those more willing to regwar at least in theory. If you look in the hucash lobby- you see the difference. Without cartels there would just be an "hidden" queue just like in hucash.

Now the system isn't perfect. To start with- the cartels were heavily corrupt and ppl's votes were not 100% genuine. But over time as new triers succeeded etc, the system become increasing meritocratic, and less about who you are friends with. There will be some losers and winners as a result of this system- but by nature hard work and ability is rewarded above all and imo that's a good thing not only for poker.

Thanks for explaining.

If you are not happy with the way the games are running then you should take it up with Pokerstars. You should not form a cartel which gives people in it an unfair advantage at the expense of all the other players. That's collusion and Pokerstars should not allow it. A lot of players do not want to join the cartel because they want to play freely when they want to. These players are ganged up on regardless of how good they are. They cannot get fair games because of the cartel.

If by playing freely, you mean they want to bumhunt and don't want to play vs a good reg when challenged,then you're right, there are a lot of "good" players who weren't able to prove themselves against the upcoming regs and are now not part of any division/cartel.

If these players are truly good and want to join, they'll Be able to join the division/cartel within a 2-3 months - almost every successful entrant has made money when they've met the EV criteria.

Once a member of a division, you only have to play when challenged - a lot of people rarely get challenged so have a very free schedule.

Why should anyone have to meet the criteria set by a group of players ? The games should be run by Pokerstars not by a group of players who are trying to maximise their own profit to the detriment of all the other players. As things stands the cartels unfairly disadvantage every ordinary player, the very players that Pokerstars are supposed to be providing fair games for.

is this all discussion of husngs?


also, if anything is to be changed, will there be a reflection in reduced rake to make up for lost edge?


unsure if anyone has noticed but poker has gotten tougher


if rules change to eliminate tools that help players attainin an edge, thats just more money that goes into stars shareholders pockets instead of players bank accounts

i just got here

but you should reread this and see if any of the tumblers click into place

Sorry, I can't resist.

BS, because you are sitting out of the lobby hiding on a sharkystrator queue or a spinwiz queue. Everyone who uses these tools by definition are bumhunters. You just don't like the reality.

For a given stakes cartel/division how is it decided how many players are the maximum allowed in that division? Oh, it is a group decision based on whether existing regs are making enough profit.

It can't simply be an EV qualification because the total profit in the player pool is split among all regulars so allowing more regulars necessarily lowers the profit of existing division members, an undesirable result for those regulars. So EV target is in fact derived from existing reg profit levels.

And that is kind of the point: there is an implicit limiting of access to games. Cartel members collude to keep their own average profits higher by monopolizing access to recs while deliberately excluding regs outside their friendly circle.

I know for a fact that there are weaker players in $100/$200 division that stay because of who their friends are. They don't get targeted because they are buddies. They would be unlikely to survive in a Zoom-lobby where they have to be sat by their mates.

Awareness of cartels can only increase with Twitch. Check out XFlixx's stream late June where he did a HUSNG challenge ladder, starting at $3.50 and if he wins playing $7 and so on up. As he got to $30 he was warned by viewers in chat about cartels and that he could only sit a pro and had no chance of getting a fish. A lively conversation ensued in chat, and they tell their friends, who tell their friends, who tell everyone...

For the sake of the game future support HUSNG Zoom-style lobby. Today's cartels doom the games future as publicity of their shady existence spreads.

I encourage everyone who dislikes cartels to complain to Pokerstars about sharkystrator and spinwiz, I encourage everyone to lobby for a zoom-style lobby for HUSNGs and Spin&Gos that actively prevents seating scripts and specifically bans them.

Before the introduction of divisions/cartels for HUSNGs , this was true. You just had to buy the software, join a line and destroy recreational players (which is how it works for spinwiz atm).
Post the introduction of divisions, as soon as you sit in a lobby, you have to play whoever sits you. If you are a member of a division, you have to be prepared to play for at least 30 minutes and you also have to organise a 50 game slot with someone within a week of getting challenged.

You can't be a bumhunter and survive in HUSNGs anymore.

if you meet the EV requirement, you make it into the division. Most divisions subsequently kick out someone at that point. If they don't then there are more players sharing a limited amount of the total profit.


If you are a weak reg, you WILL be targeted.
So having friends within the division "helping you" by keeping you in the division can be a very expensive outcome.
BTW, at this stage, not one person at the $60s, $100s or $200s level has been kicked out and subsequently forced their way back in.





It's not sitting a "pro", it's sitting someone who has proven themselves within that division. You can force your way up the stakes within a short period of time (even up to the $200s now that they have introduced the EV system)



That's fine, as long as all other seating scripts are banned too and you also lobby for reduced rake for HUSNGs.
If you ban sharkystrator (which is used for HUSNG), you are actually banning seating scripts in the 1 game where the tool is actually used to target regs.

I am (but this won't effect me. I'm even one of the banned softwares, and I don't care honestly) and that's why I've stayed out of the discussion. I'm just also someone who has played at a high level, and I know software that very few people know about that players have used and paid a lot of money to use. I'm speaking from someone who has played online for over 11 years, has developed software, and has a deep understanding of how this market and industry works.

Any ways, I don't want to contribute. It's just clear people on all sides haven't thought this out very well. My only guess as to why Pokerstars is pursuing this path is purely political with future partners. Nothing else beyond that makes any sense.

So much politics in these threads, so much shady discussion in these threads, so much confirmation that they are cosy clubs protecting insiders:

Oh, and shhh don't email Pokerstars and complain or they might threaten Battlenet again!!!! Ohh and shhhh EV is nowhere near as objective as some would like everyone to think. LOL.

Roll on Zoom-lobby! Roll-on Pokerstars loss of license otherwise in as many jurisdictions as possible.

200s division HUSNG discussion thread

100s division HUSNG discussion thread

60s division HUSNG discussion thread

30s division HUSNG discussion thread

Not sure what basis your saying "Ohh and shhhh EV is nowhere near as objective as some would like everyone to think. LOL. "
It will just be something you've misunderstood and distorted to fit your "cartels are evil" mindset.

What you should be noticing in these threads is that they started out unfair (read the thread that preceded the links you posts above - I was one of the main complainers), the rules changed and you can now make any division up to the $200s if you are statistically better than the worse players of that division.