Zynga made them do this.

Party Poker brought you the dumbest promotion in the history of online poker (The Monster).

I'm not sure why you'd be surprised at Party making other dumb moves.

You sir struck a chord of anger in me with this. Why is it rediculous to consider providing for yourself using this game? Did you try, and fail? It was very achievable to average 100k a year playing msnl during 2005-2011 with a love for the game, math, table selecting, and discipline. If someone is happy playing 30k hands a month , and earning $200 good for them. Don't belittle someones dream of playing poker for a living( although as the conditions in america currently stand, if someone asked me about it today I certainly couldnt recommend it) , and don't promote party turning poker into a slot machine, shackling players into skill levels. I have never played there, but I see the precedent this sets, and it's terrible.

The goal any time you sit down to play poker is ultimately what? To win money. A change like this, in theory and almost certainly in practice, makes it so that practically nobody can win long term. Even players who aren't poker pros can understand that once this 'rating system' is explained to them. It is just a slap in the face to anybody who thinks of poker as a competition rather than a game, which is the vast majority of players. PartyPoker not announcing this change and forcing players to discover it on their own only adds insult to injury.

Everybody understands that real money games are going to attract smart players who are looking to take your money. The higher you play, the more money is wagered, and thus stiffer competition. This isn't new to the game of poker, or anybody who has ever played the game. Players who just want a recreational experience with other weaker players have a wide variety of lower limit games at their disposal. When they play higher stakes, they know that games are going to get increasingly more difficult. It's part of the thrill of moving up - to challenge yourself. To see if you can hang with the big boys. Nobody forced them to play, and there was always a safety net to catch them before they lost too much if they had any motivation besides gambling their money away for the fun of it.

The only players who will benefit from this are the really big fish who will trade money back and forth with their own kind and slowly lose to the rake. Anybody else, anybody who has any aspirations to get better at the game and win money (which again, is most players regardless of skill level) will be completely turned off by a site that manipulates the player base in a way that everybody breaks even or slowly loses regardless of skill.

Somebody earlier made a good post on what they should've done if they were gung ho on trying to save fish from themselves. Give them select 'fish' tables to sit at where only other weaker players can play, but continue to allow them to play at any table they choose. When they eventually beat the kiddie tables, make it so they have to play with the rest of the population. That's a much better alternative than this, even though both ideas are fairly absurd. Poker is a self regulating economy. Poker sites have no business deciding who can play against who. That is up to the players to decide.

Way to **** up the biggest competitor of the PS-monopoly.

On a side note, can anybody imagine a B&M implementing something like this?

"Hey sir, nice pot! We happened to notice that you've been doing really well lately, and in the interest of fairness we're going to move you to this table over here. *points to table full of regulars* Hope you don't mind!"

Or:

"We're sorry sir but we can't let you sit down at that table. Those players are too good and will take all of your money. Sit tight and we'll let you know when a table that suits your skill level opens up! Uhh.. it could be a while for a donator like yourself."

This doesn't impact only guys who attempt to grind for a living. This impacts anyone who hopes to profit at all.

I don't know about you, but for me part of the fun of playing anything competitive is winning. It's not the only thing that makes it fun, but it's part of it. Do you actually enjoy playing games where you have a 0% chance of being a winning player?

It doesn't matter if I'm playing for rent checks, monopoly money, or bragging rights, if the game is unwinnable, I don't want to play.
It's good for party poker for the same reason that poker rooms are the most maligned part of any casino: they don't pull in nearly as much revenue as table games. Since table games are a big part of Party Gaming, it makes sense that they want to give pure poker players the boot. For party, poker is just one of the things that draws people in - their hope is that people will spend time at the table games. So their likely hope is that this move will keep money in fish pockets longer, because the longer it stays there, the more of it ultimately ends up going to the site instead of other players.

Also

You're welcome to your opinion, but different players come to the game for different reasons. The ability to win a lot of money (be it through winning a big tournament, running up a huge cash game win, hitting a BBJ, whatever) is exactly what draws a lot of people to poker.

I'm sure party poker will want to maintain the illusion that such 'big wins' are still possible, while moves like this take that away entirely, when it was a significant long shot in the first place anyway.

It's comedy gold to hear regs describing the games they play in as unbeatable, unless they can get the greenest and most vulnerable players to sit with them.

As if someone like Ike or Sauce dropped in, the 5 other guys who were, essentially, just playing their cards wouldn't just get raped by a player who is thinking on a completely different level. I think guys like that would find a way to beat the rake, while laughing at the folds they were getting.

Great to hear bleating from Starvingwriter82, who has always come across to me as amongst the smuggest and self-satisfied of posters on Twoplustwo. Like one of the tired men drinking in the station bar, in Hemingway's Homage to Switzerland, mocking anyone he doesn't see as an equal, but with no real ideas of his own.

6 weeks before this test Party announced the Palladium Elite VIP program would be scrapped April 1st

Even with 4 weeks notice that was unfair on players who'd almost amassed the points for the highest possible bonus (150k rake, then 37.5k rake to clear it all, bonuses aren't instant cash like on pokerstars)

And now they're finding less tables open at the stakes they play to earn a living and meet any VIP goals at all, with this tier system

Regs aren't upset because of a 'sense of entitlement', they've been encouraged to hit certain goals by a VIP system and then had the ability to maintain them / the value of them taken away very little to zero notice

try to win 200€ @ nl10 in 30k hands with 5nits without "fish" and paying 11bb\14bb\100 of rake.

what is best? the site win all that 200€! or some guy short on cash(like me that grinds n10\25) win that money?

For u its better all micro n10\25 REGS go away and all deposits of 10€ 20€ go to rake... like all the players money gone to rake... meh

ofc this is ridiculous; if u go play live u dont play a table with 5 ppl better than u, dont make sense that. And fish table select too, there are always a fishier player, and they know, they arent dumb

and some fish like to play ag. stronger players to prove that they are best.

you sound mad people are smarter/better than you

I don't have a right to slaughter bad players? Well no I can't force them to play me. However, bad players should have every right to play with me and what party is doing is restricting bad players from even being able to play a certain group.

It's been well documented that new players spend their first 5 minutes in the lobby, frustratedly looking for the 'find me the toughest table' button. It's not like they just pick a table without thinking abou it, or anything.

Holy crap this is so wrong.

so you would be fine if fish could play both reg tables and fish tables while you still cant play on fish tables?

I think it is a shame for the Poker Hall of Famer Mike Sexton and other notable people to continue representing Party Poker, while they continue killing the game.

Well who cares? Those days are gone and they are not coming back.

Player segregation is kinda like Black Friday 2 for some of you, I guess, and I don´t think that´s a bad thing. Move on and get a life.

Also, to those of you complaining: just quit Party, simple as that.

Take your business elsewhere then. That some of their customers chose to make a living playing a card game isn't Party's problem. They make decisions that best serve the organisation, not in the interests of bottom feeders preying on ignorant novices.

Doesn t fishs loose at an even bigger rate in 6 max games with 5 regs ?? obv it will be repartited between more players having a lower winrate than the hu sharks, but as far as the fish experience goes, he will buy more time in a hu match and maybe more fun as it s a more swingy game and even tight sharks plays at least 40% of hands.

Lol are you a kid?
In real world people make money of ignorance. All things in life.

If u wanna learn somthing u pay. If u dont learn u will have problems /financial and others.

If u wanna repair something that u dont know You pay.


all things that u could think

etc

Of course you can still win. You'll just have to improve your strategies.

If you have a high win-rate you're the Manchester United of poker, so you play against the poker equivalent of Chelsea. Congratulations you're in the Premier League of Poker.

If you're a bad player you're in the League Two of poker.

If my toilet stops working, I get a plumber because of my ignorance with regards to plumbing. However, it's mutually beneficial. He makes money, I use my time for something else and have a toilet that works again.

Skinning some fish leaves someone feeling pretty hollow, especially if it's a large loss. You're a bottom feeder.

So your argument is that this is okay because the top .001% of players will still be able to make a profit? Good stuff.

Yeah they will be verry few players who could still make a living and then as regs get turn into nex fish the same players will move down to where all regs left are ****ing stars and play perfect GTO (probably everyone will left and find a new occupation long before then) and you sir would have no more poker forum to troll.

On the upside it would make you feel better about your own failing at making a living out of that game now that 99.99% of players are also failing.

You can always play at Full Tilt if you don't like it.

The whole point of matching people up based on winrate is that nobody has more than a small edge at any given time. You get better and win more, and in turn your opponents get tougher. Eventually it gets to the point where you have to be among the very best players at your limit to profit, and that's just wrong on so many levels.