Table NinjaInterview with Table Ninja developers
PokerSoftware.com: Where did the idea for Table Ninja originate?
Sutherland: I played poker professionally for over a year on PokerStars before beginning work on TableNinja. I was often frustrated by the fact that the major online poker sites seemed to have developed their software with the casual one-table player in mind. I wanted to provide a completely new way to interact with PokerStars so that multi-tablers could have a customizable interface designed specifically for playing multiple tables and maximizing earnings. I brought this idea to a friend of mine who was working full-time as a professional software developer and TableNinja was born. With my poker expertise, his software expertise, and all of the help and support we've received from the poker community, we were able to build TableNinja into the great program it is today.
PokerSoftware.com: Talk about some of the challenges of creating the program.
Sutherland: The biggest challenges are always in the details and, from the start we believed that it is essential that TableNinja works 100% reliably 100% of the time. Other similar programs might work 98% of the time, but then at a crucial moment a hotkey might fail and, as a result, you might lose a tournament you had been playing for hours. With TableNinja, you can be confident that everything will work exactly as it should 100% of the time. Handling the rare cases that might only come up once every couple thousand hands has been our biggest challenge.
PokerSoftware.com: In your opinion, what are its strongest features?
Sutherland: Personally, I think the strongest features for cash game players are the "Default Bets" and the "Auto Seating/Buyin". I love being able to simply double click a table in the lobby, be seated instantly, bought in at that table, and ready to play. I also think that the default bets can really change the way you play poker. Every time it is your turn, TableNinja automatically enters a customizable percentage of the pot into the bet box for you. This means that all standard pre-flop bets are sized automatically for you, which lets you play more efficiently and allows you to start playing a lot more tables. For sit and go players, I think our Sit-n-Go Sensei, with a fully automated Sit-n-Go Opener and our unique blind-dependent "Sit-n-Go Betting," are definitely our best features.
PokerSoftware.com: What feedback have you received from customers?
Sutherland: We've gotten an overwhelming amount of support from the poker community and are incredibly grateful to all of our loyal users for all the feedback and support they've given us. Most of TableNinja's current features were requested by the community at some point and we really try and make interacting with the community a big part of our development process. I've gotten hundreds of e-mails from people who wanted to let me know how much they love TableNinja and, as a software developer, there is nothing more rewarding than knowing that people appreciate the software you've created.
PokerSoftware.com: Talk about the table selection functionality of Table Ninja.
Sutherland: For sit and go players, the TableNinja Sit-n-Go Opener will automatically open tournaments of the types you specify for an entire session. For example, you can set TableNinja to automatically keep five of the $16 No Limit Hold'em Turbos and five of the $27 No Limit Hold'em Turbos open for two hours. TableNinja will open five of each tournament type and then any time you finish a tournament, TableNinja will automatically detect that and open a new table for you until your two-hour session is over. This allows you focus 100% on playing your best poker and you can go an entire session without ever having to bother registering for new tournaments or messing with the PokerStars lobby.
For cash game players, TableNinja's automatic waitlist handling allows you to specify a certain number of tables you wish to play. You can then join as many waitlists as you wish for the tables that look the most profitable and TableNinja will automatically accept seats and buy you in until you hit the number of tables you want to play. Then, if you leave a table, TableNinja will automatically accept the next waitlist seat that comes up to replace that table.
PokerSoftware.com: What do you see as the future of programs like Table Ninja?
Sutherland: We're going to keep expanding TableNinja and start working on providing support for additional sites. We already have a new program, TableNinjaFT, which provides a limited set of TableNinja's features for Full Tilt players. Furthermore, over the next few months, we have a huge list of improvements planned, including adding more Full Tilt support, adding various types of informational on-screen displays, supporting custom PokerStars themes, and providing some new features that we believe will revolutionize multi-tabling.
PokerSoftware.com: What features are in the works?
Sutherland: Right now, one of the features at the top of our list is an on-screen display that will convert your stack size into big blinds in real-time and display things like your M and "true BBs" for each table. This will make multi-tabling sit and gos a lot easier and remove the need for players to constantly calculate their stack size. We also are working with TiltBuster.com to release a custom TableNinja PokerStars theme that will be designed specifically for multi-tablers. In addition, we have a lot of exciting things in the works for TableNinjaFT and plan to continue to expand our Full Tilt support.
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