bustabit.com -- The Social Gambling Game

[finnile]

Site operator knows the crash point of how many games in advance?

All. Just like all investor schemes I'm aware of, it's not provably fair for investors. The new scheme being built for money pot however, is the best I think we have -- it allows you to invest a huge amount of money, while minimising your counter-party risk. It's also great from Money Pot's perspective, as it minimizes the total liability it holds to investors, a very under appreciated thing.

I don't think you will have to worry about knowing the rolls. Thats because, all investment sites can play against the investors, and people are willing to take the risk.

[alani123]

So, leveraged investments? This definitely sounds interesting and I can say that I'm looking forward to the release.

[Dabs]

This is a potential solution to hedge your 'investment' from some of the risk of investing, but at this point, god speed to anyone who wants the risk of trusting any of these sites anymore with loads of your coins. Site operator knows the crash point of how many games in advance? He can run a dozen bot accounts that slowly drain investment by winning without making it obvious he's doing that. I'm starting to wonder why anyone- with how many times this community has been burned- would put themselves at risk anymore. How many times will it take?

This is becoming an issue with me, because I still have faith in humanity. A few bad apples do not make everyone else with similar plans just as evil and corrupt. The whole time there was never any proof that, for example, dooglus would not run, except his word that he would not do so. For many, it was enough to invest up to almost 70k. Mr. Previous Owner of this MoneyPot is still around, but he opened it with his real identity known.

I plan to open another fun game, because it's fun (well, it looks fun to me.) Or I plan to relaunch my old lotto game (or some variation of it.)

But no matter how provably fair we make the games (this or any other) for both players and investors, someone will accuse the operator of simply scamming away everything. Not unless we use some form of smart contract multi-signature scheme, where a dishonest player or investor can negatively impact site operations.

I mean, the world's largest and biggest bitcoin poker site is not provably fair.

The point is, sometimes, you've got to have a little faith. No scientific evidence is going to replace track record and integrity, but some people do deserve to get the benefit of the doubt.

Edit: one thing that is worth noting: from what I've heard, the plan is to allow investors to only actually deposit a fraction of the amount they want to risk. So you'll be able to say "I have 100 BTC and want to risk 1% of it per game; here's 10 BTC of it for now". So if they do run off, they only get 10 BTC not your full 100, but you'll get profit (or loss) as if you had invested the full 100 BTC.

Who's going to escrow the investor funds that have not yet been actually deposited? What if the site attracts a whale and some or all of the investors decide not to pony up?

[RHavar]

So, leveraged investments? This definitely sounds interesting and I can say that I'm looking forward to the release.

It is not the intention of the system, but rather a side-effect. A leveraged investment is not much more than a +EV gamble, and one of the reservations that Dooglus raised early on was that if you let people do +EV gambles with the investor system you risk cannibalizing the gambling side of the site. Not only this, but due to leveraging they can easily push out the more stable investors, all-the-whilst bust easily, taking the sites max-loss down with them. We're going to disincentivize this by not offering "tax credits" on losses; which means if you chose to divest at a loss, you will not be given a credit to offset any future investment earnings.  It will not effect long-term investors, but will significantly penalize the gambling day-trading-investors.

The sort of investors I am after are ones in the position such as: "I have have 1000 BTC which I'd feel comfortable investing, with a 0.1% max-loss per game. But the counter-party risk of giving it all to a gambling operator is absurd; but drip-feeding 10 BTC at a time, where the max risked is based on my entire amount I have seems fine".

If people do however want to use our investor system to gamble or leverage, they were welcome to do so and it certainly will create quite interesting absurdly high and unstable max-losses per game, but it's not the real purpose of the the scheme, which is to minimize the counter-party risk for investors.

[RHavar]

Who's going to escrow the investor funds that have not yet been actually deposited? What if the site attracts a whale and some or all of the investors decide not to pony up?

In the formula Eric gave, there's a min() there to prevent the need for anyone to act as a counter-party to the investor. The most an investor can contribute to the max game loss is the amount we actually are holding of theirs. The amount can go to zero, but never under so we never are in the awful position of trying to chase debts or guarantee investors.

[Dabs]

How about the "I have 1000 BTC, I just sent them 10 BTC, but they lost massively to a whale, and I'm outta here." ? Does your most recent answer address this? I'm a little bit confused, since if you won't let the investor lose much, that just means you don't need all his money anyway. But that's the reason you're supposed to have a large bankroll.

[RHavar]

How about the "I have 1000 BTC, I just sent them 10 BTC, but they lost massively to a whale, and I'm outta here." ? Does your most recent answer address this? I'm a little bit confused, since if you won't let the investor lose much, that just means you don't need all his money anyway. But that's the reason you're supposed to have a large bankroll.

Eric covered that here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=709185.msg9399161#msg9399161

He missed out that commission structure which still hasn't been finalized or published to github,  but works just like Just-Dice's without the tax-free credits, but it shouldn't effect the case of a whale winning.

[jaysabi]

If an investor has 1000, but only 10 of it is onsite, and the site gets hit by a lucky whale -- the investor will have 990 offsite and 0 onsite -- and need to evaluate whether or not the lucky whale was Ryan with a hat on, or a natural whale before transferring more money on site. This is how the investor protects himself against counter-party risk.

If the site recovered before the investor topped up their investment, the investor would still be left with 0 in their onsite investment. That's why it's important that every investor decides carefully how much they wish to keep onsite, offsite and risk per game.

Aren't they being paid based on having 1000 btc invested though?

[jaysabi]

Aren't they being paid based on having 1000 btc invested though?

Sure, but I don't see any contradictions here. If it helps, you can think of it as investing 1000 BTC with a stop loss at 990.

The problem is you're paying someone based on how much they say they're investing but aren't actually investing. That means you're doing max bets/max wins based on a BR you don't actually have, which is problematic if the folks who say they're investing 1000 btc decide to walk away after they lose 10. And on the flip side, you're paying out profits based on amounts that aren't actually at risk and therefore not truly "invested." If someone says "I've got 1000 btc invested" but has .1% stop-loss, they've only got 10 btc at risk, so if a whale wipes out the 10 btc, they can walk away with minimal loss, but on the other hand, if the site profits, you're paying them a share of profit as if they had 1000 btc invested.

Is that an accurate description, or am I misunderstanding how the system works? And if it is accurate, does that seem fair?

[tripppn]

I was trying to remember the name of this game.  I got hooked a while ago.  I love this game.  Time to get hooked again!   

[jaysabi]

And if it is accurate, does that seem fair?

Imagine this: you have 1000 BTC and send it to PRCDice.com to invest. You have a bot that monitors your investment, and automatically cashes you out if your investment falls below 990. Ignoring for overshooting, you are only risking 10 BTC but have the upside of investing 1000. Does that seem fair?

So what the money pot investor scheme would allow you to do is achieve the same effect without ever having to expose yourself to the counter-party risk on that 990.

Ok, this makes sense. But is it that all 1000 coins are on the site and you just don't have access to them, or are they not on the site? I'm just trying to reconcile how the BR can be said to be 1000 and you're paying bets out thinking the BR is 1000 if you don't ever have full access to those 1000 coins because of a set limit by the investors.

For example and for the sake of simplicity, say you have one investor. He deposits 1000 coins, and so your BR is in theory 1000. But he sets a max loss of .1% or 10 btc. You are thinking you have a BR of 1000, so you've set the max payout per game to be based on a percentage of 1000 coins, when in reality, your BR is going to walk if it falls to 990, or once you lose 10 coins. Allowing max wins to be much higher than the actual BR will tolerate losses for increases the odds of you going bankrupt if you hit variance, doesn't it?

[dooglus]

say you have one investor. He deposits 1000 coins, and so your BR is in theory 1000. But he sets a max loss of .1% or 10 btc. You are thinking you have a BR of 1000, so you've set the max payout per game to be based on a percentage of 1000 coins, when in reality, your BR is going to walk if it falls to 990, or once you lose 10 coins. Allowing max wins to be much higher than the actual BR will tolerate losses for increases the odds of you going bankrupt if you hit variance, doesn't it?

No, the site can't go bankrupt. If there's only one investor, and he walks after losing 10 BTC, all that would happen is that the bankroll will drop to 0 and the site won't be able to take any more bets.

Now suppose there were two investors. One deposited 10 BTC but said he had another 990 BTC offsite, for a total of 1000, and he wants to risk 0.1% each roll (that's 1 BTC per roll) and another deposited his whole roll of 100 BTC and wants to risk 1% per roll.

While both investors are in, they each contribute 1 BTC to the max profit per game, for a total max profit of 2 BTC per game. If things go badly for the site suh that the first investor loses the 10 BTC he has on deposit, he will stop contributing to the max profit at all, and the remaining investor will be the only active investor. He's still risking 1% of his remaining 90 BTC per roll, for a max profit of 0.9 BTC per roll.

The first investor may not actually have the 990 BTC he claimed to have, but we don't care. It turns out he was taking a huge gamble risking 1 BTC per roll when he only had 10 BTC in total, but that's OK and his own responsibility. Once he's busted (which he may well do) the other, more careful investor will still be just fine, having only lost 10% or so of their investment, and will probably go on to recover fully.

Does that make sense now?

[jaysabi]

say you have one investor. He deposits 1000 coins, and so your BR is in theory 1000. But he sets a max loss of .1% or 10 btc. You are thinking you have a BR of 1000, so you've set the max payout per game to be based on a percentage of 1000 coins, when in reality, your BR is going to walk if it falls to 990, or once you lose 10 coins. Allowing max wins to be much higher than the actual BR will tolerate losses for increases the odds of you going bankrupt if you hit variance, doesn't it?

No, the site can't go bankrupt. If there's only one investor, and he walks after losing 10 BTC, all that would happen is that the bankroll will drop to 0 and the site won't be able to take any more bets.

Now suppose there were two investors. One deposited 10 BTC but said he had another 990 BTC offsite, for a total of 1000, and he wants to risk 0.1% each roll (that's 1 BTC per roll) and another deposited his whole roll of 100 BTC and wants to risk 1% per roll.

While both investors are in, they each contribute 1 BTC to the max profit per game, for a total max profit of 2 BTC per game. If things go badly for the site suh that the first investor loses the 10 BTC he has on deposit, he will stop contributing to the max profit at all, and the remaining investor will be the only active investor. He's still risking 1% of his remaining 90 BTC per roll, for a max profit of 0.9 BTC per roll.

The first investor may not actually have the 990 BTC he claimed to have, but we don't care. It turns out he was taking a huge gamble risking 1 BTC per roll when he only had 10 BTC in total, but that's OK and his own responsibility. Once he's busted (which he may well do) the other, more careful investor will still be just fine, having only lost 10% or so of their investment, and will probably go on to recover fully.

Does that make sense now?

Yes, I understand this explanation. But what is the benefit of this system now? It's still a system of "don't send more than you're willing to lose if the site turns into a scam." Or is the system not addressing that concern and only addressing the concern of how much you can lose per game even though you're fully "invested?" Maybe I misunderstood which problem you were trying to solve.

[dooglus]

say you have one investor. He deposits 1000 coins, and so your BR is in theory 1000. But he sets a max loss of .1% or 10 btc. You are thinking you have a BR of 1000, so you've set the max payout per game to be based on a percentage of 1000 coins, when in reality, your BR is going to walk if it falls to 990, or once you lose 10 coins. Allowing max wins to be much higher than the actual BR will tolerate losses for increases the odds of you going bankrupt if you hit variance, doesn't it?

No, the site can't go bankrupt. If there's only one investor, and he walks after losing 10 BTC, all that would happen is that the bankroll will drop to 0 and the site won't be able to take any more bets.

Now suppose there were two investors. One deposited 10 BTC but said he had another 990 BTC offsite, for a total of 1000, and he wants to risk 0.1% each roll (that's 1 BTC per roll) and another deposited his whole roll of 100 BTC and wants to risk 1% per roll.

While both investors are in, they each contribute 1 BTC to the max profit per game, for a total max profit of 2 BTC per game. If things go badly for the site suh that the first investor loses the 10 BTC he has on deposit, he will stop contributing to the max profit at all, and the remaining investor will be the only active investor. He's still risking 1% of his remaining 90 BTC per roll, for a max profit of 0.9 BTC per roll.

The first investor may not actually have the 990 BTC he claimed to have, but we don't care. It turns out he was taking a huge gamble risking 1 BTC per roll when he only had 10 BTC in total, but that's OK and his own responsibility. Once he's busted (which he may well do) the other, more careful investor will still be just fine, having only lost 10% or so of their investment, and will probably go on to recover fully.

Does that make sense now?

Yes, I understand this explanation. But what is the benefit of this system now? It's still a system of "don't send more than you're willing to lose if the site turns into a scam." Or is the system not addressing that concern and only addressing the concern of how much you can lose per game even though you're fully "invested?" Maybe I misunderstood which problem you were trying to solve.

Here's the problem:

At Just-Dice I had a large number of coins invested because I trusted the site's operator. I made a good return.

At Moneypot I don't trust the operator as much. I would invest a large number of coins if I did.

With the proposed system I can tell them I want to invest a large number of coins, while only actually sending them a small number of coins. So if they turn out to be dice ninjas they don't get to steal too many of my coins. If they turn out to be honest, I get the same return as I would have by sending them all my coins, but without the risk.

Also, if a mysterious "whale" turns up and wins huge numbers of coins from the site overnight, my exposure it limited to the number of coins I actually sent. I'm somewhat protected from a "Mateo" style house player.

Another benefit is that I can pseudo-invest the same large number of coins in multiple sites at once (supposing there are more sites offering this feature). If the betting volume ends up split 50/50 between the two biggest sites I don't have to decide which site to invest in - I can invest in both of them, and get the same return from each as if I had sent all my coins to both of them.

[elm]

If an investor has 1000, but only 10 of it is onsite, and the site gets hit by a lucky whale -- the investor will have 990 offsite and 0 onsite -- and need to evaluate whether or not the lucky whale was Ryan with a hat on, or a natural whale before transferring more money on site. This is how the investor protects himself against counter-party risk.

If the site recovered before the investor topped up their investment, the investor would still be left with 0 in their onsite investment. That's why it's important that every investor decides carefully how much they wish to keep onsite, offsite and risk per game.

wouldnt this kind of handling force the OP to adjust the max bet size? sorry if I missed the answer

[Dabs]

Ok, so, hmmm, then it doesn't really matter what the investor says, what really matters is how much he put in. The remaining money (whether real or fake) can be safely ignored.

That's not any different then having the same investor just put in 10 BTC and risk 10% of it, and another one sending 1 BTC and risking 100%. Or, yah, maybe I still don't get it. That stop-loss thing looks good... The more conservative investor can survive longer (or has less risk of ruin due to variance).

Can I send 0.1 BTC and risk 1000% ? That would be awesome.

[calci]

Will the site be accepting investments soon? and is espringe the owner or is it Ryan?

[Dabs]

Ryan is supposed to be the new owner. Espringe is acting as both escrow of the old player funds, and consultant, since he created the game.

The funds won't be a problem once the site starts making money, or 6 months, whichever comes first.

[Babba D]

nice community of chat and its good to have time spent there

[jaysabi]

say you have one investor. He deposits 1000 coins, and so your BR is in theory 1000. But he sets a max loss of .1% or 10 btc. You are thinking you have a BR of 1000, so you've set the max payout per game to be based on a percentage of 1000 coins, when in reality, your BR is going to walk if it falls to 990, or once you lose 10 coins. Allowing max wins to be much higher than the actual BR will tolerate losses for increases the odds of you going bankrupt if you hit variance, doesn't it?

No, the site can't go bankrupt. If there's only one investor, and he walks after losing 10 BTC, all that would happen is that the bankroll will drop to 0 and the site won't be able to take any more bets.

Now suppose there were two investors. One deposited 10 BTC but said he had another 990 BTC offsite, for a total of 1000, and he wants to risk 0.1% each roll (that's 1 BTC per roll) and another deposited his whole roll of 100 BTC and wants to risk 1% per roll.

While both investors are in, they each contribute 1 BTC to the max profit per game, for a total max profit of 2 BTC per game. If things go badly for the site suh that the first investor loses the 10 BTC he has on deposit, he will stop contributing to the max profit at all, and the remaining investor will be the only active investor. He's still risking 1% of his remaining 90 BTC per roll, for a max profit of 0.9 BTC per roll.

The first investor may not actually have the 990 BTC he claimed to have, but we don't care. It turns out he was taking a huge gamble risking 1 BTC per roll when he only had 10 BTC in total, but that's OK and his own responsibility. Once he's busted (which he may well do) the other, more careful investor will still be just fine, having only lost 10% or so of their investment, and will probably go on to recover fully.

Does that make sense now?

Yes, I understand this explanation. But what is the benefit of this system now? It's still a system of "don't send more than you're willing to lose if the site turns into a scam." Or is the system not addressing that concern and only addressing the concern of how much you can lose per game even though you're fully "invested?" Maybe I misunderstood which problem you were trying to solve.

Here's the problem:

At Just-Dice I had a large number of coins invested because I trusted the site's operator. I made a good return.

At Moneypot I don't trust the operator as much. I would invest a large number of coins if I did.

With the proposed system I can tell them I want to invest a large number of coins, while only actually sending them a small number of coins. So if they turn out to be dice ninjas they don't get to steal too many of my coins. If they turn out to be honest, I get the same return as I would have by sending them all my coins, but without the risk.

Also, if a mysterious "whale" turns up and wins huge numbers of coins from the site overnight, my exposure it limited to the number of coins I actually sent. I'm somewhat protected from a "Mateo" style house player.

Another benefit is that I can pseudo-invest the same large number of coins in multiple sites at once (supposing there are more sites offering this feature). If the betting volume ends up split 50/50 between the two biggest sites I don't have to decide which site to invest in - I can invest in both of them, and get the same return from each as if I had sent all my coins to both of them.

So Investor One tells MP he has 1000 coins to invest and sends in 10. He's only risking 10 to a whale or variance. The other 990 are not on site.

Investor Two tells MP he has 100 coins to invest and sends in all 100.

Is Investor One paid a share of profits based on his share of the BR as: 10/110, 10/1100, or 1000/1100?