Overall: 4
Fair Poker is a newer site on the growing iPoker
network of online poker rooms. Their main marketing
angle is that they treat their clientele well, offer
fair policies, and reward players for their business.
Overall, this is a decently strong site with a realistic
bonus and some special freeroll promotions for regular
players. Also, this network is just as popular, if not
more so, for fixed-limit ring games which are often
scarce on other sites.
Bonus: 3.5 (50%
up to $100)
The actual bonus amount that you can get for
Fair Poker through our site is decent at 50%,
which is good up to $100. However, converting the bonus
to cash is somewhat easier to work off than other sites
on the network as you’ll only need to play 10 raked
hands for each $1 of bonus. This is realistic because
any raked hand counts toward your bonus regardless of
how large the pot is. Overall, the bonus isn’t enormous
but it you can probably earn it within a reasonable
amount of sessions.
Promotions: 4
Besides the initial deposit bonus,
Fair Poker runs a few other interesting
promotions. Occasionally, they run the “Win/Win”
promotion, which is actually really cool. If you lose
all of your first deposit, they’ll credit back half of
it to you. However, consistent winners who double their
first deposit will get an extra 25% credited to their
accounts. Check the Fair Poker homepage to see if this
promotion is currently available since it’s a very
unique neat idea. Another promotion is the Sit ‘n Go
jackpot offer, which rewards repeat victories in single
table tournaments. For example, if you win 6 consecutive
of their larger Fort Knox events you’ll receive a
$100,000 jackpot. Perhaps the lowest investment at one
of these jackpots is through their $2 12-person Dirty
Dozen events, which yields a $2,000 prize for winning 4
in a row. Other promotions include their monthly $25,000
guaranteed tournament and numerous freerolls. While they
offer daily $200 and $100 events open to everyone, these
are largely crapshoots with an enormous number of
players. Better freerolls include those with playing
requirements such as the daily $300 event, which
typically has more attentive players and a smaller
number of opponents. Another interesting freeroll is
their weekly $500 event, which is open to all players
who participate in a satellite tournament over the
previous week.
Fish: 4
This network is largely being flooded with new and
inexperienced opponents induced by large promotions.
What this translates to is a weak player base that I
found easily beatable. At a typical medium-stakes
no-limit ring game at
Fair Poker, about 1/3 of the table usually
consists of calling stations willing to pay off your
monsters while the rest are either overly aggressive
with weak hands or willing to put plenty of money in on
thin draws. Overall, I find this to be quite an
inexperienced network still lacking a decent number of
experienced players to keep them in line.
Tournaments: 3.5
The actual tournament events are run well on the
Fair Poker network, but they are still lacking a
large amount of traffic. Lower events with $10 or less
buy-ins are still fairly popular and often exceed
200-300 players. Larger events and satellites are
usually small, which may be an advantage if you’re
trying to earn a seat into a larger event and don’t want
to battle massive player fields. Sit ‘n Go tournaments
are also pretty popular, especially the $2 12-person
events and $5 full tables.
Software: 4
The
Fair software is basic with a sharp graphic
scheme and a full screen capability if you’re playing at
higher resolutions. Avatars at the table have a semi-3D
feel to them, and you’re able to choose your persona
from a handful of choices. The hand history option has a
nice graphical interface and the game pace is pretty
quick.
Best Features
-Earnable deposit bonus. While it isn’t huge, you don’t
have to play as many raked hands as other sites to cash
it out.
-Sit ‘n Go jackpots. If you’re a consistent winner at
these tourneys, you can win pretty sizeable jackpots.
-Soft tables. The games at this site are largely filled
with new players.
-No rake at microlimits. Not that the rake ever gets
large at these tables, but it’s a nice little perk.
Cashouts: 4.5
This is a pretty stable network, and I had my cashouts
via NETeller within 24 hours.
Customer Service: 4.5
Standard e-mail support is to be expected and of course
it is offered with pretty quick response times. However,
I give
Fair Poker a good score for also offering
telephone and live chat support from within the
software. I usually prefer the live chat option – I
don’t have to pick up the telephone and the operators
are usually pretty helpful.
Game Selection: Hold’em, Omaha, Omaha H/L
Limits: Fixed Limit: .02/.04 -
$10/20 No Limit: .02/.04 - $5/10
Tips
As
Fair Poker offers a large amount of
shorthanded ring games I’d like to give you some quick
tips on playing these 6-person tables. First of all,
you’ll need to open up your game a bit more if you’re
used to full tables. The blinds come around much faster
and you should play an aggressive game from late
position. Hands I will often raise with include any Ace
with a decent kicker, two face cards, or any pocket
pair. You also should be more observant as you’ll likely
be facing the same few opponents for an extended period
of time.
Click here
to visit Fair Poker.
|