CardRunners vs. LeggoPoker vs. DeucesCracked (Review)

RedJoker

I was a member of CardRunners for the last 6 months, my subscription ran out recently and I haven't got around to renewing yet. I've been a member of LeggoPoker for two weeks and I won a free months subscription to DeucesCracked a couple of days ago.


CardRunners have a library of over 600 videos and are about to announce they're increasing their output to 10 videos per week with 5 on nl cash games. They're actively looking for new coaches atm too. Huge selection and very diverse, mtts, stts, lhe, plo, o8, horse tournaments and obviously a ton of nlhe, 6max, FR, HU. Top instructors are sbrugby, greenplastic, CTS (only 6 vids though but very sick), Stinger, PeachyKeen (FR). Fabian's videos also deserve a mention. They have once off videos from jman (must watch), boostedJ and empiremaker2. Loads of micro and small stake instructors as well so you get to see pros playing the lower levels.

They have some quality issues from time to time but it's members seem to bitch about every little fault tbh. The videos are always watchable but sometimes the instructors have things like aim on which is kinda unprofessional.

I don't post on the forum (I'm on about 5 at this stage), so I can't really give a proper review of it. As far as I know the pros don't reply to hand histories that much. There's never much discussion of the videos and when I tried to ask about a play in PeachyKeen's first video it took ages for anybody to respond, peachy did reply eventually though. They have a chat room which the pros sometimes go on but any time I've been on there they're in the general discussion section (as opposed to strategy section, which is always empty) and they don't post much when there.

There's a large selection of articles which are worth reading too. The pros recently got together for a weekend so there should be some very good content trickling out in the near future.

LeggoPoker have very high quality videos, way ahead of CR and about the same as DeucesCracked. I think I'd recommend them before CardRunners tbh. AeJones is absolutely sick (easily as good as CTS's videos). Bobbofitos videos are excellent as well, he records the audio afterwards and pauses the recording to go through concepts, they're really heavy going and crammed full of content. MYNAMEIZGREG is a very good instructor as well. They've recently brought on 5 new pros; luckychewy, Clayton, straate, MezmerizePLZ and Apathy

There aren't anywhere near as many videos as CardRunners but the quality is excellent and there's no aim noises going off either. The videos have a more laid back and funny feel, aejones is hilarious. There's a high focus on nl cash, mostly 6max with a bit of hu. Clayton and luckychewy are doing MTTs and there's a few STTs as well. They've announced they're upping the video output to 6 a week.

The forums are newer but have more pro activity, a pro responds to every hand history. There's theory posts there as well. There's a thread for every video which go into discussion of some of the situations of the video, the BobboFitos ones are great:
http://www.leggopoker.com/forums/poker-training-video-analysis/bobbo-5-10-hu-video-692.html
http://www.leggopoker.com/forums/poker-training-video-analysis/bobbofitos-3-6-nl-vid-163.html
http://www.leggopoker.com/forums/poker-training-video-analysis/bobbo-4-tabling-full-ring-854.html
http://www.leggopoker.com/forums/poker-training-video-analysis/bobbofitos-5-10-6max-video-1197.html
The forum is free so I highly recommend checking it out for yourself.

They've just started up a "LeggoCast" which I'm listening to at the moment, fairly funny but the sound quality gets messed up in spots.

DeucesCracked are very different from LP and CR. They do things via series. The first season had 7, so one a day, bu they've announced they're doing 10 series now. They each have their own theme, some of them are classroom type stuff like the maths one, others are more standard videos like the whitelime vs. Krantz ones. Then there's others which have a mixture like Unconventional Wisdom or the new HU one. After the series ends they start up a new series. The video quality is very good here as well.

Top instructors are Whitelime, Krantz, Vanessa Selbst, FoxwoodsFiend and DJ Sensei. There's a lot of limit videos as well though. It's probably about 50/50 split. They've started up an omaha series, a FR no limit mini series and a HU no limit series. There's very little or maybe even no MTT or STT content though.

Haven't checked out much of their forums, they have a review thread for each video with good pro activity. The forums are free too.

If you download the videos you actually own them, the other sites have their videos protected so you can only watch them for 14 days before having to unlock them again. You can also watch their videos on loads of different devices.

Prices.

CardRunners charge $24.99 a month (up to $27.99 at the end of this month) with a $99.99 sign-up fee. When your subscription runs out you have 4 months to renew before having to pay the sign-up fee again.
LeggoPoker charge $30 a month with a $100 sign-up fee, you can get a 6 month membership for $230 and an annual subscription for $400.
DeucesCracked charge $29 a month with a 7 day free trial. You can get a 6 month subscription for $24.65 a month and a 12 month subscription for $23.20 a month.

LeggoPoker and DeucesCracked also offer rakeback and if you generate an MGR of $500 (pretty easy to hit I'm told) you get free access for the following month with no sign up fee. I'd highly recommend this if a subscription would be a big chunk of your roll. CardRunners offer a 1 day pass for $14.99 which will allow you to stream up to 50 videos for 24 hours, if you decide to subscribe the $14.99 will be deducted from your fee.

Other Sites.

I was given a free subscription to StoxPoker a while back but couldn't even be bothered to watch their videos. I don't know what it is but I felt like watching stoxpoker videos would be like posting on Pocket5s when I could be posting on 2+2. I have no idea where I got this bias from tbh, it was just a vibe I got and could be completely wrong.

They've been around a while and have a lot of videos, fairly diverse, lots of limit and nolimt, a good bit of classroom stuff too. I don't know much about them so I'm not going to say anymore, perhaps somebody else can give a review.

PokerXFactor specialize in MTTs. I don't know much about them so hopefully somebody can give a review.

PokerSavvyPlus are fairly diverse as well and have Ansky, Ike and Mike Matusow among others. Again I don't know much about them but hopefully somebody will be able to review them.


If I was going purely for no limit cash it would be LeggoPoker atm. If you were able to afford two I'd go with DeucesCracked as well because they'd make a good addition to either LeggoPoker or CardRunners as they provide something different. I think the rakeback offer is well worth looking into too. If you had the time and motivation to make a big dent into CardRunners' 600+ video library they'd probably be the best value for money but at a certain point I'd imagine things would start getting repetitive. If you play a lot of different types of games or are looking to learn some more then CardRunners is undoubtedly the place to go.

All the sites have free sample videos which you should definitely check out. There's a collection of free videos from 2+2 posters available here as well. You can find more reviews and comparisons of the different sites on this forum.

delanec8

Cheers for this

Hitman Actual

Good post as usual, RJ. A basic questions on video formats: Are they always just streamed from the website, or can they be downloaded and watched on a different PC or a PMP?

valor

Ansky's videos are best of anyones across all sites

CoolBoardr

lenny_leonard wrote: »

Good post as usual, RJ. A basic questions on video formats: Are they always just streamed from the website, or can they be downloaded and watched on a different PC or a PMP?

For DeucesCracked you can watch on the site, or download as .WMV, .mp4 or .m4v (iPod format - for one table videos only).

DC is pretty good if you play heads up.

dvdfan

lenny_leonard wrote: »

Good post as usual, RJ. A basic questions on video formats: Are they always just streamed from the website, or can they be downloaded and watched on a different PC or a PMP?

Lego and cardrunners allow streaming and downloadable versions, you need to put in your password when watching the downloadable versions so you cant access them once your subscription is expired.

Nice post RJ i signed up to Leggo after my subscription with card runners ran out so im looking forward to checking out their videos

Hitman Actual

Thanks CoolBoardr and dvdfan. The downloads would suit me perfectly for watching on my daily commute.

RedJoker

CardRunners have downloads and streams for both WMV and flash. They also have a european mirror and are adding a lot more mirrors to improve speeds.
DeucesCracked have downloads for WMV, iPod, MP4 and flash. They stream in flash.
LeggoPoker have downloads and streams for both WMV and flash.

cokedrinker

Are leggo videos encryted in the same way as cr? I like the way deucescracked have no encrytion on their vids, so you don't have to be at a pc / internet connection to view them

RedJoker

cokedrinker wrote: »

Are leggo videos encryted in the same way as cr? I like the way deucescracked have no encrytion on their vids, so you don't have to be at a pc / internet connection to view them

Yep.

You don't need to be at an internet connection to watch them though. You can download them on a laptop for example, unlock them and you're free to watch them without an internet connection for the next two weeks. So if you were going on holiday you could download and unlock a load of them and have something to watch for the whole trip.

Ollieboy

was just working my way through the sample video's at the moment and I have to say I'm very disappointed. I find most of the stuff the pro's say to be very logical or comman sense and sometimes I think what there trying to say is rubbish as they state a positive point in relation to there play in relation to outcome. I haven't seen any of them make a mistake, big ego's I guess.

I think the cost of these downloads is very high in relation to there training value. As anyone found these to be a worthwhile tool? I was reading another players review and he thought the same as me. Am I wrong here?

Also, should this thread along with book reviews have its own sticky, as it would be a useful guide to new players find resources.

ozpoker

I recently joined Stoxpoker. I haven't shopped the other sites, so I don't really have an opinion about them. But Stox have two compelling reasons to join:

1) I think Matt Matros' MTT videos are excellent and I've easily justified the "cost" of joining just from the ideas I was exposed to.

2) They are currently in beta for some killer software: Stox Combo (a super PokerStove) and StoxEV (a GUI based hand analyzer). StoxEV will easily save me 100 hours over the year in time spent doing analysis.

They currently have a promotion where you sign up with a new site, play 100 points or so (took me about 2 hours 2 tabling) and you get a 6 month subscription for free. StoxEV alone has already returned my investment 10 times.

RedJoker

That's a fair point Ollie.

It really depends what level you're at. A guy playing 10nl is going to get way more value out of it then somebody playing 100nl. And a player playing 100nl will get much more then somebody playing 1000nl. But as a percentage of bankroll the 10nl players are paying a far higher cost then the guys playing 1000nl.

It's a good thing you bumped this because there was more stuff I wanted to add on.

Stoxpoker also do the rakeback deal.

After finishing my month at DeucesCracked I felt a lot of the content was aimed at micro-stakes players and players looking to break into small stakes. The content was very good just that the series format meant that all the basics were drilled into you over and over. With no sign-up fee, a 7 day free trial and no download protection I'd definitely recommend this to anybody on a limited budget.

I'm sure they'll start bringing in higher stakes content, they've started up a "ghost" (standard sweating videos) series and got jfish and flawless_victory signed up as well so there'll probably be a big improvment in this area soon.

There's a new site www.pokertrainingguide.com who'll be doing reviews of all the video training sites. Should be finished by the end of this month.

CardRunners have brought in Raptor and have started doing video discussion threads for each video, pro particaption is hit or miss at the moment though but it's improving. They also signed up Lee Jones as their COO so expect some serious improvements soon.

LeggoPoker have gotten rid of MesmerizePLZ after a colluding scandal and haven't replaced him yet.

Ollieboy

So guessing from your post, its really Cardrunner or nothing. I was speaking to a few pro's about this in general and they find it interesting to see how other pro's play hands differently to the way they would play it.

I think anyone using these site should use them to discuss different types of play and not take them as accept playing style or way to play certain hands, which is something the instructor is trying to do, which could end up doing damage to your game more than improving.

But I still think its very expensive....lol

RedJoker

Ollieboy wrote: »

So guessing from your post, its really Cardrunner or nothing. I was speaking to a few pro's about this in general and they find it interesting to see how other pro's play hands differently to the way they would play it.

I think anyone using these site should use them to discuss different types of play and not take them as accept playing style or way to play certain hands, which is something the instructor is trying to do, which could end up doing damage to your game more than improving.

But I still think its very expensive....lol

Depends what you're looking for.

Yeah that's something you can do. I've implemented a lot of stuff into my game from the videos, some stuff worked and I kept it, other stuff didn't so I dropped it. It's important to have a balance in your game so taking anything as gospel without understanding how and why it works is more likely to do damage to your game anyway.

Expensive reallys depends on your bankroll, your current ability and how much time you have to watch the videos.

It's kinda like poker books, they're good for a beginning player but an experienced (or even intermediate) player will get very little out of them. Intermediate players will get a lot out of training videos but an experienced player will get much, much less.

bcbreen

i am a member off poker savvy, and have been form the conception of the site back in November, though it is a fairly new site, it has some off the sickest cash game players u will find on any site,

mike the mouth how covers any thing from hold em to Omaha,

ansky(Dani plays as anksy451 on Full Tilt and supernova9 on stars) is a high steaks no limit 6max pro,

Chris Rhodes(aka tribefan9) limit hold em pro,

Isaac Haxton(philivey2694 on Stars, and as luvthewnba on Full tilt) is a high steaks 9max no limit pro,

Evan Roberts(aka _Fisherman) high steaks no limit heads up pro,

not to mention guest pro aswell,

Andrew "AMA0330" Arnott low limit NLHE

Andrew 'Foucault' Brokos. 6maxMSNL

jimmy fricky(Gobboboy) aussie millions runner up 2007. also i hate this fat red neck

all players have made millions over the past years, and thats just the cash game section,

mtt wise their not lagging here either,

Justin Rollo(wpthero) how is a mtt pro who has wracked up 6figure+ winning online,he recently took down the stars 2nd chance Sunday for 50ish k, and came 11th in full tilt 750k on sun, he also took 300k in last years wsop

tony dunst(bond18)

Shaun Deeb


this site is good value for money , theirs no sing up fees like card runner and poker x factor, and its only 15euro a month which is nothing really, wit cool members chat where u can chat wit the pros, members freerolls wit 50$ knock out bounty's on pros,

so their u go, thats the down low on poker savvy,

Rb

Was Matusow your English teacher by any chance?

Or are you Matusow shilling Poker Savvy?

bcbreen

iam

a reg member off savvy for your information and is 100% true info, some1

didnt

have a review on the site s i gave one, if i knew it was gonna get so much hassle i

wouldn't

bothered

, i was just helping. + i posted it again cos i didnt think many more would c it in here,

Rb

By "reg member" do you mean "have a financial interest in"?

Ste05

I don't think bcbreen is a shill anymore, just a misguided fan of Pokersavvy.

I've deleted his other thread, but left this one here, so as not to cause any damage to Pokersavvy should people think they are shilling the forum. I'm still going to PM the Pokersavvy guys, (I'm a member there too, and can heartily endorse the site, and I wouldn't have expected shilling from them). But obviously until I talk to Ansky or one of the other guys, I can't confirm.

But from a PM exchange with bcbreen, I don't think he is a shill.

Anyway, once you post here more, you'll soon realise that this post below is a resounding thumbs-up for PokerSavvy, also, I would agree with it too, (i.e. another good reference for Pokersavvy)

valor wrote: »

Ansky's videos are best of anyones across all sites

bcbreen

ste wats your name on savvy, u gonna play the free roll on sun?? reg member i mean iam a paying customer