Hello, fellow mobsters. I haven't been playing much recently but decided to get back into action. I decided to surf the internet to see what's new in the world of online poker. I didn't find much new, however I came across a poker related site, where you can buy bubble protection for a tourney that you plan to play. That is, if you buy this insurance and get eliminated within certain percent range before prizes, you will get your buy-in back. Frankly, I don't know if this site is actually new (maybe you already know about it) but this is the first time I see it. So I decided to share this finding with you. To be on the safe side, I will not post the link, but you can easily find it by googling the term "bubble protection". And I didn't see anything there that can harm BRM business. Now I will have to revise my Holdem Manager data to see how often I am eliminated on the bubble. That is, to see if this site is of any use for me. In general, I am overwhelmed by the amount of the poker and around-poker sites. We have strategy sites, NDB-sites, tracking sites, staking sites, chip-me up sites... Now bubble protection site. What's gonna come next?
Joined: May '09
Location: India
Age: 37 (M)
Posts: 4873
found this site few months ago but i dont play tournaments so i just ignored it. anyway i dont think its gonna be beneficial for players and if it wasnt profitable for someone why would they open such a site. edit- i think it might benefit new players who play scared near the bubble and look to finish itm instead of winning the game, but you should be aiming for win anyways.
Joined: Aug '10
Location: Germany
Age: 52 (M)
Posts: 2219
I think this no option for the future. What is coming next? Pre-Bubble protection etc.? Poker is a game not without a risk and at the bubble you have a lot options to play a good game.
Joined: Feb '08
Location: Switzerland
Age: 34 (M)
Posts: 210
Basically it will just shift the bubble to a new range. I have no idea about the price of such protection but I don't think it can be profitable for the players who buy it.
Joined: Oct '09
Location: Spain
Age: 60 (M)
Posts: 2851
I lokked it all up, and it goes like this:
If the bubble in a tournament pays out to 10% of the field, bubbleprotection increases the bubble to 20% of the field. (always bubble +10% of field) So if you play a 1.000 runner tournament, you will get your buy-in back if you go out in 200th. For this service they charge 12% of your buy-in.
Don't know how they calculated the math on that to make it profitable for them, but it must be.
"Might" be a good deal for players who bubble often because they play a "tight" online game, hoping to cash big once in a while?
Or a player who goes over his bankroll to try a $109 buy-in for example, and wants to heve better odds in not losing the entire amount?
Joined: Apr '09
Location: Australia
Age: 40 (M)
Posts: 6483
Posted by IslandJack: Don't know how they calculated the math on that to make it profitable for them, but it must be.
It's a very basic calculation
Posted by IslandJack: If the bubble in a tournament pays out to 10% of the field, bubbleprotection increases the bubble to 20% of the field. (always bubble +10% of field) So if you play a 1.000 runner tournament, you will get your buy-in back if you go out in 200th. For this service they charge 12% of your buy-in.
Simply - they've provided insurance that covers 10% of the possible spots you can finish in and they charge you a 12% fee - so let's say in a MTT of 100 people, if everyone bought that insurance, exactly 10 of those people would receive an insurance payout, however - since they took a 12% share off everyone - it gives the "house" a 2% edge on every bet hedged with them.
Basically - they're assuming everyone is roughly even chance to finish in that just before the bubble, 10%, bracket. Well - at least within a 2% margin of error anyhow.
I would say they've placed their margin fairly wisely tbh. And like anything with a house edge, I think statistically you would lose out by buying this protection.
However - I guess if you checked through your HEM - what you're looking for is this: Do you finish in the '2nd 10%' bracket of MTTs MORE than 10% of the time? In fact, to cover their edge, I should say MORE than 12% of the time..
Joined: Jan '11
Location: United States
Age: 60 (M)
Posts: 3361
I say it actually gives the house a bit more cash based on how many players buy this "Bubble Insurance" Just like jessthehuman stated if there are a 100 players and say only 20 buy the insurance, but only let's say 2 to 5 can make this bubble reimbursement. Well, the ones that don't paid for their insurance plus their buyin. I believe that's correct! Jess seems like he could answer this for sure.
Joined: Mar '09
Location: Greece
Age: 47 (F)
Posts: 14136
I had seen this some time back when they were still making the project but didnt know they finally launched.
It kinda gives you a boost when you get those good hands you want to play just before the bubble or even earlier. It can help you reach bigger payouts, i think.
Joined: Feb '08
Location: Switzerland
Age: 34 (M)
Posts: 210
Does the site give back the full buy-in (tournament fee included) when you have the insurance ? Also, the money used to buy this protection isn't added to the prize pool so it's a clear win for the poker room.
Joined: Mar '11
Location: Germany
Age: 55 (M)
Posts: 1242
Interesting thing. For sure the poker room will make money with this, otherwise they won´t do it. Nevertheless, if a player often reaches this zone, it may be worth to consider this insurance.
Joined: Oct '09
Location: Spain
Age: 60 (M)
Posts: 2851
Posted by jessthehuman:
Posted by IslandJack: Don't know how they calculated the math on that to make it profitable for them, but it must be.
It's a very basic calculation
Posted by IslandJack: If the bubble in a tournament pays out to 10% of the field, bubbleprotection increases the bubble to 20% of the field. (always bubble +10% of field) So if you play a 1.000 runner tournament, you will get your buy-in back if you go out in 200th. For this service they charge 12% of your buy-in.
Simply - they've provided insurance that covers 10% of the possible spots you can finish in and they charge you a 12% fee - so let's say in a MTT of 100 people, if everyone bought that insurance, exactly 10 of those people would receive an insurance payout, however - since they took a 12% share off everyone - it gives the "house" a 2% edge on every bet hedged with them.
Basically - they're assuming everyone is roughly even chance to finish in that just before the bubble, 10%, bracket. Well - at least within a 2% margin of error anyhow.
I would say they've placed their margin fairly wisely tbh. And like anything with a house edge, I think statistically you would lose out by buying this protection.
However - I guess if you checked through your HEM - what you're looking for is this: Do you finish in the '2nd 10%' bracket of MTTs MORE than 10% of the time? In fact, to cover their edge, I should say MORE than 12% of the time..
It's a fairly simple calculation if you assume "everyone" takes the insurance in a tournament. It gets a lot trickier if only the people who do what you say in the last part take the insurance, the ones often (more than 12% of the time) finishing in those 2nd 10%, take the insurance. That's what I meant. For THEM. It could turn out to be a fine line in terms of profit for them if everyone were equally smart in that regard. But of course everyone isn't, so I'm sure they will profit nicely as you explain at the end. Or did I miss something?
Joined: Apr '09
Location: Portugal
Age: 44 (M)
Posts: 4827
This seems nice for those who play MTT with higher buy-in. Remember, this will be a product you will be buying, plus the tourney buy-in, which means that if you enter a $200+$20 MTT and you buy this insurance, it will probably cost at least $60. If you lose neat bubble, you will receive $100, but the truth is, instead of spending only $220, you spent $280, which means you will only be receiving a third of what you spent. But that is what insurances are all about. If you enter prizes and you won a nice prize, you will not care of having spent the insurance value because you will be earning a lot more than that.
Joined: Apr '09
Location: Australia
Age: 40 (M)
Posts: 6483
Posted by IslandJack:
It's a fairly simple calculation if you assume "everyone" takes the insurance in a tournament. It gets a lot trickier if only the people who do what you say in the last part take the insurance, the ones often (more than 12% of the time) finishing in those 2nd 10%, take the insurance. That's what I meant. For THEM. It could turn out to be a fine line in terms of profit for them if everyone were equally smart in that regard. But of course everyone isn't, so I'm sure they will profit nicely as you explain at the end. Or did I miss something?
yeah - I think though
A) A 2% margin would most likely account for anyone who is statistically appearing in that 10% of places After the bubble more often than most.. Statistically speaking, 2% gives a pretty wide margin I think.
B) I think some people would suffer from a gamblers fallacy - whereby -they observe that over X amount of games they've finished in that bracket, say 15% of the time and figure thereby they will also finish in there 15% of the time in the future. This could quite possibly just be a statistical anomaly and in no way at all affect the outcome of their future games. I would imagine, like all variance issues - you would need a pretty significant sample size to determine whether you're actually more likely to come into that bracket. So there would be a lot of people making this error of judgement.
C) A lot of people probably simply wouldn't think it through this far at all - just purchase it for whatever reason.
D) And finally - I imagine they probably combed through a huge amount of results from a huge amount of players to come up with that margin. I bet they accounted for most variables that are relevant. And further - I guess they can adjust the margin if they needed too - if from 12% to 13% makes a huge difference - theoretically this 1% increase SHOULD provide around 50% more profit. Since it's the 2% over the 10% that provides a profit margin - increasing this 1% is actually a 50% increase on profits, while looking like an insignificant difference to most casual observers.
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Posted by Fakiry: This seems nice for those who play MTT with higher buy-in. Remember, this will be a product you will be buying, plus the tourney buy-in, which means that if you enter a $200+$20 MTT and you buy this insurance, it will probably cost at least $60. If you lose neat bubble, you will receive $100, but the truth is, instead of spending only $220, you spent $280, which means you will only be receiving a third of what you spent. But that is what insurances are all about. If you enter prizes and you won a nice prize, you will not care of having spent the insurance value because you will be earning a lot more than that.
If the insurance was for buyin only (no fee) then a $200+ $20 would be:
insurance = $200 * .12 = $24
Finish just before the bubble then:
money spent = $200 + $20 + $24 = $244 Money returned = $200 total loss = $44
If it includes fee then:
insurance = $220 * .12 = $26.40
Finish just before the bubble then:
money spent = $200 + $20 + $26.40 = $246.40 Money returned = $220 total loss = $26.40
Edited by jessthehuman (14 March 2012 @ 00:28 GMT)
I guess it can be good for very tight players who very often finish close to the bubble. But still, it's like playing the roulette and betting a color, the 0 and the 00 make it valuable for the house, so in the end I don't think it's worth it.
Almost everybody plays very tight just before the bubble, so there's a lot of chips to be picked up by playing aggressive, stealing the blinds, just at that time...
Seems to me like you can do a lot for building your stack, with little risk of losing your buy in.
This seems like a real edge over others that do not have this insurance... Might be worth the premium...
Joined: Mar '09
Location: Greece
Age: 47 (F)
Posts: 14136
The thing is that the big stacks on the table follow this tactic to steal blinds before the bubble, so unless you are tilting more to the point of shoving it all in you probably risking losing you raise by a reraise
Joined: May '09
Location: Spain
Age: 49 (M)
Posts: 1331
Hi guys!!
Playing a MTT thinking about our buy-in is a bad way. The bubble protection makes the more profitable levels more difficult to play. If we get a good stack, during bubble we can steal a lot at the scary money players. If that players have 'protection' it will be more difficult to steal.
