When PokerStars announced changes to its rake structure and VIP program last week, it knew there would be some push back from customers, but it never expected the volcano of emotion that erupted from high volume players. Immediately after the announcement was made, players on the Two Plus Two forums, the largest poker message board on the internet, scolded PokerStars for a “money grab” and staged a revolt.
The changes made by the world’s largest online poker room revolved around two things: a switch from the “dealt” method to “weighted contributed” method of calculating VIP Player Points (VPPs) and a simplification in rake calculation, including lower percentages and new rake caps. It is the VPP calculation change that has people up arms.
Prior to the change, PokerStars used the “dealt” method of VPP calculation, which meant that every player who was dealt cards in a ring game hand would receive an equal share of the VPPs that were awarded to the table. In the new, “weighted contributed” method, players are awarded VPPs relative to how much they contribute to the pot (overall VPP calculation for the table remains the same). Thus, players who fold pre-flop receive nothing, while those who battle it out for the pot receive the bulk of the rewards.
To most, the basic idea behind the change should make sense: reward the players who build pots. The uproar stems from the impact that people believe this will have on PokerStars regulars, the loyal, highest volume players. These players, the ones who make a living playing poker or are very serious amateurs, rely not just on their skill to make a profit, but also on the cash rewards earned through PokerStars’ loyalty program. These players also tend to be very tight players, a style of play which makes it easier to massively multi-table and even out some of the peaks and valleys that inevitably haunt daily grinders. Because they are tight, they do a lot of folding pre-flop and thus, with the new “weighted contributed” method, will not, on average, receive as many VPPs as they did before. On top of that, the higher a player climbs on the VIP status ladder, the more Frequent Player Points (FPPs) he receives per VPP; these FPPs are what can eventually be redeemed for cash (in addition to the Milestone Cash Credits for hitting certain VPP numbers). Thus, the highest level players are expected to take a healthy FPP hit.
The players who will benefit from the changes will tend to be looser, lower level, recreational players. They will not receive as many FPPs per VPP and therefore will not have the breadth and quality of rewards from which to choose compared to the high VIP status players.
As Two Plus Two poster “MSauce” wrote, “This means that almost all the high volume regulars will lose money, the recreational players will gain very little, and stars will gain all the rest.”
One player estimated that a player who would have earned 1 million VPPs in the old system and reached Supernova Elite status would receive $41,200 less in total rewards because of the combined loss of Milestone Cash Credits, FPPs which would be redeemed for cash, and free tournament entries. He went on to estimate that the rewards redistribution would result in a maximum of $7,200 going to lower level players, meaning that PokerStars keeps the remaining $34,000. Again, these are just estimates given by one player, but his point is that the regular, high volume players will be seriously hurt by the new policies, while PokerStars will profit.
Company rep “PokerStars Steve” readily admits that the VPP change will benefit the online poker room, saying, “It’s difficult to predict accurately how much savings will this change generate, but our preliminary assessment, if play remains the same, is in the range of 1.5% to 2% of gross rake for the ring games.” He added, “We planned to use this money to reduce the rake and invest in marketing and other initiatives that bring recreational players to the site.”
As he said, PokerStars did reduce the rake in an effort to make up for any potential lost rewards. Players were still upset about the rake caps at some tables, but those complaints were minor compared to the change to the “weighted contributed” method. The change was made, for all intents and purposes, to make the games more attractive recreational players, who, as stated earlier, tend to play looser than regular grinders. Casual players typically get bored playing against ultra-tight players and because casual players re-deposit more frequently than regulars, PokerStars wants to do what it takes to keep them having fun and on the site. Additionally, regulars make their profits off of the casual players, so the more “fish” on the site, the better it is for the “sharks.”
The outrage was so strong that a mass sit-out, an “Occupy Pokerstars” of sorts, was organized on the Two Plus Two forums, led by the aforementioned “MSauce.” The plan was to get as many people as possible to open as many tables as possible at noon EST on January 1st, take a seat and simply not play. The goal was to sufficiently disrupt the games so as to get the attention of PokerStars and work towards a resolution of the problem.
Of course, since this was organized on a public forum, PokerStars learned of it and began to take action. The online poker room suspended the changes to the rake structure (including rake caps) so that they could be evaluated further, though it still moved forward with the switch to the “weighted contributed” method of VPP calculation. Additionally, PokerStars offered to host a meeting with a handful of players at its offices in the Isle of Man to discuss the issues. These moves were well received, for the most part, by the poker community, but the weighted contributed controversy still remained, so the protest proceeded as planned.
PokerStars was ready for the sit-out, too. Protesters who attempted to open up table after table (up to as many as 24) and sit-out were cut off at the pass. Players who joined the protest were removed from the tables and allowed to play at only one at a time. This response by PokerStars happened almost instantly, so it was obviously programmed into the poker software in anticipation of the sit-out event.
That is not to say, however, that the protest did not work. While the event itself did not last long, all the discussions and planning leading up to it grabbed the attention of PokerStars and it does look like there are reasonable people on both sides willing to work on a resolution. It remains to be seen if the players will get their way, but stay tuned to Poker News Daily for any updates as they are released.
