Prior to each Online League game, please do this...

[MintTrav]

I"m sure it happens...but soft play can be interpreted in  various ways...

The difference in soft playing a hand...say checking back a probably winning hand vs a team mate is a whole lot different than telling said team mate in the chat (or FB or MSN, etc) i have 66 fold please.

I think that is the discussion that keeps coming around...Team Game vs "Legal" soft play.

I don"t see how Brian"s post could be interpreted like that. I read it as directing the players to a convenient place where they could see the team-list, so as not to attack their own team. As I understand it, no-one is suggesting that they are telling each other their hands, so what is wrong with that?

Its a team event, of course there will be soft playing between clubmates. Bravo to the more overt teams imho.

Totally agree with this. It is a team game. I encouraged soft play within our team last year and personally found ways of helping short-stacked team-mates on several occasions. The old points structure rewarded it so it would have been daft not to do so. The new structure doesn"t reward it so we prob won"t bother so much this time.

[Waz1892]

Its a team event, of course there will be soft playing between clubmates. Bravo to the more overt teams imho.

I"m sure it happens...but soft play can be interpreted in  various ways...

The difference in soft playing a hand...say checking back a probably winning hand vs a team mate is a whole lot different than telling said team mate in the chat (or FB or MSN, etc) i have 66 fold please.

I think that is the discussion that keeps coming around...Team Game vs "Legal" soft play.

Just to clarify......

What exactly is "Legal" softplay?

I"m sure it happens...but soft play can be interpreted in  various ways...

The difference in soft playing a hand...say checking back a probably winning hand vs a team mate is a whole lot different than telling said team mate in the chat (or FB or MSN, etc) i have 66 fold please.

I think that is the discussion that keeps coming around...Team Game vs "Legal" soft play.

Its a team event, of course there will be soft playing between clubmates. Bravo to the more overt teams imho.

Totally agree with this. It is a team game. I encouraged soft play within our team last year and personally found ways of helping short-stacked team-mates on several occasions. The old points structure rewarded it so it would have been daft not to do so. The new structure doesn"t reward it so we prob won"t bother so much this time.

"legal soft play" I was meaning this kind of thing.  And agree it will happen of course.

.....and I wasn"t for one minute suggesting Brian was seeking etc, etc, to do anything untoward

[AMRN]

I don"t see how Brian"s post could be interpreted like that. I read it as directing the players to a convenient place where they could see the team-list, so as not to attack their own team. As I understand it, no-one is suggesting that they are telling each other their hands, so what is wrong with that?

Absolutely this^^


OMG - agreeing with, and liking a John Murray post. What is the world coming to?!  

[TheSnapper]

Its a team event, of course there will be soft playing between clubmates. Bravo to the more overt teams imho.

I"m sure it happens...but soft play can be interpreted in  various ways...

The difference in soft playing a hand...say checking back a probably winning hand vs a team mate is a whole lot different than telling said team mate in the chat (or FB or MSN, etc) i have 66 fold please.

I think that is the discussion that keeps coming around...Team Game vs "Legal" soft play.

Just to clarify......

What exactly is "Legal" softplay?

Totally agree with this. It is a team game. I encouraged soft play within our team last year and personally found ways of helping short-stacked team-mates on several occasions. The old points structure rewarded it so it would have been daft not to do so. The new structure doesn"t reward it so we prob won"t bother so much this time.

"legal soft play" I was meaning this kind of thing.  And agree it will happen of course.

.....and I wasn"t for one minute suggesting Brian was seeking etc, etc, to do anything untoward

The thing is, "that kind of thing" is no more or less "legal" in the game of poker than telling a team mate what your hole cards are. Making a distinction between the two is meerly expressing a personal opinion as to which you find more tolerable.

[Waz1892]

Its a team event, of course there will be soft playing between clubmates. Bravo to the more overt teams imho.

I"m sure it happens...but soft play can be interpreted in  various ways...

The difference in soft playing a hand...say checking back a probably winning hand vs a team mate is a whole lot different than telling said team mate in the chat (or FB or MSN, etc) i have 66 fold please.

I think that is the discussion that keeps coming around...Team Game vs "Legal" soft play.

Just to clarify......

What exactly is "Legal" softplay?

Totally agree with this. It is a team game. I encouraged soft play within our team last year and personally found ways of helping short-stacked team-mates on several occasions. The old points structure rewarded it so it would have been daft not to do so. The new structure doesn"t reward it so we prob won"t bother so much this time.

"legal soft play" I was meaning this kind of thing.  And agree it will happen of course.

.....and I wasn"t for one minute suggesting Brian was seeking etc, etc, to do anything untoward

The thing is, "that kind of thing" is no more or less "legal" in the game of poker than telling a team mate what your hole cards are. Making a distinction between the two is meerly expressing a personal opinion as to which you find more tolerable.

Ok, I"m not explaining myself correctly, so I"ll move on.  Soft play happens...i don"t like it, but never going to stop it -each to there own

[BOINGBLITZ]

Just caught up with this.
I find it easier, as most of our team seem to use it regularly, to print the list on facebook.
That is all it is....a LIST of our players and it is open for all to see.
If we have 5 players at the same table (as happened in hand 1 this week) I want them to know who our players are.
If they choose to ignore that fact, then for me, they are not playing as a team and if that is the case, how does this"Team" event differ from any other freezeout?

When we played the TGF live Final at Star City in February, Tony Trippier and Steve Redfern were at the same table near the end and we needed both to make the top 25 for our team to have a slim chance of winning.
  Tony shoved his short-stack into Steve"s BB and Steve folded A-A so as not to knock a team-mate out. Is that collusion or playing for your team ?
  I know what my answer is.

[George2Loose]

Course it"s collusion and soft play. This needs clearing up. Is it allowed or not?

[SirPercival]

The TGF game did not specifically state any rules against soft play and indeed they encouraged players to play as a team.

APAT have been very clear on the matter.

15 - Collusion or Chipdumping between players from the same club (or an opponent) is not allowed and will result in the disqualification of both players and any individual points they may score.  Soft playing is also likely to be picked up by the 888Poker compliance / fraud team and lead to the closing of player accounts and possible confiscation of player funds.


My original question was why use facebook for the list of players when this forum is available? I also list our players for all to see, but I do it on this forum.

[The Healer]

It is with interest, reading the posts regards this topic, as it was the reason I stopped playing League games in S4.

Now, I know its a "Team" game, and I understand the synergy that it could create, however, reading that a teamate folded AA to a shortstacked teamate, maybe underlines the concerns I had previously.

Could you imagine the outcry, if say, a Striker in a football "team", is through , one -on -one with the goalkeeper(AA), and at the last moment, decides to stop, turnback, and wait for his "teamate", who hasnt scored that season (shortstack) to catch up, play the ball to him and he misses.

I know that I am, in relative terms, new to Poker, compared to the more experienced of you guys, but this topic is one that still wrankles with me, and confuses me even more, when. apparently, it states;

15 - Collusion or Chipdumping between players from the same club (or an opponent) is not allowed and will result in the disqualification of both players and any individual points they may score.  Soft playing is also likely to be picked up by the 888Poker compliance / fraud team and lead to the closing of player accounts and possible confiscation of player funds.


So what is exactly legal and what is not ? ?

[Chipaccrual]

Collusion - A secret agreement between two or more parties for a fraudulent, illegal, or deceitful purpose.

In terms of poker, if two or more players are sharing information about their secret hole cards with other players to game an unfair advantage.

Chip Dumping - The pre-arranged passing of chips in a poker game between players.

Both of the above are illegal on any poker site, and will be dealt with through the sites usual channels.

Soft Play - A poker player varying their normal style of play against specific opponents within a team game environment.  Usually where it is in the interests of the team to not knock out a team mate.

This is a lot harder to police and pick up.  Does always folding your small blind when a team mate is short stacked in the big blind count as soft play ?  Does folding to a short stack allin shove, when you have the pot value to call with any two cards, just because it"s a team mate who"s made the shove count as soft play ?

The reality is that this is a league based on teams, and no one is going to want to knock out a team mate.  Players need to be aware that there is going to be an element of soft play going on, and in Rule 15, we make players aware that there is the "possibility" that if this is of an extreme nature, it may get picked up by the software controls in place.

We are in our third season now of the league, and I am yet to hear of one case that the software has picked up on.


This is a fun league, aimed at giving players an opportunity to get to know local poker players, and have a bit of competition against other regions in the country.  Collusion and chipdumping clearly break the rules, and will be dealt with severely by 888poker.  Soft play is a bit of a grey area, and always will be in a team environment, nothing we can do to change that, otherwise I"d spend my entire week reviewing "was it, wasn"t it" scenarios.

Based on that, each player can decide whether they want to participate or not.  Each to their own.

[George2Loose]

So basically u have a rule which isn"t policed so we can collide/soft play and if we don"t like that we don"t participate?

[Chipaccrual]

So basically u have a rule which isn"t policed so we can collide/soft play and if we don"t like that we don"t participate?

Collusion and soft play are two different things, although both are difficult to prove.

If two players were on MSN, telling each other what cards they had, and playing the rest of the table accordingly, that is likely to show similar betting patterns as if they soft played, and didn"t get involved in hands with each other.

In the rules for the league, we are making players aware, that these things are against the terms and conditions of the software provider.

Unless specific situations with evidence is brought to our attention, I"m not sure how anyone can expect us to "police" the situation.  Open to suggestions ?

The reality of it is that we want a league where there is no collusion, chipdumping or soft play, but that all comes down to the players, who are ultimately responsibly for this.  And that"s where it is the individual players choice.

[PHIL_TC]

At the end of the day, this is a fun league and should be treated that way. If people want to cheat how can you police them? Do APAT need to issue locked down standard laptops with only 888 installed to everyone pre season? its impossible to stop people colluding / chatting on facebook / MSN / Skype if thats what they want to do. However if they have to cheat to do well then in my humble opinion they"re a sad sad bunch, and instead of looking back at victories with pride they"ll be looking back at somethinng very shallow and meaningless x

[8bonesy8]

There seems to be a lot of fuss over this, in the original post, all Brian was saying was don"t take on team mates unnescersarily. If you have AA in the big blind and anyone shoves into you, you will call, if you have a drawing hand, and it"s a teammate, then you probably wouldn"t, regardless of the pot size. If you have a team game format, then surely you can"t then complain if players play for the team, chipdumping aside of course.

[RioRodent]

So basically u have a rule which isn"t policed so we can collide/soft play and if we don"t like that we don"t participate?

It"s the reason I don"t play it. I got chastised by my captain for 3-betting a team mate... left me scarred for life, I"ve been the same player since. Only last night I had a dream nightmare where I was being disciplined by said captain.

Nurse, NURSE... is it time for my medication?