I also agree that this scam excuse for a "poker" site deals far too many runner runner runner runner flushes and runer runner runner straights. OH I KNOW....... this is because they deal so many hands each hour that this crap is more likley to happen. OH YEAH??? Well if that is so why don't we see MORE hands where NO ONE HAS A PAIR or GARBAGE WINS OR bluffing wins with A or Q or 9 high or 72 ? Please explain that!! Just because we see more deals per day/per hour how does that translate into MORE HIGH HANDS? THAT is just GARBAGE. IF there is MORE hands dealt then we should see more GARBAGE hands also. Right ?! The distribution should be random. Right?!!! Who was it who said " ther is a sucker born every minute"? FTP is for suckers and newbies!

OK. So I go back and play one hand on F-rigged-T and wouldn't you know it in the FIRST HAND I hit a str8. Only problem its the fourth diamond on the board. Since the betting was low since I am not committed so when he raises on the river I lay it down. I lay a (nut) straight down due to FTP's rigged RNG that deals too improbably high hands in a heads-up game and needs to generate FOUR runners to flush my opponent. Although it was possible he had it on turn (with 3 diamonds on board) he did not bet it until river diamond hit. How do you spell "SCAM"?!

READ THESE POSTS from 2005

This site is just as rigged as it was then and they do have shill players who get bettter cards! Prove I am wrong!

j bays
September 28, 2005
this has got to be the most unrealistic site out there just today i was playing i got A K someone else got A K someone else got 10 10 and someone else got J J and the flop was A K 10. that never happens

Unregistered
September 28, 2005
Full Tilt Poker is absolutely RIGGED. I have conducted a concerted study of them over many months, and they are cheating players for sure. Make no doubt it if you are targeted by them in any way, you will not receive cards and will get more bad beats than is possible under even the most liberal probability scenarios. It is a rigged site, and needs to be investigated soon given that American pro poker players are endorsing it therby giving it an air of credibility when there is none. Further I believe based upon my observations that they have shill players who get favorable card treatment! Do NOT play on this site or any others unless you don't mind being cheated. Notice how some claim only poor/losing players complain. This is not true. It is reverse. In fact it is the newer and poor players are too "stupid", and inexperienced to know any better. Not the better players like me.

this guy is right from earlier this year!

rmil
February 24, 2008
I'd like to address both nitemare6 and AmericanDrifter. First off, nitemare6, your example of being beat by AQ with KQ is not a bad beat, nor is it anything out of the ordinary. It is nearly the same as getting beat with a pair of queens King kicker when someone has pair of queens Ace kicker. Anytime u have trips with a paired board, you are always in danger of losing to a higher kicker or a full house. AmericanDrifter, while I agree that people who post a single example of a bad beat and then call the site rigged lack sufficient evidence to back up their claim, saying that "bad beats are more memorable" does nothing to prove that certain sites aren't rigged, or aren't rigged to cheat certain players at the very least. Yes, bad beats do happen, but they happen in a certain proportion to the number of times a favored hand should win, depending on the number of outs. If this proportion does not hold up, there is something wrong with the site. I am not a statistics major or even a math major, so I do not have the education nor the time to pore through my entire hand history and offer the proof that Full Tilt is bogus. However, I am smart enough to know that people with 4 outs or less on the flop should win less than 20% of the time when the money goes all in. It was extremely clear to me during my run at Full Tilt that this was not the case. I was losing to people with ridiculous draws far more than I was winning. All sites are NOT the same. To date, I have made money playing low stakes no limit at Paradise Poker, Bodog, and Players Only. The only two times I have ever cashed out at Full Tilt was 1.) after I placed in a tournament and 2.) after I decided I would never play at the site again. Do you mean to tell me that the players at the low stakes tables (.05 .10 - .25 .50) at Full Tilt are so much better that my strategy holds up on all those other sites but not there? Many Full Tilt enthusiasts like to use the "tinfoil hat" argument and claim paranoia among the "losers" who think the site is rigged. To those I say this: aliens at Area 52 is a conspiracy theory. A business outside of U.S. jurisdiction cheating American players out of their money is far from a strech to imagine. If you still find it hard to wrap your head around the fact that such deception is possible, here you go: 1. Enron 2. Martha Stewart 3. Watergate 3. Watergate In conclusion, I'm not slamming online poker. I love the site I'm playing at now and will continue to play there and (most likely) win. However, I refuse to stand idly by and say nothing about a site (Full Tilt) that I feel has truly ripped me off. I will tell everyone I know (and those I don't) that playing at Full Tilt is a dangerous bet.

I've seen some funky, funky stuff since I returned to FTP to blow the rest of my measly remaining bankroll. For one thing I can't pick up a hand. It's totally normal to sit through 20-30 hands without getting anything better than Q-4 or similar. I'm a fairly tight player, but I'll play the usual pairs, face cards, suited connectors, and the occasional gapped connector if I'm in late position. I'm very disciplined about not playing weak aces, and have even taken suited weak aces out of my repetoire at the starting stages of a tourney. They're just too much trouble. That puts me in around standard 15-20% range to get into a pot. The last dozen or so times I've had KK it's been busted by crap (see previous posts) and the last few times I've had AA it's been in the big blind and somehow everyone gets a sixth sense and folds to me. Actually I had AA in one of those FTP point tourneys and finally got some action - I raise pre-flop, guy goes over the top and of course I call. He shows, of course, AA as well. Just another day at the tables at FTP.

LOL. I'm at a final table right now. The short stack went all-in on the button with K-8. Lead stack in the BB calls with K-7. Do I even need to reveal the result? 7 comes out on the flop. And I just went out with A-Qo versus 8-5s, and he hits the 5. Same guy. I'm almost broke now and I honestly can't wait.

Well that's all she wrote. I'm finally broke. Watched my AA get cracked 4x in a row tonight. The best was the three way all-in with AA vs. QQ and JJ. Short stack had the jacks, the guy with queens had us both covered. Didn't even bat an eye when the third Q came out. Runner up was the A-A vs. A-5 that hit the straight. It's every single time now. Can't win a big hand, it's that simple. I'm sorry, say what you want about variance/running bad/etc. etc. but I don't think it's statistically possible to lose that many times when in a dominate position without some "help". More than my fair share? Maybe, sometimes. A couple in a row? It happens. But this many times in succession? No way. Something's fishy, and you're crazy to put real money into this site. And to all you "winning" players and friends of "winning" players - enjoy the fantasy while you have it. I went almost a year playing profitable poker. There were of ups and downs, but when they finally decide it's time for you to step aside and flip the switch on you, good luck. It WILL happen to you.

Update. Signed up at PokerStars. SNG results:

1. NLHE, 27 players, finished 2nd
2. NLHE, 9 players, finished 2nd
3. HORSE, 8 players, finished 2nd
4. NLHE, 9 players, finished 7th
5. NLHE, 18 players, finished 18th
6. NLHE, 10 players, finished 1st

Hm. 4/6 ITM. Who knows, maybe they've got the rigging set up for new players like I think FTP does, but I'm going to take this as a strong indicator that my game was not to blame for going broke there. Also, maybe there's some hope that my game wasn't completely ruined from the crap at FTP like I was afraid it would be. PokerStars has a lot of the same crazy calls, and there were some insane beats, but the former were rewarded at the rate one would expect and the latter happened at a frequency that was reasonable.

I got some remarkable info. I was playing Stud Hi $2-$4 and had AAK. Playing against another playing making my hand AA KK9T 5 (just two pair, missed flushed too). The cards of the other player that I saw were .. J33J . He finally showed me TK J33J 3 and he won. I got reraised on the 5th, 6th and 7th street and the pot was > $50. I wrote that he was very lucky with his 7th street. What a chaser! His respons was that I had it wrong, he made his boat (full house) on the 6th street. I checked it, and checked it. Noop, on the 7th. Than other players agreed that it was on the 6th street...

My idea is that the chronology of cards is maybe messed up. I've been beaten on the 7th street (again and again and again...:( ) and my opponent wins on the 6th street. So for his point of view he value betted on the (6th) and 7th, and I felt that I had another bad beat.

Maybe this is the reason that pokerplayers are confronted with so many bad beats and suckouts... impossible calls etc.

I have been playing poker for a few years and live two hours away from atlantic city and play live 2-5 games there. I have sat in ring games for 32 hours straight and never have had so many bad beats as I do on Full tilt in a matter of minutes. I started with 50$ and in one day made it to 200$. That wasn't because I was getting hands, it was bc I was playing poker, making good calls, knowing my odds and bluffing people out of pots. I withdrew so I had 50$ left.
Very next day this is what happens:
4 hands in a row at one table:
Pocket aces, player pushes me all in with pocket kings, turn and river were both kings (lost 20.00).
AQ on button, player re-raises. I call. Flop has queen, player puts me all in, I call. Player has JJ. Turn is an ace, river is a Jack. (15)
AK, player AT(Hearts). flop 6h Kd 5C He goes all in for 132.00. I make a great call and he gets runner runner hearts(lost 25.00)
I have QQ player AK, Player raises pre-flop I reraise, he puts me all in (remember he has AK so that means he is the ruler of the world and he can't contemplate someone haveing a better hand than he pre-flop). I flop a set, he flops a straight. (lost 10.00)
I know that bad beats occur, it is a part of poker but they dont happen that frequently one hand after another. I lost 85$ in four consecutive hands. When it happend I thought that these people must be bad players and just got lucky, but everyday I play on this site I get more and more suspicious. I feel that full tilt is purposely doing this so that they can get more money to rake. I feel that the bad players are winning more than they should (statistically), so that full tilt can still make more money.
Just over the last two days I have lost more than 100$. I CANNOT GET A HAND THAT HOLDS UP. I AM BEAT ON THE RIVER EVERY TIME. How can it be that I always have the best hand pre-flop, and on the flop, to be beaten on the river.
I had flopped top two pair A6, someone flopped A5,after a series of re-raises he catches a 5 on the river! Next hand I have Q9, flopped two pair again. Someone with a short stack goes all in, and someone else goes all in for 10 bucks. I know I have the best hand! The short stack flopped bottom two pair and the other had Q10....GUESS WHAT! she gets a 10 on the river. I flop a set of threes, someone gets a full house on the river. How can I always have the best hand and lose? In a row? How do these people win runner runner like that, or catch two outers? and always against ME? How come everytime I draw, straight and a flush draw and have all these outs, I NEVER hit?
I was getting suspicious even before that because every time I got to a certain amount of money, I would lose to what I started with and when I would build it back up, I would lose again. WTF?
At first I blamed it on the players, I blamed them, because whenever they felt they had the best hand (or just didnt care), they would put me all and they would catch shit. I would call, becayse I would have the nuts pre-flop. I cant slow play anything or try to make money, I am always beat on the river. Now I feel this is rigged. Why is it that everytime I get to a certain amount of money, I start losing to lesser hands? The when I build the money up again, I have two straight days of bad beats? Or I will sit at a table and bleed chips becuase I get good hands, but I never hit anything. I feel they don;t want me to withdraw any money.
Thank god I googled Full tilt is rigged and now know this only doesn't happen to me!

KrisKris...

this poker site is totally rigged IN SO FAR as they have their RNG skewed to dealing high hands. It deals hands that, like you say, are against all reasonable probabilities. The excuse that you will here is that we see more hands each hour and thus we will se all these ridiculous HIGH hands dealt. Well if that is so, like I said below, why don't we also see MORE of the garbage hands where two players have nothing and A high or K high wins or they bluff out other players with J8 or 105 or a pair of 3s ort 5s or 9s win more often? ALl you hear is the propagandists saying how we will see more HIGH hands online since more are dealt. But you never hear them say why the normal distribution is still not achieved and observed (by all of us with brains and long-time poker experience like in live games)IF this poker site was truly not rigged and did seek to deal random hands. Nope!!! It's a joke! Like you said good players don't win as much as they should and CRAP PLAYERS win far too much. What is sadder is how many suckers keep playng poker online. GA (gamblers anonynmous) needs to work harder to increase membership as it is obvious this online poker caters to obsessive compulsives with no impulse control, and no idea of what should happen with a resonable and honest dealing system. Bad beats? Sure they happpen in live games all the time. But on Full RIGGED Tilt Joker poker they are the rule rather than the exception. If I designed a logo for full rigged tilt I would have an image of FOUR RUNNERS on board to give a guy with 49os a flush.

Thanks for commenting back. I understand the excuse that they give you. But go sit in AC or vegas, especially with the automatic shufflers MANY hands are delt each hour, very comparable to full tilt. And they will never see that many bad beats in a matter of minutes. The number of bad beats I had on that site, in 20 minutes, I have never encountered sitting at a poker table for 24+ hours! They know nothing about statistics, odds, or probabilities. Also I think there are pokerbots playing on that site. How is it possible for one player to be sitting at 19 tables? NOT LOSING MONEY!!! My head starts spinning when I play two.
The only way I could make money on Full rigged tilt was by bluffing, and being a better player than those fish-donkeys. All of my hard work, flushed down the bad beat toilet. Well I am happy I have no more money on that site. For the third day in a row I was not allowed to win anything. It's sick! I wish they can be exposed somehow.

With you all the way kriskris911 and nitemare6. My previous posts sum up my thoughts, which are pretty much exactly in line with yours'. Went back to FTP after winning consistently at PokerStars to see if I could still see a difference. Just did some fake money games and freerolls, which I know aren't the best source of competition, but in the later stages of freerolls and the high buy-in play money there are decent players. Just hilarious to watch. It's so obvious where the skew is you can practically call the outcome when people turn over their cards after an all-in. If PLAYER1_STACK > PLAYER2_STACK then PLAYER1 WINS else PLAYER2 WINS. That simple. I think this bias is what has trained players to move all-in with air in the first few hands, because it's critical to gain a chip advantage early. Otherwise you're going to lose no matter how good your cards are.

There is often a similar series of events for chasers. Bad players tend to call a flop bet no matter what, hoping to improve on the turn. Good players tend to take a lot of factors into account to make this decision, and so fold more often when they determine the situation is -EV. Say a bad player has two suited rags. If the flop comes rainbow, for example, and a bet is made, they will call almost everytime. Say the bettor has middle pair or something, they might be inclined to probe bet or something on the turn to figure out if they're up against top pair and minimize their loss if they are. If the turn card makes the bad player one away from a flush, you can bet the farm they're sticking around NO MATTER WHAT. Either they will a) go all-in at this point hoping to scare you off because even if they don't they still could catch or b) they'll call any size bet to see the river. I'm not saying anything you don't already know - the difference is that on FTP that MIRACLE RIVER CARD COMES WAYYYYYY TOO F**KING OFTEN. I mean, it's a ridiculous chase play and even if the pot odds demand someone stick around to try and catch, the simple statistics say this should only work out for them <20% of the time. Rough guess, I'd say this kind of situation works out for the donkey chaser about half of the time. Even more if they've got a monster stack.

The fact that so many players do this kind of miracle chasing on FTP supports the idea that it works out more often than it should - in a honest game you'd learn not to do it pretty quick.

Advice
 

The only comment I have on all the comments about getting rivered all the time is this: "Don't let it get to the river, and if you think an all in is inevitable, you better have the goods!" And stick with cash games, the tournaments on EVERY online site have gotten 100% out of control, no skill players left in those unless you play in huge stakes games. Just my 2 cents... And for the record, I would probably say that these sites aren't rigged, there are just a million factors coming into play (watching tv, listening to radio, talking to wife, multi-tabling, jacking off) that you don't deal with in live play.

To the guy who said he played 30+ hours straight at $2/$5, yeah right. You would've lost your ass if I was sitting, everyone needs sleep bro.

Mike

You are absolutely right! I don't want to bring the hand to the river. I am forced to, because of the mindless idiots who go all in. Or push me in pre-flop. I do all I can to stop it, but nothing works. Raises, and re-raises....
Re-read what I had originally wrote! I know what happened and it's not possible that I can lose so many made hands....did I mention IN A ROW!
I can play NL holdem all day. I have played cash games at AC for 30 straight hours or more. I am use to it, I do it every weekend. I'm not a bro, I'm a gal. I should never have started playing online poker, I just thought it was more convienent than driving two hours back and forth from AC.
I only go all in with the goods. Pocket aces pre-flop, top pair top kicker to a loose aggressive, top two pair with no draws out there. I make excellent calls, and I get rewarded with bad beats.

Sound advice in theory mrkromer. Unfortunately doesn't work out in practice. You can try as hard as you can to bet a guy off a draw, they'll chase to the end anyway. Normally that would be fine - make the guy pay for his low-percentage draws and if he hits, that's the cost of doing business and is profitable in the long run because most times he shouldn't. What a lot of us are saying is that the percentage that hit is inflated (i.e. rigged) to the point where you lose money with solid play. Whether someone is distracted, multi-tabling - whatever - shouldn't affect that bottom line.

I think 2High summed it up perfectly!

Much better players on poker stars.

I think the online conspiracy theorists are hilarious. The cards are randomized. Do you think they threw some weighting into the card selection algorithm to favor any card that might complete a straight/flush just for fun?

At the casino last night I lost to some guy who rivered a straight. Oh no, real life is rigged!

Bankroll?
 

You both bring up good points, and I run into a lot of people going to the river on a regular basis as well, but I am curious about one thing we haven't mentioned:

How is your bankroll management? Do you not win in the long run because you only have a hundred or two hundred bucks to play with? I only ask because I never did very well online OR live until I learned to play within my bankroll. I don't have a huge one, normally around $500, but I seem to do a heck of a lot better when I stay at .25/.50 and .50/1 tables and $10 sit n gos. I laugh at myself when I think about when I first started playing online. I would buy in for $75 and play 1/2 nl. Anyway, just wondering what your thoughts are on that.

Mike

Hey mrkromer. Speaking for myself - I mentioned this indirectly in my previous rants - bankroll wasn't really a factor. I had ~50 buy-ins, which is more than enough according to advice I've read before. I think more than enough to handle typical ups and downs. The losing more than winning due to bad beats, and then finally culminating in the 30-loss streak is what broke me. We're talking unreal here.

There has been talk before about rigging on FTP in their forums. Of course, there are staunch defenders (obviously with a vested interest) and I believe there is a post there about a statistical analysis on the cards dealt that showed it was random. However, I would love to get my hands on the data used and stratify it according to: how new the player is (i.e. recent signup), whether the situation occured in the early or late stages of a tourney, etc. If FTP was smart - I mean deviously smart - they would make the cards random over the entire set dealt, but skew the distribution situationally. For example, a big stack in late stages of a tourney might be weighted favourably while in early stages (which would involve many more hands dealt since people haven't been eliminated) you would weight the other way (and this weighting would only have to be very slight to make up for the other skew because of more total hands).

Why would they do this? It's all been said before: get new players hooked by making them winners, increasing elimination/turnover in tourneys to increase the number/unit time a person enters, etc. This could easily have a big impact on their bottom line, and be virtually impossible to detect/prove unless someone had a fully described dataset and knew what to look for.

I started with a 50$ bankroll and started playing 10/25 cents NL holdem. No way I would start playing 1/2 NL with 50$. I see players at casinos constantly getting cracked when they buy in for the minimum.
I went from 50-100$ and started playing 25-50 cents. When I made 200$ I withdrew 150$. When I played the next day I won 2 hands, and then I started losing hands consistently. Hands that I feel I should have won. I agree with 2 high, the distribution is skewed. I lose more than I win to bad beats. How come every time I flop a full house I get beated by a bigger full house? My two pair constantly loses to a higher two pair on the river. I do blame it on bad players who push you, because they think they have the best hand. But I have seen too many questionable things on full tilt to attribute bad beats just to bad players. Flopped a full house before. 222KK, guy goes all in with K9. Guess what he gets a 9 on the river and I just lost 30$. I cant even protect my hand. I can not make any money on this site anymore. When I do build my money up, I lose it, when I get to the same amount again I lose it. I am forced to withdraw everytime I make 50$.

do Ks EVER hold up on this rigged poker site? Oh yeah they hold up about 1 out of 4 times! What a joke. Full Rigged Tilt joker poker! Played in a ten cent tournie today. Sure enough I get Ks in position and raise PF to 550 (BB = 80). Of course two donks call. One of them has 4s and the other AJ. Wouldn't you know it... the guy hits a 4 on the flop. I know this happens in live games too. Yeah. Of course. But it happens FAR TOO OFTEN on Full RIGGED Tilt

If full tilt had a bad beat jackpot, they would be broke!!!
No matter what you do people can't lay their hands down.
I witnessed the unbelievable yesterday.
I'm in middle position and raise with pocket 88's. The button goes all in for 18.00$, the small blind goes all in for 25.00$, and the big blind goes all in for whatever amount. I am shaking my head, saying what is going on. Now I only have pocket 88's, these people were representing AA or KK. I fold, they show AK, AQ, and KQ. I almost threw my computer out the window. I think you can understand why.
I started playing on pokerstars for money, and there are good players on it. You do get donkeys, and yes, they do draw, and sometimes they hit. But it isnt the CIRCUS that you witness on full tilt. Yes bad beats happen, but full tilt is the extreme!! Comparing the two sites, there is a huge difference.
I was playing a tourney on full tilt and one on pokerstars and the tourney on full tilt was the donkey freeroll! You can raise any amount of money and the entire table will call you.

To my mind every time full tilt does an update it becomes more brazen in how rigged it becomes. Now 3 of suit comes on the flop every 3rd hand.
AA wins about 8% of the time.

kkk777 I've noticed this too actually. The 'ol all-in after the flop on a flush draw. It's the new fad on FTP. And why not? It hits the majority of the time. Also, the number of runner-runner-runner-runner flushes I see is just crazy. When I first signed up on FTP, that move was practically non-existent except for late stages of a tourney where you have to make a stand. Now people will do it at any time - who cares if the blinds are 20/40 and the stacks are 1500 chips - they'll push their entire stack every time - and it pays! You're sitting there with top set thinking "I'm almost a 3:1 favorite at worst... I HAVE to call". And the tears flow as the donkey gets there every time.

And kriskris911, same thing. Used to be that three all-ins after you when you're holding a medium pair was an easy lay down - I mean, one of them has it. Now, K-9 or better and it's going all in, especially if it's sooted. Just a joke.

Is there not something that can be done about this? You would have to have an IQ below 60 to believe these cards are random.
Hand that is behind seems to win about 70% of the time.
Worst hand, dumbest play wins every big pot.
Is almost like Full Tilt has become an encourage the idiot program.

The guys running Full Tilt are scam artists in my opinion! If they were not they would make their dealing system more transparent and visible to players who complain that they rig the deal. But mommie these are "pPro poker players"! Uh, what undergrad or grad school do you need to go to to get a Ph.D. or MBA or MA or even a B.S. in poker? These are gamblers who got lucky and happened to be around when the poker craze took off, and are cashing in. Anyone who thinks that so-called "pro" poker players would not cheat by rigging hands or using shills/house players to make more money (rakes) by action or set-up hands isn't thinking rationally. These guys are not saints. These are not special high integrity people that save people's lives or do good for the world or others! Rather they are mostly (borderline sick) gamblers who probably couldn't make it doing anything else, or didn't have the skill or education or background, and got lucky in the short term. Their true characters are not known to anyone just because a few of them show up on TV. So why wouldn't they cheat if they run an online poker site and could make millions more?!! ANYONE?

I couldn't have put it any better myself.

I have to agree with all the others here. There's something fishy going on at FTP. I don't know how anyone with half a brain can't see the obvious patterns that occur time and time again on the site, as opposed to other poker sites. For example:

-Cards constantly making good hands for more than one player (for example, a low/high straight for 2 or more players on the turn and a "miracle river" flush for another on the river)

-A large number of miracle rivers/ runner runners

-More than one player simultaneously holding similar hole cards (paired- KK, QQ, 99/ connectors- 9c-10d, 9s-10s/ suited- 3s-5s, 4c-9c, 5d, 6d)

-The "Hotseat Phenomenon" (The same player--usually a donk (see below)-- constantly flopping trips or hitting FHs and flushes several times in a row during the hour)

-70-85% of flops coming out in a repetitive pattern during a short period of time, such as JJA, 998, 464, 332 OR... 243, 978, KQJ, 2A3, 756, which results in a high number of big hands--straights, full houses, three of a kinds-- being dealt out like candy from a pez dispenser)

I know you're asking... So what does all of this do? What is the point? It favors GAMBLERS (those who like to make high risk moves on the hopes they will beat the odds) over players who use strategy to make their moves.

For example:

SCENARIO 1:
Gambler bets 1200 preflop with 29o. Players call or reraise with AA, AKs, and KQ. Gambler REFUSES to fold and even reraises. Miracle of miracle: flop comes out 2-9-9. Turn: 6. River: 4.

SCENARIO 2:
Gambler, who's been playing fast and loose all night with low hands (and won) bets 1000 preflop with 23o. Players with AA, QQ, AKs call. Flop: AQ6. Two players have flopped 3 of a kind (AAA, QQQ) and are just pleased as punch to call and reraise gambler, who refuses to fold. Guess what happens? Turn: 5 River: 4.

SCENARIO 3:
Player 1 raises 100 chips preflop with KK, is RERAISED 350 by 3-9. Flop: Q-Q-3. KK keeps raising but 3-9 won't budge AT ALL and in fact reraises in a show of defiance. Turn: 9. River: 9

This type of thing of course can happen in real life. But it happens far too often on FTP to not be by design and usually at the expense of better poker players.

Now before people tell me I'm imagining things, ask yourself this one thing: if FTP isn't rigged, then it would obviously favor good players, right? And keep bad players/ donks to a minimum, since they would lose so much that they would either leave the site altogether or brush up on their playing. But it seems as if with each passing week that I was at FTP there was more and more reckless players at the tables, going hogwild, as if they were being encouraged in their behavior. But of course they are. FTP favors them. Enough said.

One of my last memories of the site-- and what caused me to finally quit-- was watching a complete donk buyin with 1K chips and triumphantly leave 8K richer. His strategy? Bet an insane number of chips preflop, no matter what cards he had, then just reraise on the turn and river to arrogantly challenge other players. And it worked. Raise 1200 chips preflop with 39o, watch him get trips. Get called and reraised by players with KK, AA, AKs, watch him get three of a kind, flush, or straight on the river. You could practically hear him laughing in mockery as he quickly left the table with everyone's winnings to use the same strategy at another.

That's when I said "enough is enough" and left. People who want to put money on that site, feel free to do it. You do it at your own risk-- that is, unless you're a gambler. If you're a gambler, then you might become the richest person there.

In my opinion, the only way we can do anything about the FTP situation is to start playing like a donkey. I know it sounds ridiculous, but if we know that 60% or greater of the time the underdog usually wins, and if we are constantly seeing runner runner flushes, why not go all in when the board has two spades and we have two in our hand. Seems to work for everyone else why not us? Pocket kings never win.?..throw em out!! Start playing junk. I've noticed that if I have hand like 8 3 off and I fold to a raise, I just threw out a full house. If you think someone has a pocket pair and you have AK or any junk ace in your hand and they go all in, CALL. That magic ace always seems to come. We need to adapt our strategy to the strategy of full tilt. If you have a four outer on the flop, and someone is raising, keep calling. I never hit inside straight draws or wheels in real life, but full tilt hands them out like ice cream on a hot day.
The impossible is possible on full tilt, don't play the way you do in a live game.
If you are a table and you see a repetitive pattern try to figure out which hands you can play. Or everyone just boycot full tilt. No ring games and no tourneys.
FTP is a joke I have witnessed the same thing. Every time I have pocket Kings, someone has pocket aces, if I have pocket queens and someone has AK, they always get a straight. When I have 3 6 to complete a straight someone has 4 8 to make a bigger one. I have also been subjected to these players who think even after you re raise and go all in that they still have the better hand, and then catch shit. They don't know how to play poker and they get rewarded! In real life people have to get lucky sometimes, because that is what makes poker go round, but luck happens too many times on full tilt and never to the good players.
I had pocket kings and when someone went all in with 810H and got a flush on the river he wrote "Bam" "Next". They are arrogant and they think they are good, but just wait till they day they play a live game they will be broke in a second.

I'm just going to boycott them cash-wise. To be honest, I _like_ the client software more than other online sites. But they'll not get a penny of real cash from me again, that's for sure. As long as real money isn't involved, I get a good laugh out of the beats. Anyone who actually tried to adapt to the rigging would be in danger of seriously ruining their game I think.

Another FTP story. I was playing a 180-hand freeroll last night, and had actually made it to the final four without doing that stupid all-in every hand strategy everyone uses (aka BINGO night). Just played solid poker and bet the mortal nuts hard (there's always SOMEONE(s) who'll look you up and give you all their chips).

There was a MONSTER big stack who had been the luckbox donkey of the night with ~200,000 chips, the rest of us had about 20,000. So of course he was in every pot, betting every flop, etc. etc. Standard big stack bullying. Anyway, blinds are massive and I was just waiting it out to move in with a decent hand. The donk was to my right, and I got A-A! Hurray! The BB was short stacked badly and would have to call no matter what. Donk just limps, I move all-in, BB calls, and the donk calls. He turns over 8-8 and BB had rags. If I double up, I'll be in a strong second and should be able to take one of the two winner spots. But FTP loves the drama ending hands to clean the table out so they can shuffle us along, so not only does he hit a set - he flops quad-8s. Knocks the both of us out and the tourney ends with the last two standing. LOL. And we all know this is the rule not the exception.

But of course he flopped at least one 8.
AA is almost a guaranteed loser - which is one of my biggest complaints.
AA is about a 7 - 1 underdog vs any random hand.

can someone explain to me what there rake is? How much do they take out of a pot and what is the limit? When do they take the rake?

The rake in cash games seems to not be straightforward. Check out [url]http://www.fulltiltpoker.com/rake.php[/url]. Looks like about 5% of the pot typically. In SNGs and MTTs it's just a percentage on top of the entry fee. This also depends on the amount - usually around ~15%. Getting those tourneys finished so that people enter another as soon as possible sounds like a great motivation for setting-up big drama action hands where you have to push all-in or can't possibly get away from a hand once you see the flop. The bigger stack will win these more often then they should in order to get people eliminated.

Here's a series that has been circulating the web from a guy who built a poker bot. It's a multi-part series that isn't done yet, but you can read the first three parts here: [url]http://www.codingthewheel.com/archives/how-i-built-a-working-poker-bot[/url]. Sweet dreams. This is a seperate issue from rigging, but a big reason to be wary of any online site, including FTP. I'm certain I've seen colluding bots at work before in tourneys. If you're in a big pot with a few others and all of a sudden two start to bet big, most times everyone else is going to get out of the way if they don't have a huge hand. Watch out for cases where one min-bets after the river (like 30 chips into a 10,000 pot) and the other guy folds. The next time, the other guy will fold. Rinse and repeat. But these are the obvious chip dumping strategies - a decent bot (like the one in the above linked article) would be very difficult to identify.

i thought that NBA game in 2002 - Lakers Kings was rigged.
Is everything rigged?
i guess i am naive.

Surely, if FTP is putting its cards on steroids we can do something about it

the only thing to "do about it" (until there is some regulation/jurisdiction within the USA) is to NOT play there OR to play for only minimal monies and not let them "steal" (via various means that have been alluded to here) your cash. I like poker!! It's a grret game. It got comraderie, comepetition and challenge. You can win some money. So recently I have gotten re-motivated to play live games more due to my negative epxeriences with FTP and quesitons about online poker sites in general offering an honest game in which a great, good or better-than- average player can succeed over a longer time. IF I lose consistently in an honest, live game then I will conclude maybe poker (or at least NL poker) is not for me. Until then I consider myself an experienced above average player with a excellent command of human nature and other facets or nuances of this game that make for winning play. I don't beleive these aforesaid aptitudes however can be fully used on FTP since you are not able to play real poker; and thus, you begin to play more defensive with regard to emotions such as "what will FTP's flawed RNG system deal this hand?" and the like. So plays and strategies I or other good players would have normally pursued in live games such as the way you would have bet, bluffed and the like, become distorted due to my (our) fear of being in a rigged system or rigged hand. We begin playing against a system rather than other players!

Ok, so I am on full tilt right now, playing some rigged cash games. What I am noticing right now (at two different tables) is that the name of the table match's the name of one of the players sitting at it.
Table 1 is called Rick the ruler and table 2 is called Stoystar. But the players aren't there, they are reserved for stoystar and rick the ruler.
Anyone know what that is about?

I wanted to make sure that I wasn't being paranoid about FTP being rigged, so I started testing out several other poker sites to see if I would see the same results. After all, if it's true that all the unusual things we see at FTP are just the high # of hands seen per hour, we'd be seeing the same thing everywhere else, right?

Nope. Visited one poker site (which I'll call XYZ Poker Site so I won't come across as a shill). Couldn't have been more different than FTP. 1) There were more bad beats, miracle rivers, and runner runners in 3 hours of play at FTP than in the 2 weeks than I've been playing at XYZ. 2) Donkeys were at a minimum at XYZ, whereas they're the norm at FTP. 3) No wild fluctuations at XYZ in bankroll. At FTP it's normal to triple your bankroll in an hour only to go back down to nothing in about the same time due to a large # of donkey calls being rewarded with miracle rivers. At XYZ, my bankroll has been slowly but steadily increasing. 4) None of this nonsense at XYZ where the flop CONSTANTLY makes a big hand or major draw for more than 2-3 players. So yes, if you flop a big hand, no more second guessing yourself as 3 people call or reraise, because you know your flush, straight, full house, or three of a kind will hold up.

Conclusion? It's 99.99999% certain that FTP is rigged to cater to gamblers, not players. No doubt about it. Don't be impressed by people who claim to have won $$$$ because anyone who gets a feel for how the rigging works can use it to their advantage. Doesn't make them "good players"; just makes them people who know how to game the system.

Even if i just play for play chips it infuriates me. I can't stand the idea that it is rigged and they are making millions of dollars.
8% hands win 80% of the time.
And people are so addicted (as am i LMAO) they continue to play.
My heroin dealer is furious because i never come by any more.

Hi guys,

Well I for one am certainly glad I've found a site where I can share my stories with a bunch of people who can see the same obvious anomalies.
My story is very similar to 2HighistheNutz, where I used to cash regularly in tournaments (approx 20%) and single table Sit'n'Go's (approximately 30%). I had a nice flurry of wins about 3 weeks ago on FT including a nice second in a 200 person tournament. Now, I had already undergone a long period of bad luck a few months ago following a 4th in a large tournament so I was no stranger to the FT 'curse'. That time I tried to deny that something odd was up with the site. This time I cannot, with any kind of logical explanation, make any sense of the bad run of luck I've had over the last few weeks.

I have not made the money in any tournament or SNG for the last 30 games straight on FT. After my spate of good results I started getting bad beat after bad beat. I cannot count the amount of times KK has resulted in me being knocked out. KK should be a wonderfully profitable hand but on FT it is showing a big negative EV for me. AA is a 50-50 at best like someone has already said on this site. In a 50-50 race it is like winning lottery to win the hand. The flop has been atrocious for me in these last few weeks. I cannot seem to flop anything and if I do I get a good, but 2nd best hand. If I am ahead on the flop someone sucks out on the turn or river. I almost cannot win a pot let alone a tourney or a SNG!! I used to win 50% of the hands I played (VPIP). That stat has dropped to under 25% in recent times. Everyone seems to catch their hands against me. It is unbelievable how often a flop of 5-4-4 could come out and I am playing KA or KK and I do a continuation bet and they go all in. I call it and they have A4 in their hand. This had happened so many times it defies general mathematical probability.

My love for poker and the combination of odds, wit and psychology is poisoned by this site. I have lost my confidence for playing good hands aggressively and I am playing as though my main opponent is the site first, opponents second. I’ve stopped thinking mathematically and play like I am treading on eggshells. Full Tilt is blasphemous to everything poker is. It rewards poor play and misplayed hands. It rewards players chasing long shot draws and catching them to beat a solid, smart player maximizing his pot equity edge.

Lately, Full Tilt has been playing even worse than ever. For instance, I had AA, a hand which always makes me think I am about to be knocked out. A player to my right raised and I re-raised with my AA. He called my re-raise. The flop was 9c 9h 2c. The player bet and I went all in. He called. The turn was a Tc. Cards turned over. He had Jc. He had a flush! What was he doing raising with K-7s in the first place and why did he call my raise? It is like he knew that a flush draw and a flush was coming. The chance of a player with suited cards to get their flush by the river is something like 6% but this player played the hand like he had the EV of aces. Within 2 minutes I was again involved in an all in pot. I had KK. I raised and someone re-raised me. Flop was something like 2-4-5. I could see there was a straight draw but who is going to re-raise with 33 or 44. I knew he might have aces but he was playing so loose that I had to play with the 2nd best hand in poker and a shortening stack. I went all in. He called. Cards turned over and he had 88 – a poor hand against such aggression pre-flop. He should have put me on a high pair. The cards came down and by the river he had a straight. A 6 came on the turn and a 7 on the river.
There are an infinite number of other examples I could give but these were two that stuck in my mind because of how poorly my opponents played and yet knocked me out.
For the record I do quite okay in other sites. I am making tidy little profits in CDpoker, Titan and Party Poker and those sites, at least for the moment, appear to be dealing realistic cards. I am doing even better at casinos.

There are a couple of observations I’ve made about the way cards are coming on FT. These are just observations. Is anyone else seeing these patterns?
1 - SB and BB often have big hands at the same time.
2 - Players next to you often have a big hand when you do and it is often the guy to the left who has the bigger hand.
3- Big hands like AA KK come out at the same time a lot.
4-The big stack wins a high % of stacks even when they are behind.
5- The cut off always seems to have a big hand.
6- If I play in more than 1 table at once I get the same luck on all tables.

I could see how these anomalies would support programming designed to create ‘action flops’ and expedite the knockout rate of players. The sites officials and employees and the general body of players often say there is no reason for a site to rig the cards. If using programmed measures to speed up the rate of knock out isn’t beneficial to the profit maximization of the site, then I don’t know what it is.