How useful is collusion?

[grapes]

I've been playing seriously online for years, and have never been too worried about collusion. I've never been at a table where I seriously suspected it either. But I've had a few beginning players ask me about it recently, and it got me thinking.

First, where would collusion be most useful to the colluders, and damaging to the other players? My guess would be Omaha, where there are 4 cards that can be shared with a fellow cheat, and the hi/lo games, where two players who know they they have the nuts each way can jam without fear of being quartered. I would be especially afraid of pot limit omaha or o/8 for big money, as I hear they play on some European sites.

I don't think collusion would be very useful at holdem or stud (assuming there are only two of them). Sure, sometimes knowing what two dead cards are can have an effect, but probably not too often and not very big. When both players are in the hand, sharing their hand values doesn't seem to make much sense in most cases...

Further, I think that most people who would resort to cheating would be losing players -- and if they can't play well enough to win by themselves, there is a good chance that collusion won't do much good, and they may even do worse by cheating.

Anyone ever seen seen it happen online (with some kind of proof)? I would be very interested to see how different sites deal with suspected colluders, how much evidence they need to ban them, if they don't just ignore it if no one complains.

[Kurn, son of Mogh]

I saw some strange betting once while playing NL Omaha on 'Stars. Not enough for me to be sure, but strange enough for me to leave the table.

The online sites claim to have good analysis software that can spot suspicious betting patterns. As far as I'm concerned, play low enough and you'll avoid whatever cheating may be out there.

I don't think there's any more cheating online than there is live. caveat emptor.

[beernutz]

Read this post and thread from rec.gambling.poker and tell me what you think: 5000 hands of collusion~~ oops we did it again

[CtPokerPro]

</font><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr />
Read this post and thread from rec.gambling.poker and tell me what you think:

[/ QUOTE ]

Hi beernutz,

I just wanted to chime in that I think these guys are full of crap. I have a dozen reasons why I feel that the entire thing was fabricated, but the strongest reason is that some of the specifics they mentioned were checked by paradise and could not be confirmed.

Also, an "experiment" by two colluders would never last 5,000 hands, and would never be replicated. The details are too firm and the methods they describe would lead to their being caught long before that kind of volume was played.

This is just my opinion, but I am extremely leery that these episodes EVER happened. Yes, there is cheating at paradise. They catch them all the time. However, imho these two are not credible.

[FA_man]

I once sat down at a 3 player table and was requested by 2 of the 3 people to leave... that this was a "3 player only session".

I then sat out and proceeded to watch the two ram and jam the guy into folding 4 hands in a row. When he left, they told me I could buy in if I wanted to... I didnt of course. I saw them then do the same routine and move tables when the table got to 4+ players.

I reported them to the site, and the site claimed analysis of their hands showed no collusion, and that they lived in different countries.... like its really that hard to be in contact from different countries this is the internet! We are playing poker in Antigua or god knows where...

I wouldnt put any faith in sites' analysis software and keep a watchfull eye all the time.

-FA

[beernutz]

[FA_man]

Pacific Poker

In fairness to Pacific, they did say they would continue to monitor their play.

-FA_man

[beernutz]

Why am I not surprised?

[chaos]

Since they can't keep track of how much money is in your account or where the action should be preflop, I wouldn't expect them to be able to detect collusion.

[FA_man]

Well im not sure if this is technically cheating, but here is what I saw another time on Pacific Poker.

Im sitting at a 5/10 and this guy sits down and asks "who wants free money"? He then proceeds to raise and reraise pots, until he is alone with 1 caller, and folds out of turn.... or folds to checking. After 4-5 hands like this, he offers to go to a 15/30 and do the same thing, and invited me to a heads up session.

Obviously luring someone into a scam. I didnt go for the invite, but I sure as hell liked it when he was at the 5/10 with me, I took down a huge pot because of him.... good luck out there

-FA_man