Cardsforfun Drives Action & Fun: High-Stakes Cash Game Review
GipsyTeam
21 January, 14:42
A new VIP named "cardsforfun" arrived at CoinPoker, and the regulars lined up to play. Ultimately, Kayhan Mokri triumphed, winning two pots over $1 million in a week.
In mid-December, an unknown amateur with the nickname cardsforfun appeared at the high-stakes CoinPoker tables. His first opponents at the $1,000/$2,000 tables were regulars PencilArms (rumored to be Prudently on PokerStars) and KennedyP (KennedyPK97 on PokerStars).
For KennedyP, the meeting with his new opponent turned out to be extremely successful – at one point, his stack exceeded $1 million.
The largest pot size during the session topped $440k.
Cardsforfun three-bet preflop and bet every street after. On the river, Kenndy reraised with the nuts and was called.
The match against PencilArms started much better for cardsforfun. At one point, he already had about $1 million at the table.
Cardsforfun called the three-bet and re-raised his opponent's continuation bet on the flop. PencilArms called and then check-called the turn and river.
A selection of the most interesting hands can be found on the BobbyJamesPoker channel.
The biggest pot of the session went to PencilArms, and this hand began his comeback.
PencilArms finished the match with a stack of $1.75 million.
A few days later, cardsforfun had a second fight against KennedyP, but this one didn't last long.
Cardsforfun returned to the tables in the new year and took on all the strongest regulars.
Clickr four-bet preflop and made a small continuation bet on the flop. On the turn, cardsforfun check-shoved, and was quickly called. The river was dealt twice, and Clickr held both times.
In a 3-bet pot, Linus three-barreled all-in on the river.
To win the hand, cardsforfun had to hit the nuts.
Wiktor Malinowski tried to bluff his opponent, but a ten and healthy kicker was enough to be called.
Cardsforfun raised and made a continuation bet, the turn was checked, and on the river, Viktor bet $40k into a $32k pot.
Linus ended up outperforming everyone and finished with a stack of around $500k. Cardsforfun put the rest of his stack in preflop.
Cardsforfun found this action game too cheap.
limitless: cardsforfun, give me a rematch HU limitless: You crushed me last session :D cardsforfun: Is $200k the highest on here? I wanna play heads-up for $500k or $1 million Enlight: 200k highest yep Enlight: But you can probably ask to add bigger Enlight: They will follow request cardsforfun: I've got to go. I'm down for 500k-1M, let me know limitless: I'm in.
CoinPoker quickly added $1,250/$2,500 and $2,500/$5,000 tables at 200bb depth. Cardsforfun's first opponent at the new level was Kayhan Mokri.
The first significant pot went to cardsforfun. Kayhan decided to aggressively play with his deuces. It cost him a pot of $651,000.
But almost immediately, the Norwegian high roller won one of the largest pots (for Hold'em) in online history.
In one day, cardsforfun lost almost $800k. $500k went to Mokri, and the rest to Linus.
In the following days, play continued at the $2,500/$5,000 tables, but without cardsforfun. A player with the nickname ATAKA expressed his willingness to compete. This is widely rumored to be Trueteller.
One of the most talked-about hands was the one Kayhan won with .
"I had 97 of the wrong suit," ATAKA told GipsyTeam. "I thought he'd often have K5, K4, Q5, Q4, K3. I should have pushed myself. The game came together by chance, and there's a big VIP playing (besides me). But I haven't had a chance to play him yet. Kayhan has lost about $700k over several sessions. Lots of money, few buy-ins."
Mobius Poker tweeted, drawing readers' attention to the huge rake.
"Timofey (Trueteller) and I get 90% rakeback," Kayhan reassured the worried audience. "The rake is completely reasonable."
"They gave 90% rakeback btw, for 40k+ stakes," Wiktor Malinowski added.
– To give some context, as this post is very misleading 🧵
Nosebleed HU cash games are an extremely tricky environment for any site to manage. On CoinPoker, currently run by far the biggest games in the world, with a VIP who specifically requested to play super high stakes.
Amateurs love playing heads-up, but the reality is that today’s top regs are exceptionally strong. Without adjustments, amateurs are simply burning money too fast & games will die. On top of that, there is significant bumhunting.
This creates a dynamic where recreational players lose at extreme rates, often 20bb+/100 hands. At these stakes, that can mean avg losses of well over $100k per hour. No recreational player will sustain that for long.
The simplified solution is to give the recreational player enough money back to balance this out. The regs are making money anyway, and they simply will not play unless the games are EV+, which is completely understandable, as this is their livelihood. In this specific hand f.e. the pros got 90%+ back manually, Mobius Poker.
In nosebleeds, the rake needs to be set at a level that allows the site to return enough value to the VIP, such that their effective loss rate becomes reasonable and they can enjoy playing for longer, ideally at only a small loss.
Obviously, this is much better solved via product features. But until the software fully supports this, it has to be handled manually by the VIP team after the fact.
Phenom Poker, thanks for the input, but your rake cap does not matter much if nobody is playing on your site?
Some readers had trouble with the currency conversion...
“Imagine reading this hand history and only thinking about the rake,” Josh Arie was amazed. “Dude bets 80k with no diamond, gets cashed and wins, and all you are thinking about is the rake."
"A lot of people are saying it's Trueteller. I'm not 100% sure, but I'm inclined to believe that's the case. A few years ago, he was the main boss, playing with OtB_RedBaron and other top players. Then he was gone online for six years, and now he's back and immediately started playing for $1 million. It's simply unbelievable. I'd be thrilled if Trueteller really did return."
In the latest session, Kaihan and ATAKA got it all in preflop for a pot of over $1M.
Kayhan 5-bet all-in.
Amid constant action at the high-stakes tables, CoinPoker has decided to raise the rake. George Froggatt announced the news on Twitter :
– CoinPoker increased rake at HS significantly overnight – almost all games 5k+ are unbeatable
They've listened to regs in the past – but most important thing right now is don't mindlessly play these tables and give them a data point to justify the changes
“Is it not still 0.5BB cap?” a reader clarified in the comments.
The caps on all the 7max tables changed from:
$5knl 0.2bb -> 1bb
$10knl 0.15bb -> 1bb
$20knl 0.1bb -> 1bb
4max seems to have increased to 0.75bb too
– Maybe rakeback incentives have concomitantly increased?
For HU, yes, but for these 6-max tables, no.
Charlie Carrel also covered this briefly in a new video:
CoinPoker essentially says, "Okay, we’re trying to figure out what’s best. We’ve got a bunch of these whales coming in, losing millions of dollars to you guys, and we’re trying to figure out what’s best because we have to give loads and loads of rakeback to these whales so they’re not losing at such a huge rate that the games just die."
And at the same time, they’re saying, "I think one big blind isn’t that much." It’s definitely much higher than competitors, but a one big blind cap is still beatable. I think it turns into, if anyone speaks to, like, 4BB per 100, roughly. It depends if there’s ante, depends on some other stuff, but roughly four big blinds per hundred. It’s definitely beatable if there’s a whale on the table that’s losing like 30BB, 20BB per 100. It’s beatable for the best regs on the table, and for the worst ones, it’s not.
But here’s the thing. I don’t think CoinPoker is just doing this as a money grab like a lot of other sites have been doing, because they still have tables which are just like for rake battles, which are basically near-zero rake, where you can genuinely just watch the best heads-up players in the world, like Linus and Asianflushie, just battle. They’re paying essentially zero rake on the site, and they’re just playing.
First of all, that’s great to watch and really, really good. I feel like they’re not doing a good enough job marketing the fact that the best players in the world are playing for hundreds of thousands of dollars on their site. I feel like that should be a much bigger thing if I were part of their marketing team. But it doesn’t seem like they’re just grabbing money.
A day later, CoinPoker clarified the situation in their weekly newsletter.
For cash games at $25/$50 and above, we’re introducing Personalized Rewards.
Most poker reward systems rely on generalized rakeback models. We take a different approach. We recognise the crucial role individual action players play in creating, sustaining, and growing high-stakes games.
Action players will be fairly compensated and rewarded to make sure the games are sustainable long-term.
Table Size & Rake Adjustments At $25/$50 and higher stakes, all 7-max tables will transition to 6-max.
We are also introducing new NLH rake caps:
▫️ 0.5 BB for heads-up play ▫️ 0.6 BB with 3 or more players
These caps are designed to strike a balance. They allow players of all levels to remain profitable while enabling us to properly reward those who drive action and keep games running.
For games without action players, the effective rake will be significantly reduced, as there’s no need to cover additional rewards.
For regwars, a different set of benefits is offered now.
We love poker, and the players who elevate it. So, CoinPoker doesn’t only support action players, but also the professionals who transform poker into an art form. We’re happy to reward these skilled competitors.
Beyond providing fair, safe tables, we offer these pros lucrative rewards that surpass our normal rakeback. CoinPoker’s team customizes these additional benefits for games at $25/$50 or above.
This is our player-first approach in action, and it’s why we’re the trusted platform for high-stakes clashes.
