bwin Poker has recently introduced a new rake scheme, along with its parent network, the OnGame Network, that went into effect as of July 15, 2010. It’s called Essence, and this is the … well, essence of it:
The official bwin Poker word on Essence, as revealed in a memo issued to its Affiliate Partners, is that it is an improved algorithm designed in such a way that “the player’s overall contribution to the poker ecology becomes a major component to its healthy balance.”
Ordinarily a poker site (or land-based poker room) will have a set rake that the house takes out of any pot (often limiting it only to pots where a flop is dealt). That rake is typically determined by the size of the pot, the number of players dealt cards in the hand, and the table stakes. It’s how the house pays itself.
But with bwin Poker’s new rake scheme, certain new, additional factors will be taken into account in an effort to more fairly personalise the rake requirement on each player.
The Essence rake scheme will take into account each given player’s playing style, their contribution to the pot, their skill level, the effects each player has on all the others over the long term. In this way, bwin Poker hopes to define each player’s value to the site. That value, determined over the past 90-days performance, will be converted into a numerical coefficient that will allow bwin Poker to distribute the rake obligation of players more equitably. At the end of each pot, the rake contributed by each player will no longer necessarily be divided equally. It may be, but if factors are diverse enough among players at the same table, different layers will pay a different rake.
The existing rake scheme for tournaments (which is really just the fee tacked on after the plus sign “+” in a tournament buy-in), will remain unaffected and unchanged by the new Essence guidelines. As will the existing bwin Poker Points system. The new bwin Poker Essence rake scheme only affects cash games at the site (and those of other OnGame Network Poker sites).
Read our detailed info about the bwin Poker Bonus on how this will affect clearing the poker bonus.