Please Please Please help 🙏


Could I ask your advice on a poker tournament my father played at the weekend. He qualified to a $600 LIVE tournament in a freeroll online hes played a couple of years but knows the game! I was over the moon for him he's only been playing $1-3 tournament online ! I have played two events before and thought it would be a really good experience. He was so nervous and excited you know the feeling! He managed to make it to Day 2 with 130,000 this is were it gets interesting registration closed at 3 from day one last flight then they proceeded to play day 2 now at 4pm the players sat down at day 2 for over 2 and half hours without knowing how many got paid out so essentially the was playing blind not knowing the payouts I have never seen or heard anything like this in my life! Obviously no medium or small stacks would make a move until they know the payouts this went on for 2 hours. They was breaking tables up without any seat drawing! At one point he called my father's name out and said your moving he wasn't next big bling the guy was nowhere near the table just randomly called his name he got.moved 6/7 times he finished 71 out of over 700 entrants and didn't cash ?


Thanks In advance just wanted someone else's opinion it just doesn't feel right I have played thousands of tournaments and never heard of the money not being shown for two and a half hours!



James

Did the players ask the tournament director why the payouts hadn't been posted? Which venue was it?

sounds like a poorly run tournament... you should probably name the venue as others who played there can comment/it'll gain traction.

Seems poorly run, payouts definitely need to be posted as soon as available (Usually shortly after registration has closed). As far as table changes go, they don't often move next BB or anything similar, it's usually random, or in smaller field tournaments they often move the player so he's in the same position (EG a player from the BU if the empty seat is from the BU on the new table).

This is not outside the range of normal.

The tournament was a London Live Event at the weekend at Victoria Casino Edgware Road run by 888 and grosvenor Jointly I have played over 20 years and never in my whole tournament career have I heard this please get this into the poker community this isnt split milk I feel his first experience at a big tournament has been spoiled. You will usually find him in pennybuys and low stakes I feel embarrassed and I know the poker community is a nice friendly happy community ! Please get this story out there I have.messaged numerous professionals asking there advice

There was one player on my father's table who asked the dealer about payouts and proceeded to call the floor to ask why no tournament information was displayed ie money collected places paid

He was fobbed off and obviously the players with.nice stacks didn't care ��

I've seen similar. A daily tournament where registration and rebuys end after the first hour, a lazy TD took an hour to post the payouts and update the other info - cause he was "busy".

Sounds strange, normally the screens are updated with payout details pretty quickly IME.

FYI 57 got paid, 830 for a min cash, 72k for 1st.

https://twitter.com/ThePokerRoomUK/s...33312490541061

Longinescan you seriously say when late registration has closed that tournament prices take over two hours to.be displayed are you grasping the immoralness and how it changed the dynamics of the game ?

Nobody is saying that.

What exactly is it that you want from us here?

You asked if it was normal and got the answer "Nope, not normal" and now you want to argue with people about it for some reason.

He thinks his dad bubbled the tournament because of the late posting of the payouts and wants us to agree his dad is now owed something.

Hey James Joyce, try punctuation next time

This happened to me in Aruba but it was far worse there.

At no time in the tournament did they post the number of paid players or the payout structure. When they made the final payouts it was for about 50% of the overall take which was pretty outrageous. I surmised at the end that the staff was taking a cut of the payouts.

In general there is a % of players that make the final payout. If I had been there I would have asked what that % was and made estimates from there (usually they round up sometimes by more than 1 player). It looks like in this tournament the payout % was 8% and they rounded up. Typically in the US anyway they pay 10% or 12% depending on where. In the WSOP it is 15% if I remember correctly (I didn't cash this year and last year was Covid).

Typically final payouts aren't posted if they are still accepting entries. In the Parx Big Staxx tourneys on Day 2 they are still accepting entries for the first Day 2 level so they don't post the payout structure until the 2nd level (if I remember correctly). Though in some rooms they post the payout structure and then modify it as late entries accumulate (which can actually make things worse).

Not sure what the "please please please help" thing is about. Sounds like you want to be recognized as a victim. There is no recourse to not getting paid in a tournament because you bounced out early. You will fail in any attempt to appeal to the gaming commission or in any lawsuits.

I guess the exception to this would be if they didn't pay the appropriate number of people. I have seen it happen twice where they failed to call for a bubble and there was no hand for hand. Once was at the WSOP in the senior tourney where I guess a lot of people got eliminated at the same time and they missed the bubble. Once it happened at Foxwoods where the Floors just missed it. In both cases I would guess that somebody who should have been paid may not have gotten paid. So you can ask the room (Victoria Casino Edgware Road) or 888 what the % of people who should have been paid was. I'm guessing they will say 8% and that will be that.

For future reference I would encourage you to play like min cashing isn't the goal. Winning and/or chopping should be the goal. I have bubbled quite a few tourneys with no regrets. Well there was one tourney where I was waiting to cash and 7 times the all-in long shot won until on the 8th attempt I managed to lose as the all in favorite... But the bright spot was I learned to stop caring about the min cash (even in the WSOP Main event).

The other thing you should know is that a failure to call for hand for hand at the bubble is a huge advantage for short stacks (especially those who are trying to min cash). The big stacks won't know to do their bubble bullying and there will be some shortish stacks who will think they may have to double up to survive and may bounce because of it. But I am guessing they did call for the bubble long after your father was eliminated.

My thoughts echo the same as others here.

1. Your father wasn't scammed or targeted, there does not seem to be anything actionable here, and the window for recourse is long closed. So chalk it up to a life lesson and move on
2. If in this predicament in the future, raise more of a stink, ask for the TD and ask why the updated information is not posted.
3. There are opportunities here, even if you are a small or medium stack. With no information on where the bubble is, aggressive play is going to be successful
4. If this was a casino run tournament, do not play events at this casino anymore. If this was a circuit event, find out what company was managing the tournament, and contact their TD, and then avoid tournaments run by that company. You can help fix the problem for the future. Your dad will get no compensation
5. Learn to not let these things tilt you. Yes, this was bad practice. Yes, this unfairly disadvantaged certain stacks. But if you play tournament poker long enough, you are going to encounter many, many situations that are unfair, from the mundane (short stack plays his big blind, then gets moved UTG at a new table) to the very unusual (live hand gets mucked by dealer). It is easy to let these things tilt you. But if you focus on the things you can't help, you ignore taking advantage of the things you can.

So, yes, this is not normal, and not particularly fair. But it happens, roll with it, or even exploit it. And the time to do anything about it as it is happening.