Omaha Rake Reduced for Low Stakes at PokerStars

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Saturday, June 29th, 2013 | Written by Stephen Smith

A nice win for micro-stakes and low-stakes omaha players at PokerStars this week, as the room has agreed to lower the rake at certain levels of pot limit omaha and no limit omaha.

The announcement came on the TwoPlusTwo forums, where a PokerStars representative detailed the changes – and the events that brought them about.

But before we get to that, let’s talk about the new rake rates for low-stakes omaha at PokerStars.

Rake changes to omaha games

Four omaha stake levels will see a dramatic reduction in rake levels: .01/.02, .02/.05, 05/.10 and .10/.25. While specific numbers aren’t available, it’s safe to say that those limits make up the majority of omaha play at PokerStars by volume.

How much of a reduction? Around 5.5% less on average, although different stakes will see different reductions. Specifically:

.01/.02 = -6.93%

.02/.05 = -5.65%

.05/.10 = -5.28%

.10/.25. = -4.41%

As the above list indicates, the lowest stake players will see the greatest percentage reduction in rake. But even though the highest stakes players will see a small percentage reduction, the pure dollar value of the reduction should be greater thanks to the increased rake take at those stakes in absolute terms.

How PokerStars came to reduce omaha rake

The new rake schedule for low-stake omaha was a direct result of player feedback to PokerStars on the matter. In fact, players have been petitioning Stars to address the matter for a number of months now.

Unlike many poker sites, PokerStars engages in a regular dialogue with online poker players, including a series of regular meeting between player representatives and site management. It was at these meetings that the concept of a reduced rake for certain omaha limits began to really gain momentum.

The responsiveness to player concerns is one of the reasons that PokerStars sits on our list of the top sites for UK poker players.

The core issue at hand was that PLO is a game more subject to rake, as more pots are contested and more hands go to showdown. That forces PLO players to rely on rewards to overcome rake. But rewards at PokerStars are heavily skewed toward the top end – which is to say the highest-volume players.

This left PokerStars with a choice: Reduce rake and reduce rewards, keep rake the same but distribute rewards more evenly, reduce rewards or simply reduce the rake.

Rewards earning rate left unaltered by PokerStars

PokerStars ultimately chose the last path, citing their past experience with reward reduction or reward distribution as a controlling factor.

In short, PokerStars said, they have learned that when introducing a positive change, pairing it with any additional change that can be perceived as a negative change basically sinks player reaction to the entire change – even if the positives clearly outweigh the negatives.

As a result, PokerStars decided to simply reduce the rake to a level they felt would render more players able to achieve a positive win rate without so much reliance on rewards.

Could this lead to more rake reductions?

It’s not hard to imagine how players at other limits could look to these reductions as justification for reduced rake on their games.

But PokerStars went to some lengths to specifically indicate that this change did not portend additional changes to the rake schedule at large, saying “This is not an indication that we will be changing rake for other stakes of PLO. We do not currently have any such intentions. We will review the impact of this change in the coming months and consider the learnings when making future decisions about rake.”

Watch our poker news section for more updates on all things PokerStars.