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The Death of SNGs

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  • Tikay10Tikay10 Member, Administrator, Moderator Posts: 158,756
    Jac35 said:

    .

    @Jac35


    If only all questions were that easy to answer.

    Oh, & the answer is yes/no/maybe/YBA.
  • Jac35Jac35 Member Posts: 6,471
    Thanks for the prompt reply
  • darsh11darsh11 Member Posts: 56
    I
    Tikay10 said:

    Promotions for SNG/DYMs & Happy Hours.

    I don't really want to go down this rabbit hole but someone needs to appear for the defence, & to provide a balanced discussion.

    As best as I can recall, Happy Hours (well, POWER hours actually) was last done in January & Streak Week (specifically for DYM & SNG players) was at the end of April, less than 4 months ago.

    Sky Poker were criticised for running Happy/Power Hours as "it only benefited the bigger players" but that's standard stuff & I daresay it will return at some stage. Of course, they get stick for every single Promo they run & so nothing new there.

    PS - there is no difference between Happy Hours & Power Hours but the name had to be changed for Regulatory & Compliance reasons. You have no idea what a regulatory minefield it is these days.

    Streak Week was end of April & worked OK I thought. It's specifically for DYM's & SNG's but needs to be carefully managed as those formats are susceptible to collusion. It will probably return at some point.

    Note, by the way, that the current Sky Poker Premiership works quite well for DYM players as we can see by perusing the league tables.

    All types of players & play need to have Promotions. Cash, (by FAR the biggest segment, twice as big as MTT's & DYM's combined), MTT's & DYM/SNG's but there's only 12 months in a year, so everyone just needs to exercise a little patience, Sky Poker can't address every format & desire every month. Then there's those at both ends of the buy-in & affordability range, all of them need to be addressed. It can't be all about Team Big Boy.

    The last few months have specifically addressed the smaller bankrolls, with stuff like Escalator Freerolls & Eliminator Freerolls. It's essential that these guys get a chance to be involved in Promos from time to time, & I hope nobody begrudges them that.

    Sky Poker Promos don't just appear on a whim - typically they are planned 3 to 4 months in advance, as they have to be planned & go through all sorts of approval processes to ensure they are Compliant & don't fall foul of any Regulatory stuff, plus they need to be financially stress-tested to ensure they work. Assets also needs to be designed & created. In the current environment (think of the monstrous & unprecedented traffic swings we have seen this year) that's quite a tough gig, as traffic levels are a moving feast at the moment.

    Anyway, I'll ensure your comments are passed on to the guys with their hands on the tiller - Sam & James. And if you were not already aware, both of them are sharp & shrewd, & have considerable experience of managing an online card room, & I'm quite sure they will do the right thing. Mostly.

    Streak week was great but I think a fair portion of players lost faith for the reasons you've mentioned.

    Players who criticise Sky for running power hours for helping the bigger players just shouldn't be taken seriously.
    Every point you get is doubled whether you play high stakes/volume or low. It's illogical to make promos that give more money to those who take less....

    The current promo works well for the turbo grinders - it's been if anything detrimental to the other SnGs as people want to take as quickly as possible.

    The fact we're losing dym players is nothing to do with trends in online poker.
    Players are leaving because they either struggle to get their chosen games running or feel the rake is too high.
    Appreciate nothing will be done immediately but I don't agree that having the rake won't double the number of games running.

    In my head I'm convinced that the players we lost to other sites would still play here and the number of regular dyms would be a multiple of what they are now.
    I can see more players leaving and that's one do the main reasons I wrote this post.

    It wasn't simply to have lower rake/more promos for my benefit but to see if the situation can be revived.
  • Tikay10Tikay10 Member, Administrator, Moderator Posts: 158,756

    @darsh11

    All noted, but as far as I can recall, the current rake on DYM's has been unchanged for 13 years so I'm not sure we can say with certainty that players are now suddenly leaving due to high rake.
  • kapowblamzkapowblamz Member Posts: 1,526
    Trying to revive SNGs is like flogging a dead horse. The ceiling for how effective any change could be is absolutely miniscule.
  • sighcallsighcall Member Posts: 494
    Is the traffic for sit and gos on sky declining?
  • Tikay10Tikay10 Member, Administrator, Moderator Posts: 158,756
    sighcall said:

    Is the traffic for sit and gos on sky declining?

    @sighcall

    All traffic is in decline from the lockdown boomlet.

    I don't know how it is doing year on year, but at a guess I would say it has declined slightly. As a format, it's generally less popular these days, & I am pretty sure that applies to all Online Poker sites.
  • darsh11darsh11 Member Posts: 56
    @Tikay10

    You're right - I don't think rake is the sole problem but to twist your point completely I don't think we can rule it out just because the high rake was successful before.

    I have been playing on here since 2013 and never complained about the rake (although I always considered it to be high).

    Now that I can play multiple games at once, the things that put me off were:
    1) the software reliability (the layout is great but is prone to crashing)
    2) the lack of available games (I'm happy to play mtt but generally i mix with SnG.)
    3) the rake

    Not sure if I'm allowed to name players who've left the site but it would fascinating to hear from them too.
  • SnufferSnuffer Member Posts: 3,057
    Tikay10 said:


    @darsh11

    All noted, but as far as I can recall, the current rake on DYM's has been unchanged for 13 years so I'm not sure we can say with certainty that players are now suddenly leaving due to high rake.

    I recall only a few years ago the rake on the £1 & £2 games were 15%, the 25p games were a whopping 20%
  • MattBatesMattBates Member Posts: 4,118
    darsh11 said:

    I

    Tikay10 said:

    Promotions for SNG/DYMs & Happy Hours.

    I don't really want to go down this rabbit hole but someone needs to appear for the defence, & to provide a balanced discussion.

    As best as I can recall, Happy Hours (well, POWER hours actually) was last done in January & Streak Week (specifically for DYM & SNG players) was at the end of April, less than 4 months ago.

    Sky Poker were criticised for running Happy/Power Hours as "it only benefited the bigger players" but that's standard stuff & I daresay it will return at some stage. Of course, they get stick for every single Promo they run & so nothing new there.

    PS - there is no difference between Happy Hours & Power Hours but the name had to be changed for Regulatory & Compliance reasons. You have no idea what a regulatory minefield it is these days.

    Streak Week was end of April & worked OK I thought. It's specifically for DYM's & SNG's but needs to be carefully managed as those formats are susceptible to collusion. It will probably return at some point.

    Note, by the way, that the current Sky Poker Premiership works quite well for DYM players as we can see by perusing the league tables.

    All types of players & play need to have Promotions. Cash, (by FAR the biggest segment, twice as big as MTT's & DYM's combined), MTT's & DYM/SNG's but there's only 12 months in a year, so everyone just needs to exercise a little patience, Sky Poker can't address every format & desire every month. Then there's those at both ends of the buy-in & affordability range, all of them need to be addressed. It can't be all about Team Big Boy.

    The last few months have specifically addressed the smaller bankrolls, with stuff like Escalator Freerolls & Eliminator Freerolls. It's essential that these guys get a chance to be involved in Promos from time to time, & I hope nobody begrudges them that.

    Sky Poker Promos don't just appear on a whim - typically they are planned 3 to 4 months in advance, as they have to be planned & go through all sorts of approval processes to ensure they are Compliant & don't fall foul of any Regulatory stuff, plus they need to be financially stress-tested to ensure they work. Assets also needs to be designed & created. In the current environment (think of the monstrous & unprecedented traffic swings we have seen this year) that's quite a tough gig, as traffic levels are a moving feast at the moment.

    Anyway, I'll ensure your comments are passed on to the guys with their hands on the tiller - Sam & James. And if you were not already aware, both of them are sharp & shrewd, & have considerable experience of managing an online card room, & I'm quite sure they will do the right thing. Mostly.

    Streak week was great but I think a fair portion of players lost faith for the reasons you've mentioned.

    Players who criticise Sky for running power hours for helping the bigger players just shouldn't be taken seriously.
    Every point you get is doubled whether you play high stakes/volume or low. It's illogical to make promos that give more money to those who take less....

    The current promo works well for the turbo grinders - it's been if anything detrimental to the other SnGs as people want to take as quickly as possible.

    The fact we're losing dym players is nothing to do with trends in online poker.
    Players are leaving because they either struggle to get their chosen games running or feel the rake is too high.
    Appreciate nothing will be done immediately but I don't agree that having the rake won't double the number of games running.

    In my head I'm convinced that the players we lost to other sites would still play here and the number of regular dyms would be a multiple of what they are now.
    I can see more players leaving and that's one do the main reasons I wrote this post.

    It wasn't simply to have lower rake/more promos for my benefit but to see if the situation can be revived.
    Do you think the DYM format is as popular now over all sites as it was a year ago? 5years? 10 years? I don't have any data but from everything you see SNG and DYM in the traditional sense are a less popular format. Freezout MTTs are a less popular format. Times change and so do player preferences.

    There is always a trade off between winning players taking money out of the game and sites doing it through rake. Players want lower rake so they can be making more and sites are in existence to make money.

    With the software issues I would be careful for what you wish for, it puts off some regs so if the software was loads better or the rake was the lowest around the top regs would play here and games would get loads harder.

  • Tikay10Tikay10 Member, Administrator, Moderator Posts: 158,756
    darsh11 said:

    @Tikay10

    You're right - I don't think rake is the sole problem but to twist your point completely I don't think we can rule it out just because the high rake was successful before.

    I have been playing on here since 2013 and never complained about the rake (although I always considered it to be high).

    Now that I can play multiple games at once, the things that put me off were:
    1) the software reliability (the layout is great but is prone to crashing)
    2) the lack of available games (I'm happy to play mtt but generally i mix with SnG.)
    3) the rake

    Not sure if I'm allowed to name players who've left the site but it would fascinating to hear from them too.

    @darsh11

    For a variety of reasons, I'd rather you did not.

    But yes, players come & go, it was always so.

  • Tikay10Tikay10 Member, Administrator, Moderator Posts: 158,756
    edited August 2020
    Guys, I've been chatting with the Office about SNG & DYM traffic.

    I'm not going to give exact numbers, but I'm sure most of you trust me.

    Currently, against this time last year, SNG/DYM traffic is significantly up. "significantly" is double digit growth, & it's not small double digit, either.

    Why did so many (me included) think it had declined YOY?

    Two reasons, I suspect.

    1) Compared to the Boomlet, yes, it well down.

    2) Add in the time of year - this is always the worst month of the year, then add in the boomlet memories, & it SEEMS much worse than it actually is. And compared to 3 months ago it IS much worse.

    It's still not great, far from it, but it's way up on this time last year.
  • kapowblamzkapowblamz Member Posts: 1,526
    darsh11 said:


    3) the rake

    Negreanu confirmed a while ago that more rake is actually better, and he's very famous so I'm going to take his word for it.
  • YouMadYouMad Member Posts: 60
    Tikay10 said:



    Currently, against this time last year, SNG/DYM traffic is significantly up. "significantly" is double digit growth, & it's not small double digit, either.

    I suspected this (as per my earlier post). Just from locking at Sharky and the SNG counts of the top players from the last two years compared to this year, this makes sense.

    I think the OP was talking more about regular speed DYMs and SNGs, which I would suspect have been declining year on year. I for one moved over to playing mostly turbos in 2017 as that's where the volume and players were.

    As @MattBates states, times change and peoples preferences change. I think a speedier format is just more popular these days. I don't think a rake slash would bring hoards of players back to playing regular speed DYMs.
  • Tikay10Tikay10 Member, Administrator, Moderator Posts: 158,756
    edited August 2020
    YouMad said:

    Tikay10 said:



    Currently, against this time last year, SNG/DYM traffic is significantly up. "significantly" is double digit growth, & it's not small double digit, either.

    I suspected this (as per my earlier post). Just from locking at Sharky and the SNG counts of the top players from the last two years compared to this year, this makes sense.

    I think the OP was talking more about regular speed DYMs and SNGs, which I would suspect have been declining year on year. I for one moved over to playing mostly turbos in 2017 as that's where the volume and players were.

    As @MattBates states, times change and peoples preferences change. I think a speedier format is just more popular these days. I don't think a rake slash would bring hoards of players back to playing regular speed DYMs.
    @YouMad

    You may well be right. The figures I was given for for ALL SNG's & DYM's combined. I have no idea how the figures stack up for specific formats.

    It'd absolutely right though that times change & so do preferences. Personally, I loved playing them, & I've played tens of thousands of them, but they are not to everyone's taste. When Sky Poker put me out to grass, I'll be all over them again.
  • MAXALLYMAXALLY Member Posts: 17,483
    Congratulations on you topping League 2 in the latest Sky poker promotion @darsh11 .

    Enjoy your £300* winnings.

    *minus rake = £270

    ;)
  • bencbenc Member Posts: 1,053
    Faster paced games in most formats (zoom cash, spin n gos,husng, turbo mtts) is the way poker has evolved through a mixture of it being more fun for the casual player, rake generated for the sites and the ability to win in the short term more often when the skill edge is lower. I would imagine a large % of recs don't even give rake a consideration, the reality is dyms games are not the most fun in comparison to other games offered and wont be attracting recreationals as much as in the past because of this, attracting more regs to the games wont have any impact in the long term if recreationals are choosing not to play them as you'll just end up with an equilibrium where the weaker regs cant win and leave anyway you don't want loads of games running but it being five regs in every lobby waiting for one recreational .

    If other sites offer better volume low rake options in the same game seems like a no brainer to just play there? Personally if i played the dym format and wanted to play on sky i'd be putting a ton of off table work into how to beat the turbo format as they seem to run consistently enough to get good volume in (according to scope one player has played 34,878 games this year already) and having looked at one regs £11 turbo dym results over a decent sample theyre beatable. Sky promos actually are pretty good for dym players on the whole in my opinion things like streak week and premier league promo drive action there and are semi regular alongside being able to earn decent rakeback.

    Congrats on the league this week as well @darsh11 football took precedence for me yesterday, solid work putting in the big grinds everyday for last two weeks.
  • SwimmrSwimmr Member Posts: 14
    As I am probably the highest raking 6max sng player this year, I'll add my £0.02 in case any one cares to read, haven't read the whole thread so apologies if I'm repeating anything that's already been said.

    I have over the last year or two tried many different sites for 6max sngs, of which all seem to be declining in quantity and quality of games. Sites with higher traffic and lower rake seems to only appeal to regs and does very little to appeal to recreationals. Sites that seem to have leader board or rake races attached to them seem to kill them even further, Slayerv1fan has been streaming on twitch high stakes sngs on another site where the games are just 6 regs battling the majority of the time. So without meaning to sound like a shill for any poker site, lowering the rake or even the effective rake will not bring back the glory days of sngs. If you have any aspirations to make some side income or more I'd suggest branching out to MTTs or cash as well as still playing sngs, like me. Feel free to sharkscope me to see my results over the last couple of years, you'll be able to see where I made the transition to MTTs as well.

    An idea that I have seen another site that may be a good appeal to recreational players is a freeroll that is only open to those who have lost over a certain amount of money in the previous week, I'm sure the people in charge of promos are probably aware of these and have there reasons for not wanting something like this, if not @Tikay10 I'm sure will pass it on.

    TL;DR sngs are dead move on.
  • ThuddThudd Member Posts: 4
    Tikay said the last power hours were in January – 8 months ago. That is poor to be honest. You are not giving the people who put a lot of rake into the system any benefit. Looking at other ways to bring new players in is great, but you need to look after the people already here, because when those players go then you have a lot of empty seats and nobody wants to play on a poker site with not a lot of players. Sky have drove a lot of regulars away by treating them as an underling to new players.

    I was off for a few years and I have only just came back recently, I am playing on another site just now because there is not a lot of action on Sky, and reasons given by Sky like ‘power hours only benefit high volume players’ are ridiculous. Everyone benefits because those double points are open to everyone who plays those games. It is not our problem if some play more than others. I’ve got news for you, when a group of players are putting in a lot of the rake, playing daily and putting in a grind, why should they not benefit more than a new player who does not contribute the same?
    Help me understand this please.

    Pokerstars did the same years back with their Supernova and it cost them a few players and sponsored pros but they could get away with it because they had a stranglehold on the market, these procedures of punishing the regs should not apply to all poker sites and it is dangerous for a smaller poker site to think they can get away with it too.

    In their quest to bring in new players, Sky have ignored the regular players, or taken them for granted at the very least.
  • Jac35Jac35 Member Posts: 6,471
    Thudd said:

    Tikay said the last power hours were in January – 8 months ago. That is poor to be honest. You are not giving the people who put a lot of rake into the system any benefit. Looking at other ways to bring new players in is great, but you need to look after the people already here, because when those players go then you have a lot of empty seats and nobody wants to play on a poker site with not a lot of players. Sky have drove a lot of regulars away by treating them as an underling to new players.

    I was off for a few years and I have only just came back recently, I am playing on another site just now because there is not a lot of action on Sky, and reasons given by Sky like ‘power hours only benefit high volume players’ are ridiculous. Everyone benefits because those double points are open to everyone who plays those games. It is not our problem if some play more than others. I’ve got news for you, when a group of players are putting in a lot of the rake, playing daily and putting in a grind, why should they not benefit more than a new player who does not contribute the same?
    Help me understand this please.

    Pokerstars did the same years back with their Supernova and it cost them a few players and sponsored pros but they could get away with it because they had a stranglehold on the market, these procedures of punishing the regs should not apply to all poker sites and it is dangerous for a smaller poker site to think they can get away with it too.

    In their quest to bring in new players, Sky have ignored the regular players, or taken them for granted at the very least.

    You seem a very cheerful chap

    There are promotions every month alongside the rakeback you receive

    just look at the promotion this month
    If you a high volume player you stand to win a good amount on top of your rakeback

    Last month gave all players a good chance to win

    It’s pretty well balanced and i disagree entirely with your comments
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