'Stars support - 1st class as usual

[Kurn]

About a week ago, I was playing a $70 + 6 6-max SNG on 'Stars, when 2 players began chatting. The first said something like "If you click *block chat* on a player, he can't see what you say." (yes, this is what he believed) and the two proceed to talk about their cards and discuss teaming up to eliminate the rest of us. While playing, I e-mailed supprt. Ended up busting out 4th, and basically let it slide when I hadn't heard anything. Until just a few minutes ago, that is. Below is 'Stars' response.

Hello Richard,

First thank you for taking time to report your concerns. We take the
integrity of our games seriously and appreciate vigilant players who help
us monitor the games. I have completed my review of the
accounts 'setsrnice1' and 'oldstyle58'.

Here at PokerStars we are able to replay hands with all cards face up. To
review this case I retrieved all hands played by these players to date.
There was none; this tournament is the first time that they have ever
played together.

While cheats may be able to hide what they are doing from other players,
when the cards are turned face up (as in our review), there is little they
can do without raising red flags. This is where we have an advantage over
B&M cardrooms, since the players cannot toss the evidence in the muck! In
tournament play, we look for a variety of collusive activities, including:

1) Best hand play, where the "team" only plays the better of their two
hands
2) Softplay, where the "team" does not bet against each other
3) Chip dumping, where the larger stacked player dumps off chips to the
lower stacked player to help him survive

Obviously these players were blatantly using all three of these plays to
their advantage in contravention of our rules. As a result, they have
been permanently barred from our site.

In addition, we have disqualified 'oldstyle58' from this tournament, and
advanced you from fourth place to second. Your account has been credited
$147.00 for the prize money.

I would like to thank you once again for taking the time to report your
concerns to us. Although we have a number of tools in place to help us
find cheaters, we still value the extra eyes on the table provided to us
by concerned players like yourself. Players like you make us better!

If you have any other questions, please let us know.

Regards,

Dan C
PokerStars Support Team


Still Number One.

[jillaj]

Man are these guys brilliant. I hope they took all their money too.

[Talking Poker]

That awesome.

Stars' response is good, but those two idiots playing like that is truly awesome.

Every time I think I've met the stupidest person on the planet, not a day goes by before I am proven wrong.

[Kurn]

One of the idiots crippled me *because* I could see their chat.

I'm in the BB with A7o with 4 left. Idiot 1 UTGfolds, Idiot 2 on buton says "A2, should I do it" Idiot 1 says, "go for it, he'll fold."

I call knowing I have him dominated and he flops a duck.

[de-coder]

that is awesome. Please post the whole tournament history for those of us who have too much time on their hands and need a good laugh.

[bunny]

Were you silent the whole time or did you, or anyone else, at any point let them know you could see their chat?

This is the reason some of my friends don't like to play online poker, for fear there are dumpers and cheaters, if not chatting in chatbox, they will do it by phone or messengers.

PokerStars.

[Robbr25]

Dude that is freakin great.
+++REP to PokerStars

[melioris]

that is fantastic. Stars is a firts rate organization.

But I agree, the best part of this story are the dummies. I hope took some time off work and followed these two clowns from table to table for a couple of days before you notified support.