Partypoker Millions are taking place right now in Nottingham. From what i have heard from several sources is that partypoker LIVE is putting in a lot of players into their tournaments where they suspect there will be an overlay. Most players seem to get a 40/60 deal, where they get to keep 40% of their cashes. At these events you also see a lot of partypoker pros playing recklessly because they get put back in again basically for free. As far as I know this has been happening in Montreal, Sochi and Nottingham.
The 1k event in Nottingham basically hit the exact guarantee with 1009 players. As everybody knows, the higher the buyin, the less players are usually playing. Not so in Nottingham, where they pretty much exactly hit the guaranteed amount in the 5k again. (1015 entries)

I watched the Joe Ingram podcast with Rob Yong and i find it funny to see rob basically complaining that they don‘t get more players playing on Partypoker. These kind of shady behaviours are pretty much the exact reason why.

So instead of an overlay, they have pros playing recklessly and rebuying?

Yes, far worse than an overlay.

This is the worst kept secret in poker and well known knoledge between almost everyone that plays. It's actually great for the game as the vast majority of the players that are being freerolled tend to not be professionals and more enthusiasts/ semi pro's. I wasn't freerolled I went in on my own dollar. The tournaments would never hit these massive guarantees if this weren't to happen and the end result would be alot smaller prizepools that are way more sharky. In short the players being freerolled is great for everyone and long live the freeroll.

https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/s...&postcount=320

from June 30, 2017:

EDIT: The complaint expressed in the OP is about sponsored pros, and the snipped quote I've posted here addresses hypothetical car park overlay insurance. I'm not very informed on backing/strategy/EV so have no opinion either way -- just wanted to cross-post in case these two topics are related.

Organizers should not have a monitary interest in participants outcomes. It shocks me that regulators don’t have/enforce basic rules like this and makes me wonder how much other things lack oversight.

OurSurveySays already runs a stable mafia that sucks the life out of poker so I doubt his moral compass isn't screwed up.

I would. Just play cash games until your Party Poker rep makes the call. Then it's nothing but upside baby.

Interestingly enough BRS just closed their website a few days ago. They are likely the most involved in this practice.

This is so shady and wish Party Poker would be realistic with themselves in regards to the size of their player base and not engage in this type of practice to boost guarantees.

This shouldn't be described as shady imo. In general we should encourage people who invest in poker and are willing to take risks. But there are perhaps better ways to utilise the cash they burn this way (eg prize pool add-on, promotions, satellites with added seats).

Hasn’t it always been this way? Or, at least hasn’t it always been at least this bad if not worse? This is gambling in a casino, not a local AAU basketball tournament. There are always going to be shady deals and certain players who are backed by the house in some form or fashion. At least the ‘fix’ is not rigged like in the old old days of hidden cameras. The overlay is removed, maybe unfairly, but at least the tournament is fair otherwise.

Common practice in every guaranteed tournament in any casino around the world.

Doesn't pokerstars do that as well? I always see 20-30 players from greece registered in high buy in events with high guarantees, weeks away from the starting date.

Greek players register to legally avoid tax, which is calculated daily based on balance changes. Registering and unregistering allows a Greek player to defer their winnings to losing days.

I don't really see the issue here, It's way better than sites which cancel games under x players so never really offer overlays. If the sole reason you are entering a live game, especially one you have to travel to is that you think it might overlay you may want to question why you are playing that game!

Someone is salty about not getting to free roll that extra 0.05% in tournament equity

Why don't they get more people playing on Party Poker? Because the site is full of bots and the software is still sht

They do this specifically so they can use the big guarantees to promote the event, when in reality, they're padding out the prizepool by staking players which will occasionally reduce their investment into the tournament itself when one of these players goes deep.

Absolutely it's unethical and hurts the casual players who are attracted to big prizepool tournaments, essentially stealing equity from them.

This is one of the main underhanded tactics that party use to try to compete with Stars, both online and live. It's not sustainable in the long term, but they've probably budgeted for it for the next X years, after which, if they're not within striking distance of Stars player volume, they'll give up and fail.

Coming at it a slightly different way.

In the long term, overlays can't happen. The company would go broke or the guarantee would shrink, tournaments (or series) would be cancelled etc...

So the choices are
1) Lower the guarantees and make sure there are no overlays. In this world, there are only very interested parties who bought in and play hard etc...
2) keep the guarantees high and have the house put in players that are either playing less than optimally, as referenced above playing recklessly, or players that normally wouldn't buy into the tournament (known informally as dead money).

I think 2 is better for a guy who wants to play in live tournaments than 1.

Of course having a company print free money and hand it out to all the players is better still but this world does not exist.

Party Poker are a class act compared to how scummy n gross pokerstars has become.

They're not putting dead money into the tournament, these people are decent players. A lot of pros aren't as rich as you think and are borrowing money from each other and could actually be serious about winning a tournament they have free entry too.

This practice also has to have a bad impact on their competitors in the area, which is bad for the players because no one wants one place to dominate the rules and time schedules and tournament structures in your area.

I don't particularly like this and I dont think it's common knowledge either

So you vote for lower the guarantees? Or stop having the tournaments?

Unless you think money tree scenario is a valid one?

There is defo something suspicious going on with party and BRS, I personally know some BRS players who are like maybe 10% ROI 33 abi players who are being put in these 5ks with no makeup and given 30%, I can't see how its a sustainable business model unless party are giving them some kind of money back or discount on the actual buyins. I'm not even a BRS player and someone from BRS asked me if I wanted to travel to notts last week if I wanted to fire the 1k and some 5k satties. I don't see why they are trying to inflate these gte's so much if they cant reach them, surely its not sustainable and is going to mean that party live ends up crash and burning?

Taking the moral and conflict of interest aspect out of the equation this "padded" guarantees being reached via "house" players is a long term mistake for Party from a business standpoint.

Take a player whom has the br to play in a 5k at Nottingham but isn't a multimillionaire. Why would he put up 5k risk when he can play for 30% equity. Unless he thinks his ROI is that high he's far better off taking the freeroll.

Out of these "house players" how many tried to satellite into the Live event on their own dime? If the player had any brains the answer should be zero because qualifying on their own isn't close to the optimal approach for their BR when a 30% stake is just around the corner.

Party Live have a lot of things going for it. They managed to make some outstanding partnerships on paper with the two best cardrooms in the world imo (Playground and Dusk Till Dawn). But it's important to be realistic with themselves on what can be accomplished in such a short period. Some of the guarantees have to drop... and if they do I honestly think the "normal" player participation won't drop in the least. The ones that are opposed to a 3 mill guarantee from a former 5 mil guarantee will be offset by others feeling they are now playing in square environment where all players are getting an equal shake.

From Party's business pov with reduced guarantees they won't be losing 30% on the last million or two of each guarantee which on 1 million is 300k. That's not small change.

This has been going on for a few years in almost every mid-high stakes mtt on party every single day of the week. They are essentially running a stable both online and live. At least some of the guys in these stables are getting very preferential treatment online (high rake back percentages, multiple accounts, and generally more leeway from party to behave in an unethical manor).

I wonder if the primary beneficiary of this arrangement (BRS) has deleted it's online profile because of the publicity this is getting. What are the legalities of Party having such an agreement? I'm going to go out on a limb and say they are probably breaking some rules of their gambling license and this is why BRS has deleted their website and social media etc. The BRS guys are however still playing.

I'm not sure how party expect regs to keep using their own money on the site while a huge percentage of the player pool is getting 30-40% roi completely risk free in so many tournaments. Whats fair about that? How do you think the recs feel about that?

The whole business plan as it is seems to be extremely high risk, very amateurish and short sighted. Some naive people in the upper echelons of party management have in my opinion been manipulated by some greedy stable owners.

I do still play on party, but myself and many other regs are seriously re considering whether its worth the risk. I sincerely hope that party is a long term success, but their current business practices are very unlikely to lead to that.