Originally Posted by lunarphase

Poodog's gonna poo

Post more plz

Am I the only one who has no clue what Jaguarsfan is saying?

Keeeep HUDS plz

How is it they can ban HUDs and block scrapers, but they can't synchronize breaks, correctly identify side pots/main pots or assign MTT finishes (prior to the end of late reg)???

And they've already messed up HHs beyond belief (real mistake).

 

Originally Posted by BodogBecky

Thanks for posting this- there's more info as to why Patrik made this decision up at CalvinAyre.com...I'm very interested in hearing your thoughts for sure and please feel free to comment directly under the article, the team would LOVE to hear the opinions from actual poker pros/sharks.

Thank you,
Becky

I posted a comment there- a lengthy one. 3:1 says it never gets approved for anyone to see...We all know why they are doing all this, yet noone beleieves that everything they are doing is good for the room. Some pieces? perhaps. But the package? rubbish

 

Originally Posted by siola

how are huds not fair if anyone can use them?

This will be a weak analogy at best but:

Everyone can buy a gun, so what's unfair about about letting gun owners shoot people who own no guns? Why do so many casinos/poker rooms ban guns on the premises? If those potential victims don't want to be killed, they can just carry guns themselves as a means of protection.

If you are a non gun owning poker player, would you rather play in a room where guns are not only permited, but their use is even promoted, or would you rather play in a gun free environment?

It would be sweet if sites ban huds, I dont use anything so doesnt effect me. But i think without these hud/hems/tracking sites it will encourage action. For cash atleast people cannot bumhunt initially as much because they would simply not be able to ptr someone and decide not to play them or get hem/hud stats from friends/piers. For mtts I do not think it makes a big difference just for people who gazillion tbl and rely on a hud its going to be a lot harder. Also a lot of regs who tilt/dumb get sucked out on by a fish and post there ss stats or w/e in the chat which def discourages some recreational players I would think.

 

Originally Posted by Nate Avenson

This will be a weak analogy at best but:

Everyone can buy a gun, so what's unfair about about letting gun owners shoot people who own no guns? Why do so many casinos/poker rooms ban guns on the premises? If those potential victims don't want to be killed, they can just carry guns themselves as a means of protection.

If you are a non gun owning poker player, would you rather play in a room where guns are not only permited, but their use is even promoted, or would you rather play in a gun free environment?

While I agree with disagreeing with siola, your analogy makes no sense. HUDs don't kill people, they offer an edge by intimidation, they don't aid you in the game of poker, etc etc.

it would be a horrible business decision for a poker site to ban huds. playing without a hud means people like me who will play 10-16 tables at a time could only comfortably play 6-10 tables at a time. fields will get smaller, guarantees will drop, and casual players will see that the big tournaments arent nearly as juicy (prizepool-wise) that they used to be

less tables means less rake...less rake means less profit. it would just be a really poor decision for their bottom line.

people who say HUDs provide an unfair advantage should probably be sterilized

 

Originally Posted by Goldenad

it would be a horrible business decision for a poker site to ban huds. playing without a hud means people like me who will play 10-16 tables at a time could only comfortably play 6-10 tables at a time. fields will get smaller, guarantees will drop, and casual players will see that the big tournaments arent nearly as juicy (prizepool-wise) that they used to be

less tables means less rake...less rake means less profit. it would just be a really poor decision for their bottom line.

people who say HUDs provide an unfair advantage should probably be sterilized

This guy wins... Banning HUDs and such on Bodog wont have nearly as a dramatic effect on the company's profitability as it would on sites like stars and ftp. This holds especially true for cash games. Regardless of whats good for the game, the main sites will never do this unless they are forced to by regulation.

Hud's ftw in mtts

Only pussies use huds.

i would also add that if online poker got back to the purest form, i.e. no outside help, then more fishes like myself would actually take up the game and play - thus giving the better players more money to win and in fact increasing the size of tourneys and cash game entrants - multi entry tourneys would start to overflow with salmon, tuna and herrings.

Unfortunately though there would be some redundancies in the poker tracking/software market.......maybe these fish could come and play?

This is not a simple issue i think. HUDs, tracking sites etc can help a beginner more than a pro in many ways. Of course most beginners might not now these things exist and therefore live in the "dark ages" for a while until they discover the whole world of poker information and tools out there.

There is no doubt that people will do more "mistakes" without the information they get from these tools. Especially players with little experience and lower poker skills.

What one wants to address here it seems is that it's hard for new/unexperienced players to get started and actually get somewhere when the more experienced ones have all these utilities at hand that they can use to exploit the various games in the best possible way. They want to improve on this by adding restrictions and going back in time sort of. It reminds me a bit of the silly efforts of anti piracy in a way.

If you want to improve on this situation my suggestion would be to be pro creative instead of restrictive. Restrictive routes hardly ever lead to anything good. If you dislike the unfair advantages of these tools, create your own alternatives within the client. That way everyone can take advantage of them and you can "control the functionality".

Tracking sites also lead to more traffic, more play and so on. I'm sure a lot of people here are motivated and play more due to various rankings. Without them a lot of people would probably play less and the same is the case without HUDs (in terms of lesser amount of simultaneous tables). Maybe every site should have its own result tracking information either in the client or on their web (or both). Then everyone would know what's going on on "their" site, both new players and pros. Inter site rankings could still be operated by external sites of course. This would lead to a more open world which is probably a good thing both in terms of new players and the poker world becoming more "legit".

If you want to give beginners or recreational players an easier time there is other ways to do this. Some possible ways could be:

- Tables for players that have played less than x hands on the network.
- Restrictions as to who can play lower limits globally or on certain tables/tourneys
- Built-in HUD helper that lasts until a certain level or hands that helps beginners (can tell them who are good players, odds, hand value and various other tips).
- Big brother program. Creative incentives and possibilities for experienced players to help new players.
+ probably tons of other stuff.

Not all of these are necessarily good ideas but...

Easy access to knowledge and information is what the Internet is all about. Pretty much every attempt on the internet to move in the other direction has failed miserably and probably so will the poker world if restrictions and secrecy are the chosen path of the sites.

 

Originally Posted by JLizard

I won the nightly on bodog without a HUD this week. Didnt win a single MTT on other sites that I used a HUD that night . HUDs are bad the research has been done. also HUD HUD HUD HUD HUD.

hud

JL- I don't really care if they ban them or not. (And I say this knowing that all the big money i ever won there was pre-HUD) The real issue though is that they are coming up with a value proposition that is just outright incorrect. There may be other issues in play, but HUDLess cake went down the tubes.


SO this is what they offer:
A) " Hey rec fish, we don't have huds. trackers etc.. all the scary stuff you never knew about" First off, are they actually going to advertise this? If they do, will it actually make a ibt of difference? (doubt it) And if not, then truly rec players wont even know and there's no benefit!

B) Value proposition for the regulars is something along the lines of *We'll take away your rakeback (if you are lucky to have it) because you withdraw money. We'll remove all the reload bonuses. We'll take away the TLB and prizes.. and all the other promo stuff.... so that we can spend it on bringing you more fish to feed on... and then it should be all square*

Well, B seems like an utter fallacy. First, they kill pokerscout off, so noone knows, from the cash game side, whether traffic is actually increasing other than anecdotally. That seems sketchy to me to make it hard for the industry to see their volume.

And on the tourny side, they make a minor adjustment here and there, but have people really seen more players in tournaments? more tournaments? Higher guarantees? Better structures? It is a resounding no.

What they have done in the near term is make more profit! They outsourced call centers all over the planet. They moved programming to Barcelona (god knows why this one is....). They changed rakeback so it goes to the losers, which lets them stay on the site marginally longer and lose more to the sportsbook, not the regs. ANd they probably aren't spending all of the marketing money that was used previously.

So while I started this thread as an FYI and a question about whether this is all good for the game.... it's also a question of whether Bodog is wasting their time... certainly as it applies to tournament players... since I don't see us getting any benfit from it.

I've tried for 2 years now to set up my HUD but failed every time (can't get it to work right) and have never used one.

So I'd argue HUDs are an unfair advantage (for the people smart enough to figure them out)