Two Plus Two Newer Archives - ***** November LC Thread *****

Hello Landon,

Thank you for contacting Full Tilt Poker Support.

As an avid poker player, I certainly understand your frustrations with
bad beats and general negative variance. I have myself been through
prolonged streaks of both good and bad luck.

Please be assured that our shuffle is random.

Please consider that as well as being technically close to impossible,
there is no motivation for a poker site to "rig" the deck in favor or
against a specific player. From a business standpoint, it makes sense to
keep players happy, and the best way to keep players happy is to provide
a legit, fair, and friendly game. This is why site integrity is of
paramount importance to us.

I have the feeling that you misunderstand how our business operates.
Unlike casino sites, poker sites do not earn revenue when a player loses
money. Our income is derived solely from the rake, a small percentage of
the pot that is taken from the winner of the hand. Understand that in a
very real sense, we have no interest in the outcome of individual hands.
Manipulating the dealing of cards does nothing to increase our revenue
and everything to minimize it--it would be financial suicide as a
business decision to engage in such unethical activity, ruining our
reputation. Understand that your losses are not translated into our
gains; the player who has won the money from you has gained to be sure,
but this is completely unrelated to how our revenue is derived.

Unfortunately in the short-run, variance is such a large factor in
poker, and many players will receive more than their expected average of
premium hands in terms of card distribution and consequently at times,
less than their expected average of premium hands. The same can be said
in terms of hitting flops and completing draws or having hands hold up.
It is only when dealing with very large numbers that a player's average
statistics will approach its expected average. This is where the
expression, "professionals play by the month, not by the day" is
derived.

Understand that there is no "doom switch" but there certainly is
statistical variance. It is only when speaking of tens of thousands of
hands that personal statistics begin to approach its theoretical
expectation. For players that play this game for a living, it is
imperative that they keep a very large bankroll to endure such
fluctuation. It is well known that an excellent player that may win from
1 to 2 big bets an hour playing limit can lose 300-500 big bets, and a
winning no-limit player can endure a run of 20 or more buy-in losses,
again due to variance. In sit and gos, 20 to 30 session droughts in
which a player does not cash is not uncommon. These are taken into
account, and professionals are very conscientious of when to move down
limits to lower their risk of ruination to a reasonable level. Knowledge
of these statistics will not make these players immune to bad
beats--nobody is--however, they will react better when these inevitable
bad runs do occur. Also, these same players are very honest with
themselves, analyzing when they are running bad, and when they are
playing bad. It is often the level of honesty that separates an
excellent player from someone who is merely above average.

I strongly suggest that you visit the poker forums in the link below; it
is the largest poker forum that is visited by many poker enthusiasts
such as yourself, and is an unbiased third party to our site (and any
other poker sites in business). I believe that the voice of the general
poker community will be more persuasive in dissuading you of your belief
that online poker is rigged.

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/ubbthreads.php

On behalf of Full Tilt Poker, I wish you the best of luck at the tables.
Should you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to
contact us.

Regards,

Jeremy S
Poker Specialist
Full Tilt Poker Support

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Learn, Chat, and Play with the Pros
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Original Message Follows:
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I have played exclusively at Full Tilt Poker for the last six months.
For the last five of those months, I have been on a slow, excruciating
slide. I have experienced every kind of negative mathematical variance
known to man (you have my hands if you want evidence). Please don't
construe this to be whining, I'm simply asking to have my doomswitch
turned off. Don't tell me you don't have a doomswitch. I imagine Full
Tilt has a giant Wheel of Fortune spinning thing with the name of every
Full Tilt player, which Chris Ferguson constantly spins. I don't know, I
don't work for Full Tilt, this is just speculation. But I do know you
have doomswitches, and mine has been on for too long. Please turn it off
before I am busto and unable to play on your site anymore.

Thanks in advance for my upcoming heater,
Landon