Playing smaller sites with rakeback vs playing in the fishtank (Party)
It appears that rakeback is a thing of the past on Party.
Anyone have opinions on whether it's more profitable to play on Party with no rakeback vs a 30% rakeback on smaller sites?
Anyone have opinions on whether it's more profitable to play on Party with no rakeback vs a 30% rakeback on smaller sites?
Comments
I have played a few times with rakeback at 30%, I still prefer to go play at Party due to the table selection and the profits are pretty good.
With that said, I haven't played enough at the small sites with rakeback to really say rather or not rakeback will be more profitable in the long run or not.
My (short-run) intuition is that the players are SO bad on Party that it makes up for ~25%-30% rakeback available on most sites.
On the other hand, the exact rakeback details matter. IMO, it depends on (among other things):
1. Exactly how much your rakeback is, and how it works.
2. The skill level of the players on the site you're considering "rakebacking" on.
3. If you can stack regular deposit bonuses on top of a rakeback.
4. Is the rakeback site well-established and reputable enough that you are comfortable playing there? In many cases, it's high risk, high return--- that is, the newest sites are often willing to pay the higher rakeback rates.
ScottyZ
Likely this is less of a factor at 1 2 through 3 6, but I think as you creep upwards of those limits the skill level rises quite a bit on the smaller sites in comparison to Party.
I guess it's back to Party for me.
Any Pokerstars table at 2/4 or 3/6 has a VPIP of maybe 20-25. With party I never play at a table that is below 30 in this figure (though it does make for some annoying bad beats). I have sat at tables on Party where the VPIP is nearly 50% for a full ring game. The lower rake and better VIP program at Stars compensate a bit, but it's still a different game.
The cryptos (ie Sun, Interpoker) are not too bad if you play the short handed tables, particularly the pound tables, but you are paying effectively nearly twice the rake to do so since they cap it at 3 pounds. If you are going to do rakeback/bonus there then Interpoker is probably the best bet. I usually clear the month's bonus on one of their promotion days (ie: $10 for each KK dealt to you or $30 for 400 raked hands) and they do clear concurrent to each other.
If you play a game like pot limit omaha then a rakeback plan is probably better then party, but my only experience in that game is at the $25 and $50 buy in and I have not really seen much of a skill difference (probably because I am hardly a world class player in it yet :P).
FYP
Oh yeah...and the players stink really bad...with the exception fo when there are other Canadians on the table...then I always assume they are from here and therefore deserve a little respect.
Maybe I'm just greedy wanting bad players and a good rakeback, but 3 tabling 3 6 or higher for a decent amount of hours a month can usually bring you in $600-$800 in rakeback. I'm still up in the air on this one as I'm very new to multitabling, but I can calculate what I'll be missing out on now that the Party skins have been dropped.
I usually will play two 1-2 NL 5 seater tables at supreme, and in doing that I am very happy with my rakeback. As I type this, there are a few 2/4, 3/6 and 5/10 limit tables (5 seaters) and a few NL tables of the same levels as well. You're right about the $$ in rakeback..I usually average $140-200/week in rakeback which works out to a mortgage payment over a months time. Now that I'm getting the mighty .05/post here to play w/ on supreme on top of it all, it just makes it all the more sweeter