To speed up play, what do you think if the BB posted everyone's ante as well?
The Bike in LA tried this last week to mixed reviews. What do you think? In a regular tournament, a standard normal level would be 400-800 with 100 ante. So the ante is 25% of the big blind. The schedule below has the ante at 22.22% of the big blind. (based on 9 players)

If the player in the bb only has 300 and the blinds are 100-200 with 200 ante, then he has action on the 200 ante first, and then 100 action on any matching blinds. (and the pot is just 200 short) Thoughts?

Playground has been doing button antes this series and it's gotten really positive reviews from what I've heard (I'm also a big fan). It speeds up the game, and by not making antes dependent on the smallest chip on the table, antes never double and the structure smooths out (ie, going from 500 to 1000 or 5k to 10k).

+1 to this.

Button ante is optimal IMO, eliminates players not anteing whether intentional or not. Happens way too often in this day and age where players spend so much time on their electronics. Smoother process for dealers and generally allows for players to see more hands. Only arguable downside is when you're short stacked and have to pay BB->SB->Button ante 3 hands in a row, but with no antes being paid in other positions I don't think it's that much of a factor.

Definitely speeds up game, it's way I always ran my home games

Only real drawback is it makes some players realize more easily how much money is in pot preflop where maybe they didn't fully realize before.

But that's minor. I'd like to see this everywhere

I prefer the current way, even though it causes some delays and such.

If 1 player antes for all, how much do they ante? If the tourney is 10-handed, but there are only 8 at this table, do they ante for 10, or for 8?

If a player is super short, and they have to ante, does that mean they have to win the pot just to get their own chips back? I mean, if the blinds are 400-800, and the button has to ante 1,000, but only has 1,000 or less, that would imply that if he wins at showdown, he just breaks even, winning back the antes he posted.

If the ante player only has like 100 in the case above, the pot is now effectively shorted for everybody else, as they couldn't ante the full amount.

I admit these issues will not occur often, but I still prefer the current system. If the issues and delays caused by the current system are unacceptable, then I prefer eliminating antes entirely over having one person ante for all. current>no ante>1 player antes for all.

Cheers, Greg Raymer (FossilMan)

I agree with you sir.

full ante, its fine

several acceptable ways to handle this

yep

Disgree

+1 button ante

Here is structure from Playground. Their button ante is equal to the big blind. If 9 handed, then ante is 22.22% of the value of the small blind. Similar to the 25% value of the ante if level was 400-800 with 100 ante which seems about optimal.

Greg brings up an interesting point where if table is short at 7 handed, does button still ante for a full 9 players. I guess the simple answer would be yes since 88.88x7= 622.22 in example level above and 22.22 in chips is not available. Also, if down to 19 players and 3 tables near end, then you would have tables of 6,6,7 with full ante being equal to $133.33 per player at 6 handed table vs $100 standard as it is now without button ante. (at 400-800/100 level)

As for button being 300 short of 800 full ante and winning back only the 500 he put in.... it might seem like he is not winning anything, but he gets a round of ante free hands until his bb hits, and he would have been anted down to less than 500 if not for the button posting the antes, so it is a wash.


Playground Casino button ante structure sheet:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5Z...otRFhrUE0/view

Just eliminate the ante and make the tourney more player friendly besides speeding play up.

It can really brutal for a short stack if they have an unfortunate table break

Played here a few months back and it was the first time I've experienced it Absolutely loved it. Speeds the game up and no BS drama of who did or didn't ante

I played in the playground series with ante for button only. The ante stayed constant (= 1bb.. except for the first couple of levels where it was 1sb) regardless of # of players at the table. I thought it ran great- and after playing 4/5 tournaments in this manner I have become a supporter. Any issues I saw that arose (mainly to do with short stacks) seem minor and easily worked out.

Pace of play issues dwarf time-related issues with antes. Institute a shot clock and then worry about the small amount of time dealing with antes.

Agree with akashenk, better places to focus attention if you want to sped up play. Even if it was I would be in favor of doubling the ante of laggards instead:

1. Dealer gathers cards and announces, "Beginning shuffle, post antes"
2. The moment the deck is cut antes are due.
3. If ante not posted when dealer goes to your spot to collect, double ante due.
4. Whine about it and call the floor and they rule against you, triple ante due.

I like it.

Seems to me that dealers already often announce blinds and antes (not always, but often enough), and instituting this sort of penalty system would just cause more time wasting with people arguing over it.

Bottom line... has untimely ante-paying really reached some sort of epidemic level? I haven't noticed it. Sure, things aren't perfect, but of all the thing to fret over, this seems very minor.

No one is fretting over it. It has been instituted at several more modern rooms and in high rollers to positive reviews as seen above, I will be surprised if it doesn't spread further. Shrug. Solutions can solve small problems and still be successful.

I don't know. It isn't a perfect solution. So why go to the trouble to implement an imperfect solution to a tiny problem. Frankly, if it were implemented in my local card room, the amount of confusion and bickering would take up 5x more time than the collection of antes. Maybe eventually things would find some sort of equilibrium. But would the game be that much better? I don't know. I think there are much bigger issues that need to be addressed.

How in the world can you advocate eliminating the ante over one person anteing????

Pot Limit Hold em tourneys died for a reason and its not because you can only bet the size of the pot.

At a homegame without a dealer I think normal ante is even more timewasting. So button ante sounds good. With a pro dealer I dont think it cost a lot of time, but always nice to learn new ways to do things

Been discussing this with some friends. One bad thing about the button ant is that there isn't always a button. It's better then to have the BB be the single ante as there is always a BB

So the BB would pay something on the order of 2-3 big blinds? No thank you.

The more I think about this, the more I think it is not only an imperfect solution to a minor problem, but is actually a bad idea.

It changes the dynamic of the hand, regardless of who ends up paying the antes. And it makes things like table-changes all the more consequential and potentially unfair. And for what benefit? Going from 30 hands/hour to 32 (maybe)?

If time savings is the goal, then there are a number of rules (shot-clock) and process (auto-shufflers) changes which can be implemented which would have a far greater impact on the speed of the game.

Once things like that are in place, if need be, you can look at betting structure to see if additional significant gains can be made. In that case, frankly, I think the most equitable and effective method would be to go to an ante-only format. But even that would have a relatively minor impact on play-speed compared to these other things.