The danger is still the shared bankroll stable using soft collusion, even if you do limit the software so you can't apply the friend list and the sit list at the same time (as would make sense to help those paying your subscription to get hunted).

I am puzzled why $7 would have more frequent joint seating by two regs on shared rolls vs one other than at $30 or above.

Your software at its most benign alters the recs chance of seating a reg and decreases their chance of seating a rec. At it's worst the stable does get seats together, does have a shared roll which alters how they play to maximise their ev even without sharing hole card info (The shared roll also helps the jacckpot variance).

The software leaves recs deceived as to how their opponents are selected - it's not random as assumed/advertised a dishonesty Stars should not continue with. It also makes stable based collusion a doddle.

I'm sure it is making you money, that it is a tool some regs profit from by having table selection denied to the casual rec but it is also a tool that's basic functionality facillitates collusion by groups of players.

If this functionality is to be available it should be in the Stars client for all - if that were the case then you supplying that software functionality to the operator would need to be licenced and you would need to sign up to social responsibility and technical standards. Instead you sell to some and the exact same software goes unlicenced.

Having this dual/alternative interface for those in the know and paying for it corrupts the game - it does it by its existence and limited distribution even before some use it not just to collude as all spin wiz users to target non spin wiz users. It's not in game collusion, it's pre game collusion against the casual player - and then your software helps active in game colluders too.

It is a fine example of what third party software does - disadvantages the new or uninformed player, deceives them by making it a different game of different rules for those third party tooled up.

The effect on the game is terrible, not just because it can help cheats but because of the effect on casual players, first when they are targetted and then when they find out they have been targetted in a game sold as random seating. Welcome to poker - here's this game. Oh you've found out that some in the know have better functionality than you and feel cheated? Tough is what we say and yet people are surprised that it gets harder and harder to recruit new players as we churn through many and spit them out feeling cheated whether it is by SpinWiz or TurboScan or datamining sites or HUDs that defy belief in terms of complexity and functionality.

That's how third party software is helping to kill the game and having the widely marketed "entry" "random" product corrupted is terrible for Stars too.

Oh man so you thought that the sitlist feature can just be bypassed if you friendlist everyone? No wonder you thought spinwiz was a collusion tool lol.

I'm not as convinced as you that spinwiz is such an evil thing- at least now you see it reduces collusion from shared br/teamplay type situations.

At the higher stakes at least spinwiz is not great due to the high no. of regs vs fish. I don't know about others- but at least I am personally manual regging on top of using it.

And of many things in poker- spinwiz is the last thing I would ban. Datamining, seating scripts in cash, and even huds in general I would ban before spinwiz. Mainly because it does what a group of players who want to avoid each other does anyway. Even recs will collude to not sit with their friends (or maybe they do want to cheat?). If you want to ban the concept of spinwiz- then take it up on stars to make lobbies truly random. But I don't think this is necessary, and the experience of recs won't change much at all at higher stakes.

The friend list misunderstanding does not alter that sitlists can be used by stables to support soft collusion, even if some members of the stable are getting targetted by non-stable players it still delivers the 2 colluders vs 1 mark far more often and more easily than manually coordinating simultaneous registration.

It is still a collusion tool and it is still designed to disadvantage casual players to the advantage of SpinWiz users. It is still deceptive as most non users are blissfully unaware that they are getting sat more often by regs and less often by other casual players. Indeed with the update promoting sitlist use within the app by prioritising sitlist users in the queue it increases the odds that the casual player gets two regs hugely - now those regs may or may not also be colluding once they enter the game but the rec is disadvantaged either way.

It does not reduce collusion, it just means that someone hunting you will sometimes get in the way of that collusion, it still delivers up your partner or stable mate more efficiently than you could manage by manually registering - indeed as SpinWiz is increasingly about seating two regs vs one mark it more effectively blocks any colluders who both register manually, one at least has to have SpinWiz. It is likely to become a monopoly tool for colluders, one at least must have it, likely all the stable of colluders.

The hunting of "weak regs" does not prevent or block collusion and collusion stables are still getting a bit of software designed to let them sit mutually. The first video was informative in trying to explain why you did not get seats all the time with your sit list partner, it underplayed the users risk of being targetted himself but hey it also left out that someone hunting you could also be coordinating with with non spin wiz users so that you get hunted and colluded against.

Most SpinWiz users are not colluding in game but there is no free lunch - any gain to SpinWiz users to justify the subscription is coming straight from the rec's reduced ev. That's bad for the game even before you get to the point where the rec finds out what has been happening in a game he thought was random seating.

Especially when pokerstars blatantly deceives people who ask them about such programmes by saying the players are drawn completely at random

HaHa

If serious you obviously haven't played 6max or you'll get crushed with only HU skills. The disciplines are different not one better than the other. For that matter 6max specialists tend to get crushed at fullring, too and vice versa. Again different skills.

BTW, my impression is that 6max cash career has much better long term viability than HUSNGs/Spin&Gos. 6max post-flop is much more subtle skills than HUSNGs due to increased stack depth. 6max pre-flop is much harder for computers to solve due to GTO only being viable for 2 player game. A third player totally ruins profitability of first two if they so choose and there is nothing a Nash equilibrium can do about it. So 6max pre-flop has to be all about adaptation. Where as good GTO player (or a bot) will soon destroy your HU career, reducing you to a Rakeback grinder.

You can say that deepstacked hucash is more complex than shortstacked maybe- but there is no way 6max is harder for a human than any form of HU. The only time where it comes close is when it's button vs blinds, or bvb but even then ranges are way tighter than HU.

Well, Spin Wix sits you with named people you choose whenever you hit the front of the queue. That is one non spin wiz user and someone from your sit list. That's pretty much it a a collusion tool.

If your sit list is fellow colluders, you get your colluder vs a non spin wiz user. It lets you (most of the time) choose one of your opponents - the potential colluder.

If you try the same via Stars registration using simultaneous registration you face many difficulties, communicating with your whole stable being one but avoiding spin wiz monopolising the tables to seat you alone against two spinwiz users being another.

Registering via Stars - can't sit named players - sitting via spin wiz can choose named opponent(s). Hmm collusion opportunity - how hard is that to get?

Can you seriously not see that in the three handed format most vulnerable to collusion that a tool letting you pick named opponents for one seat vs one none spin wiz user is a collusion tool? Really? You honestly think that is not a collusion tool to circumvent randomised seating and the Stars lobby?

It is a two vs 1 table seater, in the most vulnerable format for collusion, you choose who you want to seat as a pair vs the mark. That's a collusion tool. Now it may be out of game collusion only but pfft, as soft collusion off a shared roll delivers a real advantage people will use it that way or use it to facillitate hard collusion with shared hole cards too.

We have the whole product being out of game soft collusion vs non users and in product we have it as a soft or hard in game collusion tool - and the developers get their fee off the top via subscription, paid for by the marks unaware of the software.

It is a scam, it is wrong, it facillitates cheating, it undermines a key Stars product and yet it remains approved by stars and completely unregulated. It is fundamentally unfair to the casual, rec or new user this game's marketing targets. It is a disgusting state of affairs that potentially damages the reputtion of poker and Stars.

Still cheer up, it might get you half a buy in extra in profit per 30 mins playing, even without the in game collusion "edge".

Just to clarify: If you reach #1 others will be seated with you, instead of you being seated with them.

It's hard to collude with SpinWiz because at $30+ almost everyone has 10+ guys who are currently online and targeting them which makes your collude chance 10% (less because you can miss the tables). It's much, much easier without SpinWiz.

You should try the program before making statements.

I think it was predicted in the 'Prophecies of Nostradamus' that a guy from Estonia would be the third Antichrist.

He will appear in Asia and be at home in Europe
The man from the East will choose his seat
Passing across the field to destroy his foes
He will fly through the Stars.

But I may have just made this up.

My point is that they are different. You over-simplify what you perceive to be the 6max situation. That is why most HU specialists who try 6max cash are viewed as spewtards with sloppy range construction versus the subtle precision required to be a 6max consistent winner.

In 6max the ranges are far more complex than you appreciate. Even if heads up pot you have to concern yourself with how ranges differ between each matchup. EP vs MP, CO, BTN, SB, BB. MP vs EP, CO, BTN, SB, BB. CO vs EP, MP, BTN, SB, BB etc. Multiway even more so which you never have to deal with in HU. Differing ranges create different affects on different textures in ways much more subtle than HU play. At a gross level as a simple example you never have to concern yourself with a 3B in position but in 6max before you open raise you have to concern yourself with the table's ranges for 3Bing you both in and out of position. There are just a lot more variables to concern yourself with and they impact both pre and postflop. And both open raises, cold calls and 3B/4B/5B/ all-in dynamic.

In one spot with the same hand on the same texture versus the same opponent the "correct" or optimal play may be a bet with half pot or 3/4 pot or overbet, etc or a check/fold, check/call or check/raise, just by changing positions. Multiway pots different again.

Width of opening range is only one factor to consider. Personally I don't find it any harder to play whether it is a wide or narrow range, whether HUSNG with 25BB stacks or whether EP vs MP in 6max: both these are somewhat trivial because the starting ranges are well known. The GTO principles remain the same once heads up. Rather the harder part is to decide what is in or out in the given opponent's starting range in the more complex positional interactions thrown up by 6max battles.

I can see that, but a bigger stable improves your ratio.

Your claim that both registering via Stars at same time to collude at that level is easier is not right, one would have to have SpinWiz with the other(s) coming in via Stars as your software is currently splitting the non spin wiz users to face 2 spin wiz users.

I can see that as it becomes more and more a tool to bumhunt fellow spinwiz users (as you say it does at higher stakes) rather than just divide up the non spinwiz fish the harder it is to guarantee your collusion partners.

Or as I say it just means you need a big enough stable at that level to deliver a high proportion of colluding games.

PS advertising that your software's main effect at $30+ is to get you targetted as you in turn target a non wiz user is an odd sales pitch.

It is not their sales pitch but it is reality. This reality gets more likely subs (loyalty) from strong regs. And that is the SpinWiz market.

Computers definitely find it easier to solve HU than 6max. You're drawing a long bow if you think that complexity relationship reverses for humans. I certainly don't think so. HU is a subset of the 6max game not the reverse.

Your posts are getting better and better

I agree with all the parts of your post I removed - if people want to run analysis software when the client is closed that's none of PS business. However, there is in general (and, I believe, in law - but IANAL and in any case this is about what law should be rather than what it is) a notion of "going equipped" to commit a crime. If someone owns a stars bot and it's not allowed then the morally the position is the same as someone wandering round a block of flats they don't live in holding a set of skeleton keys - and the person who sold the stars bot is in the same moral position as the person who provided the burglar's kit - i.e. that of an accessory to a crime.

Is there any case law about HHs?

I don't support lobby-botting tools like SpinWiz anyway, but it strikes me that playing 2v1 isn't going to be profitable.

In a straight game, with 7% rake, you need to win 35.84% or the time to break even, so you need the other two players to win an average of less than 32.07%

In a 2v1 game, you and your partner need to win 71.68% of the time to break even, so you need the mark to win less than 28.32% of the time - which is a much bigger ask. Obviously collusion can help in some situations, like squeezing, but is it really equivalent to removing 58 chips* from the mark's stack?

*( (500/0.3207) x (0.3207-0.2832) = 58)

IANAL, but it seems obvious to me HHs are a record of historical fact rather than a published work.

Also IANAL, but I always assumed that if someone posts a pre-flop spot in the MTTSNG subforum, and I open a printed work like Kill Everyone, and read the chart at the back, and post "It's an open-jam" then I am not breaching copyright of that book even though the information I'm posting derives from a copyrighted work. I was always told that copyright covered the expression of ideas rather than the ideas themselves. I believe it's similar in the USA as Mason Malmuth as previously advised people not to pay exorbitant prices for e-books as the ideas themselves have no legal protection anyway, just the presentation, and the ideas will get out onto forums and other books quick enough. For that reason I don't see why a program that parsed a HH file and restated the action (e.g.) in the style of a 1950s boxing commentary, or in the form a relational database entry would breach copyright even if HH themselves were copyrighted.

However, Richas is a lawyer and TheDefiniteArticle has just finished a law degree and it doesn't seem so clearcut to them, so I am interested to learn more about this.

Nope - Project/Risk Manager my day job is in large part to worry about bad stuff that might happen, including legal, political, pr and strategic risks.

My asserting that HHs are coyrighted is based on the way Stars make that claim in their cease and desist threats. I'm assuming the Stars lawyers had at least a half decent case, not least as the did reach accommodation re opt ins.

here would be the better thread for this
http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/15...10/index2.html

but 2 vs 1 is the simplest model available for collusion. I think the linked thread shows it would work. If it is not profitable in 2vs1 then collusion wouldn't ever be.

I don't see that two collaborators beating the rake would be harder in theory or practice than 1. The mutual sit list function is essentially based on the assumption that seat selection (and superior strategy) alone is enough for both spin wiz users to beat the rake. Collusion doesn't make two at the table beating the rake any harder.

This.

With 2 vs 1 the equity (X) lost by one bad player is divided by 2 pros (half X each). With 1 vs 2 the equity (Y each) lost by two bad players is taken by 1 pro (2 Y). Unless collusion is effective enough to make X four times Y then (plain English version) it's better for the pros to have 2 fish each instead of 1 fish between two. That's the basis of the main functionality of SpinWiz - that they are always with two non-users rather than sharing a non-user with another player. And IMHO it's lobby collusion and should be banned in whole, not just the particular feature you are talking about.

Also the thread you linked to is about a 3 player SNG where ICM is a consideration - where obviously collusion is more of a problem with the non-linear value of chips. There are no ICM considerations in Spin n Goes - though the push/fold ranges the guy gives are a valid proof of concept for what you are talking about.

The thread starts on ICM but moves to Nash. I stil reckon ICM could be a proof too given collaboration if we can work out the way to amend it for collusion and the extreme bubble of 1 paid vs 3 entrants, but hey ho, Nash is enough for me.

Comparing pro vs 2 fish is not relevant, SpinWiz is increasingly sharing one fish (non spin wiz user being the proxy for that) between two regs paying for the s/w. (At least at higher stakes with fewer fish and more regs).

Given that the software helps to select a fishier mark adding in collusion HELPS it does not make beating the rake harder. You are swopping another reg, potentially targetting you, for a stable mate colluding with you. There is no way that such a deal is WORSE for the two colluders.

It is a table selection tool that facillitates collusion. IMHO collusion is demonstrably able to deliver an in game advantage, that is after all it's entire point but I think it is mathematically provable even for soft collusion in three handed games.

The dual rake is irrelvant to the gain acheived via collusion cheating by the two conspirators. Both have to pay rake even if not colluding and with a shared roll any advantage over the mark is shared between the cheats.

The three seat format is ideal for collusion.

Apart from the comments from the spinwiz guy and others stating how hard it is to sit a specific person in these games, and assuming collusion is somehow able to beat the 7% effective rake, do you think pokerstars might be able to detect a situation where a bunch of people keep sitting each other and colluding?

Honestly, the time you've spent on this subject in this and the other thread is a little crazy.

Yes I think it is detectable by Stars. Just as the double or nothing collusion was detctible long before Stars was was forced to act and pay out more tham $2m in compensation. Time they did it.

The format is uniquely susceptible to collusion (3 player and the mark not knowing table selection is possible, the way the s/w supports stable based collusion). People are quibbling re getting a colluder 100%, not that the s/w makes mutual seating far easier than not using the s/w.

Nobody is denying that casual players are essentially being deceived in to thinking that they face random players, not two regs paying to seat them - either to just bum hunt or collude against him. The way it also bum hunts those paying to be bumhunted by name rathe than non Spin Wiz user category is not very relevant to them as the primary mark.

As for me spending crazy time on this - guilty. My obsession with trying to make online poker fairer to csual players is clearly unusual to the pont of being mad but there you go, that's who I am. I don't think "regs" using software to **** them over is right and long term I am certain regs using software to shaft others via soft collusion (spin wiz subscibers vs non spin wiz subscribers) is terrible for the game.

It is fundamentally dishonest to have two interfaces to the game - Stars or Spin Wiz. It is fundamentally dishonest to pretend that the software also facillitates collusion - it is table selection in a three player game vs a third player who thinks the seating is random!

How can you not see that this is wrong in principle, and clearly illegal when the two are actively colluding either via a shared roll or worse.

Stil, that's OK - I am mad - if and when Stars get their arse in to gear (or kicked) to look at S&G collusion it is cetain that the whole thing is as kosher as chinese double or nothings.

Meanwhile it is a PR disaster waiting to happen for Stars that they approve preferential seating for some (and fail to deal with collusion).

Still cheer up, there will be some other dodgy element of online poker along soon to suck up my crazy time.