I have just finished my first experience of playing in a tournament with a shot clock.

In this case, the dealer had a phone app with a 30-second counter, which was restarted after each player began thinking, with a 10-second warning. Each player had a few cards for an extra 30 seconds which were automatically used if the player had not acted within 30 seconds. The shot clock was used only after the bubble.

I did not like it, and would be interested in the experience of others. I have played a wide range of live tournaments, including EPT and WSOP, and have never had the clock called on me. I normally act quickly. I find if I play a multi-day event there might be one or two spots per day when I take two or three minutes, but those are obvious pivotal decisions that players are happy to give you time to make.

As it happens, in this particular one I made a huge mistake, losing an above average stack in a weirdly-played cooler spot which I should have been able to get away from, but even before that I was hating the shot clock. I found that having a timer running, no matter how generous, distracted me a little in even fairly standard spots, and it definitely had a detrimental effect on my game.

I personally have seldom been annoyed by slow play. The one case that irritates me are the guys that go through a slow ritual on every hand - even the obvious folds - and the silly thing is a shot clock will still allow them to do this.

Shot clocks are there to reign in guys who like to make a big drama of every hand, getting far more than their share of time and attention overall, and perhaps in some cases to stop bubble-stalling. I think there are other ways to address the problem of habitual slow players, maybe introducing a round on a shot clock for them if they are clearly being too slow, rather than a blunt instrument which affects everyone.

One idea that might be interesting would be if the "extra time" cards were replaced with "off the clock" cards, so that when you played one the shot clock does not apply for that hand. Staff could give reasonable time, taking into account the size of the situation, and then start a one-minute countdown when they think appropriate. I think no one minds giving tank time to someone whose tournament life is on the line late on.

Keen to hear what people think.

why not just use the extra time cards if you need more time...? if theres only 1 or 2 spots per day you need extra time, you should have enough cards to do that.

i dont really get it. the slow habit preflops guys also, funny enough, are the guys that hollywood and tank also for 3 minutes on the river. so it is indeed effective.

the one thing people dislike about live poker is how slow/boring it can be. this helps speed everything up massively.

Shot clocks are not the solution, IMO. They don't stop the guy who tanks preflop every hand, just ensure he doesn't do so for more than 30 seconds. But if you only use 2-5 seconds preflop every hand, you deserve more time on your big decisions than the guy who routinely uses 20-30 seconds preflop. When they figure out a practical way to do this, give you extra time on big decisions, based upon how fast you have made all your other decisions all day, then I'll be in favor of it. Otherwise, we all just need to learn to call the clock a lot faster on serial tankers.

Cheers, Greg Raymer (FossilMan)

I personally have frequently been annoyed by slow play. (I play significantly fewer live events now because of it).

Disagree with just about everything OP says. In my view events without a shot clock are a bit of a joke.

I have no first-hand experience with shot clock events, but my concern would be that, if given 30 seconds, many players would use what they are given when they don't need to. People tend to use things given to them for free. It seems like in some cases, the shot clock could make things run slower. Has anyone experienced this?

In general, I would be in favor of any technology which actually worked to improve the game without making things worse at the same time. But as for pace of play, I believe there is a limit to what can be done. This is live poker. There are 10 human elements in each hand that is played. There's only so much that can be done, technology-wise. Sometimes it will be a little faster. Sometimes it will be a little slower. If people can't deal with that, they don't have to play live poker.

20 seconds preflop and 30 seconds post?

In a heads-up game you could use a chess clock -- set to a specific total amount of time for each player. When you act, you punch your side of the clock and the other guy's time starts to run until he acts, but that kind of low-tech system won't work on a 9-player table. The tech needed for each player to have an individual timer with, say 10 minutes of tank time for the day, is just too much trouble/money/bother.

I agree with Greg -- players at the table should be quicker to call a clock on somebody who is taking excessive time on routine decisions. But, most of us are too polite to be the guy calling clock all the time.

Agreed that something equivalent to chess clocks would be ideal, although it would take clever design to some up with a system that is simple enough to use, and would deal with table moves etc.

The players that take 30 seconds EVERY TIME to fold their 2-7 off suit make we want to exercise my 2nd amendment rights Unless you have a physical handicap or are facing a 3 bet preflop and have a SERIOUS decision it is one of the most irksome aspects of tournament poker. Locally we all know of "those" players that literally cost you 2 to 3 hands per drop and it drives me crazy also. The two minute river tank is more tolerable and reasonable but 5 minute tanks IMO are not. The stigma of calling the floor in those situations is the problem because it does create an uncomfortable animosity situation at the table almost every time.

In theory I think a shot clock with extra time chips is logical and I would love to experience it to see how I feel when I am the thinker and not the observer.

Play more fixed limit tournaments.

If you ban Ax tanking you will gain at least half a round. Theres not a worse hand in poker that gets so much deep thought. When in reality its a piece of crap. Those that think otherwise are truly lacking any basic skills.

Thinking fast is part of the tournament meta. It's a skill that needs learning and refining as with any other poker skill.

If you want to take 10 minutes on a decision, play cash games.

Are there tournaments of , for example, 1000 runners or about 100 tables in existence ; or lower numbers other than what I see on TV at the Aria which seem to have a shot clock with extras ?

It seems that there would be logistical difficulties but perhaps putting a clock at each table is doable .

Yet it places more responsibility on the dealer in which case perhaps the solution would be one blind to save the dealer . This is known as the "double big blind effect" alike and similar to the "butterfly effect".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butterfly_effect