FTP Update (01/19/2010)

It looks like Full T1lt Poker just announced some big changes. See below. I am much more familiar with Stars software, but have been playing my fair share @ Tilt lately clearing a bonus. One feather they seem to have in their cap is that they have less shortstackers and even nit regs than Stars for the games I play ($100 NLHE 9max). With this new change to tables, it looks like that may be even less of a problem, so that's a good step in the right direction. I'm not sure about this Rush Poker. It sounds like it might be fun to try, but not sure how viable it would be long term. I think it might only go up to $50NL, too, which makes it even less attractive to me personally, but it's nice to see them try new things.

Originally Posted by FTPDoug

What's in the update:

A. Rush Poker: I'll try not to be too over the top here (too late, my tweets betray me), but we think this is a good one. I really encourage you to just jump in and try it out, as words do little justice trying to explain how this game plays.

Very briefly - In Rush Poker, you are constantly involved in a hand. As soon as you fold, you are taken to a brand new table and dealt a new hand. A single table of Rush Poker will play approximately 2.5-4x faster than a normal ring game table (it all depends on how often you fold).

Lots more info here: http://www.fulltiltpoker.com/rush-poker/details

Quick tip: If you don't like the transition (moving from one table to the next) animation, there's an alternative "Fade" transition which you might like better (you can sit out to change it or just go to the Misc tab under the table Options).

Just three stake levels to start today, and it's not available in Classic View (so use Standard or Basic).

You won't know just how fun it is until you give it a shot!

B. Ring Game buyin changes: No Limit and Pot Limit games are having their buyin ranges changed. We are doing this based on both popular demand and our own internal analysis.

Old games -

Cap: 30bb min, 30bb max for Hold'em, 40bb min, 40bb max for Omaha
"Normal": 20bb min, 100bb max
Deep: 50bb min, 200bb max

Normal and Deep tables had a 5:1 and 4:1 ratio between the max and min buyin. We felt this ratio was too high. So the new buyin ranges are:

Cap: No change (already at 1:1 for max/min)
Normal: 35bb min, 100bb max (now under 3:1)
Deep: 75bb min, 200bb max (now under 3:1)

What about people that like to buy in for 20bb, you might ask. Well, that brings us to...

C. Shallow tables: We've introduced a new table type called "Shallow" which has a 20bb min and 40bb max as its buyin range. We debated this quite a bit (our other option was to lower the min buyin at Cap tables to 20bb) but ultimately decided Cap was a different enough game from what Shallow will be that it was worth creating the new type of table. So while I apologize for the addition to lobby clutter (although with the Standard View lobby you can filter to your heart's content!) I do think this was the best way to provide the vast majority of players with the game of their choice.

D. 7-Game/Mixed Hold'em changes: A few months ago a number of well reasoned 7-Game players brought up the point that they thought 7-Game was favoring the NL/PL player more than the Limit player because the NL/PL rounds played so much bigger in the same game. We did some analysis on the games and determined that they were right. So we've changed the games a bit. Instead of a 2:1 ratio of Limit blinds to NL/PL blinds, there is now a 2.5:1 ratio. There's still a slight favoring of the NL/PL games in terms of how big the game plays, but since there are 5 rounds of limit and only 2 rounds of NL/PL, it all evens out. PLO actually skews those numbers for 7-Game, so Mixed Hold'em (which is also changing to a 2.5:1 ratio) is very close to even now between Limit and NLH.

E. Bet slider changes: We've added an option in the Bet Slider Options to increment (with both mouse click and mouse wheel) in small blind steps instead of big blind steps.

F. Bug fixes: A bunch of bug fixes, but of most interest here is that we believe we've fixed both the "invalid bet amount" popup on ante tables bug and the new table not appearing when you get moved tables in a tournament bug. Please let us know if you still experience either of these.

Not that I need to say this, but please give lots of feedback about these changes, obviously there are some big ones. B, C, and D were all done based on player feedback and a thorough analysis, with the driving goal being how to best make the games as fair and as fun to play as possible. I hope that we've succeeded in that goal.

I haven't played yet, but I'm having mixed reactions to these rush games. On one hand, I like trying new things and keeping the game moving along and it appears like it would invite fish. On the other hand, getting reads is a critical component to poker and it's like they take that completely away. I will sometimes go out of my way not to get too invested in the first few hands I play at a table because I don't have reads and playing these is like EVERY hand being your first.

Can the HUDS advance to the point where they can interact in real time with the game to retrieve your player stats as soon as the hand is dealt? Maybe that with notes could make it more bearable. I just hope something like this doesn't contribute to hurting the core of the game of poker.

ya i feel like the rush thing helps nits and fish far more than anyone else... harder to spot them and play accordingly

Rush seems awesome! Was 4tabling 25nl and 4 tabling 50nl. Pretty crazy action.

I only 1-tabled for 25 hands or so, but I don't see myself playing it regularly.

It seems tighter than normal, I can't target the fishes, and I got the BB 3 times in 6 hands, which annoys me even though I know that sort of thing will even out.

Here's a sick article about Rush Poker: http://www.flopturnriver.com/blogs/f...sh-poker-12115

Shameless plug ftw.

wow, definitely threw me off my rhythm.. i tried 6 tabling full ring, with 1 of them being rush poker.. i donked off a few stacks and quit.. i dont like that i cant get reads on people..

I played some Rush Poker tonight. It's cool and novel, but overall I didn't like it that much. It's context-less poker so you can't get reads or use your table image to your advantage, which makes it less interesting. Not to mention that reads are a big part of any good player's edge. But I do like that it moves so fast. I'll definitely be opening a table to play at the beginning of my sessions while I'm on wait lists. I'm interested to see what this does to the normal games. I could see a lot of casual, one-table players loving Rush Poker which will keep them away from the normal games and make them go broke faster

I forgot to mention the best part of this FT update... 35bb min buyins!

Shortstackers: FFFFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!!!