I've found in general 3 things help with a VP tournament:
1. Speed - if you play fast normally, you can sometimes use this to your
advantage. Many people at invitational VP tournaments are slot players and
will be slow, sometimes not even finishing out their credits. If you can use
all your credits you will have a slight advantage.
2. Change strategy toward the end if you are not getting very good scores.
Also rethink the paytable. For example on one tournament I was in a Royal
Flush paid only 500 points while a Full House paid 100. With the abnormal pay
schedule one was better off to forget holding many 2, 3, to a royal hands
and concentrating on high cards and pairs instead. So if possible study the
pay table awhile before you are about to play to make sure you understand which
game it is.
3. Luck - Luck is always a factor. In the one VP Tourney I won, I got a
Royal Flush on a redraw - the only time this has ever happened to me. Even with
a so-so score in one session, the royal was enough to get me 1st place.
Unfortunately VP tourneys are not all that popular, and fewer people than normal
showed up, so 1st place paid only $4700 - instead of the $7000 they'd
advertised (or the $20,000-25,000 1st places you find at many invitational slot
tournaments).
For small tournaments you pay a fee for, see if they give extra prizes such
as buffets or t-shirts to all entrants. This could make the tournament worth
entering even if prizes are low.
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