Poker Stars is planning to cut the buy ins and prize pools of the 2 weekly 08 mtt on Saturday and Sunday.

They are reducing the buy ins form $215 to $82 and cutting the guaranteed prize pools massively down to 5k starting from the 22nd .

While this might make sense for NLHE MTT's as there are other higher buy in MTT's on a daily basis and for other poker varietys such as razz HORSE ect which struggle to get a decent field, the weekly 08 mtt's never miss their gurantee and cutting them would mean there was only one o8 MTT a week that was 200+.

In my opinion this will really hurt the growth of this game and it will also lose Poker Stars money in lost rake.

I think their is a good chance if we mobilize as a community we can reverse this decision plus we may be able to keep the new MTT's as well which would be great outcome.

So as Demonic suggested another thread please post in the MTT community PS thread and send PS an email and we may be able to get this done.

Linked for the lazy :http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/61.../index156.html

Hi Omahaha,

I dont play them ( yet ) , and maybe never will if stars removes them , but joined the cause. I think we have to create some kind of strong players base joining against all this recent changes since the acquisition of stars by amaya.

Hey Counterfeiter ty for your contribution.

I personally think we have to pick our battles as some of the outcry is OTT.

Having said this getting rid of the $215's leaves only one online weekly o8 MTT over $120 which is terrible for the game at a time where I think o8 has great growth potential due to the comparative softness of the o8 fields to the increasing tough high variance NLHE fields.

Fight for the $215s Weekly!
Full Tilt has done the same, shortly after they disappeared all together.

in....sucks if the weekly 215's go.

They already have incl the 82 prog's on Saturday. We don't need these meaningless 82 weeklies with a lol 5k gtd.

Keep our only O8 215's and PLO 215 pls stars.

Would be nice to keep the 215s and add 82s, even a 215 pko would be nice. Makes no sense to get rid of them and have the gap of $109-$530. Joined the cause anyway, Hope we can keep them.

On a side note does anyone notice the 109s being cancelled recently and running like a reg fest sng?

Really struggling to find the sound logic here.

- They already have weekend $82s
- The weeklies aren't missing their guarantees
- There's no other gap between the $109 and the $530
- NL/PL O8 are not unpopular games

I always try to look at the situation from a site's viewpoint but even to me this seems odd.

The logic, imo, is:

1. lower buy in will increase field size.
2. lower buy in has bigger pro rata fee.
3. those who currently play 215 will play 82.
4. 530 will ultimately be lowered/cancelled.
5. Winning players are no longer wanted on Amaya.
221. Online Poker is just another casino game where only the house wins.

I agree with Jeztuck.

The numbers are simple - per customer, an on-line casino makes about 4 times what an on-line poker site does (at least 70% of all casino profits come from slots). Physical casinos have been dropping poker rooms because they only break-even or even lose money by running them.

By choosing to use structured debt to finance the takeover of PS, Amaya HAS to, in real terms, make more money via Pokerstars and FT than they ever did as free-lancers, critically so if stars is barred from the US market.

Spin n Gos, caps, hyper-turbos and arcade-style poker is one way to eek out a few extra points in revenue and profit. I find most of this negative but with the weeklies, OK, look at the average running numbers of the last few:

Sat 55 PL: - Entrants 300 +, G $10K, prize pool $15K +
82 PKO - Entrants 500 +, G $30K, prize pool $35K +
215 NL - Entrants 100 +, G $16K, prize pool $20K +
215 PL - Entrants 70 +, G $15K prize pool $15K +

82 weeklies might do better than the current offering in terms of overall prize pool, even if guarantees are reduced. More places would be paid so recs and crossovers have a better chance of a positive experience and playing again.

Surely if we get 500 + for the 82 PKO on a Sunday, we can get 350 for the weeklies and generate a bigger fund. While on the surface it might look negative to drop the 215s (having both 215 and 82 would be nice), it may end up working out in everybody's favour long-term ...

Sort of agree with Exile. The 82$ are "between" 22$ and 215$. I'd like to have both as an option, but prefer the 82$, where more people than just O8 regs compete. Bigger fields like 350-500 are definitely great for the game...and could lead to more popularity...

The variance for a winning player will go up despite the probable increase in roi, and hourly rates will also be lower. Its horrible for anyone who thinks they are a winning player in the current 215 fields. It also saturates midstake o8 for absolutely no reason and removes some variety for recreational players. The PKOs are perfect intros for new players, they can win some money and often get a discount on their buyin, with some $ given back to put into the system.

PKOs are also bad for winning players because the rake is substantially higher relative to the actual prizepool (I've not explained this well but I just woke up). But we'll never prevent them and they are a bunch of fun.

I think we'll convince Bryan to change them back in the end, we already have midstake stuff!

I am fairly sure that Jeztuck is not saying that he is in favor of the changes but is instead simply providing a rational for Poker Stars decision.

Of course people who do not want to pay a $215 buy in/ believe they are not + ev in the field will prefer an $82 buy in.

However we already have one of these in the form of the PKO and we have a $109 every night (even if it is not the softest MTT).

For those of you who think they would gladly swap the $215 for an $82 remember that once the $215 weeklys are gone it will in my opinion be very hard to get them back and there will be no o8 MTT of that buy in spread on a weekly basis anywhere online.

Even if you do not want to play these MTT's today you may feel differently in the future but it will be too late.

But in a sense this argument is redundant because I do not believe that anyone is arguing against the introduction of week end 08 MTT at the $82 level we just do not want to see the $215's vanish never to be seen again.

This is not an either or proposition if we are vocal enough as a player base we may get both which makes everyone happy.

Yes I see the problem with the 215$'s not being reintroduced, once the "weekly 82$" are there. I mean, the best would be to have 27$/82$/215$ at the same time and name them L/M/H, but then SCOOP probably would lose it's attraction of that?

to be honest i have nothing against the change.
the 215$ were to steep for me.
but with the 82$ i will have a chance to play it from time to time.
especially if they run 11$ satties like for the PKO.

11$ non-rebuy? Could encourage some more action if people see them...

For games growth 82s obv better because much more players have access to it and there are no mtts with a higher buyin than 40 dollar right now (109 and 55 arent mtts for me if you reach ft and arent itm). 215s didnt grow afaik always 60-150 runners. Thats not much for a weekly "prestige" tournament at biggest pokersite with best starting times (weekend 12et). Satelitte offering not good. Psko 82 dollar isnt a real 82 tourny though because half is bounty.
But i understand that higher stake players would preferto play 215. if you look at whole ps playerbase they are a small minority and most would unreg from 215 after satellite win. Better solution would be adding higher daily omanias or keep 215 and add a weekly 82. but by adding tournies they hurt the exsting ones which leads to that every of it looses a few players/prizpool and prestige.

Looks like stars just added another PSKO starting at around 3:30pm WET - $27 buy-in

No offense, but even assuming that more people are in favour of the change than against, this does not imply that PS ought to make the change.

Proof 1 [proof by contradiction]: Assume it is so. Then by the same logic we should probably reduce 81 to 27 to 5 to 1, because 1-mtts would probably be most popular. Contradiction, because it would be absurd for PS not to offer mtts with a buy-in over $1.

Proof 2 [analogy]: Luxury restaurants would get more customers if they lowered prices, but probably make less money.

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Don't complicate stuff PS: The $215 were doing well. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

27 dollar buyin and lower already exists. 82 is missing.

In general It seems odd how posters complain about rake(increases) but always want to show ps how much rake they would miss/could get.

$82 already exists it will be the 215 that does not exist if people do not fight for it.

You also completely missed tlicks point.

Meh I guess everyone has the right to be selfish and want what is best for themselves but it saddens me that 08 players do not see that having no O8 215's running anywhere on line on a regular basis is horrible for the game even if you do not play them.

I repeat once again that if we fight for the $215's to stay there is a good chance we can still keep the 82 as well.

Imo the biggest problem here is not that PS lowered the buy-in to $82 but they lowered the guarantee from 16k to 5k. And they did it despite the fact this tourney always hit its guarantee...

I think we will see a raise of that guarantee, lets just try to get 20k+ price pool on day 1