Stars 25-50 Shortstackers

[bcblack]

I'm not a NL player, except at baby stakes, but I tend to agree with the shortstackers here. The guys complaining have won a lot of money playing poker, and are arguably some of the best in the world at online HS NL. You have an edge that you use to take money from other people. Now there are a few people that have found a way to negate your edge, and you call it unethical! Poker is not about ethics. It is a highly competitive game where the sole purpose is to take your opponents money. If it isn't against the rules, it ain't cheating, and it is totally ethical.

[spooky shadows]

ima aspiring 25 50 nl ratholer iz that so wrong????

[Daut44]

again, this is mostly not about the ethics of shortstacking. this is more that it is an exploitable edge in the game because of a tiny minimum buyin, and this flaw should be corrected.


heres the final draft of the email. im sending it now, i suggest everyone else who agrees send it as well. please make sure to replace the end with your name and user name, and if you play lower stakes, make sure to change the 25/50nl to whatever stakes you play.



Dear Stars Support,

I believe that the shortstacking situation in no limit games on stars has gotten out of control. I play 25/50 nl and everytime I wish to join a table there are at least 3 shortstacks in the game, all of whom immediately leave the table if they double up.

Despite what most players (including myself) consider unethical, I cant say I blame these shortstacks for "ratholing", because with the current setup, it is a profitable and exploitable flaw in the system.

Since the minimum buyin for a NL game is 20bb, and someone can play near perfect poker with 20bb, they have an inherent edge in the games. Every player at the table is forced to adapt to the shortstack's game, but not the other way around since the effective stacksize for the shortstack is his own. I propose that we change the min buyin to at least 30 or 40bb, which would reduce the built in edge the shortstacks can have from such a low minimum buy in.

Furthermore, in casinos the minimum buyin for a NL game is typically 30bb. The reason it has to be set low in a casino is because the smallest available game is typically 1/2nl, and someone without a lot of money cant always move down to play a game he has enough money for. However, online, one can move down to a smaller limit since the stakes only end when our money system runs out of smaller denominations. This argues for a higher minimum buyin in online games than in a casino.

One last point with the minimum buyin is that, although the overall traffic on stars remains consistently high, the 25/50 games have not been running nearly as much as in the past, even 1-2 months ago. Many regulars refuse to play with so many shortstacks in the games, and they often will move to other sites to avoid this problem.

Secondly, these players also constantly leave and rejoin tables 30 minutes later. This time period is much too short. It allows these exploitable flaws of shortstacking to be taken advantage of over and over again with players leaving and joining other tables then rejoining the original ones. I propose that this time is raised to at least 2 hours. Leaving the table with a certain amount and coming back with less is at the very essence of ratholing, and with so many available tables for players to join, it is even more important to increase this amount of time.

In addition to the logical arguments presented above about why the rules should be changed, there are a few emotional ones.

Firstly, having a large amount of shortstacks significantly tightens up the games because whenever you have a shortstack behind you, you have to worry about him going all in, so opening raise ranges become much tighter, which result in much more boring and uneventful games, which cause a lot of regulars to play other sites that have less shortstacks roaming the games.

Secondly, as mentioned before, many players feel that buying in short, hit and running, then returning at the soonest possible time is unethical. There are a few things in poker which aren't against the rules, yet many people believe aren't morally proper, but most cant be fixed. For example, slowrolling is extremely unethical, but this cannot be stopped in any atmosphere. However, by raising the minimum buying and increasing the amount of time before a player can come back to a table with the minimum buyin, this unethical situation can be greatly lessened in frequency.

To summarize, the following changes are being proposed:
1. raising the minimum buyin in NL cash games from 20bb to at least 30 or 40bb
2. raising the amount of time after leaving a table that a player can return with a different stacksize from 30 min to at least 2 hours.

This email will be sent to the support team by a large number of high stakes players. We sincerely hope that a change can be made in the currently flawed system.

Thank you very much,
xxxxxxxx (your name)

[g-p]

good work daut, im sending that myself

[curtains]

I think they should definitely raise the time before you come back to like 2 hours, I care less about the min buyin. There are hundreds of tables to choose some, so any individual player/newbie shouldn't be negatively affected by this change.

I also don't see anything ethically wrong with anyone who uses the current shortstacking rules for many reasons.

[Prevaricator]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm not a NL player, except at baby stakes, but I tend to agree with the shortstackers here. The guys complaining have won a lot of money playing poker, and are arguably some of the best in the world at online HS NL. You have an edge that you use to take money from other people. Now there are a few people that have found a way to negate your edge, and you call it unethical! Poker is not about ethics. It is a highly competitive game where the sole purpose is to take your opponents money. If it isn't against the rules, it ain't cheating, and it is totally ethical.

[/ QUOTE ]

siting in 3 handed games and only playing the button isnt against the rules either, care to defend that one?

[PoorUser]

amen
having 4 shortstacks at every table ruins the game

[bkholdem]

[ QUOTE ]
amen
having 4 shortstacks at every table ruins the game

[/ QUOTE ]

so why are you fools keeping this thread active?

i got the idea of shortstacking in bigger games than i usually played by a thread exactly like this one lol

[Prevaricator]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
amen
having 4 shortstacks at every table ruins the game

[/ QUOTE ]

so why are you fools keeping this thread active?

i got the idea of shortstacking in bigger games than i usually played by a thread exactly like this one lol

[/ QUOTE ]

most shortstackers dont win and the ones that do have very low winrates, but it just [censored] up the game for the rest of us.

[stoxtrader]

do you think the reason the 25 game goes less is because of the shortstacks or because of the increased difficulty in moving large amounts around...maybe both, but I think it is more the latter.