I would like to see a variance sim for 6 way large splashes, where you are forced to go allin atc.

In poker you are usually allin vs 1 opponent, and its possible to go down many buyins at ~0ev. With a 1/6 chance of winning it is magnitudes more variance. Running extremely under ev for your entire career seems possible.

Yes I know Phil addressed this and said he is going to make a change, but still curious.

Also, forcing everyone to buyin 100bb is dumb. recs dont like it and they lose faster at deeper stacks. Thanks

So you're counting separately the ones where everyone is effectively forced to go all in and they are 6-way then you have a 1/6 chance of winning and a 5/6 chance of losing each individual trial.

it depends how much variability there is in the size of the splashed pots. If it's not a genuine lottery with once in a lifetime splashes, rather just a variable kind of thing (like everyone gets dealt AA roughly the same amount over their careers and the same goes for the big splashes) then it's about 50-50 whether you run above or below EV.

thanks but i was asking about the swings. like in spins its easy to go 1000 buyins below ev, what would some of the downswings look like here, is my question.

Don't worry, Phil got you, he knows the recipe and will tweak it for just the "right" amount of variance, even though, he has never really faced true variance in his lifetime.

How do you quantify “true variance ce”?

I like splashes, I hate that RIO is probably going to have to cater to the people
Who complain just because they need to stop losing money because I like the dynamic this brings to the game.

Plus you can also fold the big splashes if you really want to participate o 0ev situations. Most splashes are much smaller though and introduce an interesting dynamic that I think is pretty fun.

True, except RIO does have one unique thing that the other sites don't have: 'Splash The Pot'.
I reckon what Phil is trying to do here, is test the popularity of STP (and then adjust this unique feature, to make that work first).

By making it both anon + no HUD compulsory, I think he has inadvertently made it too dissimilar from any one particular site.
It's much easier for people to move over from another site, if they don't have to make any big adjustments and it seems familiar.
All the top sites are non-anon screen names, and the biggest allow huds.
So instead of just testing 1 thing: STP popularity, he is now testing 2 or more slightly different things: will people change the way they play (no hud, no notes) to move + STP popularity (under these anon + no HUD conditions). It would have to be so much more popular in scenario 2 than in scenario 1.
So I guess with these restrictions, a smaller player pool is to be expected.

The ironic thing about anon tables, is that it makes everyone look like a bot. hehe. I don't think anyone really sees real poker, as a game played against a sea of blank faces.
I think the hud as avatar expressions is very clever and a really brilliant idea. But I expect most HUD users would also like a checkbox in settings, that would show the exact VPIP, PFR and 3Bet/agg numbers of each player under the avatars, as an additional option. Did I say RIO had one unique thing? Maybe I meant two... especially good if he adds that checkbox for stats numbers

I know Phil has addressed these points, and doing what he's doing makes sense to me, if the pool is small and you want to preserve your existing pool. But then you'd also have to expect to be doing a much smaller test.
It's also much easier to test, if you only change 1 thing. But it's like he's changed 3 things at once (anon, no hud, stp/rakeback).
So when you make alterations to 1 of the 3, you might never be quite sure if people like it, or if they just still dislike more strongly, any combination of 1,2,3 or all.

^ Very good points, in the end while stp is unique and can change the game for the better, I think nobody will end up playing in RIOP. Too many -EV things, just doesn't add up for the grinders.

I can deal with 1 out of 3 of those things you mention but all 3 is just a big no and I guess for every other grinder too.

We need to find balance, right now it's just not right. With some tweaks I can see stp working, even though I'd personally prefer cash in my account every week. What I can't see working are the anon tables, coupled with no hud.

Don't think RIOP will ever rival or come close to Stars, but with a bit of time might carve out a niche and be something like Bodog, which is still fine and should be profitable eventually.

I played on the first week of launch on RIO, and today I gave it a try again.
I must say the software improved immensely and I was pleasantly surprised.

Definitely want this site to succeed. I don't think there's a nicer person in poker than Phil Galfond. No HUD kinda sucks though.

I like most of what the site is offering by now.. like rakeback split between STP and direct, but I really don´t get along with anonymous tables.
Still played qute a bit to support the site, but I think im going to stop for now.
The anonymous part simply takes so much out of what makes poker such a great and enjoyable game.
Hopefully, as traffic keeps increasing we will eventually get a chance to choose between anonymous and screen name games.

The site need 2 major things legislation in countries like mine from which i cannot play in their site but i can in almost every other except .fr .it .es and second one big time marketing tricks aka advertisment for recreationals + expanding the game beyond only cash ,for sure need SNG and MTT.If u dont add spins it will be great since i dont like this mongo format or atleast without the ridicilious rake which PS and other sites offering them with.See how fast N8/GG expanded but they bring a lot of regs also which is normal,the deal is to bring the recs ....

Adding a sportsbook and Casino would def help the games alot. Have you considered going that route Phil?

This is sound logic, and is a sentiment I shared when I joined, but it eventually faded, and I blame the splash frequencies for that. All the mid splashes what they do is force us to play giant pots with junk like j2s without a giant reward, people complained in PLO about added variance, but theres something big to say about putting your stack in on NLH with a crap hand against a dominating one just because its marginally plus EV.

Now imagine if all those mid frequencies were transferred to tiny splashes and giant commonly shared ones, itd be totally different. The tiny splashes would work as an ante, which is essential for limiting multitabling without increasing multitablers ability, ergo, improving game quality; and the giant ones which should be shared to a degree -instead of the winner takes all format we have now-, would serve the purpose of reinvigorating the sentiment you describe.

All together I believe 51% rakeback is cheap, not enough, and ironically the site wont make enough money with that. If for some strange reason Phil doesnt want to go over 70%, then maybe keep the 51% splashes with the changes I suggested, and put the remaining on direct rakeback with ranks and progress bars.

On @RunItOncePoker recent twitter poll users overwhelmingly voted the 35%/35% promo as their best one to date. I believe this is because 1. The Splashes frequencies are messed up, and 2. It is the one that best attracts a different segment of players (the "nitty" ones).

What I have seen on the games is that although action was more "boring" because splashes were less frequent, tables remained active a good amount of time, most likely because players didnt stack of as fast as on STP.

If you blend the "nit" and the "gambler" offering appropiately, plus correct the splashes, I think that would be the best for the games and site success.

Finally, the word "rakeback" may not resonate with new players, but the word "rewards" could, as every customer in the world is interested in having more value for their money; so marketing "the best rewards in the industry" could be good to target new audience.

Why are you finding every negative angle to post in this thread. Posting from your moms basement, probably never succesfully deposited or grinded poker, nobody here wants to hear your "opinions", when you dont even know how to spell poker. **** off.

Sounds like there is a possibility a whole load of 'props' might work to tweak the way variance hits, e.g.
everyone who sees the flop gets nBBs if it is all red,
everyone at table gets nBBs if its 3 of a kind,
keep some splashes as usual,
some splashes could make the hand cap e.g. splash 10bb and everyone fold or call all in just for 10bb
some big splashes could make the hand FL!

I'd be looking for a rotating system where some subset of these is applicable across a calendar of promotions - rotating the game system must be worse for bots, and marketers like it, presumably because fish do.

I'm not deliberately doing so, just that I disagree with many things. Why so emotional kid, it's just a random poster giving his opinions and feedback. I bet you are 1 of those yes men that every friend has, a complete waste of space.

What are you talking nobody wants to hear my opinion, Phil stated specifically that he wanted feedback, and not just from idiot yes men, that will never offer constructive feedback, so he can actually improve his site!

And if you think nobody wants to hear my opinion, why would you think somebody wants to hear yours, loser!

Thanks

+1 agree. Also I think very trustworthy, and knowledgable about the game. These things count for a lot.
The fact that Phil Galfond is getting directly involved and interested in improving the site, has got me interested.
Honestly feel quite honoured to get a direct response from him On what other poker sites do you get a response from the site owner? answer: none.
(side note: option checkbox to show those hud stats numbers would fix the no-hud issue, imo. What do you say to that, Minimal23?)

Initially I felt he hadn't delivered on his own manifesto. Now, after reading his responses, I am feeling a lot more positive.
He has a list of improvements, and there is a continual roadmap of improvement going on.
Big splash STP should be like PS Milestones: Phil agrees and it's on the list! If he gets this right, it will be huge. And in a marketed non-anon environment, it could be phenomenal. Imagine perpetual PS Milestones.
It will be like money from the sky! A 'win-win', or 'non-zero-sum game' (as you pros say).

I really like to hear this. I always suspected that Stars' talk of ecosystems (and what it implied) was a big lie. So it's great to hear that my suspicions were confirmed, by a pro/expert. And of course who would start a new site, if they thought it was dying? no-one. So clearly it isn't.

I dunno exactly why Pokerstars would feel that way, but if they are, I think it's partly because they have a monopolistic stranglehold on online poker. But it's also like they have a desire to shoot themselves in the foot! So it's pretty weird really

Importantly it shows again that Phil Galfond has a different view (to that of Stars), that is more in line with the manifesto.

~~~

Side-note: I think all of the post here by different players, whether they are perceived as positive or negative, are all good, because we all want the same thing - we all want the site to succeed.

When this thread started, NVG made sense because it was a high profile player possibly starting a poker site. Now that the site is open, and has a thread in Internet Poker, this thread is quite redundant. Really should've been closed months ago, but it wasn't super urgent so I never got to it - time to finally make that happen.

Further RIO discussion should go here:

https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/2...hread-1735454/

I'll copy the last few posts ITT over there in case there are discussions people want to continue. Of course, one can always quote from other threads if one is a real forum pro.