iPoker Network Quietly Begins to Rake Rebuys

Not a week seems to go by these days without some kind of negative news in the poker world.

Earlier this month the iPoker network updated their tournament schedule bringing in completely new structures and formats. The most noticeable change was the large increase in the number of re-buy and knockout tournaments now scheduled, with a corresponding drop in freezeout tournaments.

On the face of it this was a great opportunity for iPoker to introduce something new, and exciting with serious potential to attract new players into the game. Sadly, with what was discovered later it looks like they could have made a serious error of judgement.

It wasn't until the changes were in full swing that some players discovered that the rake policy had been changed.

Had they missed an announcement?

Apparently not.

Alongside the changes to the schedule iPoker had begun to rake rebuy and add on portions for relevant tournaments. Not only that, but the Knockout format used to only get raked for the half of the prize pool which was for where you placed. Now even the half which goes towards the bounties is raked. A straight up 100% increase.

Another change which wasn't well received by the regs was the obvious trend to pay out prizes to an increased percentage of the field. Interestingly just as PokerStars is revamping the European Poker Tour and taking some flack for increasing prize payouts to top twenty percent, up from fifteen percent.

What Next?

It's not the first time sweeping changes have been forced onto the players, and after all, you can't please everybody.

In times of dwindling player numbers the providers have a duty to do what they see fit in order to make sure the company remains in good health. Now I'm not trying to say there haven't been changes which can be described as a blatant revenue grab across the industry, but for companies with a minor market share when customer numbers begin to drop the operating costs can quickly overwhelm any capital set aside, leading to disaster.

As far as rake increases are concerned there can be little doubt that they are following PokerStars' lead. If the poker industry's main player can get away with making the same changes then they must feel that they would be silly not to follow suit if there will be no repercussions. The problem is that as a much smaller company if customers do begin to walk away then it really could be game over.

Tournaments have changed a fair bit over the last ten to fifteen years. Even the original freezeout format which everybody is familiar with has seen experimentation with regards to what percentage of players finish with prize money. It's possible that the swerve towards more re-buy and knockout tournaments is reflecting how the bosses feel the customer's needs are best looked after. Of course we can also take the cynical view and assume that as re-buys and knockouts are now being raked much more heavily then players are being herded aggressively in that direction by simply removing the choice to some degree.

This is where I'm a little worried. It's one thing to make changes which benefit all concerned, and quite another to be changing the landscape in a manner that removes choice. There will be regs on iPoker who play exclusively freezeout MTTs, and without much warning a decent chunk of their volume has gone. Is it iPoker's point of view that if you're not going to play the higher raked games then you're not as welcome as you were before? It's tough to see it any other way.

Over on the TwoPlusTwo forums the mood was anything but positive. Board members were crying out how bad communication from iPoker has always been. When rakeback was discontinued they claim there was no announcement, and the rake was raised as the same time.

Another member wrote about how iPoker has never taken the opportunity to create a presence on the online forums in comparison to PokerStars, 888, and PartyPoker. Are they really prepared to alienate players who fall on both the reg and recreational side of the fence?

Amongst talk about how this could be iPoker's downfall, there is of course the circular argument that the regs will leave while the recs won't really notice. Of course once the regs leave the games become much softer, I'm sure there isn't a poker player alive that played these games before who wouldn't return if their win rate had the potential to skyrocket.

Only time will tell, but one thing is certain. If enough players of all abilities start to leave it may be too late to save a provider already struggling for liquidity.

A Missed Opportunity?

The comparison to PokerStars is interesting. They have made a great deal of changes, and received an awful lot of criticism. Surely somebody working for their rivals must have spotted an opportunity. But it seems that all they want to do is replicate.

A main factor in the change of direction across the board is how in today's poker ecosystem we need to look after the recreational players much more. The changes here do nothing for that whatsoever, and if there really hasn't been any indication that players wanted these schedule changes then it really does look like it's all about taking as much as they possibly can while hoping for the best about how the players react.

The last note goes to a gathering consensus about how the game's providers are hoping to move players towards low edge formats, such as Spin and Go. Could this be a stealth effort as part of a plan to make standard MTTs and cash games less attractive in order to have players taking less money out of the system? PokerStars are certainly doing what they can to attract new players directly in to their Spin and Go games. The removal of rakeback across the landscape has made cash games a much worse proposition too.

The next year or two will be interesting. I'm sure it will certainly look a lot different than today.