Full Tilt Poker Has Gig Changes in Store for 2010

Even though Full Tilt Poker is firmly entrenched as the #2 Online Poker site in the world, the five year-old card-room seems anything but content to maintain the status quo. After a string of revamps, additions, and overhauls in 2009 –that saw the entire lobby redesigned– the team at Full Tilt Poker has even more changes in store for 2010.

The biggest change seems to be a face-lift to their VIP Program. So far little detail has emerged concerning the upcoming changes to the VIP Program, but most sites have been moving to a tiered system that rewards high-volume players with bigger and better incentives -At the moment Full Tilt Poker has a very generic system that is purely based on the amount of rake taken from the table: Every player earns the same amount regardless of the volume of hands they play.

The only current incentives for the VIP Program currently in place are the “Happy Hours” which any player can cash in on, and the “Iron Man Challenge” which rewards players for consistently playing at the Full Tilt Poker tables.

Other changes in store should have grinders on Full Tilt Poker jumping up and down for joy: On the Two Plus Two Poker Forums a spokesperson for Full Tilt announced that the site would be upping the minimum buy-in for cash game tables, in an effort to deter players from pulling a “Hit and Run”, where players buy-in short, win two or three buy-ins, and then leave the table only to reappear with the minimum buy-in on another table. While in no way illegal, this tactic has always been considered a breach of poker etiquette and frustrates many players -PokerStars has recently upped their minimum buy-ins for the same reason.

In the same forum post on the Two Plus Two Poker Forum, the spokesperson also mentioned that a “two-click” exit is in the works, as well as a “Sit Here” dialog box appearing when you first take a seat at one of Full Tilt Poker’s virtual tables. Even though these two changes will make little to no difference in the grand scheme of things, they are fairly simple to implement, and both features are long overdue.

The overall changes seem to be just another battle between PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker for Online Poker supremacy: “The anything you have I have too” mentality. Although it will be very interesting to see exactly what changes will take place to Full Tilt’s VIP Program: Will it turn into the a system like PokerStars -who has also announced changes to their VIP Program for 2010– that greatly favors the high-end players on the site, or will it fall in between that system and the current Full Tilt version where everyone is equal?