No, the OP is actually closer to a live cash game scenario. The floorman sends you to your table. You could even have a main game, just like IRL. Why not?

You grow the game by decreasing winrates and making more winners. Makes sense to me.

I think short-term heaters for new and rec players is more important for growing the game than having more small long-term winners. These just can't happen when new players have to play against an over-priced rake AND a group of sharks every session.

And yet the rake is so cheap, so how can this be?

The problem isn't the rake, people. The problem is the overfishing.

All those years of good times were just too good. You've destroyed your own ecosystem.

It shouldn't make less players profitable. It should make more players profitable, just lower win-rates.


It's better for the long-term health of the game and it's not even close.

Genuine question... why not anonymous tables?

Edges from Software tools would be gone for everyone so that's a mute point. Then it would just come down to poker skill and everyone gets a fair shot at the fish.

No

lower winrates -> higher ratio of rake to profit -> site gets a bigger piece of the pie, which is not getting any larger

If you took all of the fish out of the current $25NL player pool and left the current regs to continue battling each other for the next year, I guarantee that none of them will be profitable.

The rake is like 6.5bb/100 or something like that. I seriously doubt that a $25NL reg has that kind of edge over another $25NL reg.

You can apply the same principle for pretty much all stakes until you get to high stakes where good regs can actually profit off weaker regs due to the rake being relatively small.

So regs don't bum-hunt purely because they want to make the most money, they do it because it is the only way for them to make any money at all. You need to have a big donator at the table.

All players will have their win rate lowered with table selection gone.

If the bum-hunting regs can't play as much volume with a fish at the table, then assuming they put in the same volume, more of their volume will be put in playing weaker regs and better regs, which hurts all of the regs.

A current 4bb/100 winner will drop to 3bb/100.

A current 0.5bb/100 winner will drop to -0.5bb/100.

I don't see how a current weak reg with a 'win' rate of -1bb/100 can suddenly turn into a winner with a positive win rate as a result of these changes. If there is an explanation, then please put it forward.

If your idea is that the weaker regs get to play more hands with the fish now, well these weaker regs will take the money from the fish slower than the best regs, (more rake generated as the money gets transferred from the fish to the weak regs), and then these weak regs will end up handing this 'fish' money back to the better regs; only the weak regs will bleed this money very slowly to the good regs, (which again means more rake generated before the good regs finally get their hands on that cash).

So essentially removing table selection just means now that the weak regs get a better shot at the fish, the best regs now need to win that money off weak regs and fish, rather than winning it straight off the fish via table selection like what currently happens.

And the bum hunters and table scripters are driving those fish out of the games. The fish may be bad at poker, but they're not idiots. When they sit down and suddenly a bunch of people are sitting to their left they can figure out what's going on.

I can see an argument for where the scriptors possibly are driving fish away due to the speed that tables fill making them feel targeted and not believing that they could be facing real opponents and instead bots ready to fleece them; but non-scripting bum-hunters that fill a new table gradually are unlikely to be driving fish away since the fish doesn't really care who he plays and he has already deposited.

By removing game selection, you're forcing weaker regs to move down which makes the average skill level at every stake much higher. Instead of playing a bunch of breakeven nits who scripted their way to their left, recs will end up playing better players who will take their money much faster. Fish would lose money at a faster rate and have less winning sessions and regs would keep a smaller % of that money. The couple of times a rec would get another rec on the table wouldn't compensate for the times they have to play 5x Forhayley.

I think making everything Zoom is a great idea. I also think the button should always be randomized every single hand. For example, if there are only 5 players in the pool and therefore only one table... still randomize the button every hand!

This would not only prevent bumhunting, but it would also prevent software/button abuse/angle shooting/high stakes sitout wars for the most part.

I think if we brought this idea to Stars, they would say something like "We are concerned about anything that changes what people are used to and want to keep things as similar to a live setting as possible to keep players comfortable." I personally feel like they should do it anyway... ya, it will freak out the recreational players at first. But in the long run, I think the recreational players will enjoy it. Pros who rely on bumhunting will hate it. Top tier pros who want to play poker without focusing most of their attention on lobby skills will love it. The only players who will not like it will be the bumhunting TAGfish rakeback grinder types... and **** them, as they contribute nothing to the poker world. Good riddance.

I agree with your post. Also MTTs are not a real exception because you can't table select within MTTs anyway. An MTT is already a giant player pool with the room organising seating like you are proposing for cash. One of the things that attracts me to MTTs rather than cash is that this kind of "hustler" element is removed.

Arguably it should not be visible in the lobby who else has registered for an MTT (and particularly an SNG) until it actually starts.

Nice. Of course people can see what is happening. They have life experience even if they don't have poker experience.

"Sit out next big blind" should be replaced by "sit out next button", so if you leave a table or have been disconnected/away for whatever period of time, your avatar remains at the table till you hit the button, not the big blind.

The rakeback grinders contribute nothing to you and your bottom line. They contribute plenty to the online poker community, keeping games going 24/7 for recreationals to play in and helping poker sites make lots of money, so they are very good for the games.

Also, reducing choice by making everything Zoom and not allowing some recreational players to play a form of poker that they prefer. How is that good exactly?

All I see in your post is the whinings of a selfish player that doesn't understand the poker economy.

When I played micro cash games back in the days, my table selection was simple. I always joined the tables where I saw the highest average pot size, I didn't care who's sitting at the table.

^^ Except you're discounting the fact that scripters and bum hunters are probably the better regs in the pool.

If stars took away table selection & kept the quick seat feature then fish/recreationals still get to play 1-2 tables of reg tables without the zoom variant hence there experience doesn't get taken away. The rb grinding no table selecting 24 tablers actually benefit from taking away table selecting imo, prob evenly spread the recreationals around. Bum hunters suffer, it's good for the games.

Where were you last week Exo when this same topic developed a full blown case of aids in ssfr?

If it ends up being slightly better for some rakeback grinder regs, it will be worse by a greater magnitude for the rest of the regs so that overall the group of regs have lost money. This is because the regs will be forced to play more 'reg-only' hands against each other than they do currently.

That is assuming that there are rakeback grinders that don't table select. Most that I encounter at least attempt it even though it is harder to do when 24 tabling compared to 8 tabling obviously.

So yeah, it is not an acceptable solution if it means a few regs gain a couple of bucks, lots of regs lose money, the recreational players lose the same amount and the sites pocket the difference.

I don't play high stakes so Im not that familiar wit scripting, but what would happen if you got a bunch of people to open up tables, and then sit out, forcing them to play each other. Yeah te game would probably break, but at the very least you could annoy the crap out of them

beating the nit/rakeback/scripting/etc regs is no problem. dealing with the absolute boredom of sitting at a table with them as they fold every hand/timeout is borderline suicidal. This is what makes the games less fun and drives the fish away.

Remember, recs play for entertainment:

when i originally mentioned anonymous tables, such as bovada, it was said:

I do think these are valid concerns, and they would need to be addressed, but i still believe this [anonymous tables] and a cap on # of tables is the best for a recreational environment. I think Bovada has proved this.

Anonymous tables sound terrible. How on earth are you supposed to employ player specific plays that exploit particular opponents that you have a history with? That after all is a big part of poker, adapting to each opponent's play.

If you have anonymous tables then people will just play a robotic, minimal-thinking style that does reasonable well against your average opponent. How boring is that? Plus it just decreases the avenues that a good player can use to gain a skill edge. Hardly promoting poker as a game of skill is it.

That "weak reg" is not a player deriving his income from the game. A slightly lower rake will not allow him to make 1bb/100? Cool. That doesn't change much for him.