Author Topic: Online Poker  (Read 6104 times)

JAYSLOL

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Online Poker
« on: December 14, 2017, 08:01:43 AM »
I sometimes play poker on PokerStars (play money only, no real money spent or risked) and every 4 hours or so you can add 12,500 chips to your stack for free, so even if you lose everything you can start over in a couple hours (at one of the lower tables anyway).  So i'm always amazed that anyone would purchase play-money chips, but it seems people do because I just saw an ad pop up with their "holiday special prices" for play money chips anywhere from $2.99 up to $499.99!  Who the fuck would spend $500 on chips worth NOTHING!?!?  So i looked it up and apparently theres a whole underground economy of people buying and selling play money chips!  MY BRAIN HURTS!

Just Joe

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Re: Online Poker
« Reply #1 on: December 14, 2017, 08:38:28 AM »
Its the same with video games where you advance your character or your place in the game by spending real money. I'm not a video gamer so that was a surprise option. First comes the game purchase price, then the cost of fast forwarding your game play.

JAYSLOL

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Re: Online Poker
« Reply #2 on: December 14, 2017, 08:57:38 AM »
Its the same with video games where you advance your character or your place in the game by spending real money. I'm not a video gamer so that was a surprise option. First comes the game purchase price, then the cost of fast forwarding your game play.

Yes, video games have gone that way too.  I prefer the old days where you bought a CD with a game on it and got the ENTIRE game without having to pay more to upgrade, or be able to advance at a not-ridiculously-slow rate or have to pay extra to get rid of ads etc.

MgoSam

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Re: Online Poker
« Reply #3 on: December 15, 2017, 10:20:26 AM »
So i looked it up and apparently theres a whole underground economy of people buying and selling play money chips!  MY BRAIN HURTS!

Interesting no? See I can understand some of the motivation. I like playing poker and haven't played online in over a decade. For my there's 2 problems.

a. I don't play for free. This is because there's no financial incentive to play well. I've seen people get bored 20 minutes into a tournament and go all-in on nothing.
b. I don't trust the poker sites with money on the line. There are ways for people to cheat with it.

Based on this, it seems that having people for essentially Monopoly money would help reduce both issues for consumers. Now I wouldn't spend my money on this, but I can see why there's a market for it. If nothing else, it can help someone practice playing poker before committing to putting real money on the table.

Its the same with video games where you advance your character or your place in the game by spending real money. I'm not a video gamer so that was a surprise option. First comes the game purchase price, then the cost of fast forwarding your game play.

Yes, video games have gone that way too.  I prefer the old days where you bought a CD with a game on it and got the ENTIRE game without having to pay more to upgrade, or be able to advance at a not-ridiculously-slow rate or have to pay extra to get rid of ads etc.

Agreed! I don't mind the concept of FREEMIUM (free game but limited in what you can do, gotta pay for full access), but I hate the concept that you can buy a game and still not really own it or have to pay a monthly fee to use it. I can't see myself playing any of these games. There's a reason they can charge a monthly fee or have you pay extra to advance faster and that's because the games are designed to be as addictive as crack. Now I don't know about you guys but I don't have the time for a crack habit.

KodeBlue

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Re: Online Poker
« Reply #4 on: December 28, 2017, 06:40:37 AM »
So i looked it up and apparently theres a whole underground economy of people buying and selling play money chips!  MY BRAIN HURTS!
yes, it's called "bitcoin".

MgoSam

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Re: Online Poker
« Reply #5 on: December 28, 2017, 10:06:51 AM »
So i looked it up and apparently theres a whole underground economy of people buying and selling play money chips!  MY BRAIN HURTS!
yes, it's called "bitcoin".

Bitcoin kinds reminds me of the idea of the greater fool.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6HEs6EdxVI

EricEng

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Re: Online Poker
« Reply #6 on: November 08, 2019, 08:39:17 AM »
a. I don't play for free. This is because there's no financial incentive to play well. I've seen people get bored 20 minutes into a tournament and go all-in on nothing.
Agreed.  I don't play money poker myself, but I have done play money poker before and it's pointless.  People know it's not real, so they don't play as if its real.  If you play as if it's real money, and they play as if it's fake money the game is ruined.

It's like playing an involved long board game.  If people don't play to win, it destroys the game for everyone else.  We call those players "Captain Chaos". 
https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/775909/rant-against-captain-chaos

partgypsy

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Re: Online Poker
« Reply #7 on: November 08, 2019, 02:14:35 PM »
Games, can be addictive. My lil' brother has been playing video games since forever (he grew up with them), he is now in his late 40's. He says that many games are increasingly monetized in that you can upgrade, get advantage by paying money. In particular he plays world of tanks, and he was very very tempted to do so, to get more armour, faster tank, etc. Instead he does it the slow way. He figured out strategies of how to win points on games even if his overall team loses. So slowly over time he accrues these points he can then convert to upgrades. Not a moral issue for him, just that he is stubborn and cheap. He even said if he played more he could actually make a little money by converting his points to $, but is not inclined to so do. He feels the trend which apparently is very bad on some games (they make you take time outs if you don't pay) degrades the playability of the game, but as it makes money for the company it's not likely to change.

BECABECA

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Re: Online Poker
« Reply #8 on: November 08, 2019, 02:29:31 PM »
Games, can be addictive. My lil' brother has been playing video games since forever (he grew up with them), he is now in his late 40's. He says that many games are increasingly monetized in that you can upgrade, get advantage by paying money. In particular he plays world of tanks, and he was very very tempted to do so, to get more armour, faster tank, etc. Instead he does it the slow way. He figured out strategies of how to win points on games even if his overall team loses. So slowly over time he accrues these points he can then convert to upgrades. Not a moral issue for him, just that he is stubborn and cheap. He even said if he played more he could actually make a little money by converting his points to $, but is not inclined to so do. He feels the trend which apparently is very bad on some games (they make you take time outs if you don't pay) degrades the playability of the game, but as it makes money for the company it's not likely to change.

I’ve played a few of these types of free-to-play, pay-to-win games and enjoyed figuring out better strategy to keep up without spending any money. But eventually I realized that this business model is really detrimental, as they’re employing psychologist to explicitly design the game to be addictive and prey on the people susceptible to such addiction, resulting in people spending tens of thousands of dollars that they can’t afford. I also realized that even though I’m not paying to support this predatory business model, me even playing these games is causing other people to spend money they can’t afford to try to keep up with me. So last year I decided I’d never play another free-to-play, pay-to-win game again. I was happy to see Apple Arcade come out a month ago... a $5/month subscription to play games that are just entertaining games with no in-app purchases. I hope more game makers will opt to go this route instead.

partgypsy

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Re: Online Poker
« Reply #9 on: November 09, 2019, 05:55:48 AM »
Games, can be addictive. My lil' brother has been playing video games since forever (he grew up with them), he is now in his late 40's. He says that many games are increasingly monetized in that you can upgrade, get advantage by paying money. In particular he plays world of tanks, and he was very very tempted to do so, to get more armour, faster tank, etc. Instead he does it the slow way. He figured out strategies of how to win points on games even if his overall team loses. So slowly over time he accrues these points he can then convert to upgrades. Not a moral issue for him, just that he is stubborn and cheap. He even said if he played more he could actually make a little money by converting his points to $, but is not inclined to so do. He feels the trend which apparently is very bad on some games (they make you take time outs if you don't pay) degrades the playability of the game, but as it makes money for the company it's not likely to change.

I’ve played a few of these types of free-to-play, pay-to-win games and enjoyed figuring out better strategy to keep up without spending any money. But eventually I realized that this business model is really detrimental, as they’re employing psychologist to explicitly design the game to be addictive and prey on the people susceptible to such addiction, resulting in people spending tens of thousands of dollars that they can’t afford. I also realized that even though I’m not paying to support this predatory business model, me even playing these games is causing other people to spend money they can’t afford to try to keep up with me. So last year I decided I’d never play another free-to-play, pay-to-win game again. I was happy to see Apple Arcade come out a month ago... a $5/month subscription to play games that are just entertaining games with no in-app purchases. I hope more game makers will opt to go this route instead.

Yes my brother is definitely for the, either you pay $30 and you own the game, or you pay a set monthly fee but everyone is on the same playing field, not a lot of extras to purchase once you are in the game. Hopefully game makers will respond to the desire for those games.

My older daughter at one point got into Magic, so we bought her some starter packs. She would play at this comic store that had weekly game nights. At some point she realized because of some of the cards the other people had, there was no way she could be competitive without spending 'significantly' more money. So she dropped it and didn't look back. She instead has a weekly D & D sessions with friends, as well as board games with friends (pandemic, betrayal house on the hill, exploding kittens, etc). She's also designed some games for fun.

LennStar

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Re: Online Poker
« Reply #10 on: November 09, 2019, 01:55:20 PM »
There are people selling characters in games that are leveled to 60 (generally the hgihest level).
More importantly, there are people buying them.

WHY? The fun is in leveling. For me.

But there seem to be a lot of people who are willing to put in literally thousands to have a totally OP charcter/Roboter/whatever.

joleran

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Re: Online Poker
« Reply #11 on: April 15, 2020, 04:56:59 PM »
My older daughter at one point got into Magic, so we bought her some starter packs. She would play at this comic store that had weekly game nights. At some point she realized because of some of the cards the other people had, there was no way she could be competitive without spending 'significantly' more money.

All of the cards and rules are available for free online.  The only thing preventing someone from printing them out and slipping them inside a sleeve (card sleeves are cheap and super common) and being able to play is the people who spent a bunch of money getting upset.