Is Online Poker Rigged?

PokerAussie — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 04:49:37 +0000

If you participate in any sort of poker forum, you’ll quickly notice how many threads are dedicated to people whining about online poker, saying it is rigged against the players. These posts tend to come from new players, but we’ll look at a few reasons why people make these sort of wild accusations in the first place.

There are a few theories on why online poker is rigged, but they all tend to come from the general school of thought that poker sites rig hands to generate more money for themselves. These theories talk about bad beats, suckouts, and getting dealt fewer hands than they should. The most common theories include:

The first timer theory. People believe that pots are rigged in favour of people who have recently deposited, which means that these people will spend more time and money playing poker, creating more money for the site. The converse of this is the “doomswitch” theory, whereby somebody becomes ‘doomed’ as soon as they withdraw money.

The “big stack” theory. The wildest one, this one states that big stacks have an advantage over small stacks, and that pots are rigged in their favour.

The big pot theory. This theory states that the site intentionally sets up two big hands against each other more often than it should mathematically occur (such as AA vs. KK, a set vs. a straight ect.). The larger the pot, the more the rake, so thus the site profits more. This theory has most of it’s application in poker cash games.

So why would people post this theories? One reason is the amount of volume online compared to that of live. In a normal live setting, one can expect to be dealt a maximum of 30 hands an hour with a good dealer. Online, the pace is usually double that. At a single table, about 60 hands an hour are dealt. Coupled with the fact that most people play 4+ tables at once, this volume is significantly larger to that of live. I personally get about 600 hands in a 2 hour session of play – equivalent to 20 hours of live play. Thus, because people see far more hands, the number of bad beats and suckouts that one sees will be increased exponentially as well.

Another reason is the skill level of online players. Live play is generally far worse to that of online play. If you were comparing the two, 200NL live is generally accepted to be equal to that of 10/25NL online. Thus, someone who wins a little playing live, expects to be an awesome player online at much lower stakes. When they get stacked numerous times by players better than them, they complain. Rather than looking at their own game and how they play, they blame the software, simply because it is much easier to blame something you can’t control.

So is it really all rigged? At this point, from my experience, I would have to say no. These huge internet gambling sites are dealing with millions of dollars and thousands of customers a day, and if something were crooked, they would stand to lose millions of dollars. Some players play poker for a living, and thus rely on these sites to be trustworthy. If onine poker is rigged, how are the online poker professionals making a living? Thus, each site is regulated by commissions, which make sure that each room is not doing any underhand action to increase their own profits. The RNG of each site (random number generator), which determines how the cards fall, is also monitored by special commissions.

To this day there have been no proven allegations as to online poker being rigged. There have been some glaring mistakes made by some sites, such as the super-users on UltimateBet and Absolute, and the incorrect shipping of pots on Cake Poker, but this is separated from the rigged theories of online poker, and the sites tighten up on their security all the time. Until solid evidence over hundreds of thousands of hands is shown that details the rigged nature of the online game, there will be no evidence that proves that online poker is rigged. As the old adage says – ‘innocent until proven guilty’. Get a boss media rakeback deal when you play online poker and get a monthly bonus every month for your playing time.

Playing Medium Strength Hands vs Aggressive Opponents

David — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 03:53:53 +0000

Aggressive Poker Opponents

Loose aggressive players will play a lot of hands and hence it can be hard to put them on a range of hands because they play any two cards. Instead of trying to put them on a hand range, a good poker strategy to use against them is to sit to the left of them so you have position, tighten up your starting hand range, and wait for a spot where they overplay a mediocre hand or make some stupid bluff.

If you are the preflop raiser, you should be less willing to continuation bet when you miss the flop. Aggressive players will defend against cbets particularly on dry flops when they know you are cbetting with nothing, and if they don’t check raise out of position they will often call your flop bet with a weak holding.

Playing weak/strong hands are straight forward against aggressive opponents (the same can be said against most opponents really). Don’t play back against them when you miss the flop, allow them to win the small pots. If you have a strong hand which is not susceptible to being outdrawn, then it can make sense to slow play the hand.

However, the topic of this article is playing medium strength hands which can be tougher to play against loose aggressive players because they are vulnerable to aggression.

The concept of pot control is important to understand when playing medium strength hands against loose aggressive players. There are different ways to apply pot control, but the most common scenario is when you check behind on the turn to eliminate one round of betting.

Although you risk giving a free card and possibly getting outdrawn, when playing against loose aggressive players the advantages of pot control are greater then the possible negative consequences because you minimize the risk of folding the best hand if the aggressive poker players decides to check raise as a bluff.

Also, by checking behind on the turn you show weakness and may induce a bluff on the river when they miss their draws or turn their mediocre hands into a bluff.

There are many situations where its not possible to extract 3 streets of betting, especially against aggressive players who will often only have a weak hand. So instead of betting to protect your medium strength hand it can be more profitable to apply pot control to avoid tought spots and maximize your winnings on the river when the aggressive player is likely to bluff.

Here is an example of playing a medium strength vs a loose aggressive opponent.

Full Tilt, $0.10/$0.25 NL Hold’em Cash Game, 5 Players

CO: $20.49 (82 bb)
Hero (BTN): $33.27 (133.1 bb)
SB: $26.24 (105 bb)
BB: $31.19 (124.8 bb)
MP: $28.66 (114.6 bb)

Pre-Flop: Hero is BTN with J J
MP folds, CO raises to $1, Hero calls $1, SB folds, BB calls $0.75

Flop: ($3.10) Q 9 7 (3 players)
BB checks, CO bets $2, Hero calls $2, BB folds

Turn: ($7.10) 7 (2 players)
CO checks, Hero checks

River: ($7.10) T (2 players)
CO bets $6, Hero calls $6

Results: $19.10 pot ($0.95 rake)
CO showed 9 J (two pairs, Nines and Sevens) and lost (-$9 net)
Hero showed J J (two pairs, Jacks and Sevens) and won $18.15 ($9.15 net)

Villain is 37/21 over 20 hands so they were a loose aggresive player. It seemed like they were involved in every pot.

Preflop I guess there is the option of 3betting JJ to isolate the aggressive player in position but I decide to flat call and the loose passive player in the blinds calls as well.

On the flop the aggressive player who raised preflop makes a continuation bet. The flop was very coordinated and it was Q high, which isn’t great for my hand in a 3-way pot however considering the board was very coordinated and likely hit a piece of villains range, they were probably continuation betting with hands I was still beating, so I call.

The 7 comes on the turn which pairs the board, which didn’t change much and the aggressive player checked the turn. If the aggressive player had the Q, they would definitely be double barreling with the flush draw to protect their hand. They would take the same line if they made trips or were on a strong draw, so when they checked the turn I felt like they probably had a 9x hand or air which I was still ahead of.

I didn’t see much point in betting the turn even though I felt like I was ahead of their range, because I didn’t want the aggressive player to check raise the turn and make me fold a better hand. Also, if they had a 9x hand, by applying pot control on the turn, I can probably still extract two streets of betting because the aggressive player will sense weakness when I check back the turn.

When the T comes on the river, it completes some straight draws if they had 68/J8. Considering I have pocket jacks, them having J8 was unlikely. When you analyze the bet sizing, it really looks like it doesn’t want a call so I felt like they were bluffing with a worse hand in this spot and make the call with a medium strength hand.

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Is Online Poker Rigged?

Playing Medium Strength Hands vs Aggressive Opponents

Aggressive Poker Opponents