Multi Action Poker Brings Innovation and More Action To Live Poker Games

In 2007, part-time poker player and entrepreneur Tim Frazin was playing in a particularly slow pot-limit Omaha home game in Dallas, Texas. With the players taking their time with each decision and many of the hands being run multiple times, he was lucky to see a dozen hands per hour.

Noticing an adjacent empty poker table, it struck Frazin that while contested hands were being played at the main table, those not in the hand could easily get in some more deals if they moved over for a short while. It was the birth of Multi Action Poker, but Frazin didn’t know it at the time.

After the session, he wrote the idea down in his notebook. The rest of the year was great for Frazin at the poker table. That July, he won the first Venetian Deep Stack Extravaganza championship event in Las Vegas for $163,031. In September, he took fifth in the World Poker Tour Gulf Coast Poker Championship in Biloxi for another $140,177. He forgot all about his idea and the notebook.

Then in January of 2012, just eight months after Black Friday took away the ease of online poker in the United States, Frazin got engaged. His fiancé Mei Yin forced him to clean out his closet, where he discovered his old notebook. By the end of the year, Multi Action Poker was ready for beta testing.

So What Is It?

Multi Action Poker is based on the simple concept of increasing the action of a live poker game. This is done by combining two games into one table. Instead of one dealer box, there are two. Each dealer is responsible for dealing and controlling their own game. The players each have two separate and distinct chip sets and cards for the two separate games. You could be involved in a big hand on the flop in one game and be getting dealt a new hand in on the other.

Sound confusing? Frazin agrees… to a point.

“There have been people watching the game on the rail who tell me that it looks confusing,” said Frazin. “I can understand that. When I first started playing poker online, playing one table was easy, two tables was hard, and four tables seemed impossible. But a couple of weeks later, I was easily playing four tables at once while cooking dinner. Multi Action Poker is very similar. It will take, at most, about 15 minutes to get it, and after an hour you will completely stop thinking about it.”

There are two separate chip sets in play, each color-coded to match a specific deck of cards and spot at the table. Each game is given a colored lane to keep the action separate. The benefit is that each player gets to see double the hands, experiencing less downtime at the table.

“Poker desperately needs a shot in the arm,” explained Frazin. “The game is getting smaller and smaller, and we need to do something to get the casual players interested again. I have friends who won’t go to the casino to play poker because they say it has become boring. Multi Action Poker is the opposite of boring. The recreational player who plays poker just ten hours a week will get to see twice as many hands and will be engaged from start to finish.”

The Benefits

One of the many positives of spreading Multi Action Poker at a cardroom is that the players aren’t the only ones who are loving it. Because every player plays two hands and two stacks while at a Multi Action Poker table, the casino collects twice as much rake per square foot without having to actually increase the rake at all.

“It’s not hard to pitch the game to the casinos, because for them it’s about the bottom line,” Frazin said. “If a poker room decides to offer Multi Action Poker, they are going to double the amount of rake they collect at that table. It’s a win-win for everybody.”

But just because there are two rakes being taken doesn’t mean that the players lose out. In fact, because players can top up on one short stack despite being up in the other, Multi Action Poker is the only capped poker game in the world where a player can be winning and still add more money into the game. The end result is that the rake doesn’t eat away at the table stacks like it does in more traditional games.

Frazin also loves the fact that Multi Action Poker gives beginning players more bang for the buck when they go to the casino. Nobody likes it when new players have a bad experience and get scared away for good, but this format lowers the risk of ruin to keep them in the game longer.

“One of my favorite things about Multi Action Poker is that the casual player gets to diversify their stacks,” said Frazin. “How often have you seen a recreational player go to the casino, get his aces cracked and then leave less than an hour later? Now, because you are playing two different chip stacks, you never have all of your chips in play in any hand. If you take a bad beat, you can reload one of your stacks, or simply move the minimum buy-in over to keep two stacks on the table.”

Ringing Endorsements

Frazin isn’t the only one who believes in Multi Action Poker. Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi, winner of two World Poker Tour titles and three World Series of Poker bracelets, had a great time playing the game.

“Two hands are always better than one,” explained Mizrachi. “Multi Action Poker is great for someone who likes action and more hands. The action never stops.”

Jennifer Harman has two WSOP bracelets and nearly $2.5 million in career tournament earnings. She was also the first woman to compete in the big game at Bellagio, playing against the world’s best for the highest stakes.

“Multi Action Poker is a blast to play,” said Harman. “You don’t ever have to wait for a hand. You are always in action. It’s a fresh new way to enjoy all the best poker games.”

Where Can I Find Multi Action Poker?

After successfully beta testing in Las Vegas, Multi Action Poker launched this May at the Isle of Capri Casino in Pompano Beach, Florida. Thus far, the game has been a massive hit with the players who particularly enjoy splitting up two different poker variations, such as limit hold’em and limit Omaha eight-or-better, or pairing no-limit hold’em with pot-limit Omaha.

“The players are enjoying it immensely and the staff has supported it from the first day,” said Director of Poker Stan Strickland. “The game has run every day since its inception, and I honestly see it continuing to grow in popularity in the future. It’s an exciting game. Anything that is great for the guest is obviously great for our room and we are happy to be a part of the Multi Action Poker family.”

If you’d like to learn more about Multi Action Poker visit www.mappoker.com and tell your local cardroom manager to bring the game to your area. You can also get updates by following RealMapPoker on Twitter, liking them on Facebook www.facebook.com/mappokertable or by sending an email to infomappoker.com. ♠