ONLINE POKER - SITE - Full Tilt

[simo1981]

After copping the most ridiculous bad beat on the river (on the bubble) in a token tier 1 i decided to send a little email to full tilt. As of now i have not receioved a reply but i will post it here as soon as I do (that is if i do).
"Ever since i last cashed out i have suffered an absolute BULLSHIT amount of bad beats on the river by other players hitting ABSOLUTE FUCKING BULLSHIT draw cards. Please tell me something. I would like the name of the company who has independently tested your site's random number generator. I play on 2 of your competitors sites and they have the information readily and publicly available. Please tell me, has full tilt poker had theirs independently tested (yes or no) and if yes, by whom and when, and where can i access the results."

[nitemare6]

i have written them 7-8 times to the point where they have said they would not reply to anymore email. They will reply and give you some sympathy; then assure you that everything is fine and that s-t happens blah blah!

[simo1981]

As promiosed here is ftp's reply. How ironic that just before i checked my email this happened: HU game i flop two pair, 2 and 3. However there are 3 clubs on the board. being short stacked only 480 chips, i go all in. Player calls with a Kc4d, on a flush draw. I dont want to see another club! And i didnt, turn 4, river K. it really doesnt matter what ftp say in this reply, ITS FULL OF SHIT, but a promise is a promise, so here it is:**********
Thank you for contacting Full Tilt Poker Support.

Our shuffling and dealing processes utilize a powerful random number generator (RNG) that incorporates several features to ensure randomness and a fair game for all players.

Our RNG uses three separate sources which apply algorithms to generate 32-bit random numbers. The three random numbers are then XORed together to generate a new random number. XORing a random number against any other number produces a new number equally random to the preceding numbers. So even if two out of the three sources failed to generate sufficiently random numbers, the final XORed number will still be random provided at least one of the three given numbers is random.

This holds true as long as the two numbers are uncorrelated, so it's critical that all the different values come from independent sources. If the numbers were correlated, the randomness could be cancelled by the XOR operation.

To ensure true randomness, our RNG uses several redundant and independent sources including two different pseudo-RNGs and a physical source:

1) The ISAAC pseudo-RNG.
2) The OpenSSL pseudo-RNG.
3) A hardware RNG that has a physical source of entropy.

We are evaluating several well-known auditing firms and hope to have our shuffling and dealing processes officially audited in the near future.

Our business depends on providing our players with a fair and unbiased game, and we do exactly that. We hope we?ve answered your concerns, but if we can be of further assistance, please let us know.

Sincerely,
**********************

[Ant8472]

It is their typical response. They keep giving me their template responses such as this. A couple of times I started to get good luck for a short time after I complained.

[nitemare6]

Finished first in a 555 player SNG. Must say I won not because hands held up on full-rigged but by great playing and strategic check-raising, bluffing, limping and laying down hands most would call or push with. I only saw about 22% of hands, and those that I went to the T with I won 75% at least. Also won hands with top pair Ilike 6s or 8s flopped) which has nto happened on FRT in a long time!! Ironically I had just wrote them asking how I could cash out (since epassporte wasn't an option any longer and that's how I deposited).

[nitemare6]

So I sit down at a 10/25 (6) table and fold the first hand (36os) THE VERY NEXT HAND I get dealt Qs. This is 6-handed. So I limp in and get a raise to 1.50 and re-raise to 4.75, and of course the loser goes all in. I have him covered and call the raise only because I know donks go all in withput Ks or As. So what does he have? AKos??!! Now tell me......... did full rigged deal an A on the flop or did Qs hold up?! This was the 2nd hand I played on full rigged in 3 months. You can't win in their rigged cash games.

[nitemare6]

Remember I just asked them how to cash out about 5 days ago.

[simo1981]

After i got a reply to the rng email i replied accusing them of having a cash out curse (after yet another shocking run of bad beats). i will post their reply soon

[simo1981]

HERE IS THEIR REPLY**********Thank you for contacting Full Tilt Poker Support.

In the past players have claimed that there must be a 'cashout curse' mechanism, a system that punishes players for withdrawing funds. Besides being nearly impossible to do, we would be foolish to jeopardize our entire reputation and business in an effort to make extra money off a few players.

The so-called curse is more likely a trick of perception. Consider that a smaller bankroll will cause more panic if you lose a fixed amount of money than a larger bankroll. For example, if you have $400 in your account and lose $100, you would have lost 25% of your bankroll. While this may be somewhat troubling, it will not induce panic. If you had withdrawn $200, the same $100 loss would represent half your bankroll and will cause panic. This will lead some players to go on tilt, play progressively worse and lose more money and eventually go broke.

Unfortunately, with a smaller bankroll, your probability of ruination is much higher. If you continued to play at stakes that you may have been winning at prior to your large cashout, your bankroll may not have been sufficient to handle the swings of the game.

In other words, the cashout curse is real. But it isn't because Full Tilt threw a switch, it is just everyday statistics at play.

For a more detailed, statistical examination of the so-called 'cashout curse', this is a very thorough article:

[url]http://groups.google.com/group/rec.gambling.poker/msg/aff054bc065303a8[/url]

With regards to the authenticity of our RNG, our players provide us with constant empirical testing and verification of our RNG. Unlike live games, all online hands are recorded in the form of a hand history. With many players using tracking programs such as PokerTracker, hands are scrutinized by the poker playing community, and any deviation outside of expected variance will be found very quickly with hundreds of thousands of hands being played everyday. There are players that have hundreds of thousands of personal hand histories saved in databases, and a dysfunctional RNG would be easy to spot.

If there's anything else we can help you with, please feel free to ask. Best of luck at the tables!

Regards,

Amaan
Poker Specialist
Full Tilt Poker Support

[simo1981]

So I guess what he is saying is that when my straight or set gets drowned on the river by an improbable runner runner boat or 4 runner flush, it isnt a bullshit rigged bad beat, i was on tilt and playing recklessly and shouldnt have been in the hand to begin with??? lol.

[nitemare6]

So i go back to the cash games (.10/.25 table) and miracuously double my bankroll at two tables and end up winning another approx $45 in 25 mintues on top of the $138. Now I had just written email about 30 minutes earlier to ask them if Qs EVER hold up on FRT. Guess what? I get Qs and find myself in a hand with a guy with J10. Flop comes AQKc. He flops a str8 and I flop a set. So we end up all in! Turn is 8d. Anyone have a guess what the river card was!??? Anyone? Yep it was a ONE outer! I got the last QUEEN and the poor guy leaves the table with me saying "sorry bro that is sick"! Do you think my letter had anything to do with this? And who did shoot John Kennedy!? :-) By the way, I meant to say that I won a 555 plyr "tournament" and not a "sng".

[mrkromer]

That's far from a 1 outer. You could have hit the q, an 8, ace or king, so you had 10 outs.

mike

[nitemare6]

LOL- true ( i told my math professor buddy that after I posted it) - TY

[nitemare6]

OK. So I sit down a few minutes ago to fool around on a 10/25 cent (6) table. FIRST hand: I get J10 and raise 3x BB. One call. Flop 79J all hearts. I bet 75% of pot. Call. Turn is 8h. FOUR running hearts. Now this is the third time today in the few hands I played in between doing other things that I have seen FOUR FKING RUNNERs. And mind you this in in a very small space of time. Anyone else notice how many times we see FOUR runners to give some guy a hand and allow him to beat out 2p or TP etc.??! Its a farce. I guarantee if anyone did an analysis of this site they would find 4 running flushes and straights hit WAY more than real probablities would dictate. Just my opinion. Anyway sure enough the guy has Ah2c and wins the pot. I leave the table since its just no fun playing with this kind of dealing; it's not the amount of money its what others have said many times. I just know I play far too good to constantly lose hands I should win. The only possible thing one could say about the above hand is that I did not push all in in hopes that he would fold his flush draw. But in my view I might have merely built a pot for some donk to cash in on. "Full Rigged Tilt: the most flawed non-random dealing on the Net to bring out the donk in each of you!"

[nitemare6]

Played last evening in a tournie and the guy I played heads=up with at the final table of the tournament I won was there and we were conversing. SO I am gettign othign and keep folding. No chance for even a semi bluff. Just the same cards liek a 2 or 3 or 4 over and over in different combinations with J or 8 or 9 or 10. Ever have that happen?! So I finally get As and luckily I am in the BB. We get a few limps and one guy rasies it up to 600 so there is a nice pot (approx 1500). I re-raise to 2400 since I need to get chips and don't mind if guys fold since I am not going to slow play. The guy who raised says "damn do you have As?" He then raises me 700 and I am all in. He shows Ks. Guess what the full rigged tilt flop delivers where I am a 81% favorite. Sure enough he gets a K. TWO outer hits again. The guy from the other tournie says "that is such BS"! Yep bro, its a total joke how this site deals cards. Like many have said its NOT that these things don't happen in holdem poker. The math and probability says ANYTHING "COULD" happen. It just happens way to often for anyone to believe this is truly random dealing as with a deck of 52! I don't know how programmers skew these hands or how they set it up to deliver this bs dealing like the above. But I have trouble believing (DUE TO THE TIMING OF THESE BEATS) that this is rondom. In this case I was short stacked and it behooves FRT to get out the short stacks. It behooves them to set up hands like the above more to increase rakes on cash game tables. It behooves an online site to cheat players. Heck why do athletes keep taking drugs when they know they might get caught and lose thier livelihoods, reputations and more???! Why the heck do people ever cheat. Well they do and its usually money. That is why I think FRT is playing games with us and its not a real "poker game"!

[Ant8472]

After 3 weeks of not playing on Full Tilt I decided to give it another go. Lately I've been playing a lot more at the casino and have stayed away from online under the allusion that the sites are rigged. I still play but a little less often and I've stayed away from Full Tilt altogether for 3 weeks.

I got back onto Full Tilt with a clearer head after some time off and having won some money at the casino which restored my confidence that I can actually play this game for a profit.
I considered this a fresh start. It did not take me long to see that the way the cards fall on Full Tilt is very different to how they fall at the casino. I could not hit any cards. I hardly got any playable cards. When I did get playable cards I caught nothing on the flop. I mean absolutely nothing. Over a period of 2 hours and 3 tournaments I could not catch anything on the flop. I was playing dead. I couldn’t win a hand. There is no way in the world that someone can tell you it is the way you play that creates the poor results when you get no playable cards and catch nothing on the flop. The best player in the world can't do much with that. You can only bluff so much and on an aggressively and fishy online site in $10 tournaments, bluffing is seldomly the right move.
The difference between the luck I was having online and the luck I have at the casino is immensely different. It seems more obvious to me now how rigged Full Tilt is.
People who advocate that online sites are not rigged will often argue that it can seem like someone gets a lot of bad beats online because the hands go faster and it will seem like they are getting more bad beats. Well I argue the exact opposite. Should one also catch a lot more cards and win alot more pots online than live, particularly if they play more than one table at a time? There are more cards being dealt online and I am catching very few cards yet at the casino I hit hands quite regularly. At least one in every 2 or 3 hands, I am hitting something worth playing onto the turn and river at the casino. Maybe I am hitting top pair or middle pair with a draw, maybe I am hitting it hard with a set or trips or a draw. On Full Tilt I couldn’t hit a thing today, not even middle pair. The flop antagonized me every hand I played.
I had literally 3 very good hands all afternoon and they all got me knocked out.
I was knocked out with AA, KK and AK in 3 different tournaments. I had my aces cracked by someone who called my raise when they had J9 suited. They got their flush. I had KK in another tournament. As soon as I saw KK I said in the message window ‘this is the hand that gets me knocked out’. Short stacked I went all in with my KK. Someone called me with AQ and they got their A on the river. Again, short stacked in another tournament I called an all in with AK. My opponent had TT and his tens held up. My aces and kings couldn’t hold up but his tens held up.
I know that hand for hand my results don’t sound spectacularly unlucky but when you look at the whole picture it reeks of negative programming designed to make you lose. I've never been that unlucky over a sustained period of time anywhere live or on any other online site.
Before I had live experience I wasn’t sure what to think of all the bad beats and dead flops, but with the exposure to the casinos and live games it is clearly evident that I am getting incredibly bad luck online. It is not mathematically feasible that my luck can be that bad.
For the record my ROI is 150% at the casinos and about -40% on Full Tilt.
No wonder I am always on tilt on Full Tilt.

[bad_dog76]

Well, I haven't posted in a while, but then again I haven't played in a long time either, but I can see nothing has changed. Online poker sites are still giving, the big F.U., to solid players and letting the fish and donks suck out on a regular basis.
I went to the closest casino this past weekend (for my birthday, which was actually yesterday Happy B-Day to me LOL)
Anyway, my "hometown" casino is Turning Stone, in Verona NY.
I get there at about 9:30AM and jump right into a $100NL table.
Now, unlike Ant8472, who mentioned his confidence was up from winning live, my confidence was a bit shaky from the constant bad beats on line.
My 3rd hand in I'm dealt JJ. I'm almost scared to play this, and I actually played it bad.
I just called a min raise, in the small blind. The BB also called so there were 3 of us in the pot. I'm waiting to see an AK10 flop with a flush draw, or something to that effect.
Nope, In real life poker, the flop comes 28J rainbow. I check. It's checked to the initial raiser who then bets the pot (which was about $11) I call, everyone else folds. Turn brings a K. I check again, he goes all in for his last $40 or so, and I immediately call. He flips over AK. So I'm feeling good at this point.
There were many hands I played to this outcome. I had AQ vs someones AJ. An ace hit the board, and my AQ held up. I had KQd one hand, flopped the nut straight, had somebody call every one of my bets, on her flush draw that she never made. My 10's held up against 8's. My KK held up vs QQ. My KK held up against AQ etc etc etc.
The ONLY bad beat I remember taking (and this really isn't a bad beat per say) was I had flopped a set of 3's on a 237 flop. I bet and got reraised by a short stack (who put in his last $15 or so) He had 99. The river brought a 9. So although I did have the best hand on the flop, the best hand, won for all intents and purposes.
By the time I left the table, at around 4:00pm (because I was starving LOL) I was up around $450.

It's simply amazing how I can play, in a live game for about 6 hours and leave with a profit of over $350 or so, but I can play online for 6 hours (at the same limit) and, even when I'm winning, still only break even, because there is ALWAYS ONE hand that brings all of your profits down. And anyone who plays online, on a regular basis, knows what I'm talking about.

I left Turning Stone Casino with $948 around 1AM in the morning, I stepped up to the table with $90.
I lost some money in blackjack, as well as, Carribean Stud (what a bullshit game that is LOL)

But anyway, I bet I won over $1,000 on the day. Granted, that's because I had a good day. That's the most I've ever won there on the poker tables. But it just proved to me, that although I don't vary my style much from online poker, to live poker, there is a HUGE difference in the outcome.

SCREW ONLINE POKER!

[nitemare6]

Great to hear your story bad_dog!!! Your story albeit a one time anecdotal situaion in lvie poker is EXACTLY why THERE IS NO DOUBT that F-Rigged-Tilt has juiced it's RNG for purposes of rakes and who knows what other ulterior motives. I am right now looking to start a game in Chicago and also loooking for games as well as planning on spending some time a nearby Indiana casino to play. Only problem is I am not sure they have NL. It might be limit. But tha't ok. I play well enough that I believe I can take down that game as well (to paraphrase a line from Rounders- LOL). I also agree wtih your initial trepidation when you first sat down. I expect to feel that same way when I play more live games (after not playing much live in many many months) until I "withdraw" from this online poker scam dealing crap! Then if I get a bad beat or get outdrawn from time to time (which I expect) I will say "good hand, bravo" and move on to the next one!

[Ant8472]

Well done bad_dog76. Its a good feeling to play correct poker and be paid off for it isn't it?
My confidence in returning to online poker after having profited at the casino was only short lived though. A couple of bad beats had me ripping at my hair and freezing up on AA or KK.
My profits at the casino continue. My ROI is up around 170%. I have not played online in over a week and it has been over 3 weeks since I played on Full Rigged Poker.

[simo1981]

Im guessing from the recent lack of posts you guys, like me have finally boycotted this joke of a site. Any suggestions from experience a good site to put my money into, a site that are happy to collect just the rake and do not resort to legalized extortion?

[mrkromer]

I've completely stopped playing on FT; still play on Poker Stars a little, but I don't take it very seriously. Most of the sit n gos on there are still full of recreational players looking to play 9 out of every 10 hands. I have found that the cash games in the morning tend to be pretty stable.

mike

[2HighIsTheNutz]

I still go on there maybe once a week for a donkament freeroll or for a play money game. No reason other than boredom. I play on PokerStars almost every day and really enjoy it. I find the SNGs are all over the spectrum - sometimes you get a really fast table of bad LAGs (like mrkromer said), and other times you can get a table of tighties. Much better environment to get experience in an all-round strategy. The key difference is that you feel like your decisions somewhat impact (positively or negatively) the outcome. Strategy is a factor. The players are friendly and sportsmanlike.

I don't even know why I lurk back to FT at all - it's not fun and it's still the same thing every time. Card dead for extended periods, then get a bad beat when a hand finally does come. The last game I played I was getting nothing for about 25 hands (as usual), watching 3 overs come on the flop every time, etc. Blinds are going up and eating away at me, and finally picked up something resembling a playable hand - 7-8s - which looked like a monster to me at that point. I made a sizeable raise (4xBB), figuring I could pick up the blinds and even if I get called it's not so bad. Everyone folds, but the BB goes over the top all-in. I just throw up my hands and give up because it's not even fun at this point. I call. I know I'm behind, but 7-8s is never really in horrible shape against just about anything. Guy flips over K-Jo. I mean, seriously. So I'm only a 60:40 dog. Of course, being FT, I get there. Guy immediately starts to claim that he knew I had nothing (uh huh, I haven't seen or contested a flop for 25 hands, all of a sudden I come in with a raise, it's obvious I have nothing - right), and berate me for putting my entire stack on the line with "rags". On FT, a SNG is basically a BINGO game where the luckiest donkey wins. If you choose not to sink to their level, you will get blinded out and/or sucked out on because you have no chips.

I've also tried PokerTime and AbsolutePoker. I don't like the software quite as much, but the feel (as far as the players and the way the cards come) is about the same as PokerStars. FT seems like an exception - kind of the butthole of the online poker world.

[Bragalone]

Hey folks....

Brand new here so first off, I appreciate the opportunity to spew a little venom. Based on some of the posts, it comes as no surprise that I've written those bastards at FTP off for the final time. I have quit a handful of times over the years but honestly, this is it....just how many damn times can a self respecting person have his pants pulled down by those blood-sucking crooks? If I hear one of the support twits use the term "variance" again, I'm gonna lose it. Four years off and on of playing there and variance has nothing to f'ing do with it. I'm a decent card player....and I go broke there all the time.

Please let me hear some more stories, so I know it's just not me that gets money in good on most occasions only to see it sucked right up by yet another two outer or a rivered flush to crush a flopped straight. I am by no means a techy guy so I can't really tell you any theories on how the "random" card generators work but all I know is that they encourage conflict. I'm assuming it would be incredibly simple to have the card dealer generate flops that will cause clashes based on the hands already out there. And then idiots like me get mad and reload....so them saying there's no reason to rig things is BS.

I've tried everything....tight as hell, real loose (like the f'ers that beat me all the time) but none of it works. So I said f--k it. I'm done. I will NEVER give another dime to that company. I've often said I don't know how they sleep at night there. But I do know that I'll sleep better knowing I will never pump cash into that site again.

here's to more live games. Cheers....

[mrkromer]

Lol, it definitely is crazy online. A good friend of mine who logs a LOT of online hours recently told me that he would feel about as comfortable buying a few hundred lottery tickets and taking his chances there.

mike

[harold2k]

I've been playing on FTP for about 4 - 5 months now, and up n' till the last few weeks I had been playing solid poker, trying to build a BR and so on, succeeding also. The last few weeks have been brutal, to say the least. Eg -- I hold 88, flop a set and my opponent has A10, the board is dry only with a Q on the flop. Money goes in and he hits runner runner K J (or J K cant remember) which i believe has a chance of 3% of happening? Soon after that I really do try not to tilt, but i get all my money in with a 90% chance to win, and again I lose. It accumilated to about 13 times in the last few weeks where I've been 91%+ chance to win and lost. I'm not one to judge, but surely mathematically speaking, the odds of winning just arent holding up as they should be? Correct me if I'm wrong, or if I've made a mistake. Another example (heads up) I hold Q 9 clubs, my opponent holds K10, I raise he calls, I flop an open ended, he bets I call, he hits a K (but giving me the straight). The board is now 10 J 5 K, money goes in and he spikes another K on the river for the boat. That basically was the end of me playing for money and I'll think hard about redepositing after I took out what was a very small profit in the end. I am yet to play live but I'm sorely tempted to give it a go and see how the cards fall. Good luck all, take care.

[antisocial83]

Completely agree with you all. I consider myself to be a very good poker player, i have won several big tourneys and can bring home 2 to 3 times home what i buy in for cash at a casino....YET....
I am consistently sucked out on from this site. Nothing ever holds up like it does at the casino its amazing. Ill give a couple examples from this mornings play, 259 flop rainbow,i hold 99, i had 3x preflop with one caller, i pot size and get called on flop, turn is a J, i pot size again, DONKEY pushes all in, i have him cover but still half my stack is in the pot... He turns over K2....yea K effing 2....and the river ....2. Another donk gets rewarded for playing like a jackass. This happens to me frequently, AA vs JJ and he flops 4 of a kind.... I have 100's maybe thousands of hours logged on that site and I am 100% convinced that something is not right. I am only still playing because i made alot of $ on the 750k sunday tournaments...If and WHEN that runs out i am swearing off online...ashame too because it could be great practice when i cant make it to the casino....... Any one have any success with other online poker sites?

[nitemare6]

The site is juiced/rigged!!! I can't believe anyone has any doubts about it still. All the BS propaganda they dish out about how we see more hands online and BLAH BLAH BLAH --- confuses some people. But remember since we see more hands online then we should also see more of a distribution of crap hands or non-monsters; i.e. K high or 10 high or a pair of 4s or Js winning the pot, etc.! You know how many times I have had Qs busted by crap starting hands of donks who stay in the pot, and get "lucky". This site is a joke. I would not blink if I haeard a few years from now an expose on this site and others about how they had players on the tables who were in conspiracy to steal monies from other legitimate players and could either see others' cards or were able to manipulate the RNG. Not saying it is happening buy I am just saying I would not be surprised to hear it someday like we hear about other corruption and fraud in the news years after it occurs.

[simo1981]

THIS FLOP SUMS UP FULL TILT PERFECTLY.
On the Bubble in a 120 player tournament:
I have A8, button raises, gets one caller, I fold. The flop is A K 8. button goes all in, the other guy calls all in. The button has AK!!!!!. The other guy also has A8!!!! So if I had of called the all in, there would have been 3 of us with 2 pair on the flop and tell me who would have folded that???? The Ace that hit on the flop was a 1 outer. This is just a typical full tilt 'setup action hand' which occurs ALL THE TIME. Yeh, sure, this site is random.......

[nitemare6]

gonna start playing at Harrah's Horseshoe in Indiana. Will report back with comparisons to Full-Rigged-Tilt !

[bad_dog76]

I think I'm going to have to make a habit of running up to Turning Stone one every week.
I went up there yesterday and played in a $75 buy-in tourney (You also have the option to get an extra 500 chips for $15. And everyone does that seeing as you only start with 1500)
Anyway, I sit down, and I get off to a slow start. Card dead and I lost one hand where I had KJ to a guy with KQ. Not a big deal. I got hot after a bit and again, it seemed like almost everytime I had the best hand it held up.
I lost a couple of coin flips here and there, but still, that's going to happen.
I finished 4th and walked off with $835. So I went down to the $100NL tables and played for a few hours. Didn't make much but I didn't lose any either.
Today I played for another 5 or 6 hours at the $100NL table and walked away with just over $500.

The last 2 times I've been to Turning Stone, I won just over $2000. I can honestly say I have NEVER come close to winning that online, and I've played online far more than live. Granted I play lower stakes on line but still. I think the most I ever cashed out was about $220 from Party Poker years ago. And then of course I couldn't catch anything afterward.

Online poker sucks. I HATE it, and I can honestly say after my last two trips to the casino I will NEVER play online poker again. I've proven to myself (despite what online advocates say) that I am a winning player. I'd rather see the cards come from the top of the deck, look at my opponents reactions to the cards hitting the board, and being able to see the dealer.

I may lose money the next time I play in a live game, but at least I know it's honest and I'm not relying on some "Random" number generator, that's anything but random.