Posting this on NVG and TWSS:

Just had an idea with both obvious upsides and downsides. But it might create some buzz.

To keep woman's tournaments legal, the WSOP and perhaps others, allowed males to play if they paid ten times as much for the same starting chips. And of course none do. But what if they were charged only twice as much?

Why on earth would they do that? Clearly the goal is to keep the d-bags away, which is why they set the multiple at 10x, high enough so that no male would be +$EV. A multiple of 2 is not high enough, so it seems pointless. Either just let them in, or extract a confiscatory penalty so they have to pay to make whatever political point they may be trying to make if they decide to play.

The goal of making the buy-in 10x for men is to prevent men from playing in a women's tournament. Lowering that to 2x would simply mean a bunch of men who overestimate their edge would play, which would reduce the appeal of the event for women who want to play a ladies event (almost all of the other events on the schedule are open events for women who want to play in a mixed field).

I don't see any positives coming out of it really other than larger field size due to men entering the field, but even then a significant number of women might not play due to all of the men playing the event 'for profit' and 'because women suck' or whatever so even that would level it out.

This seems like a bad idea in general. There are plenty of open events, and only one women's event. Just keep it as a women's event. I mean, you can have a men's event too if you want to keep things equal, but there is no demand for that because pretty much no men want to exclude women from one specific event, and most events are 90%+ male anyway at the WSOP so it would basically be the same as any other event.

How many men actually played the WSOP ladies event before the 10x discount? It seemed like only a handful each year. I don't think reducing it to 2x would get a lot of takers.

it really baffles me that men are allowed to enter the women's events.

Good idea imo, it might get the media talking, "Arrogant men willing to pay twice the entry to play poker with women". 2x is enough that very few men would play, but some would as there's a sliver of EV available.

The only drawback is they've already made it 10x so now if they made it 2x their motivations would be transparent, it would have been nicer from the start.

How do they keep the young men out of the senior's event?

It must not be illegal to discriminate against young people. Reverse ageism.

I'd say it should be a multiple that there clearly is no chance it's +EV, but still low enough to where the dolts with giant egos might think they still be profitable.

I'm guessing like $3200ish.

Okay, what are the obvious upsides?

*I think men should be able to play at wemens price as long as they bring a sandwich for all the ladies at their 1st table. 1/2 price if they know all hosts on The View and have read all of Oprahs books.

[ ] Idea is provocative

[ ] Idea will create a lot of buzz

[X] Old man wants to tarnish a WSOP Ladies Event (or "Woman's" tournament as he calls it in threat title lol)

I wish my local casino would allow/ offer 2x for ladies events...

Well it makes it much more valuable for a woman to play the event. Pretty sure they want to play a woman's only event for that precise reason - higher roi. If guys jump in and have to pay double what woman wouldn't want to play? They can still call it the woman's event because they have a handicap so to speak.

About two-thirds, I'd guess?

Imagine the feminist leftist heart attack if you create "men only" tournaments.

If you are opposed to 2X would you change your mind at 3X?

They... walked right into it...

What are you attempting to accomplish?

There's already been buzz with men entering women's events: it's almost always negative. That's not going to change with men paying three times the standard buyin to play in the tournament instead of ten, which is a deterrent.

Ahaha, you made my day.

Seriously, why creating "women only" tournaments ?

We have no physical edge at poker, unlike some other sports. And at school, they teach us that women are equal in term of intelligence.

So why the heck a man should pay 3x buyin to enter a women event ?

This.

Except the majority of the field in womens events are non professionals who want to play in a nonthreatening environment which also happens to be a softer than average, more passive than average field

Yes, Annette, Liv and co would be fine with the extra EV but remember the vast majority of players in the womens event are recs and they're playing the womens event rather than the monster stack or some other huge field high EV event for a reason.

And no, changing it to 3x instead of 2x does not change anything. 10x would be fine. Men not being able to enter at all would be fine. I find ridiculous political correctness to be ridiculous too, but there's nothing wrong with having a single women's event in a 50+ event schedule. I'd be all for a men's tournament too if there was any demand, which there isn't. Do you see men clamouring to enter a women's world chess title? Yes, it's not an open field and therefore the womens, seniors etc. events should not have the same prestige as winning an open field event, same as in chess or any other non-contact sport where men have no inherent physical advantage over women, but there's no reason at all to encourage men to enter the women's event, which is what lowering the buy-in 'handicap' to a different level would accomplish

You could have a handicap event where the players start with different chip stacks based on their perceived skillset and GPI ranking or whatever if that's what you're going for but again the event would be vastly unpopular as few skilled players would choose to enter it and start with less chips vs a normal event

This whole idea of men playing in women's events is stupid. If you dress in drag, you're not funny. If you're actually transgender then whatever go for it I guess although in any year you'd take the under 0.5 on number of people this affects. My girlfriend who plays at a competitive level has experienced plenty of obnoxious sexism at the table, but also benefits from an increased chance of sponsorship or whatever if she randomly binks the right live event and old men making it clear when they have the nuts and want her to fold 'to be nice' or whatever. That's just how poker works. Trying to effectively get rid of women's only events which is what this is isn't good for poker, and while women's only events may 'technically' be sexist, at the end of the day who gives a f... just don't go to the casino on that day if you don't like it, or boycott the WSOP or whatever, or organise your own men's only event where women have to pay 10x the buyin, that's how free markets work.

Either the multiple is so high that it acts as the deterrent it's meant to be, or it's a lower multiple like 2X which could encourage some decent-sized group of men to play. This would be insulting, plus a high male contingent might discourage the specific female players who those male players are paying the premium to play.

So it's all interesting in a sociological sense, but I'm still not sure what the upside is.

This. If it was just about rationally assessing one's ROI then hardly any poker would run.

Fun fact: EPT Deauville had men's and women's events last time but they had both men and women entering the "wrong" tournament.

The target audience for those events doesn't even know what ROI is. Not because they are stupid or bad at poker but because they don't care. They like to play poker and want to take the opportunity to do so in an environment they consider to be more fun and friendly.

It's a sad thing that a lot of women don't feel comfortable in regular tournaments, but that's a whole different issue.