Tournaments ? How do they work ?

[ScanX]

Hi

I'm a new Holdem player (been playin 1,5 month online)

I was wondering : how do tournaments basically work ?

Like you pay 10$ to participate to one and then after ?
Do you receive "fake" money to play with ?

How much can you expect to win for a 10$ tournament when you place like top 5 ?

I also saw stuff like Tournament 10$ + 5$ ? what does that mean ?

Sorry for those newbish questions, hope someone will bother answer me :)

ScanX

[ballbp]

I play a good bit of tournaments at pokerroom.com, some for real money and some for play money. They have single table tourneys that pay out the top three finishers but yes they do pay out play money for the play money tables. The multi table tourneys have 750 people and they fill up very fast and the top ten receive prizes with the top five getting payed out. The $10 + $5 or $25 + $2 is the entry fee to play. $15 or $27 and so on.

[ScanX]

thanx for your answer but why 25 + 2 ?

why not just simply 27

[ballbp]

I'm not sure the reason for the split. I'm under the impression that if it's a real money tourney, the $25 would go to the prize pool and the $2 would go to the casino. I could be wrong on that though but I'm sure someone will post the reason.

[Dave B]

Correct-the larger amount goes to the pot to be split up as prize money the smaller amount goes to the house.

[karasz]

heres my question


when do you switch tables in large tournaments?

is there a process OR just total randomness?

[groton]

i think its manly when one table get less then others

like lets say Every table starts with with nine and then two sudenly drop down to 6 or 5 people
its to many people to brake down one table and send the rest to that other table

so thay take so many people from the other tables to even them all back up somewhat.

who thay pick i think is random for the most part but i dont know.

it is Random at the Big Casino's to a point
thay do have tables thay target for braking up


like at the WPT events at Foxwoods the Tables thay had Upstairs Broke up first then the tables on the outside in the ball room broke up till there was just the one in the middle.


i dont know if thay do that online thoe

there been times iv gotten switched five times in six hands lol

[JimTheBullet]

You are mainly right in what you say Groton but, in most tournaments it isn't really random.

There are two considerations when breaking tables / moving people. The first is that all tables have about the same number of people on them. This is because some poeples' games suit different table sizes better so if you keep all tables the same then nobody can benefit from (or be penalised by) being on a short handed table.

The second reason is to keep the number of chips in play on each table fairly even. Clearly, it is an advantage to be on a table with more chips on it than the average because you can potentially earn more chips for your own stack.

In practice, in the casino tournaments I have played in, the movement of people tends to be purely to keep player numbers even. This is, I think, because the organisers have to keep the tournament moving and there simply isn't time to sort it out exactly. What usually happens is that the organisers identify a short handed table and find a table from which they can take a player. They always take the player who is about to post the big blind on the next hand - thus guaranteeing that you cannot post 2 big blinds in a row, even if you have to post immediately at your new table.

My guess is that in tournaments that are scheduled to last days, the organisers will record everbody's stack size and then redraw for tables for the following day. I would think that (this is the way I would do it anyway) all the remaining players would be seeded by stack size and then a free draw for tables would be made ensuring that one player from each stack bracket goes on each table.

I have not checked this but I would think that with online tournaments they move people both to keep the number of players and the number of chips balanced. They would be able to do this because in an online tournament both the calculations and the movement are virtually instantaneous. This hypothesis is supported by the fact that in an online tournament, in my experience at least, you are moved much more frequently than in a live one, even taking into account the much faster play.

[Dave B]

the tournaments that I have played (at a casino and online) they break the highest numbered table every time 10 players drop out. For example-210 players on 21 tables. As soon as it gets to 200 players, table 21 breaks and all of those players are moved.

So if you are on a low numbered table, be careful what you reveal, because you may be playing with those guys for a long time. The higher tables make a move quickly and bluff more, because you wont be there long.