This is definitely an interesting twist to the online cash games. With so many mass-tabling regs complaining: It cannot be that bad an idea.
I believe mass tabling is the root of the problem: Recreational player sits down, faces 4~5 multi tablers on average. He might as well be playing bots.

For amateurs studying the game, trying to get better this is a great concept: You get to play stronger players without the need to move up in stakes.

A little weird to just do this without any announcement or advertising. I do agree: lack of transparency is bad. Will wait and see before moving any $$$ into Party.

read how it's done one more time

you open table
fish uses quick seat ( after playing at that "special" tables for 1 day I think 80-90% of them do) and it never sits him on visible table
only on those fishy tables regs can't see (doesn't matter if U open tables or not, bumhunt or not etc)

you realise that this applies to basically everything in the world then right?

omg mcdonalds is a pyramid scheme, if new people dont start eating hamburgers they go out of business!

also people arguing whether this is good/bad or ethical/unethical seem to be totally missing the point. the key point here is that its not actually possible to do what they want to do.

regs play for money. they arent just going to play with other regs for long. so if you segregate, say the top 30%, these now losing regs will all leave the site. you now reduce your player pool by 30%.

however, you are still segregating, so now the winning players from that 70% have the same thing happen to them. however given they are less clued in, it looks far worse to them. so they also leave. and so on and so on.

in the short term we get a wave of account selling, multiaccounting and super and very obvious bumhunting, in the medium term we get a bunch of casuals claiming rigtard (correctly imo, given how this has been concealed), and in the longterm we get mostly a destruction of nlhe on party.

as a plo player i think this is great news for me, as im able to take advantage of the fishy tables at nlhe, then take advantage of the inevitable switch to omaha, for those that dont leave party altogether.

ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh party poker!

If they're dividing the player pool into two now, there's nothing from stopping them from dividing it into three, or four, or ten, or whatever number it takes so that players are only playing others of essentially identical skill levels. Reducing someones edge to zero while having a system in place that keeps them from ever increasing that edge (if they get better, they'll just get bumped up to tougher opponents) IS removing the skill from the game.

I never said this. Party Poker already had a system in place (the "welcome tables" to protect new players from sharks. I'm fine with that.

Here's the real deal: The ONLY way someone makes money playing poker is by 1) playing against people who are worse than you or 2) getting lucky. That's it. In fact, the lion's share of money made at poker happens when a poor player decides to try and get lucky, against someone who is more skilled.

Party poker is trying to remove the first option from the game.

3) multiaccounting a ******ed site

=)

The system absolutely does not stop if the flow of new recruits stops. It only stops if the deposits stop. The poker economy allows people to deposit multiple times, and allows for players who were previously winners to become losers and deposit themselves.

A pyramid scheme works because it cons all members into having the expectation of making money. Every person who joins is told their money is going to increase by a certain amount. This is certainly not true in the poker economy, where most players have the hope of winning, but are never promised it will happen. Also, the players pumping the most lifeblood into the system (the frequent depositor) knows that they have little to no expectation of winning money. If they do, the only deception happening is some pretty good self deception.

In a pyramid scheme, someone is encouraging you to make an investment and promising returns. The understanding on the part of the depositor is that they will, almost certainly, receive more than they put in.

In poker, someone is encouraging you to gamble by promising entertainment. The understanding on the part of the depositor is that they will have some fun, maybe lose the money, or maybe win some.

It's not semantics, and the contrast is significant.

maybe we should organize/coordinate some sit-out protest like it was already done before with PP?

Any ideas if and how to do it? Someone with experience in such matters wanna help?
Start new thread?

Part of the reason why beginners start at the micro stakes is to learn with low financial risk, they expect that the higher in stakes they go the better they need to be. It's an on going learning process as you move from stake to stake and your reward for your efforts is a higher $/HR. With this new system in place providing that their are multiple skill levels in which we are all divided into so everybody has a zero edge means that the possibility for people to move up in stakes is stalled thus reducing any chance for party poker to maximise on more rake at higher stakes. Furthermore if nobody has the incentive of moving up for a higher $/HR they will all eventually get bored and leave as a result. They say they are looking to make things better for recreational players and inexperienced newbies but at some point even those are going want to move up in stakes and if they can't they will move to a site that offers that opportunity. I was a recreational player for 2 years and I was a regular looser but what kept me coming back to donate more was the prospect of one day being able to move up in stakes. When i started taking my game more seriously this became possible. Had I not had the incentive to move up in stakes I would of long since left. Repeat business should be the main focus and this method they are introducing is going to achieve the opposite result. I think a better solution would be to have a special lobby that is only available to players that have had a recently negative winrate over a given period to help them recover and learn before returning back to the normaly lobby. Put the right to choose back into the hands of the individual. If they wish to not take advantage of a special lobby when their on a loosing streak then that's their choice but equally, players like that arn't even taking notice of "Responsible Gambling" and deserve to loose, period.

That's not true. There are plenty of long term losing players. Fish aren't all noobs who learned the game last month and will quit next month unless they start winning.

Party is trying to figure out how to turn losing players into long term losers. I think they should be applauded for the effort, even if it might not be in the short term interests of grinders.

I think short term it may hurt party, but longer term, it may help.

New players deposit, and win for awhile before losing. They come back. They remember winning at party. Maybe they think they can win elsewhere so they go to stars or tilt and get crushed. They conclude Stars and Tilt are fixed/rigged too hard etc...

Long term, this may help them.

revolution is doing this also as of march 4

Party Poker should be subjected to a full investigation showing the world just how deceptive they really are

This whole thing is sickening.

I think people need to just calm down and take a deep breath.

It is true that one possible reason that networks are doing this is purely for selfish reasons.

BUT, it is also possible that they are trying this with long term health in mind.

Just remember, that great things come from new ideas. The comfort that players have is that this is a competitive environment and if this idea is going to screw the players, then Party (and Revolution) will eventually lose value.

something like
normal tables less rake per pot
fishy tables more rake
"if you win more than x on fishy tables, you can no longer play on them for a month "
but now you have acess to normal tables if you are a good player you can win there you are fine, if you lose there, you gain acess to fishy tables again.
High stakes should be available for everyone, because average fish who cares about money doesnt play there anyway.

if non fishy tables got the same rake noone will play them tho, simple as that.

If you don't think you can make a living from poker any more then you can always get a job!

Hahahahah!

no, they are trying to turn them into breakeven players. likewise, they are trying to turn the winning players into breakeven as well.

Ok, ty sir.

Although this is obviously frustrating for online pros, I think some of the harsher criticisms do miss the point; you guys have to understand, the profitability of professionals might not be the primary concern of an online poker site. The vast majority of poker players are long term losers (over 70%), and an online poker site's main concern is to provide entertainment for all its entire player pool so its customers keep coming back.

I totally agree that this type of segregation is not in the interest of pros, but objectively speaking, we can't complain that there's some type of shady, unethical business going on just because Party considers this practice to be more rewarding and entertaining for the majority of its player pool.

My interests are aligned with most of the critics on this thread, but I think I can look at this situation a bit clearer, because I'm also part of the starcraft two community where the players are auto-matched only against players with the exact same skill level based on a sophisticated ranking system. It would be pretty ridiculous if master level starcraft player complained that they can't play fish. In fact, it's the complete opposite where good players only enjoy fair competition. No player would ever say that starcraft is shady for not letting good players win the lion's share of games they play since they are better players.

For poker, just because the primary objective of pros is to make money doesn't mean that most other players do it for the same reason. Party is pretty much doing what Starcraft does, which is to provide a fair , entertaining and challenging experience for everyone. I feel like instead of condemning Party illogically, pros need to figure out a way to align Party's interest with their own.

This cannot be applied on sngs and tourneys right? Cause since yesterday i can't see the mttsngs that i used to play ( only some hyper that i've never played)

More precisely, they are trying to make regular poker the same as video poker where the house always wins

And they shouldnt'!

They have to keep regs to maintain liquidity. They goal is not to get rid of regs alltogether but to limit regs income to minimal possible wage.

U cant compare online poker to starcraft or any other game like environment that is auto seating players to their similar skill level opponents for game fairness.
Find me a game that costs u 100s of $$$ per day to play besides over raking poker, and if u do, feel free to draw the line with the two.

Don't be naive to think that sites, and especially greedy ones like PP, care for anything above their own profit. Nothing more, and nothing less. They are figuring how to make more money from the same "eco-system" they are pretending to nurture. Its only about money.

If there weren't sit out protests year ago, you wouldn't say 70% loosing players, but rather, 75 or maybe even 80 due to the intention of that eco friendly company to charge even more for the shady services it is providing.

Don't be naive.

no way- anyone else experience this?