11b. Re: Poker machines
Date: Fri Oct 5, 2007 12:23 pm ((PDT))Let's say they get 150 players for their 2PM tournament.
First response deals with this -- as in the post to which this was a response, someone needs to be there to answer questions, encourage players to enter, etc.
The buy-in is $60 plus a $40 rebuy. You get $1500 in chips. $55
goes to the prize pool, $5 goes to the house.
In reality, the house usually gets more of the $60 at this point.
Now there is the ingenious little invention called the "bonus buy."
For an extra $10 you get another $1000 in chips. Everyone, even the
dimmest wit in the lot, makes this "bonus buy." One would be at too
much of a disadvantage if they didn't. This money, $1500, goes to
the dealers. It is divvied up based on the number of downs each
dealer does in the tournament. A down is 1/2 hour. You would need
about 15 dealers to start the tournament. But you don't need that
many to finish. But by using a rotation you insure that all dealers
do about the same number of downs on a weekly or monthly basis.
Average Dealer would do about 7 downs (3.5 hours) per tournament and
make $100.
In a tournament with a $60 entry, the optional chips, with the purchase price going to the dealers, is usually only $5.
Then there is the rebuy. The house takes $5 out of the $40 rebuy.
About 80% of the field makes the rebuy.
Usually ALL of the rebuy money goes into the prize pool; the house usually only takes money out of the initial buy-in.
Total money taken in: $15,300
Prize pool is now: $12,450
House take is now: $1,350
Dealer take is: $1,500By dividing $12,450 by $15,300 we come up with a negative equity of
19%.Then there is the issue of tipping. A highly controverial issue in
today's tournament world. More and more players are no longer
tipping. Back in the old days, the beginning of poker tournaments,
when the issue of dealer compensation came up, the players agreed
that the winners would leave a tip. It worked fairly well back then
when there was a small group of players and everybody knew
everybody. But future players had no say in the issue. Plus,
dealers did get stiffed here and there. But in todays world the
dealers have guarantees. They are being tipped up front by the
entire field. But human nature being what it is, you will still here
dealers complaining about the players that "stiffed them." Figuring
5% of the prize pool getting tipped off means the dealers are making
about $140 per tournament each. With Binion's having a 2PM, 8PM and
2AM tournament everyday, 365 days per year, it is hard for me to
believe that their tournament dealers are starving.
The custom in most tournaments now is to withhold an automatic 3 to 5% of the prize pool for the dealers. When this is done, those who "cash" in the tournament are usually gently reminded that that CAN tip additionally, and the customary amount if there's already been a withhold is just another 3-5%. In all the tournaments I've played in and cashed in, I've NEVER been pressured to tip more than that percentage, and I've always been thanked sincerely for whatever I have actually tipped. The first time I cashed in a tournament, I didn't know the custom, and didn't tip, and wasn't asked to, and never got any heat.
If you are lucky enough to cash in today's event, the person paying
you the money is probably going to be pumping you for a tip with
lines like "It is customary to tip 10% to 15%." This is somewhat
effective on tourist types but doesn't work well on seasoned
players. So a player who never tips would still have negative equity
of 19%, but a player who always tips 5% would have negative equity of
23%, and a player who always tips 10% has negative equity of 27%.So what if Binion's switched to electronic tables? What would this
scenario look like?Dealers are no longer needed so the "bonus buy" is eliminated. They
could make it a $70 buyin minus $8 house take, for $2500 in chips.
The rebuy would remain the same. So using the above scenario, with
80% of the field making the rebuy the math would look like this.Total money taken in: $15,300
Prize pool: $13,500
House take: $1,800By dividing $13,500 by $15,300 we come up with a negative equity of
only 11.76%. This is livable juice, in my opinion. It is a far
better deal for the player. The extra house take can be used to pay
for the electronic tables.
Overall, if you do the math with the real figures, more of the negative equity goes to the house, and less to the dealer, so elminating dealers won't make as great a difference as presented here. Also, I think it will be reasonable to expect the house to try to give the player only a portion of this "savings", and to increase the house withhold / fee to cover their costs for these high-tech, undoubtedly expensive, poker tables.
The real advantage for the house and the players is that the tournament could get in more hands per hour, presumably, because of the speed of dealing, awarding pots, etc. So where a "normal" tournament might have 20 minute rounds, an automated one could have 15 minute rounds -- the players would STILL get in more hands per round, AND the casino would have the tournament finish more rapidly, so that the players get back to the other table games.
I suppose if the technology were similar to the internet, a player could even choose to stay at their "regular" poker table and play the tournament in another window on their screen, or vice versa, which would be a particular advantage to the house, of course.
--BG
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