PokerStars Poker Room Manager Steve Day announced just hours ago that PokerStars would largely move ahead with software restrictions proposed on twoplustwo on June 11th.
The link is here.
Full text:
| After thorough consideration of the input here and a lengthy internal discussion, we’ve decided to move forward in principle with the changes proposed in the OP. We still have some decisions to make regarding final wording and also to make sure we are comfortable with our detection and enforcement capability. In the meantime we will be in touch with some software developers regarding their existing applications to clarify which features might violate the upcoming rules so that they will have time to make the appropriate changes.
There is one immediate change to announce. The catalyst for this conversation was a particular piece of software that efficiently delivers relevant play recommendation charts for HUSNG. Effective immediately, we are ruling that this software can no longer be used while the PokerStars client is open. In the past we had always allowed charts to be used for reference during play. A primary reason was that a player could simply print out a chart and we would not be able to detect it. Another was that the charts in use were limited in their impact on the game. Detailed charts that were complex enough to provide advice useful enough to be competitive against capable players were very limited in the breadth of situations covered, such as push-fold nash charts for HU play. Any charts covering the game more comprehensively, such as hand grouping charts with basic strategy, were not complex enough to cause an issue for game integrity. This new software framework could be used to replicate the utility of a complex bot in a chart format. It has greatly advanced the efficiency of chart retrieval and presentation to the point where we must take action. While there will be challenges with enforcement, we believe the cost of leaving this software allowable is too high. I want to make completely clear that we are headed firmly toward further restrictions on 3rd party software in the future. There is a meaningful probability that within the next year or two our policies will be significantly more restrictive than even the proposal in the OP. Our intent is to implement change gradually over time, ensuring that our internal detection and enforcement capabilities are able to keep up with the rules and that the community has adequate time to adjust. I do not have anything to share about how far we might go in the future in our restriction of 3rd party software. We will continue to consider and evaluate additional information and input prior to making each and every decision. Thanks to all who provided their thoughts and input on this topic. |
This sounds like good news.
But will I still be allowed a HUD with Nash chart popup?
How about pre-flop charts which I use versus unknown players? Will I still be able to use them?
I don't believe Stars plans to ban simple nash charts, but they haven't made that clear yet.
If nash popup charts are banned from HUDs on Stars, we'll remove them from CoffeeHUD/SpinHUD right away so that players are automatically in compliance.
As far as preflop charts go, Stars has indicated that they will reign in what they allow. It probably depends a lot on what they can enforce, which only they really know (a lot of speculation from those that rely heavily on charts suggests they can't enforce anything, but I highly doubt that given the types of cheating Stars has been able to uncover and enforce in recent years).
Easy solution for software ban:
"If you want to win, you must not lose!"
Caption "above shows the setup of the slowest one tabling player to ever play online poker, hereafter dubbed 'ChartMan.' The previous slowest player in the world, 95 year old Abe Johansen of Northern Europe, recently passed away."
It's actualy a setup of a Pokerstars Team online Pro, girl called katerina289. It's a picture from her blog:
http://fromzerotopoker.blogspot.com
"If you want to win, you must not lose!"
Yes, I saw it posted on 2p2.
I was just referring to "if you had that many charts on your wall that you checked for every single decision to replace clickable or voice activated preflop charts that have 100% of your preflop as pre determined decisions, then you'd be the slowest player in the world."
Certainly there are ways to break a 100% chart ban by printing up charts, but not nearly to the extent that you'd have had prior to any ban.
None of this means it should be 0%, 100% or anything in between banned, just arguing about the "you can't enforce any of this I can just print stuff up" rhetoric.
Of course, printing the charts is not even close as using the latest aid software solutions, but banning all the charts will create all sort of new problems (If the decide to do that).
The guy with printed simplest nash chart will have a certan advantage against other players who don't have it...
"If you want to win, you must not lose!"
That's true if they end up banning all charts.
However, this has always been possible for postflop charts (which are not allowed), and nobody has been complaining at all that postflop charts are hard to enforce (probably easier to pick up preflop patterns between players than postflop with statistical analysis too).
It's something to think about, if the argument is "do whatever you want with pre calculated preflop charts bc we the community can't see how you enforce this" then what do we do about postflop charts? They would have to be fully allowed too, which is a complete rule reversal and probably not what most players want to see.