Bookmaker office "Offside" - description, review tips. Sports poker in Russia

Offsidebet is the largest Russian-focused online poker site and also runs a very successful casino and sportsbook. While Offsidebet does accept players from other countries, it predominantly caters for a Russian player base.

If you are simply looking for another iPoker bonus to clear, or you are from a Russian-speaking territory, then Offsidebet is probably OK to use. Otherwise, I'd recommend avoiding them.

About Offsidebet

Offsidebet has been in operation since 2008 and works out of centers in Curacao, Costa Rica, Malta and Eastern Europe. Its gaming platform is licensed in Curacao and is held by Media Entertainment N.V.

The company uses Playtech poker software with a Kahnawakee license and NetEntertaiment casino software. Not a lot is known about the size of the company and a lot of information relating to it seems to be in Russian or Bulgarian. Offsidebet doesn't appear to be a big hitter having never sponsored any major sporting events or other competitions.

Clunky Software

There are a lot of script issues when trying to run the Offsidebet Poker software and this leaves the program hanging, so you’ll need to close and reopen the client again. It’s a bit of a pain when you’re trying to register with the site so I ended up registering through the website and the n just logging into the client because it was becoming an annoyance.

It was a struggle to register as I can’t choose UK or Ireland as my country, so I had to email to ask if it accepts players from there because I couldn’t find the answer in the terms and conditions either. After waiting for 24 hours (which is the maximum it says you have to wait) and for the purpose of this review, I’m a temporary native of Italy. From checking around it appears that they don't accept UK players, but I've no confirmation on Irish players just yet.

Once you do get into the client it's hard to tell whether it looks good or not, as a lot of images have failed to load due to the scripts not running. I've tried this on two different laptops and it's the same on both, so that will need to be looked at by their developers.

It's a soft green and gray color scheme, similar to what they use on their website and it's quite easy on the eye. Offsidebet has also gone one better than a lot of iPoker skins and put some work into the graphics. The table is a nice shade of green with a brown racetrack and it has the Offside logo stamped in the middle. It's set on a mahogany background and all the information, such as chip counts, chips and the chat stands out. I like it a lot.

As its Playtech it's a smooth and fast paced engine that can easily handle the 16 tables that you're allowed open at the same time. Even when you have the maximum number of tables open you can use the tile button to automatically resize and reposition each table. You may customize the software more by selecting your own avatar, choosing from four backs for the cards, using four color decks and deciding which sounds to use. Despite all the initial trouble, once it gets going it's a decent setup.

Nice Bonus for New Players

Offsidebet Poker, or Offside Poker as they seem to switch between, offers you a 200% first deposit bonus up to a maximum of $2,000, so you need to lodge $1,000 to benefit from the maximum bonus.

To release the bonus you need to earn Offsidebet PP's by playing ring games and tournaments. The advantage for cash game players on this skin is that points are not based on contributed rake, so once you participate in a hand that goes to the flop, you’ll earn points for it. But maybe that isn't so.

When you read on further and you click into their VIP program, you come across this statement:

“Since the 5th of March Offsidebet updated the rake attribution system to Weighted Contributed. Meaning that the rake allocated to each player depends on his participation in the pot and is not equally distributed among all players.”

It's very frustrating for us, both as players and reviewers, to read through information on a site and find something we like, and maybe deposit on the back of it, only to realize that it's not all as it seems once we delve into other areas of the site.

With regards the bonus, for every 1,000 OffsidebetPP you earn you'll release $10 of the first deposit bonus. If you're playing cash, depending on which of the four levels you're on, you'll earn 15-30 OPPs for every $1 of rake you pay. This is the same ratio for every $1 of tournament fees you pay. In a nutshell, you'll need to play the equivalent of $670 worth of tournaments or rake $67 to release your first $10 bonus as you'll be on the lowest rung of the ladder.

Bad Beat Bonus - $150

If you're playing cash games 100nl and above, and you lose with AAAKK or better, then you have a shot at the $150 Bad Beat Bonus. There's a few T&Cs though. You must go to showdown, three players must see a flop, both hole cards must be used and only one Bad Beat per day, so if you lose with quad 8s and some unluckier person loses with quad 10s, he gets the windfall and not you . To claim your bonus you will need to contact them, and then you must play through 10 OPPs for every $1 bonus - so it’s not as straightforward as it seems.

Best Hand Bonus - $100

Very similar to the Bad Beat, but a winning hand of JJJJ or more is required.

Royal Flush Bonus - $500

This bonus will start off at $100 and increase by $10 every day until a maximum of $500 is reached. There's some T&Cs involved, as always, but you can worry about that once you hit the RF.

There's a reduced bonus for everyone playing below 100nl, where you can still earn a $25 bonus for binking a Bad Beat, Best Hand or Royal Flush.

Offside's VIP System

Offsidebet Poker has a VIP program which is calculated by averaging your OffsidebetPP’s over the previous three months.

However, there's contradicting information as to how many VIP levels there actually are. When you're on the page which tells you info about your first deposit bonus, it says there are six VIP levels, and there's a clickable link. In that clickable link however there are only four VIP levels and they are called White, Blue, Black and Silver and the number of OPPs (Offsidebet player points) required for each are:

White 0 - 1499 OPP

Blue 1500 - 4999 OPP

Black 5000 - 9999 OPP

Silver 10000 - 19999 OPP

VIP levels will be updated on the 1st of every month and your average points will be calculated by taking 50% of your previous months play, 30% of the month before that and 20% of the points earned three months ago.

If starting off on the White Level, in order to hit the 1,500 points needed to move up to Level 2, you'll need to play ~$1,000 worth of tournaments to rake the $100 fees to move you up to Level 2. If you want to aim for Level 3, then you'll need to average ~$250 worth of rake/fees over a three-month period, and this is getting your OPPs at a rate of 20 per $1 raked.

This coincides with a Rollback Bonus scheme offered by Offsidebet Poker. This allows you to earn a maximum of $30 for every 1,000 OPPs you accrue. You’ll need to send an email with all your details to apply for this bonus, but once you get accepted into ‘Offside Poker Club’ you can start earning money for points.

Realistically, not many players will earn the 50,000 points required to allow you a $3 per 100 point conversion rate. Players that make it to ‘Black VIP level 3’ will be earning $1.50 per 100 OPPs.

A Selection of Games Only for Offsidebet Poker players

Offsidebet Poker runs a tournament league every month, with a total prize pool of $800 a week on offer. It offers daily freeroll tournaments at 7pm GMT which are all free/OPPs to enter (some with 50c rebuys and $1 add-on). The higher you finish, the more money you win in that particular game and the more leader board points you earn.

Of the seven weekly tournaments, two offer OPPs as prizes while the other five games offer an added prize pool of between $100 and $200. The website states rebuys as $0.10 but in the client they are $0.50. You can expect about 250 players in these freerolls.

Offsidebet Poker’s clickable logo advertises $5,000 in Poker freerolls, but I can only see the ones above and they don’t even have any information on what prizes are received by the players who finish near the top of the leaderboard. Contacting support to find out the info is proving futile.

Depositing / Withdrawing Info

You can use Credit/Debit Cards, Skrill, Neteller, Bank Transfer, Ukash, Ecocard and WebMoney to deposit. The minimum deposits range from €5 for Skrill/Ukash up to €30 for Neteller, which is extremely high. All of these deposits are free and instantly credited to your account, including its FastBank Transfer option.

You can use all the same methods above for withdrawals, and each of them ranges from a day to a few days to process. Web Money is on its own though, as it takes up to five business days. One thing I learned is that you can now cash out back to UKash and withdraw your money through PayPoints and Bank Machines.

I have a bit of a problem with the maximum withdrawal limits for some of the methods on offer. For example, I can withdraw 10,000 using Fast Bank or 15,000 using Neteller, but only 2,000 using Skrill. That would put off a lot of high stakes players that might use Skrill as their desired method for moving money around. Likewise if you win a medium-to-large tournament it's unclear how often it would take to withdraw the winnings to Skrill.

Are they Safe or is Offsidebet a Scam?

Offsidebet don't cover themselves in glory as far as their sister bookmakers are concerned. There are some reports of them failing to process withdrawals, removing money/bonus from people's accounts without warning and capping people's betting limits very quickly.

Another 2+2 scandal relates to a Russian forum posting details about a huge number of bots working on the skin in association with Offsidebet Poker employees, which seems to have a big impact on people trying to withdraw money from the site not to mention the huge negative publicity it brings on them.

Disappointing Support

There's no live support at Offsidebet Poker. The help button on the client brings you back to the website, where you can only contact them by email. It states that they are ‘customer support fanatics’ and strive to provide the quickest, most accurate support around.

A claimed 10-minute response time up to a maximum of 24 hours gave me a lot of hope for having any potential issues resolved quickly. But alas 48 hours later and I had not received a reply to two separate emails. You can’t even contact them by phone so I guess they have a different interpretation of what constitutes a ‘customer support fanatic’ than I do.

When they did eventually reply to my queries several days later, they were brief, unhelpful and didn't even address more than half the questions I asked. This is simply not good enough for a company that wants to be taken seriously.

This might be because I was using English rather than Russian, but if they want to offer English speaking support, they should make it high quality or else scrap it.

Negatives

They don't accept UK players

Very poor support, especially as it's one of their selling points

A lot of contradicting information on their site relating to the loyalty/VIP program

Verdict

When a site doesn't accept UK (and maybe Irish) players it's hard to give a proper verdict. The support offered by the site might be different towards its Russian customers, but it's non-existent for me. The thread on 2+2, coupled with the poor support and the bad scripts, would not fill me full of confidence about keeping a large sum of money on Offsidebet Poker.

The conflicting information on the site about the rake and the loyalty scheme just puts me off even more - any site that can’t be bothered to relay the correct information to potential customers should be avoided.

There's not a lot that would draw me to depositing here so I'd recommend you give it a miss. If Russian is your first language, they are probably more reliable, but even then there are plenty of other good options on the network.

Network: iPoker

Email:

Live chat support in Russian: from 12:00 to 21:00 Moscow time, seven days a week.

Input Output Money: MoneyBookers (EUR, USD, GBP), WebMoney(EUR, USD, RUR, UAH, BYR), Credit Cards via Moneybookers (EUR, USD, GBP), Click2Pay (EUR, USD, GBP), Credit Cards (EUR, GBP, USD, RUR, UAH, BYR, MDL, TRY, EEK, LVL, LTL, GEL, HUF, KZT, KGS, PLN, CZK, RON, BGN), Ukash, Ecocard

Minimum deposit: 1$ !!!

In order to take part in our exclusive freerolls at Offsidebet you need to register using this link. link by entering the code during registration POKEROM

Offsidebet Poker is part of the iPoker network of poker rooms with PlayTech software and is one of the leaders among the poker rooms of this network. Offsidebet Poker practices a permanent system of bonuses and rewards for both new players and those who have been playing online poker for a long time. Many promotions, tournaments and freerolls are held regularly, Many promotions, tournaments and freerolls are regularly held, including
Plus

Loyalty program:

There are 6 VIP levels in the Offsidebet loyalty program aimed at encouraging active play: White, Blue, Black, Silver, Gold, Platinum. Depending on their VIP level, players gain OPP points at different rates, the amount of which determines your monthly or weekly cash bonus, and also receive various additional bonuses.

ORR accrual:

OPP points accrual in cash games depending on the VIP level:

OPP points in tournaments: for each dollar of tournament fee, from 15 to 30 points are awarded, depending on the VIP level. For example, $30+3 deposit is worth 45-90 points.
OPP can be spent in a poker shop, and they will not hang dead weight! 2000 OPP is equivalent to five dollars worth of goods.

Offsidebet Poker Permanent Bonuses:

1. First deposit bonus- Offside Poker is offering a bonus of 200% up to $2000. Bonus wagering time is 90 days from the date of deposit.

2. Invite a Friend - You have the opportunity for an unlimited time to receive rewards from the monthly rake generated by each friend you refer to play poker on Offsidebet.com

3. RollBack Bonus: A super bonus (similar to rakeback) for all Offside players that does not require an initial deposit. With this bonus, you can receive up to $30 for every 1000 OPP points. Players with higher VIP status earn points up to 2.5 times faster! For VIP players - a weekly bonus!

As well as DAILY bonuses:

4. Bad Beat Bonus : up to $150 consolation bonus. If you lose with a combination of cards not lower than AAAKK, you can expect to receive this bonus.

The $150 bonus is valid on all Texas Hold'em tables (excluding tournament games) played for real money with blinds of at least $0.50/1.00.
Tables with $0.10-$0.20 and $0.25-$0.50 blinds are eligible for a one-time $50 incentive prize

5. Best Hand Bonus : plus $100 to your gaming account! Combinations worth at least JJJJ can qualify for the Best Hand Bonus. The Royal Flush combination does not participate in the Best Hand Bonus draw, because. another bonus is provided for it, which is discussed below.

The $100 bonus is valid on all Texas Hold'em tables (excluding tournament games) played for real money with blinds of at least $0.50/1.00.
For tables with blinds of $0.10-$0.20 and $0.25-$0.50, there is a one-time promotional prize of $25.
For tables with blinds below $0.10-$0.20, the prize is $10.

6. Royal Flush Bonus: By collecting Royal Flush, you will get a good increase to your bankroll from the room - up to $500. Royal Flush combinations of any suit can qualify for the Royal Flush Bonus

The $500 bonus is valid on all Texas Hold'em tables (excluding tournament games) played for real money with blinds of at least $0.50/1.00.
For tables with blinds of $0.10-$0.20 and $0.25-$0.50, there is a one-time promotional prize of $100.
For tables with blinds below $0.10-$0.20, the prize is $25.

(maniac, fish, rock and others).

A player using ABC poker strategy is easy to read for an experienced poker player. With this approach and table starting hands it is recommended to use it mainly for beginners playing at micro-limits.

Below we will consider 3 situations when ABC game can bring relatively good results.

Short stack play

Most professional players play with maximum stacks, and therefore prefer to use meta poker, focusing on large pots and high stakes. However, not always cash game lovers can afford to buy up to the middle level of the table. It is in this case that the poker player needs to turn to the good old ABC poker, which allows you to get a stable profit and move towards big win small steps.

The ABC strategy focuses on selective play of strong hands and a calm attitude to the aggression of opponents with medium-strength hands. Thanks to these qualities of the basic strategy, you will be able to profit from opponents who are ready to invest in the pot with questionable hands in response to your aggression. An adequate assessment of the strength of the hand with different board textures will help you once again not succumb to opponents' provocations and save your money.

Playing at a table with only "short men" using the ABC strategy in general can become very simple, because many poker players tend to be more comfortable with the risk of small amounts and make mistakes more often.

Presence of showdown equity

AT recent times in no-limit games, showdowns have become a rarity. Most often, players fold on the flop or turn, and the last one to bet takes the pot. If the game is played for little money, then the income before the showdown becomes more likely, and in this case the ABC strategy will come in handy again.

By focusing on playing a strong range preflop and value betting hands with top pair and higher postflop, you will be able to feel comfortable on the later streets of the betting and win the pot at showdown much more often.

No bluffs

This is the main reason for using the ABC strategy at any level of game control. If your opponents mostly bet strong hands and check weak hands, you should probably do the same.

Of course, you may think that this behavior is passive and deprives you of the initiative in the game, but a check behind can get you much more information than it seems at first glance. So, when you check back on the KT4 flop, you kind of ask your opponent the question “Do you have a king in your hand?”. A check on the turn will mean a negative answer, but a bet should confirm your guess.

Of course, strong opponents can exploit your return checks and give you deliberately false information, but against weak opponents, this line of play will be very effective.

Check all weak hands and wait for information from your opponent. Another check will mean a weak hand and you will have to act accordingly. So, with a strong hand like top pair, you can safely check to showdown, and with weaker hands, you should bet to take the pot before the showdown.

At a time when most people continue to play in big hyped poker rooms such as PokerStars or 888Poker, there are a huge number of small poker rooms on the Internet that can also offer quite good conditions for users.

Usually, the main advantages of these poker rooms are not the quality of pictures and a large number of tournaments, but the audience of users. The fact is that strong regulars usually play in those places where you can earn the most, that is, on popular sites. That's why general level players in such rooms is quite low.

This is a great opportunity for beginners to practice their skills with players of the same level. One such room is Offside Poker. This article is dedicated to him.

What is this room?

This room has been functioning for quite a long time, but at present its affairs are not going in the best way. He experienced his heyday in the period from 2009 to 2010. It was at this time that most of the players were registered, but after that the decline began. Most likely, the scandal around the room, which was widely discussed at the time, became the reason for this. This will be discussed below.

Permanent promotions

Naturally, in order to expand your audience of users, you need to arrange all kinds of promotions and give new players generous bonuses. True, to be frank, you can find more profitable promotions from other operators.

However, the deposit bonus is as much as 200% of the amount you have deposited. At the same time, the maximum bonus amount is as much as $ 2,000 per account. But the money will not be credited immediately, but as the user accumulates a certain amount of rake.

Badbeat Bonus. Poker is a cruel game. Regardless of your playing skills, no one is immune from the situation when your flush is outrun by a full house, which reached the opponent on the river. Such a thing is very offensive and there is a special bonus in Offside Poker specifically to mitigate this.

Each player who loses the hand, having at least AAAKK in his hand, receives 150 dollars to his account. But there are some details. Such a bonus will not be received by any user who lost with this combination, but only by the one who had the highest combination during the day. For example, if you lost with a similar full house, but after some time someone in the room lost with four of a kind deuces, then the bonus will not be paid to you, but to the user with four of a kind deuces. Another detail is that you won’t be able to withdraw the bonus immediately, but you will also have to wager it.

Best hand bonus. A similar promotion that is similar to the previous one. This time it is considered the best hand. If you win with a hand that is at least four of a kind Jacks, then you will be credited with 100 bonus dollars to your account. But here the same restrictions apply as with the previous example: the hand must be the strongest of the day and the bonus money will have to be won back. An additional condition is that this promotion is only valid on limits of $0.50/1.0 and above.

Royal Fush Bonus. Another action of the room, which has its own pitfalls. It has the following conditions: there is a starting jackpot of $100. Every day, 10 dollars are added to it until one of the users has a flash role. But the bonus has a maximum amount, it is $500. An additional condition is that the game must be played at $0.50/$1.00 limits. In this case, both pocket cards must participate in the combination. The jackpot is one-time, if this combination is collected by several players, then only the first of them will win.

Loyalty program

For regular players, there is a VIP system, thanks to which users can get part of the rake back. Previously, there were six levels, ranging from "white" to "platinum". Currently, the loyalty program has been reduced to four: White, Blue, Black and Silver.

To move to the next level, you will have to accumulate a certain number of OPP points. The accumulated points can be exchanged for goods in the internal store at the rate of $5 for every 2,000 OPP points. We can say that these are relatively good conditions.

Deposit and withdrawal

Now you can deposit and withdraw funds from your account in the Offside poker room using:

• Banking VISA cards and MasterCard
• Skrill
• NETELLER
• UCASH
• WebMoney
• EcoCard

At the same time, it will be possible to withdraw a day only through the payment system with which you replenished your account. This means that if you made a deposit using Skrill, then you will also have to cash out through Skrill. It is worth mentioning that the minimum amount for which you can make a deposit is 1 dollar.

Registration

A characteristic feature of the poker room is undoubtedly that no one has the right to register in the room without an invitation. It is difficult to say what caused this, but the management of the poker room decided to make their platform closed. In order to start the game in the room, you need to receive an invitation from your friend, and if there is none, then you will have to look for it. There is an opinion that such a policy is connected with an attempt to avoid paying taxes and not show their income openly.

If you want to start playing at Offside Poker, then just clicking on the “Register” button will not be enough. You will have to write a letter to the official email of the room [email protected], with a request to allow registration on the site. This approach seems very strange. Especially, given the fact that the room is far from the most popular and complicating registration in this way, you can lose a large number of potential users.

Bets

An indisputable advantage of offside poker is that users have one game account for both the bookmaker's office, and for casinos and poker. Thus, many users in the room play poker in between matches or just for fun. It is obvious that in such conditions it is unlikely that there will be very many good players.

In addition, the received bonuses do not have to be wagered at the poker tables. They can be spent by placing a bet at a bookmaker.

Scandals

As mentioned before, there are several scandals associated with offside poker. After them, most of the audience of the poker room stopped playing on this site and on more non-greedy rooms. This story began in 2013, when Offside Poker suddenly changed the conditions for wagering a cashout, which made it completely unprofitable.

But at present, large rooms are also resorting to such changes, one of them, for example, is PokerStars.

But the more important part of the problem is that in addition to changing the conditions of Offside Poker, a large number of game accounts have also been frozen. With them, users have not been able to cash out their bonus funds. And when the account holders contacted technical support, they were told that they had not met the conditions of the poker room, so the restrictions would not be lifted.

Outcome

Thus, offside poker, on the one hand, can be a good platform for beginner poker players, because the audience level of the poker room is quite low. But on the other hand, closed registration and scandals in the recent past make you think about the reliability of the room.