I want to share my experience, I hope this is the right thread, if not tell me and Im writing a new one:

some days ago I play 12 Hours long at Pokerstars.
many MTTs (27 - 109 $ BI) and some CG
I had a PLO 5C 1-2 running almost all the time
PLO8 3-6 about 5 hours
one zoom PLO 0,50-1 almost all the time

was not a very good day I lost almost all the big Pots I played (almost always with the better hand as we got the chips in) and lost net 4.2K $ (only Cash Game no MTTs)
thats not the point. The point is, I was involved in many big pots and paid tons of Rake 12 hours long.

This is what I found in the chest I got:

16.37$ (incl. Star Coins) + 1 freeroll Ticket

Im not a big cash game player, I play mostly MTTs and usually by the way 1-2 CG tables but not everyday.
Is it possible I get always so little rewards since months?
I dont remember last time I got more than 11 $ ( and this happens also once a month maximum).

I know Im stupid and there is no point in playing cash game on Pokerstars without a reasonable Rake BAck deal, but I mean is this possible to get so little rewards after paying so much rake very often??

Id be thankful for answers/opinions

thats the same they answered me after that day (see my post above)

they mentioned they want to reward more recreational players, to induce them to deposit more often and keep the Poker "environment" fresh.

The 5 factors which are importants for the rewards are:

1. Play Volume
2. Play Frequency
3. Stakes
4. Deposit
5. Random factor

but I dont believe these things come all in to play. I think the most important factor must be Deposit for pokerstars, I cant imagine something else, after so many months getting 0,50-1$ Chests all the time.

Im looking for a new Site with good rake back deal (and compatible with HM2) and as soon as I find it, Im going to use PS only for MTTs, because there is no point anymore playing cash game there.

Guys, let's be serious. Lately, the rakeback on stars is close to 1% or lower. I mean, I haven't received a dollar for the past 50 chests or longer. I only get a few cents everytime I open a chest. The change came since stars crushed several times. Probably they want to get back the refunds by paying ****ty rewards inside the chests...

A couple of interesting observations.

I was winning pretty solidly and my chest went right up to 12,500 for a blue which I think was about 3%.

Decided to try Stars ES, mostly for a bit of rakeback. Started out at around 18% rakeback (I forget the exact number of points I needed) won about $200 at NL 10 and NL25 over 2 weeks. Paid $480 in rake and got back $80 but the chest prices quickly increased making three jumps in that period and are currently at around 7% (Silver at 42,500).

Moved back to .com today for my first session there in over 2 weeks. Finished off my 12,500 point blue chest and my next red chest is just 265 points.

Chests require more points in stars.es, and I think they implement your first deposit bonus into chests, so you start getting **** rakeback like you suppose to after bonus is depleted.

Btw anyone is getting empty chest? I just got two empty ones in ps.eu. wth?

^ Sometimes the animation doesn't work when I click on a chest, but the coins appear in 'My Stars'. I've never had a completely empty chest. That would be too stingy even for Stars.

i do get chests with only a ticket.. even though i never never never play(ed) tournaments, basically empty chest

My red chests started at 150, then 220, then 265, now I need 550 points to get an average of 10 coins, 42 if im very lucky. Thanks Stars, very cool!

Today I played 5-6k nl10 and raked about 30$ and got nice .50$ in ma bank account and some nice 13 shiny stars coins to buy me self a nice .10$ spin. How much is that? 2%? I am grateful.

Anybody know what the rakeback is like at Party Poker. Honestly considering moving after like 5 years on stars lol

No I don't think so.

For sure better than at stars. One day I got a chest with 240 coins, just to see them disappear after closing the chest opening site. Did not even consider mailing support, just to be getting an automated message.

Today I went on their site to look for jobs and they are looking for someone to write AI poker software. I wonder what that is for...

My chest requirements have gone up since a few days ago. Normally for a blue chest I needed 560 points, now suddenly I need 1250 points. Is this normal? Will this go back or do I need to contact PS support?
EDIT:
For the red ones I needed about 550 points. If I recall correctly, this could've been started from the update earlier last week.

once you are close to break even point requirements go up

my chest requirements have increased by 5-7 times since appr. 2 weeks.
Platinum chest from 14000 to 95000
gold chest from 6500 to 35000

I've heard of many others experiencing more or less the same increasements which leads to even lower expected rakeback...

Not that it makes any big difference if you get 3,5% or 1% Rakeback now, but I guess Pokerstars has changed something relevant in their Reward system without informing their customers in order to make themselves a nice christmas present... Thank you Pokerstars!

Anyone else has made the same observations?

A stars rep said in another thread that it was a "technical issue" that affected "some players".

Just another cash grab by the fine folks at Amaya.

Response from the support service is that requirements are depending on:
The games being played
Results in those games
Type of chest trying to get
Net deposit/withdrawals

So with games being played this year being the same for over 4k games, the chests are also the same. I'm still building a br, so net deposit/withdrawal hasn't changed all year. Which means the sudden change is the win streak I'm on since December. Seems legit, right?

What's the calculations to workout what RB%you managed to get from a specific chest?

Check the first post in the thread.

It makes no sense to me unfortunately. I also don't get how it looks like a set %? you get different amounts of SCs and Money, etc. I thought it was however many points needed for chest ÷ by rewards? or other way round? Buuuuut they don't look correct

One point = 1c

My blue chests are 12500 therefore I need to pay $12.50 in rake to earn one blue chest.

We can see from the chart in the first page that 1 blue chest has an expected value of 0.46c.

So for every $12.50 I pay in rake I can expect to earn an average of $0.46 back over time.

Expressed as a percentage 0.46/12.5 x 100 = 3.6% rakeback on average.

*

Ooops, I meant my blue chests are 1250

$125

There isn't a perfect formula, because you can start the day with some 'boost' which means you clear the target at double speed until the boost is used up, but everyone seems to get different amounts of boost. I'm only getting 45 boost on my current 550 chests, for example. In addition, sometimes you get a freeroll ticket with an EV of a few cents in addition to some starscoins.

If you ignore the boost, then the rough calculation is just [coins rewarded]/[number of points required to open the chest]
So if the chest took 550 points and it contained 15 coins, then you got roughly 15/550 = 2.7% rakeback.
But the randomness means you might get much better (or worse) from day to day. (I had a lucky day with 42 coins in a 250 chest for about 17% rakeback, and another day with 7 coins in a 550 for a lousy 1.3%.)

Oh my god what a mess. After 3 years of not playing stars, im back and thats what i see.
Played around 8k hands of nl50 zoom, still just a bit half way to the platinum chest. I have no idea what to do or how does this **** works. why not just have something simple?

What are the easy cliffs without having to go thru chest course?

Don't play for rakeback via stars.
Every now an then at your level you'll be able to purchase a cool drink bottle.

/cliff.