Tournaments

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Sportbet Poker offers the most true-to-life online poker tournaments on the Internet. Whether you're a tournament expert or novice, the poker tournaments at Sportbet Poker will provide you with hours of challenge and entertainment. Click here for tournament schedule.

• What is a tournament?
• How and when to sign up
• Details of each tournament
• Costs and prizes
• The tournament starts
• Balancing and collapsing tables
• Re-buys and Add-ons
• What if you get disconnected?
• Blind-off mode
• Interrupted games
• Rules and regulations
• Tournament schedule

What is a tournament

Online poker tournaments are friendly competitions involving 10 to 1000+ players, all of whom start playing at the same time (at one or more tables) until one person -- the winner -- remains. All players start with the same amount of chips, called "tournament chips", used during the course of each poker tournament. As time progresses, the stakes rise, making it more and more difficult to stay in the game.

Players who fall behind will ultimately "bust out" (lose all their chips) and be removed from the table. Games are typically played until only one person remains. Players are awarded prize money based on their finishing position in the group.

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How and when to sign up

Each tournament has a "registration period". Registration periods are between 2 and 30 minutes, and typically immediately precede the tournament start time. To sign up in a tournament in Sportbet Poker, click the "Trny List" tab in the Poker Rooms window. (The Poker Rooms window lists all poker rooms at Sportbet Poker and can be accessed via the Rooms button in the upper left of the display.)



Each upcoming poker tournament in the list shows a time (to the right side) when registration starts: i.e. "reg starts in X mins". Simply wait for the time to arrive, and then click once on the tournament to get a Pop-up menu. The menu offers you the option to register. You will also notice that the time now shows "reg ends in X mins" which lets you know when registration will end and the tournament will start.

You are free to play in other games, or even leave the site while registration is underway -- your place is reserved. You will be automatically placed into your seat when the poker tournament starts (even if you're not online; more on this below).



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Details of each tournament

To see details of any tournament on Sportbet Poker, locate a list of all tournaments under the "Trny List" tab on the Poker Rooms window. (If the Poker Rooms window is not visible, click once on the Rooms button in the upper left of the display). Click ONCE on any listed poker tournament and then choose Properties to see all details of the chosen tournament.

Some of the more significant tournament factors include:

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Costs and prizes

The cost to enter a poker tournament can range from zero, to a nominal amount, to amounts as high as $100 or more. Sportbet Poker offers both Real money and play money tournaments. When you register, the entry cost is deducted from your account. If you un-register before the tournament starts, the cost is refunded.

Entry costs typically involve a Buy-in, which is put towards the prize pool. There is also an entry fee, which is Sportbet Poker's fee for hosting the games. For example, a tournament might involve 30 people, each of whom buys in for $10 plus a $1 entry fee. Each player's $10 goes towards the prize pool, which in this case would equal $300. The $300 prize would be split, likely between the top 4 players.

Separate from the entry fee or buy-in, each tournament has a "starting chip amount" -- the amount of chips you will be given at the start of the tournament. Chips are often set relative to the buy-in, but not always. (For example, a $10 buy-in for a tournament with a $1000 starting chips amount.)

Some poker tournaments (called free roll) will have no cash buy-in or entry fee but may require True Points, but still offer a prize, funded by the house. Other poker tournaments might require you to place in the top 10 of a prior tournament -- called a satellite.

And, it goes on and on. There is an endless combination of possibilities -- and that's part of what makes it so much fun!

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The tournament starts

As registration ends and the tournament starts, you will automatically be seated at a table with your previously allocated starting chips. If you're in a game at the time, you will be moved as soon as you exit the hand (either at the end, or by folding). If you are disconnected or offline at the start time, your avatar is still seated at a table. All poker tournaments have a designated "seating" time or "pull in" time to accommodate players in another game when the start occurs.

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Ballancing and collapsing tables

Sportbet Poker offers multi-table poker tournaments. Tournaments with more than 10 players will therefore have more than one table. A 60-person tournament will start out with 6 tables of 10 players, and finish with just two players at one table. So in order to keep the games fair, tables are "balanced" as players are eliminated.

For example, suppose there were three tables with 10, 9, and 9 players respectively. If 2 players were eliminated from one of the tables of 9, that would leave three tables with 10, 9, and 7 players. In such a situation, we would move a player from the table of 10 to the table of 7, resulting in a better balance of 9, 9, and 8 players at the three tables. Generally, we will move a player to another table whenever there is a difference of 3 or more players between tables. In some rare cases, we will move a player when there is a difference of 4 or more players.

Deciding which player to move is based on their position relative to the dealer button. We try to move the player who has just been passed by the button, into a seat at the destination table that has also just been passed by the button. But since this is not always possible, we move the person who is closest to this situation, into a position that is also as close to his current one as possible.

Collapsing is a natural extension of balancing. Once there is a total of 10 open seats among all tables, the smallest table is broken up, and its players moved to all remaining open seats. Here again, each player's position relative to the button is considered in the moves.

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Re-buys and add-ons

Some poker tournaments offer you the option of getting more chips during the tournament. A re-buy is an option to purchase more chips at any time up to a certain stake level. For example you might have the option to get an additional $500 worth of tournament chips at a cost of $5, until the games reach 200/400 stakes, after which you'll no longer have the option. (Note: you cannot re-buy if your chips amount is more than the original starting chips.)

An add-on is very similar to a re-buy except it is offered at a specific time to all players who choose the option. For example, just before the stakes rise to 150/300, you'll be offered the choice of getting $200 worth of tournament chips for an additional cost of $2.

All add-on and re-buy amounts are added to the prize pool.

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What if you get disconnected

In a live tournament, if you've registered and don't show up, or if you leave mid-game, your seat is still dealt cards and your blinds are paid by chips from your stack. The same occurs when you're disconnected at Sportbet Poker -- your character will become translucent (and green) to others in the game, and you will fold each hand, even those where your character bets the blinds. This is called being "Blinded-off".

When you register for a tournament, you must accept this risk in order to play.

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Blind-off mode

As noted above, if you get disconnected, your player will continue playing and be Blinded-off until all your chips are gone. You also have the option to set your game into this mode manually by clicking the Blind-off check box in the upper left area of the display while you're in a tournament game. This affords you the option of leaving your machine for a while during the tournament. But be warned: blinds will still be taken when your turn arrives.

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Interrupted games

While rare, it is possible that a technical problem will stop or abort the poker tournaments in progress. In the instance that a tournament is aborted, all players are automatically re-seated at their respective table and play will resume either at the hand preceding the problem, or even at the same point in the game. No money will be lost as a result of Interrupted games.

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Rules and regulations

When you register for a poker tournament on Sportbet Poker, you must accept the following rules and conditions:

• If you are disconnected or leave the game, your character will continue playing by folding each hand and paying the blinds.
• All-in Protection does not apply in Tournaments.
• While in an online poker tournament, your account cannot play in another game.
• You can only be registered for one tournament at a time and can only register for a tournament while not in another.
• Once the tournament starts, you cannot withdraw or receive a refund for any buy-in, re-buy, or add-on used -- unless the tournament is aborted by the house.
• Site hosts can revoke chat privileges if deemed appropriate.
• All other Sportbet Poker site rules apply.

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