[erdiesel]

I noticed that on pokerstars, when playing in a tourney, the table/seat is random so little to no possibliity of any kind of collusion between friends/players.

however in the cash game, you can choose the cash game table, and if a group of friends are quick enough they can join the same table it seems to me and milk any strangers who join by sharing hole card information amongst themselves via instant messenger or phone.

am i being paranoid or is that not a distinct possiblity?

[ipgyst]

It's definitely a possibility. There were a bunch of Europeans who had an Omaha-8 collusion scam busted. Don't forget 1-table sit-n-gos also. Wouldn't be too hard for a few buddies to buy into the same one.

The beauty of online poker is these guys are easy to spot. You know IP addresses, hole cards, and exactly who played how many hands with whom and against whom. If you suspect something, report it to customer service. They look into these things pretty closely. Unless it's AP.

[erdiesel]

thanks i don't suspect anything personally, but i don't like the idea that it could be a very real possibility.

[ipgyst]

If it makes you feel any better, it is probably easier for people to collude in a live game (home more likely than casino) than in an online game.

[erdiesel]

Originally Posted by ipgyst

If it makes you feel any better, it is probably easier for people to collude in a live game (home more likely than casino) than in an online game.

what are you talking about? how so, in a live game (nearly impossible in a casino) how can players exchange hole card info without anyone hearing? hand signals? telepathy? not likely

[ipgyst]

Cheating is more than just revealing hole cards (which is almost useless in a ring holdem game).

It's not hard to deal seconds. Marking cards is a common cheating method (for instance, all the picture cards). Two people could agree to be very aggressive and raise each other to get other people out of the pot when one of them has a good but not great hand (there are about a million ways to communicate one discrete amount of information). In a game like Omaha8 or Stud8, it's good to know where all the aces are, so tipping a cap or shuffling or stacking chips in a certain way might convey that information. I've never cheated, online or live, so I'm just scratching the surface with things I've heard about and read about. I'm sure other CT members have "heard" and "read" about other methods of cheating in a live setting. If I played for bigger stakes, I'd do more research to know what to watch for.

[dad604]

I think collusion happens online fairly often but I don't feel it is a big problem. For most of those that collude at the lower limits, they are so stupid that I feel they still lose or get caught. At the higher limits where they might be more smarter but also opponents are smarter too and can spot collusion better. Any complaints to the site operator and they can check past hand histories and patterns of sitting together which would be hard to do live poker.

Personally, I have ran acoss it couple of times but they so stupid, I enjoyed playing with them. They end up losing. They so stupid that they use the chat box to collude but had it turn off to see the other players' chat. They thought it turn off the chat so that others can see their chat but it works the opposite way. So the rest of the tables knew the colluder's hole card.

[VARoadstter]

There's no doubt that collusion is a problem. The online sites spend large amounts of money monitoring and investigating table play to try to keep things from getting ridiculous. If you do ever find yourself in a situation where you feel that your opponents may be colluding, you should report it to the administrators of the site.

Here are just a couple ways that would be possible to collude:

Two or more players in the same house using different access providers (one dial up and one high speed, for instance).
Two or more players using IM or IRC to chat between each other while hands are in play.
Two players using a phone conversation to tell each other what they hold.

I personally think that it's more likely that someone would do this at higher limits of play than at low limits. The kind of person who is looking to score from this kind of cheating is likely going to want to make a significant score which would be far more possible at higher limits.

[guinness]

Originally Posted by erdiesel

what are you talking about? how so, in a live game (nearly impossible in a casino) how can players exchange hole card info without anyone hearing? hand signals? telepathy? not likely

Impossible in a casino? LOL..what are you out of your mind? Thats been going on since the birth of card rooms. I could say "I'm thirsty" and that could mean I have a set to someone I'm colluding with. You can have a preset group of words that signal what your cards are that sound meaningless. How do you think a quarterback vocalizes play calling out loud at the line of scrimmage?

[erdiesel]

Good points all. Hahaha dad I would loved to have played in the session with the idiots revealing their home cards!!!