Online Poker "Hustlers"

I play very frequently on pokerstars and over the past 2 nights I noticed 2 users at the same tables each night. When I moused over their names they were both from Pittsburgh. I played with them both nights, and am sort of thinking that they are playing "together"; sharing hands, dumping pots to each other as fake bluffs, not necessarily playing against each other.

Just wondering if anyone has ever heard of this before: Is it allowed? o you actually think it's profitable to do? and if so...Shouldn't there be a way to prevent it?

It's called collusion, it's not allowed and you should report both their names to PokerStars.

Does that type of thing happen often? I can't say I've ever noticed it....but I guess if they are halfway decent I shouldnt be able to =\

Can't say I've noticed it on Stars but then that might be because I tend to move around the games a lot, I rarely recognize one person from a previous night let alone two. I did see it on PKR once some guy was obviously chatting to his mate via MSN or similar and forgot what box he was typing into. Just report them and let Stars look into it.

I feel ya...

this is a dirty tactic, but a profitable one...be wary of entering short handed cash game rooms...where groups of friends sometimes 4 or 5 will be in one room waiting to cash in on unsuspecting players who think they're getting a fair shot...these groups will be on the phone with eachother or on private chats as mentioned b4 in this blog by another member...

this is why i prefer $5-$50 buy in tourneys with hundreds, if not, thousands of players randomly seated at random tables...chances are these scam artists will never last to the point where they meet up on the final tables together...hence, evening things up to a point of default in most cases : )

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crazylegs7 said:

I play very frequently on Pokerstars and over the past 2 nights I noticed 2 users at the same tables each night. When I moused over their names they were both from Pittsburgh. I played with them both nights, and am sort of thinking that they are playing "together"; sharing hands, dumping pots to each other as fake bluffs, not necessarily playing against each other.

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Pittsburgh is a major city, it's certainly not a longshot that they were playing independently of each other. And the fact that they were playing together on 2 consecutive nights? Well, to state the obvious, it wasn't the 2 of them playing the same tables, it was the 3 of you playing the same tables. If you play same levels, same game, same time, same site, you are going to run into the same people.

Have you got any example hands?

crazylegs7 said:

...I noticed 2 users at the same tables each night...both from Pittsburgh.

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This in itself doesn't mean much. I play against my friend fairly often and we live fairly close to each other. I still try to bleed him dry. His chips are the tastiest. That is, as long as friends aren't helping each other out, there's no rule against them playing together.

Look over your hand history and see what percentage of hands they played overall, and what percentage of hand they played together.

That is, if they're both in about 35% of the hands, but play 90% of the same hands, they are probably colluding. If this is the case, email support@pokerstars.com, include the game numbers and they will investigate.

I've heard reports of PokerStars responding by seizing the funds of cheaters. I've also read a response from PokerStars saying that while it appears that the players are friends who like to play at the same table together, they are not colluding (helping each other) so no action will be taken.

Alternatively, maybe one of those guys was a big fish and the other guy was following him around? I keep a list of "less than good" players and will occasionally look them up to with with them.

eb311 said:

this is a dirty tactic, but a profitable one...be wary of entering short handed cash game rooms...where groups of friends sometimes 4 or 5 will be in one room waiting to cash in on unsuspecting players who think they're getting a fair shot...these groups will be on the phone with eachother or on private chats as mentioned b4 in this blog by another member...

this is why i prefer $5-$50 buy in tourneys with hundreds, if not, thousands of players randomly seated at random tables...chances are these scam artists will never last to the point where they meet up on the final tables together...hence, evening things up to a point of default in most cases : )

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I still have yet to see any proof that cash game collusion provides a significant advantage. Sure it's a minor edge, you can see if your flush draw is actually 4 to 1 to hit or 4.1 to 1 or even 3.9 to 1. Now once in a while you get hands where for example you're scared of trips but 2 of your buddies folded it so you know for a fact they don't have it. I still think most people colluding lose more money due to paying the rake from playing too many hands than they win.

Plus I'll play with friends in cash games if we're both on at the same time. We'll even have an AIM open talking about the game, but if either of us is in the hand we don't talk about the hand and we don't softplay each other. Of course we usually don't get into huge pots against each other mainly because we know that there's much easier money spread throughout the table. But if I have the nuts or near the nuts I'm not going to check it down to him, I'm just not going to try any risky plays knowing that I can pick a better opponent to do it against. Of course I'd do that if I were playing a game with Phil Ivey as well, even when we weren't colluding so I don't think we're soft-playing per say. We talk about hands after we've both folded, trying to put them on hands, and it's a lot of fun. But it's not collusion.

Similarly as mentioned above many have buddy lists of fish they want to find, and finally did you check if they were multi-tabling? If someone is playing double digit tables the odds of them having one in common is pretty likely assuming they play the same limit at a similar time.

This isnt a huge deal, I play with friends all the time online, we all live in Greeneville, and we all try to take each others money. If they were actually coluding, Stars would be on top of it, as they are with most cases

This one isn't easy to spot or investigate, but still report it and PS will be watching those two.

you should definitely report them that is ILEGAL they could lose their whole bank accounts if found to be in colusion

Bear in mind that what you see when you are at the table with other players is only a snapshot of their entire play. It is hard for any one of us to determine if their is collusion from our positions. If you feel that there may have been collusion, you should report it to PS. Their Security Dept. will be able to get the whole picture. If there is collusion, they will find it out pretty fast, if not, they will clear the names of these two players. PS also relies heavily on the players to report these types of incidents. You may be the first to identify a problem group or maybe you will be one in a long list of people who identify concerns regarding certain players and will make PS job easier to keep the game clean.

I think it is possible but unlikely. A lot of the same players play in the same games every day. I have played against players who I found out lived down the street from me, but I wouldn't know them if I ran them down with my car.

narizblanco said:

I think it is possible but unlikely. A lot of the same players play in the same games every day. I have played against players who I found out lived down the street from me, but I wouldn't know them if I ran them down with my car.

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DITTO

My wife and I use to play on tropical poker. We could sit in the same room and play SnG's and was never called on doing it. Were too competive to help each other. TP was a good site but quit allowing US players.

Duane

I would report to PokerStars and let them take it from there.

I wouldn't report them unless I was positive it was collusion. It could be 2 friends who like to play at the same table. I used to do that frequently. You can always choose to play on a different table.

interesting

i agree i dont think that should be aloud they already take my hard earned money as it is i dont need people gangin up in groups and doing it....

I know that this is an old post, but I live in Pittsburgh and know there are some shady hustlers here. You should post the names if you have them.