----- Original Message -----
From: Mars
Sent: 2009/05/28 00:50:13
To: support@pokerstars.com
Subject: House Pots



Hi there,

As an active player on your site at the micro and low limits, I find it rather frustrating when I step into a ring game, wait for my premium hands, only to split a pot with one or more players and actually lose money due to the rake.  For instance, earlier today I was playing PL Omaha, and wound up all-in on a T8xQ board with AJ97 and the nut flush draw.  As it turned out, my opponents held J9xx for the nut straight as well.  The river was a blank, and so the three of us split a pot that was somewhere in the $10 range.  No harm, right?  Wrong.  Because of the rake, we all lost about 20c, or 4 big blinds.

These hands, where "The house wins", benefit nobody.  Players get angry at the fact that they lose money on a winning hand, which in turn does not make it worth it for the house to collect the rake for that hand.  Most casinos offer some form of "No Flop, No Drop" rule, where no rake is taken if a flop isn't seen.  Why can't some similar rule be created to prevent pots where nobody wins?

I personally do not play any form of split poker game heads up (cash games), as there is a good chance i will come out losing, even if I net more money than my opponent.  Isn't there something wrong with this?

I eagerly await your response.

Sincerely,

Kevin Marsteller aka k06mars

PokerStars Support wrote:

Hello Kevin,

Thank you for your email.

I understand your frustrations of splitting a pot, and have split many in my career as a poker player. It is quite rare to actually lose money in these situations - usually only two players split the pot, and you will have other players in the hand early on (perhaps even to the last card) that will generate more money into the pot.

I am against using the phrase "the house wins" in reference to poker. If you were playing blackjack, then you would be playing against the house - the house would have a certain percentage chance of winning and when they win, the house wins. However in poker, *you* are the house. You are playing against other players, and get to choose what percentage chance you are going to risk to win a pot (for example, chasing a flush
draw).

We charge you a standard fee to play poker - to be the 'house'. This is our rake. Rake is a very small percentage of the winner's pot, and it is the fee that we charge to maintain the site and run our business. We rake $0.05 per $1 in the pot, and if you are playing at a $0.05/$0.10 table you only need the blinds to cover the rake of a $3.00 win.

I hope that this has explained the situation to you, and thank you for playing at PokerStars. If there is anything else I can assist you with today please do not hesitate to contact us.


Regards,

Tim
PokerStars Support Team

----- Original Message -----
From: Mars
Sent: 2009/05/28 12:38:16
To: support@pokerstars.com
Subject: Re: PokerStars Support - Rake


Hi Tim (or whoever responds to this),

While it isn't exactly the most common occurrence, splitting a pot so player's end up losing money is common enough that players complain about it.  It's very possible, for instance, to raise with a hand such as QQ preflop, get one caller, and end up with a split pot on an AKJTx board - again, not something you see happen constantly, but it does indeed happen.

If you are against using the phrase "the house wins" in reference to poker, you clearly do not have a long history of playing poker - only the strict academic sense.  As I play blackjack as well as poker, I am very aware of what it means to play against the house, as well as how you (and other live and online casinos) make money through the poker tables.  It is VERY common to hear players say after a split pot (where the "winners" actually lose money) that "the house wins" because there is no other winner.  In cash games, poker is a zero-sum game.  Whatever is gained by one player must be lost by the other.  In this sense, the house is playing every hand (not that I am complaining, I realize - and accept - that you should accept a rake as a business).  In these split pots, where the winners actually lose, however, there is no winner - until we go back to the basic idea that the house is playing, in a sense.

As the biggest site for online poker the in the world, you are constantly collecting hundreds (if not thousands) of dollars per minute in rake - so if these pots occur as rarely as you say, the net result would be minimal financially, but you would have a ton of happier poker players because of it - resulting in more play, and therefore more
rake.

Regards,

Kevin Marsteller

PokerStars Support wrote:

Hello Kevin,

You must learn to accept and handle bad beats if you intend to evolve as a player. The beats that you have taken are typical of what any player experiences on a regular basis.

If this doesn't convince you, you can do your own statistical analysis of your hands. There are a few programs like PokerOffice and PokerTracker, that allow you to import your hand histories, and offer statistical analysis, which I am confident will satisfy your concerns.

If you have evidence, based on a complete and unbiased analysis, that the results of our games do not conform to normal percentages, please feel free to present it, along with the methodology you used to reach these conclusions.


Regards,


Lee B
PokerStars Support Team

----- Original Message -----
From: Mars
Sent: 2009/05/28 13:27:24
To: support@pokerstars.com
Subject: Re: PokerStars Support - Site Integrity

Hello,

I am not complaining about bad beats - I realize AA will lose roughly 20% of the time against a lower pocket pair.  If you read my email you would realize I am not talking about those.  Since when is J9 splitting a pot with J9 (for instance) a bad beat?

This email was originally meant to suggest no rake on split pots if a rake would mean the "winners" lose; clearly all that has been done is reveal that support staff are trained to do nothing more than answer simple questions about the rake and respond to bad beat complaints.

If you intend on responding to any of my actual comments, please do so.

Regards,

Kevin Marsteller

Hello Kevin,

Thank you for your further email and for allowing to assist you.

I will forward your suggestion to proper department for consideration. We are very glad to have players like you helping us on improving the gaming experience here at PokerStars! Thank you again for your feedback.

If there is anything else we can help you with, please let us know.

Regards,

Ricardo B.
PokerStars Support Team