Ah, thanks - will have to make it work then.

So glad Jerry could come shill for this event. Low rake? Only if you factor in the extras. There is no need to bull**** when the event already looks decent and is great way to bring players back.

$25 rake for poker golf and food seems pretty reasonable.

Starting to see a plethora of mid stakes tourneys that have buy in of $365 like even WSOP-C events and such. $65 fee on a $300 tourney is no bueno.

Jerry, re-read your post. It says food and golf included in an already low-rake event? Am I reading it wrong?

$315+50 it's a 2 day event with 30/40/50 min levels, it's reasonably valued, but if we could get everyone to play the same structured event for $1000+50, I'd be a lot happier.

Just curious what tournament players think about tournaments that allow players to surrender their stacks during the re-entry period and come back as a new player without busting. What are the pros and cons to allowing this in a tournament?

IMO any mid-level tourney with house fee (juice) of greater than 15% is a ripoff.

As long as players continue to show up, the juice will continue to go up.

Thunder Valley, for example, is one of the biggest offenders: 20-25% juice for most daily "crapshoot" tournaments, including the holiday specials ($100 + 25).

(Chumash in Santa Barbara county is perhaps the biggest offender: $140 + 40 for its big tournament. What a ripoff.)

10% juice used to be the standard until TV poker got hot. Casinos started charging 20% juice and hasn't stopped even though attendance has returned to pre-TV boom levels.

Online poker will eventually return to California (because the Indian casinos and the big card rooms all want a piece of the action.) IMO online poker tournaments are far superior to live tourneys: bigger fields, smaller buy-ins, less juice.

Justin, you won't find anyone who doesn't approve of this. It's win-win-win. Player gets to keep playing longer with more chips, house gets more rake, and other players get a larger prize pool. Not to mention that you get to avoid the incredibly obvious incentive to dump your last remaining chips to someone else your last hand in collusive fashion.

Yes barber. I was going to point out the same thing. If it can help prevent the chip dumping in last 3 minutes of entry period I am all for it!!!

I've been following rake pretty closely at all locations. I don't think thunder charges anywhere near 20-25% on most "regular" tournaments. I don't play the dailies so not sure where those fall without a receipt.

For a $40 or $60 event with smaller fields not sure if only charging 10% or 15% would justify the event from casino point of view except that it can feed the cash games. So I expect a lower buy in to have higher rake.

How much is the rake for their monthly $300 40k guarantee?
It's not $75 which would be 25%.

If it is 25% I will not play it this Saturday. I believe you will find it closer to 15%. Maybe 12.

IMO chip dumping still occurs, the only way to prevent chip dumping is to NOT allow re entries. If I have a half stack and it's the last hand and an open and a call infront of me, I'm not going to fold now to forfeit my stack, I'm gonna get em in. The only thing that changes if we can't forfeit is I'm gonna make sure the other players cover me so I bust out rather than be stuck with a really short stack.

Tournaments were used by casinos to bring in players, so the players would eventually play cash games and that's where the house would make the money. "Tournament specialists" began to find value in these events, and over time began to lobby to make the blind and payout structures "better" giving themselves a better shot at profiting. It got to the point where the house realized that they weren't getting the draw they needed to justify the loss they were taking on the tournaments, so the rake/ juice went up. From the houses standpoint, they need to break-even/ profit from every tournament now. I believe the average "tournament specialist" doesn't realize what the costs are to casinos to host these events.

What is the loss Thunder Valley takes by using up a majority of there tables on a busy Holliday to accommodate a tournament, when they could be dropping $200/table/hr at those same tables?

I wouldn't expect anyone trying to play tournaments for a living to play these terribly raked small tournaments, and to me that's ok, because that makes a fish like me have a shot when I play them.

So in the forums opinion, there is absolutely no downside to stack surrender?

Good point!

So then stack surrender could actually encourage chip dumping.

Yes, I see that Casino Royale has $315+$50, but this month there is a WSOP-C with a $300+$65. Thought they were fairer than most. Guess not.

No. Reread what he said. He's saying he'll get the chips in bad when re-entry is allowed, regardless of chip surrender. Stack surrender can ONLY help if you're going to allow re-entries.

Well it could encourage chip dumping In the circumstance that a shorter stacked player happens to be all in but otherwise it certainly doesn't. It definitely makes sense to allow it and seems like a similar concept to letting players re-enter on day 1b when they finish 1a with a short stack.

Lets just say that it doesn't prevent it.

But re-entries/ stack surrender are just more factors that ever player should consider when making decisions in the early rounds. The same way some people take advantage of people on the bubble that are playing for a min cash, some players can get overly aggressive during reentry periods and run over players that avoid confrontation. I personally am not a fan of unlimited reentries, I don't mind multiple flights when you can enter each flight and you can keep your largest stack.

Thunder Valley's tournament juice schedule:

$20 buy-in with $10 rebuys (Monday night): $2 for the house for each buy-in, rebuy, and add-on; $3 for dealers from the buy-in only (listed on receipt as "player fee").

$40 buy-in: $7 for the house, $3 for dealers

$60-75 buy-in (Friday, Saturday, Sunday 11am): $12 for the house, $3 for dealers

$100 buy-in (Sunday night KO at 7pm): $14 for the house, $3 for dealers

$125 buy-in (Friday 5pm, Saturday 5pm, Holiday 11am special): $20 for the house, $5 for dealers

$300 buy-in (First Saturday of the month): $30 for the house, $9 (3% withheld from prize pool) for dealers and staff

$60 satellites (Friday 11am and 8pm prior to First Saturday $300 buy-in): $7 for the house, $3 for dealers

Both the 2-Pair and Ante-Up Tour events feature high juice (over 15%) plus 4% withheld for dealers/staff (instead of the customary 3%).

Also note that chopping at the final table is NOT allowed at these events, according to the tournament director (Nicole) at the 101 Casino in Petaluma.

The 101 also does not end each "Day 1" flight at the same time. Instead of ending Day 1B and 1C at the same time as Day 1A (when 12% of the field is reached, the way the WSOP handles multiple Day 1's), Day 1B and 1C will also play down to 12%, with Day 2 starting at the lowest level among Days 1A, 1B, and 1C.

I no longer have any interest in playing these events due to high juice and unfair structures.

I'll have to check on structures and multi day events. I played main event at 2pair 101 but don't recall when we bagged other than it was 2am as compared to the other flight as I didn't bag in both.

As for juice it's something they are working on. I know the 2pair event this Sunday April 6th is a pretty low rake especially considering they are giving away lunch, golf, and hat.

I might be misunderstanding, but you don't like playing down to a specific %? You prefer a set time? I actually prefer the %, I think it prevents the action slowing near the end of the night on day 1b & 1c's. I guess it's a preference thing, but as long as they make it clear, I have no problem either way. As far as the juice goes, yes it's high, but don't expect it to change, tournaments on the lower buyin levels aren't designed to be profitable for anyone but the house.

Any TD with any common sense should know that EVERY Day 1 flight should finish AT THE SAME TIME so that players from one Day 1 flight won't have to play longer (or shorter) than the other Day 1 flight.

The elapsed time to reach 12% of the field on Day 1A should set the end time for Day 1B, 1C, etc. so that every player would have played the same amount of time on Day 1, regardless of the Day 1 flight the player was in.

The WSOP has been doing this since 2007, when multiple Day 1's were used for $1000 and $1500 buy-in events to build gigantic fields.

To have each Day 1 flight play down to 12% would be unfair to all players, some of whom would have to play longer (in some cases, MUCH longer i.e. over 1 hour) than the others.

Until someone with common sense starts running tournaments at the 101 in Petaluma, or until Nicole starts doing things right, I have no interest in playing tournaments there.