Late regging on the bubble

[MathrimC]

I would like to bring up (once again) the ability in some qualifiers to table-snipe and late-reg during the decisive hand on the bubble.

Because you don't know how many places away from the money you really are, making correct decisions becomes impossible, and people making incorrect loose bubble calls often get rewarded, because if two more people reg after the hand played out these loose calls often end up being closer to correct than people taking ICM bubble pressure into account.

I'm not just making this comment because I feel disadvantaged, I know it works both ways and I can late reg like that myself if I want. The main reason I don't like it, is because it ruins the game for me as a strategy gamer. Maybe a slight exaggeration, but to make it clear with an analogy: it's like checkmating someone in chess, and hearing afterwards that the rules changed, you lose the piece you made your last move with and the game continues. The fact that you don't know how far off the bubble you really are in a qualifier (in which bubble play is the most important strategic aspect) takes away a lot of the strategic elements of the game which for me is the primary reason I play poker, and increases the bingo factor of the game. I have nothing against bingo or people who play it, but that's not what I signed up for.

I would prefer if registration would close when the bubble starts.

What do other people think about this?

[jonny2192]

There is nothing more frustrating, than seeing the chips go in on the bubble and waiting for the notification you have won but instead you see 2 new players appear.

 

 

[wwaanneess]

true story!

[pirahn]

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@jonny2192 wrote:

There is nothing more frustrating, than seeing the chips go in on the bubble and waiting for the notification you have won but instead you see 2 new players appear.

 Not as bad as coming second and table closes, then finding out late reg came second without plating a hand.lol.

Should be fixed next release

 

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[Tillus]

Highly agree on this as well. Especially now that you can observe any table and say the shortstack ist all-in being called and is behind pre/on the flop, you can just snipe insta-reg and take advantage of the situation. I guess the only way to solve this, is to disable regging on the bubble, while a player is all-in. And even this won't solve it entirely but may reduce the profability of snipe-regging. Still, a player could wait for a shortstack to be heavily commited postflop in a multiway pot or sth, but thats not as useful as the complete information one gets when he is actually all-in pre and the cards are flipped over.

Reminds me of the frustrating situations in €250UO Final Qualifiers. Different topic tho, yet very annoying. When on final two tables let's say with a moneyjump from a €250ticket (buyinback) to the 2Kpackage (i mean this is a 1.75k money jump after all) there was no hand-for-hand. Extremely unfair if you were on the table will lesser players and maybe even the shortstack. Has been reported many times i think, anyone know if this has been fixed? 

[ArtyMcFly]

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@jonny2192 wrote:

There is nothing more frustrating, than seeing the chips go in on the bubble and waiting for the notification you have won but instead you see 2 new players appear.

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The very thing happened in a UK25 last night. Allow me to illustrate:

 

A couple of minutes later, with blinds at 50/100, another of the original players has gone busto, and been replaced by a late regger, and this exciting hand takes place:

FWIW, I was informed that Mathrim was the player with KK in this spot (NH, sir!). I was fist-pumping, thinking it was all over, but two late reggers (and a couple more later on) meant the blinds eventually reached as high as 500/1000.

 

The game finally finished with the blinds ten times the size that they are in the screengrab above:

 

I don't find it particularly enjoyable for the bubble to start 5 minutes into the game, and then go on for another 45, with various entries and re-entries happening in between while most stack-sizes are less than 15bb. (Satty bubbles are either buttock-clenchingly tense, or utterly boring, according to taste.)

 

I hate moaning about things like this, because I understand the site loses money due to the overlay that occurs quite frequently in the satties (even with 10 entries, that particular game still had a 50 euro overlay), but I have several issues with the way the UK25 tour satties are set up in particular.

1. Three-minute levels for a game with a 25 euro buyin greatly reduces the time to develop reads or use much post-flop skill. This game literally always turns into a crapshoot (it basically all comes down to who is lucky enough to get aces and a double up on the bubble, with virtually no skill element).

Example situation:

[ ] Skill game.

2. 10% rake in a 25 euro game with 3-minute levels is, frankly, ludicrous. If it wasn't for the overlay, these games would essentially be unbeatable, especially now that they are mostly populated by regs/semi-regs.

3. Re-entries and late regs have significant strategy impacts. It's not uncommon to see someone late reg at the last minute and immediately jump into a prize-paying position!

 

The game is so unenjoyable/unprofitable that I'm unlikely to ever play it again once I've qualified for the UK Tour. I get the sense that liquidity in this satty system is declining, and I think it's partly because the structure is so broken. Since I believe that constructive criticism is useful the site, I have a few ideas that might improve the situation, either individually or in combination:

* Reduce the time for late registration and re-entries by half.

* Increase the length of time each level lasts (5 minute levels, for example, would provide a little more "bang for the buck").

* Reduce the rake.

* Cut the number of guaranteed seats to reduce the incentive for "overlay snipers" to late reg. (This would also save Unibet some money.)

 

Hopefully there can be a good debate on this.

[jonny2192]

Just a note, had an email saying that they are changing the UK sign up bonus to 3x4UK instead of the 1x10UK, I think this will give these games a nice boost.

 

 

[pirahn]

I dont think you can stop late reg at bubble. What is unacceptable is late reg/rebuy available after bubble.

There are many things that need to be reviewed and some good points made, but first and formost the answer to these issues is always to generate more interest and get a much bigger base of players.

 

[WuDu]

The most insane part is what happens sometimes at the SE qualifiers. Often we have a situation like 1st place winning a 25 Euro ticket, 2-5 winning 5 Euro and a 6th one getting something like 2,20 or so. With 6 players left, all 6 of them are in the money, but we still have 2 bubbles to burst. However it's still possible to register late in this tournament. The buy-in is 4.50 Euro plus 0.50 in rake. That leads to places 2-6 now getting the 5 Euro prize, while the late reg 7th player immediately is guaranteed 1,70.

Often, the late reg closes instantly after that, meaning the late reg 7th player in the scenario doesn't even have to risk 5 Euro, a ticket only costs him 3.30.

[ChapInAChair]

I agree with pretty much all of this. I don't have any objection to people late regging on the bubble but they shouldn't be 'in' the tornament until the hand being played is complete and if the bubble bursts on that hand then they're too late. I understand that there are potential overlays but in my experience the players who do this are usually regs and will late reg at some point anyway.

The situation in some tournies where people can reg after the bubble has already burst is completely absurd.

[startelver]

+1

I try to avoid the sats just because of this. 

 

[jonny2192]

Just seen an obvious case of late sniping in last chance UK25, last 2 players all in, chip leader wins, new player arrives.

This new player created a new prize, closing reg and guaranteeing themself 12.50e.

 

[sG]

yo

 

this is the most ridiculous thing on the client that needs a fix asap. when a person is all in and at risk on the bubble while late reg is still on, a person can wait to see if the person at risk will bust, and if he registers the tournament before the river comes the tournament continues with the new person registered.

 

this is such an insane thing to have to take in to account doing icm and math on the bubble which is basically all sattelites is. should i have to allways think someone is grinding the lobby and waiting on the bubble, or should i play as if no one is grinding the lobby, this makes a huge difference in what decision i will be making.

 

rant.

 

 

[sG]

so the fix would basically just be disabeling registration when a person is all in on the bubble.

[FeelsBadMan]

Aren't most satties that get to that point before late reg closes re-entry now? I personally never expect anyone to bubble during late reg in this situation anymore, regardless if people snipe the bubble or not. There are a couple of tournaments that don't have re-entry tho, the last chances I think.