first off, the idea that not disclosing your financial situation when registering a tournament should be some felonious crime that you face prison or jail time over, is just stupid and completely impractical.

there is no incentive for two horses who share the same backer to softplay or collude with each other, as the relative finishing place of another horse has no effect on the first horse's bottom line.

there is some incentive for a backer to softplay against his horses, because he obv gets more money when his horse finishes in a better place. this could have a pretty big impact on other players when the play is approaching money/ft bubbles, or when (shorthanded) at a final table.

there is also some incentive for players who swap %s to collude or take lower variance lines against each other, but this is going to be combatted by self-interest towards their own equity stake, which is generally 10-100x larger than the % that has been swapped. any softplay that occurs as a result of this generally has a pretty negligible impact on the rest of the field, but in the rare occasion that they're at the same table during a bubble situation, there is some potential for compromise there.

but seriously, lol @ the idea that collusion by "teams" in tournaments is somehow a bigger problem or more pervasive than collusion by "teams" in cash games. if people have to disclose their financial situation for scrutiny when they register a tournament, then there's absolutely no reason for people not to have to do the same when sitting down in a cash game.

so limon, would you support a rule/law that mandates a person to fill out a form disclosing the details of his financial arrangement before sitting down in a cash game? since we're talking about cheating, what about mandatory verification and recording of losses/wins by the casino for tax purposes? think that would have no impact on the amount of whales that you see in your so dearly coveted live cash games?

for the record, i have no backer, i have no horses, i play cash games as well as tournaments, and i vote no to this silly thread that i've already spent way too much time replying to.

and just so we can be totally clear, limon doesn't give a **** about tournament players or the integrity of tournaments, he resents them to the max and this fake white knighting is just so loltransparent

replying to 3 times, back to back to back, in a row, silly.

your silence to my questions is telling

limon, now that the 2015 Poker TDA Summit VII registration and rule suggestion page is ready, please let us know what your specific suggestion is (300-word maximum), instead of everybody in this thread submitting 100 different suggestions. How can the Epic Poker League rules below be improved?

About 2 years ago I was playing 2/5NL 1k max at the Aria. To the right of me was a slender young looking guy, who played super LAG and was stuck a bunch.

After a bit, an asian girl sits to his right. They talk here and there, interact a little, then as the waitress comes by he says something to the effect of "Did you want anything?"

At this time I realized they were together. One better, they were married.

The asian chick looked familiar. It was no other than the asian chick from all of those cardplayer cribs, high stakes living shows. And the skinny white dude to her left (my right) was her husband.

Anyway, I thought this was ****ed up they were "together" but didn't realize til after when I recognized her and googled her husband, his photo came up. Now look, we're not playing for lots of money here, but a deep 2/5 game, pots can get juiced. I think they should've disclosed this to the table or at least sit at different tables (there were 3 or 4 games going).

After I bluffed her out of a 1k pot, I racked up and left...

Always keep an eye on male/female interactions. More time than not they are together. And if you're married, its the same bankroll anyway.

Rule 43 should be before hand for hand starts in a tournament because of possible chip dumping to build up (men the master) or soft playing to save people that have pieces of each other.

This is clearly an honor system thing, but we all know there is zero honor in poker...

Are u talking about kristy?
They were not trying to hide it. No harm done.
But your reaction is perfectly fine. Just rack up before it becomes an issue.
I wouldn't sit right next to my girl. Don't need to get accused of anything.

This thread, my discussions with TDs on and off the podcast and most recently a great conversation with stealthmunk on the most recent #PokerSesh have convinced me these collusion rules are necessary but should be implemented slowly to see how they work and what the unintended consequences are.

the updates to the EPL rules MIGHT be.

1. 20% instead of 10%
2. 5ks and up only
3. only register w/ TD if at the same table
4. Violations must have clear disciplinary action with teeth.

I have confidence the TDs will come up with a fair solution because I havent spoke with one of them that didnt think something had to be done. This thread is basically a push in the right direction. Poker requires a lot of self policing, there are many gray areas that players stay out of because it is frowned upon by the community. Secretly playing at the same table as a poker partner you share financial interests with should be harshly frowned upon by the poker community in ALL circumstances and codified into law in the most easily policed circumstances to begin with.

I can't figure why people are against this idea in theory.

Casinos should provide mandatory disclosure forms for 5k+ tourneys at registration. If anyone has more than 5% of your action disclosure should be required. Casino should also facilitate payouts and tax papers if requested. I don't believe laws are necessary, just transparency, which could help identify collusion.

I have no idea how this can be applied to cash games as team cheats aren't going to out themselves.

^^I'm against it insofar as other people at the table know of the disclosure because even in 5ks, live players are just going to take the opportunity to throw around accusations willy-nilly.

If i post the sky is blue in NVG 25% of the tards here will disagree.

Well, first of all, casinos are already required by law to accept a form (I can't remember the number) to correctly allocate taxes to all backers. However, as far as I am aware, all big casinos will not even accept this form, in violation of law, and the IRS (and nobody else) does nothing to enforce that.



With respect to this disclosure idea (you have to excuse the obvious missing quotes as I am not going to search and recreate them):

A law would be ambitious and difficult to enforce. Which is why I am for a disclosure rule, not a law. The casinos ignoring existing tax laws should be changed by TDs and player advocacy groups. I'm not a backer nor have I been backed, so I'm ignorant in this area. I'm surprised horses and backers haven't demanded compliance with the law, but nothing's going to change on its own. Paying rake and and not demanding compliance by the casino is chicken****.

Why on earth would WSOP withhold millions in your home game champ scenario? That's a pretty severe and unrealistic punishment for a minor infraction. Also terrible publicity for WSOP. Wouldn't a warning be more suitable for first time offenders? Or perhaps you think a guillotine should be installed at the cashier cage?

My proposition is simple. The cashier asks you at time of registration if you are backed or swapping more than x%. This information goes into a public database that can be accessed by any smartphone. Like other rules in poker, enforcement relies on the players, dealers and TDs.

interesting thread.

limon->

1. how often does this happen?

2. are you more concerned w/ this in cash games or tournaments? it seems tournaments are the real arena where this would be super valuable. i haven't played much live nl, but in my many hrs of live limit, this almost never happens. the cost/hassle of regulation/etc. wouldn't be worth it.

but yea for tournaments i can see this being an issue where you have, say, a backer, a horse, and a stablemate at the same table. knowing what's what could help make people more aware and reduce even "accidental cheating/angle shooting" (i.e. people in that situation would be more cognizant of how they appear to others since they're sharing a bankroll or horse or whatever).

3. for cash games, i really can't even think of 1 example of this that i've seen/heard of. can you give a few (anonymous/no name) examples of how this plays out in cash games?

4. finally, how would this be actually enforced? you mentioned jilted horses/roommates etc. but in reality, those are the minority for sure. if people knew you had to register your financial arrangements, people would simply respond and be WAY more hush hush about it rather than register. there's basically no way you'd be able to get criminal charges/sentences out of this since that would be a massive process in and of itself.

so the only recourse would be withholding winnings/tournament freezeouts (can't buy in/play etc.), IFF offenders are found out. do you have an idea about how and from where this would be logistically regulated? i can't imagine this is feasible though overall.

it's an interesting thread though since it's a good idea if we could simply have all the info readily available and low cost/easy enforcement. that's a lot to ask for though

god you are the biggest faqqot of all time

says the guy who had to have a reference to testicles in his screen name. you cant make this **** up....

It was thirty years ago when I sent off for a financial newsletter that came with a free gift which turned out to be a small paperback on poker. Or really on poker games. Rather than poker strategy, the entire book focused on how determine who is colluding with who, who is cheating and how, and how to protect yourself.

The major premise was that virtually all games are somewhat less than legit and your first order of business needs to be to determine who's zooming who.

russ georgiev?

Limon related question, are any of your podcasts free to listen to right now, I know **** with the last company you produce for hit the fan, looking to listen to some stuff this week.

1. More often than we think about because a lot of it is somewhat accidental in that players don't set out going "we are going to sit at the same table and collude" but rather "we each have 50% of eachother and are playing in the same game, nbd" but then soft play eachother subconsciously or push others out of pots in spots they wouldn't have if they didn't have part of another guys action, ect.

2. Equally bad in both, big field MTT's it's less of a problem just because it's far less likely you will be at same table. Small field MTTs and cash games are the easiest for it to come up.

3. It's actually the exact situation that Guy Laliberte was complaining about last year that Vougarious took offense to. There are a ton of ways to do it, was alot more common/obvious at Limit hold'em years ago when you'd see two guys straight up colluding by forcing people out of pots. Limon isn't complaining about blatant collusion though but more the dynamic of the game when people have peices of eachother and noone else is privy to it.

4. No clue, Abe probably has some ideas, seems like a cluster**** to try to enforce anything though.

Listen live tomorrow at 6pmPST. Not only free but you can call in and we can chat a bit. good stuff.

what site?

LiveAtTheBike.com Its free and so are the live at the bike shows. Theyre also on twitch but the chat is better at LiveAtTheBike.com

Poker is not a "sport."