It really depends on if your customer base is locals or tourists. If it’s local you really do risk busting your players and killing your room pretty quickly with NL. If you have a regular influx of new money it isn’t much of a risk.
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Your goal as a poker room manager is to direct your clientele where you want them to go.
I def do not want to send ‘wanna see a flop and be entertained for the evening’ crowd to a 1-3-25 game with 4k eff stacks.
Killing your local rec crowd is a thing you do need to worry about. Stuff like button straddles are bad for that reason. Your whole goal is to control where and how much your customers spend (or at least attempt to)
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I mean, I live in Winnipeg. Not a hotbed for tourism. Our room got killed in covid bc it was government run and if not handled by someone who knows poker, it doesn’t make enough $.
But you’re not killing your player pool with a normal 1/2 1 table 2/5 on weekends type of setup. The whales are still losing more on sides.
It’s probably better for a room in most markets not to be 24/7.
Florida’s poker evolution has prompted a lot of face-palming over the years. At first, the betting stopped when the pot reached $10, and folks were betting quarters I guess. Then there was a period in the 2000’s when you had only a choice between $2 limit (every bet $2) or $45 tourneys and sngs with a $13 rake. Then there was a period where you could only buy-in for $100, and that applied to everything including $5-$10 nl. Finally things loosened up enough to match rooms in other states. To this day, “Straight 2” is still offered in many rooms, and there are $5-$10 nl games with a buyin range of $100-$300.
I played in west palm beach. 5-5-5 limit.
Was terrible.
Around 2008?
I/m going to reply to this but I don’t know what ‘sides’ means in this context:
Sports bets, I assume.
I played at Pensacola FL greyhound track a few weeks ago and they had 1/3 with 40-300 buyin, had like 5-6 tables of that on Friday night and then had one table of 1/3 with $300 min and no max, that seemed good to me. I played at the 300 max since I had only brought 300 and it was cool, I could actually raise to a reasonable amount like 10 and not have to worry about some guy making it 90 to go with 1k stack
i think he means house games (blackjack baccarat etc).
not sure i get his point because whales losing money on blackjack is the whole purpose of the casino. either way whales are a different client than your 1-2/2-5 crowd
House games, yes. They’re a bit different from your afternoon crowd or 10 pm Tuesday crowd, but you’re absolutely trying to get those people in on Fri/Sat/series time.
I think low limit tournaments are somewhat important to driving traffic during off days.
Yeah, there was a period for that too, although I think it was shorter than the other phases. $5 ante and all bets $5. I never played it cause the $5 ante was ridiculous.
Button straddles are bad because they significantly alter the structure of the game and can be advantageous for the straddler.
UTG straddle, in the vacuum of one hand, just raises the stakes in a hand where you have the worst position and is essentially always -EV.
BTN straddle raises the stakes in a hand where you have the best position and additionally grants you the best position preflop. Some of the cost of the straddle is also recouped by fucking over the blinds extra hard by altering their preflop position from the best to the worst.
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Whether button straddles are an overall good or bad for the game is in the eye of the beholder. I like them because it gets gambly players to put more money in the pot without looking at their cards. Sometimes its an advantage, but other times you make it $5 OTB, someone raises to $20 from MP, and you look down at 83o.
From the perspective of the house it’s probably bad though. It adds another layer of complexity for the game for the dealer to police, it’s probably not anyone’s reason for actually playing or staying in the game, but may cause people to bust quicker. It does seem to piss off the “I just want to see a cheap flop” crowd when someone always button straddles over their blinds.
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As WAR said, they actually make games worse. They kill action. It’s genuinely one of the dumbest ideas.
Yeah I’m not sure they are the action killers you guys might think they are, at least not in my games. I’m willing to bet button straddles lead to more max raked pots, at least in my room, which from the position of the house is a positive.
This is the exact opposite of my experience. The button straddles makes the games here way more gambly. They are awesome.
People confuse “what makes the most money to me in the session im playing” and whats best for the room. Those two actually align a lot of the times in the long run.
If bad players love button straddles and want them or they’ll play elsewhere (other room or other games) then you need them. There’s a balance you have to keep between protecting players and giving them what they want.
In my experience it’s always the regs and occasional whale that max btn straddle and not the recs.
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That’s not the case here. I’d guess 50% of players button straddle in the PLO here.
That means 50% of the players are playing a game bigger than intended and are at additional disadvantage for not understanding the benefits of the new structure.
Anecdotally you could have a game that is healthy and the majority of the players are aware and interested in that structure.
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Schwing. 8/16 at CP around 2008.
I remember a table buddy and I vowing to stay until the hot running table fish left or busted.
Took until 4:30am and after he busted his 1500 stack and two trips to the ATM.