I just received an invitation to a Harrah's LV $200,000 holdem poker tournament on April 15,16. This is a freebie tournament, but "rebuys are available for $250 on a first come basis for eliminated players." The prize fund is based on 1000 entrants. Superficially, this seems attractive, but I have my doubts. Suppose that they do get 1000 entrants. If I were eliminated early, I doubt that I would use the rebuy option, but I suspect that a lot of the other players would use the rebuy option. Obviously, the more rebuys that there are, the more one's tournament equity gets diluted. Has anyone played in any previous Harrah's invitational holdem tournaments, and have any knowledge about the extent to which players utilize the rebuy option?
Harrah's January Poker Tournament I played in Harrah's January, 2006 poker tournament. Initially the prize pool was set at $40,000 based on 300 entries. They ended up with over 1,900 entries and raised the prize pool to $200,000. They had a "qualifying" round, followed by the elimination play the next day. In the qualifying round, each table has 10 players. The last 2 players, at each table, still with chips goes on to the elimination play. The 8 from each table that are eliminated are eligible for the rebuy on a first come first serve basis. The rebuy qualifier is held in the evening. In that tournament, I believe that 500 rebuys were available and all 500 were exercised. It was generally a well run tournament and I would play in the April event if it wasn't for a scheduling conflict. I personally don't see a equity problem. Entry is free. Rooms for 3 nights are free. If they get a lot more entries than originally planned, Harrah's has a past reputation of increasing the prize pool accordingly. So all things considered (don't forget, you already paid for transportation) a rebuy could make sense. GOOD LUCK if you play.
H's poker t This poker tournament maybe a lot of fun, but not much beyond it. If someone wants to play in a poker tournament for the fun of playing and as an entertainment – good for them, enjoy. If one look at it from EV perspective, which many people on this site do, there is not much value in it. Harrah’s, in general, is known for catering to masses and making money by cutting corners and offering low quality commodity. There were exceptions, of course, one of them being the Las Vegas Harrah’s casino promotion team. When promo states that the prize pool is based on xx number of entrants, that means the organizers would be very happy if that many players participated. With more entrants casino makes more money, than proportionally to what was expected. So, as with toolman1’s example, if they got six and a third as many players they could increase the prize pool six and quarter times and make much much more than six and quarter what was expected. And what have they done? They increased the prize pool only five times. How typical. Not counting free room and food the tournament offers slightly more than $100 per person. That’s okay. But in poker nobody is worth twice the average, so paying for the reentry has no cash equity value, but could be a fine way to inexpensively buy a good time. S. Yama
Have fun at gaming I agree with your equity value assessment. I am nowhere near, and never will be, a professional gambler. I go to LV for recreation and maybe make a few bucks on the side. I think your statement "a fine way to inexpensively buy a good time" fits me very well. S. Yama, your knowledge of gaming is incredible. Now you add the human factor that some are just looking for enjoyment. BRAVO!
How did rebuy round work? Based on the posted numbers, there would be 380 players who qualified for the elimination phase directly. The missing piece of information from your post is what it took to advance from the rebuy round. If the qualification was the same as the other first round tables (2 advance out of 10), then 100 players would advance from the rebuy round. This implies that a fair share of the prize fund for an advancing player would be 200k/480 or about $417. Thus a rebuy would bring in a little over $80 in expected value. If rebuys cost $250, the rebuy option was really a ripoff of the players. But, look what it did for Harrahs. The players themselves contributed $125k of the $200k prize fund. Harrahs contributed less than $50 per player. If these numbers are correct, then what Harrahs did was either fiendishly clever or despicable, depending upon ones view of the world.
Not great equity but ... kelly_ c_ ritter: Your assumption for advancing from the rebuy round is correct. Just keep in mind that the numbers I gave were approximate but any adjustment to your or S Yama's calculations would have a minimal effect on the outcome. I prefer to think that it was "fiendishly clever". Casinos are not as "brain dead" as many believe. I look at it this way: If you don't like the equity of a rebuy, go for the "free" ride without a rebuy (you may not need one anyway) and then the equity is great. After all, entry is free and 3 free nights. But don't forget to give them side action to stay on their invite list. Toolman's Law #5: PLAY TO PLAY. Again, GOOD LUCK if play.
Harrahs way This resembles the low level Winterfest slot tourney that HET does. If I remember correctly the Rio had 72 machines and 10 sessions per day to give away $10k. You got three nights, for me right before Thanksgiving and two shots in the tourney. This was an invite for being Diamond, which I did in VP friendly Laughlin. But, they were selling any extra spots in the sessions for $20 cash or Reward Credits, which sure helped them cover the $10k daily hit.
What's the latest? Seems like Harrah's (LV) may have substantially reduced the prize pool for their invitational poker tournaments, held about every 2 1/2 to 3 months. My latest invite for the 12/21/06 poker tournament reads "over $41,000" in prizes based on 400 players. My questions as: Has anyone played in one of these in the last 6 months? What was the turnout? Did Harrah's adjust the prize pool if the turnout was more than the minimum? If they did adjust the prize pool, what were the final numbers? I'm thinking about going but the invite says they are only paying down to 10 places. This and other things have me wondering if it's worthwhile.
My girlfriend just got an invite yesterday for a $50K poker tournament from a different HET property (Caesars LV) in December. It had the rebuy option set at $250. It must be a Diamond invite because I didn't have one in my mail. She is diamond and I am only Platinum.
