House players

[MissCrissy]

How do you know if a site is using house players? What should you do if you suspect it? What's a good strategy to get around it or use it to your advantage?

[The Professor]

to be honest it's not that common anymore - especially on the bigger sites like Pokerstars, Full Tilt, Titan Poker etc as they don't need house players as the high traffic they get already does the job of house players.

And the thing to remember with House players is that they are just normal players who have the same chance of winning as you - they are given no edge by the poker room - they are just simply paid a small hourly rate to play at that particular room and to start tables to get them going etc.

In fact you may well have a slight advantage over these players as they you may catch them at the end of a long "shift" when they are tired - on the other side they are usually pretty good players as they virtually do it full time, and a pretty proficient at not losing money.

In terms of strategy - no change - just stick to your normal strategy, just give them a little respect as a decent player and know that they probably won't be chasing cards against the odds etc.

[MissCrissy]

Thank you, Professor. Great advice. I guess they really wouldn't be necessary, if a site has quite a bit of turnover already. And if you're using all the techniques you teach here, knowing if a house player is present is a moot point. But for the sake of argument, how might you recognize one?

[PokerPrincess]

It's very hard to recognize them by any specific means. However, in the newer sites if you see 1 player sitting alone at a table for any length of time, then you can be pretty sure that they are a house player trying to get another table started.

That's about the only way you will be able to tell as was said above, they play just like you or I and they have the same chances of winning or losing. One other way of possibly telling is a player that is playing at the limit tables for instance and only playing the BB, SB and Premium hands, that could possibly be a house player as well. The reason I say that is because they know they have to spend so many hours at the tables and they are not going to risk losing too many hands because, after all, they are playing with their own money.

[MissCrissy]

Thank you, PokerPrincess. So in order to tell, I'd have to pay attention to who has been hanging around for a while. And like I said to the professor, it's really a moot point. But if I may ask one more stupid question, what are BB, SB and Premium hands?

[RiverQueen]

Well, since I'm here I will answer that for you. SB is the Small Blind, the person next to the dealer, BB is the Big Blind, the person two seats from the dealer and Premium Hands are AA, KK, QQ, AK, KQ, QJ or sometimes suited connectors depending on how the table is playing.

I hope that helps and if you have any more questions, please keep them coming.

[najdoyza]

With the recent drop in players at so many sites now that they are not taking US players anymore I wonder if there will be a resurgence in house players? Stands to reason that they didn't need them when traffic was high, but they cut off hundreds of thousands of players and that HAS to make dent.

[RiverQueen]

Well you know najdoyza I think it will either go one way or totally the opposite. You see my way of thinking is that those sites that are not allowing U.S. players will eventually end up going the way of JetSet.

If they start using house players which are actually called prop players and they are getting no one to their sites to sit at these tables then they will be throwing good money after bad IMHO (in my humble opinion).

[ScootScoot]

Originally Posted by RiverQueen

Well, since I'm here I will answer that for you. SB is the Small Blind, the person next to the dealer, BB is the Big Blind, the person two seats from the dealer and Premium Hands are AA, KK, QQ, AK, KQ, QJ or sometimes suited connectors depending on how the table is playing.

I hope that helps and if you have any more questions, please keep them coming.

Is the blind the same as the ante? I looked at the list of terms on the site and the definition of blind didn't help me any. The nearest I could relate it to was the ante.