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Expekt.com Starts Live Dealer Casino

A couple of months ago Expekt.com decided to update their online casino software and added a Microgaming powered casino to their portfolio. The old casino that is powered by TAIN is still available for those who want’s to use that but we can’t imagine anyone would pick that over the Microgaming version.

As they started using the Microgaming software for their new casino they also added a live dealer casino which should be very interesting for casino players who are mainly interested in playing blackjack, roulette and baccarat. All of those three games are available as live dealer casino games where you actually see a dealer giving you your cards via live stream. Many online casino customers prefer this to the traditional casino games due to the fact that they can be sure that the games are not rigged in any way. The only downside to these live dealer games is that they move a lot slower than the traditional versions as you actually have to sit and wait for the other players to make their decisions. But that’s a small price to pay for the exceptional feel you get from these games in our opinion. When playing these live dealer games you actually get the feel of being present at an actual casino. It doesn’t get any closer to reality than that.

€200 Bonus for New Players
As a new customer at the Expekt Casino you will be able to take advantage of a 100% first deposit bonus up to €200. This means that a €200 first deposit will give you a starting balance of €400. This is a great way to get started and try out the brand new Microgaming powered online casino and live dealer games at Expekt.com. This bonus is only available to players signing up using the Expekt referrer code EXPPBS.

Expekt.com Opens Loyalty Store for Poker Players

The online gaming company Expekt.com was bought up by Mangas Capital Gaming about a year ago. Since then we have seen a lot changes, the latest one being a complete makeover of the website. Another thing that has been added that was not available before is a VIP Loyalty Store for poker players, in our opinion this was way over due so we are happy to see it’s finally been added.

From now on players who are loyal to the Expekt.com poker room will be able to use their player points to buy cool stuff from the VIP Store. In the VIP Store you will be able to find anything from books to a PlayStation 3. If there is anything that you are missing in the VIP Store you are advised to contact the staff at Expekt and they will do their best to add your product to the store, now that’s a great service.

If you do not yet have an account at Expekt.com it’s a great time to get one now that they have the VIP Store in place. Don’t forget to use the Expekt referrer code EXPPBS when creating your account as that code will ensure that you get a 100% bonus up to $600 when making your first deposit at Expekt Poker.

2010 WSOP Qualifiers at Full Tilt and Betfair Poker

As the 2010 World Series of Poker is approaching some of the bigger poker rooms are starting to get their 2010 WSOP satellites up and running. So far there aren’t so many rooms that have started their satellites but two of the ones that have started is Betfair Poker and Full Tilt Poker have the schedule ready and are going to start running their qualifiers in April.

2010 WSOP Satellites at Full Tilt Poker
Full Tilt Poker is one of the poker rooms sending the highest number of players to the WSOP every year, only PokerStars are sending more. This year Full Tilt are going to offer a large variety of ways to qualify for the WSOP. If you are interested in learning more about all the different WSOP satellites at Full Tilt this year you should check out our 2010 WSOP Satellite Schedule for Full Tilt Poker where you will find all the information you need.

2010 WSOP Satellites at Betfair Poker
For those of you who live outside of the US we can really recommend qualifying for the 2010 WSOP via Betfair Poker as they are offering some great WSOP packages for the qualifying players. An interesting offer at Betfair Poker right now is the one where you will get your seat the the 2010 WSOP Main Event for free if you generate 450.000 Betfair points between the 3rd of March and 3rd of May, this equals an 80% rakeback deal. If you want to learn more about the current WSOP promotions going on at Betfair Poker right now you should check out the 2010 WSOP Satellites Schedule for Betfair Poker.

Annie Duke Wins NBC National Heads-Up Championship

All of the poker elite was present at the 2010 NBC National Heads-Up Championship which took place last week. In the final heads-up match Annie Duke was playing Erik Seidel and she ended up winning that match and the $500.000 first prize, Seidel got $250.000 for his second place finish. In the semi finals Scotty Nguyen and Dennis Philips were eliminated by the two finalists, both of them got $125.000 for their efforts. 16 out of the 64 starting contestants ended up in the money.

Top 16 results in the 2010 NBC National Heads-Up Championship:

1. Annie Duke, $500 000
2. Erik Seidel, $250 000
3. Scotty Nguyen, $125 000
4. Dennis Phillips, $125 000
5. Jerry Yang, $75 000
6. Doyle Brunson, $75 000
7. Jason Mercier, $75 000
8. Peter Eastgate, $75 000
9. Paul Wasicka, $25 000
10. Eli Elezra, $25 000
11. Annette Obrestad, $25 000
12. Barry Greenstein, $25 000
13. Gabe Kaplan, $25 000
14. Phil Laak, $25 000
15. Chris Moneymaker, $25 000
16. Jamie Gold, $25 000

PokerStars Cancel LAPT Event

The PokerStars.com LAPT Viña Del Mar was scheduled to be held between the 19th and 23rd of March. But with only 2 weeks before the event was supposed to start PokerStars have decided to postpone the event. The reason behind this decision is the recent earthquake in Chile which caused a lot of destruction.

In an official statement PokerStars said: “Our thoughts and condolences goes out to those who have been affected in this terrible natural disaster”.

It is not yet clear if the event is going to be completely canceled or if it’s just postponed and will be played later this year.

Hoyt Corkins Topping “Player of the Year”

The US poker player Hoyt Corkins is currently topping the Bluff Magazine “Player of the Year” list two months into this year. Corkins got of to a really good start in 2010. First he won the WPT Southern Poker Championships and then he finished second in the high roller event at the NAPT Venetian last week.

Winning tournaments and ending up in the money is nothing new to Hoyt Corkins who played at a final table in a side event of the 1989 WSOP. He currently holds 2 bracelets and he has 2 WPT titles under his belt.

“Player of the Year” is based on results in land based tournaments from the big international tournaments. The winners the last 3 years are Jason Mercier (2009), John Phan (2008) and Bill Edler (2007).

Below are the current standings in the 2010 Player of the Year race.

1. Hoyt Corkins
2. Harrison Gimbel
3. Daniel Shak
4. Thomas Marchese
5. Michael Binger
6. Tyron Crost
7. Jon Kantor
8. Mike McDonald
9. Samuel Stein
10. Michael Watson

Full Tilt Hosting Mini FTOPS – FullTilt Referral Code

On the 10th of March a new season of Mini FTOPS will be starting at Full Tilt Poker. The concept behind the Mini FTOPS series is the same as the “real” FTOPS series. There will be a lot of Full Tilt pro’s participating in the various events and each event will have it’s own host which is one of the main Full Tilt professionals. The big difference between FTOPS and Mini FTOPS is the buy-in amount for the tournaments, the Mini FTOPS is aimed at those players at Full Tilt with smaller bankrolls.

The tourmament buy-ins will start at $20+2 for freezeout tournaments and $10+1 for rebuy tournaments. The most expensive buy-in will cost you $250+16. The main event is going to be held on the 21st of March and the buy-in for that event will be $50+5.

Don’t miss out on this amazing opportunity to participate in tournaments with large guaranteed prize pools with low buy-ins. If you do not yet have an account at Full Tilt then you should use the Full Tilt Poker referral code TILTME600 when creating your account as this will ensure that you get the 100% bonus up to $600 that is currently the best possible bonus available at Full Tilt.

PokerStars’ 40th Billionth Hand Has Come and Gone

The long anticipated 40 billionth online poker hand, aka F40, at the number one online poker site materialized on Friday, February 19th at 12:43 p.m. ET on a $2/$4 No-Limit Hold ‘em table. Player “Senecady” was the recipient of the 40 billionth winning hand prize which left him $24,000 richer. Also rewarded for their participation in the monumental hand was every other player dealt into the hand. For each VIP point awarded to each player on the previous 40 hands that took place at that table, $400 was paid out. Second place in the hand was “thecooler992,” who ended up with $15,590.20.

Ultimately, Senecady won with a full house, the pot valuing $401. At the time, around 280,000 players were logged on and 41,000 tables were running, these numbers rising over the previous couple of days as the 40 billionth hand approached. While PokerStars hadn’t seen 50,000 players between the dates of December 21st and January 30th, which could be due in part to the launch of rival poker site Full Tilt’s Rush Poker. However, beginning January 31st through February 19th, more than 50,000 players logged on in only eight days, according to PokerScout, official stat keeper of pretty much all online poker activity. Also worthy of notable mention is that at the time the coveted hand finally broke through, there were 128 PokerStars users on the waiting list to play at the table, Naef III, where the hand was dealt.

The celebration culminated with a joint party for F40 and the 4th anniversary of the Sunday Million last Sunday. This was the biggest Sunday Million event ever to take place and featured a $4 million prize pool and $1 first place payout. Now that the fun’s over at PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker is offering a Fast $50 Bonus to all players in celebration of the new Rush Poker.

New Way to Play Poker: the Poker Pros Network

Just when the online poker industry, which grew so fast to begin with, is starting to really feel the need for something new, the Poker Pros Network, or PPN, is introduced. This completely novel and innovative approach to online poker affords players the opportunity to truly play against pro poker players 24/7, not just wait until you happen upon one in another online poker room.

PPN allows players to choose from 35 different poker professionals, selecting one as your home poker room. You will then be invited to join private games and other events. Alternatively, you can just join the PPN main site. Both options give you 24/7 access to all 35 pros.

The 35 poker pros range in experience levels and have chosen to play exclusively at PPN. Some of the biggest names include hall of famers like TJ Cloutier, Marsha Waggoner, and Barbara Enright. Other names include tourney stars such as David Levi, Paul Darden, and Chris Reslock. Poker authors and coaches are also available, for instance, Chris “Fox” Wallace and Vince Burgio, as well as online experts, Josh Brikis, Brandon Jarrett, and Krazy Kanuck.

The opening first deposit bonus is worth up to $500 (Poker Bonus Code: PPN500) and they have some pretty big events scheduled like monthly Pro Bounties taking place every Saturday at 3:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m. ET and the Monthly Grand Bounty Tournament that runs the first Monday of each month.

These pro bounty events are unique as well. For weekly events, each pro has a bounty point value on their head and for each pro you knock out, you’ll receive those points in addition to a cash value. The points will accumulate all month and then serve as a multiplier for the cash bounties in the following month’s Grand Bounty Tournament. These tournaments will be broadcast live on PPN radio.

This is a different concept and may or may not prove successful. It does sound interesting though, and you should definitely look into participating if it intrigues you.

Bodog changes rake structure, micro stakes players pay

Bodog recently changed the way in which it calculates how much rake to take from every pot in cash games where a flop has been dealt. Bodog did not come forth with an official statement about this change, but it was noticed in a review of rake and rakeback for micro stakes players on FirstTimePokerPlayer.com. The article shows precisely how much rake different online poker rooms charge at the micro stakes (up to NL25).

According to the article Bodog Poker only charged an average amount of rake of 2.1% with their old rake structure at NL10 games ($0.05/$0.10 blinds). This was a very low rake amount that made Bodog cheaper to play at for NL10 players than most other online poker rooms, even if they would be playing on a rakeback account somewhere else.

Bodog’s new rake structure is similar to that of PokerStars for no-limit games. At NL10 the biggest difference with the old rake structure is a rake cap of $3 instead of $0.10. Although the new structure is still very attractive for low stakes no-limit players (on average 4.1% rake is charged at 10nl with this rake structure) this still means that NL10 players on Bodog all of a sudden have to pay almost twice as much in rake.

At mid to high stakes games the change in rake structure will have no influence on the amount of rake paid. At these stakes the rake cap remains the same.

The impact of this change on the win rate of NL10 players playing poker at Bodog is enormous. With the new rake structure they would be winning around 9 big blinds/100 hands less than at the time when the old rake structure was still in use. This is the same as the win rate of a solid winning player! Despite the impact of the change in rake structure, low stakes poker players don’t seem to have noticed it as discussions on major poker forums have stayed out.

When asking Bodog support why Bodog made the change to their rake structure that will cause a drop in the win rate of micro stakes players they answered assuring that:

“There is no reason for us to put our reputation in jeopardy. We collect our 5% and never exceed $3.00 per pot, or a small tournament fee, regardless of who wins or who loses. The rest of the money is divided between our players. The only way we benefit is by making, and keeping, more customers. Fixing hands would only lose us customers and is neither ethical nor sound business. We have an excellent reputation in the industry and very loyal customers – we would not risk that for anything.”

This reaction makes you wonder how often they get complaints from so called ‘rigtards’, people who believe online poker is rigged, and it also shows that Bodog support is not aware of the low rake percentages the old rake structure resulted in for low stakes players. Unfortunately an additional question asking what makes Bodog more attractive than other online poker rooms for micro stakes players now they changed their rake structure was not answered.

The old rake structure at Bodog could easily compete with rakeback programs on other online poker rooms for low stakes players. The micro stakes rake review mentions that a room like Full Tilt Poker would have had to give their 10nl players an overall rakeback percentage of 67% to be equally as attractive for example. With the change Bodog loses this attractiveness for micro stakes players: the big difference in amount of rake charged with some other online poker rooms is now gone and at the same time Bodog does not offer a very beneficial VIP-program like for instance PokerStars does.

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