Tri-State Poker Tour

[mer071898]

Well, it looks like it might be the Bi-State poker tour as it looks like the Illinois Gaming Board frowns on 3rd party companies coming in to run events. I will be having my attorney reviewing the riverboat gaming act to see if there are any loopholes, sorry to the Illinois players .

 

[Mortis]

Well, it looks like it might be the Bi-State poker tour as it looks like the Illinois Gaming Board frowns on 3rd party companies coming in to run events. I will be having my attorney reviewing the riverboat gaming act to see if there are any loopholes, sorry to the Illinois players .

It can still be tri-state.. Kansas, Missouri, Iowa..

The new upcoming casinos in Kansas are going to be regulated by The Kansas Lottery, I believe.

 

[mer071898]

Yeah it could, but to be fair I would like to have an even amount of tournaments per state and Kansas runs a little short on casinos with poker rooms that can handle a large tourney. I could inch up to Minnesota or South Dakota but then you lose some entries because of the drive time and plus you start stepping into HPT territory. Even between Iowa and Missouri, I bet I can still get 24-30 tournaments a year in.

 

[MediaBLITZ]

Just a thought - avoid a quantification in the title (TRI-State or BI-State or QUAD-State) so you can add at will. That way you don't have to come up with a new moniker, like "Big 12 minus 2".
Too bad Heartland is already taken. Leaves the ever present Mid-America though

 

[mer071898]

Good point, and I have considered that option as well, I just hate changing logos around .

 

[CSuave]

If they are enough decent sized poker rooms to support 36-45 tournaments per year, it definitely is worth looking into.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

I wanted to pose another question to everyone. I had a question messaged to me the other day.

Q. Will all the tournaments will use two flights and how do you determine the max amount of entries?

A. I am using two flights, Flight A on Saturday morning for most of the direct buy-in players and will assign Flight B for those players who won their entries through the qualifiers during the week, along with any last minute direct buy-ins, to try and keep both flights as even as possible. We will take the top 10 from each flight and bring them in Sunday after Flight B for the final two tables. I am also going to have a last chance qualifier on Saturday after Flight A for those who want to take one last crack at squeezing in. This is going to be the standard schedule to maximize the entries for each venue. The maximum entries per flight will be the maximum number of players that can be fit in the poker room. If the poker room has 10 tables with the ability to fit 10 players at a table, the maximum entries for each flight is 100 players or 200 players total for the tournament. I don't like to limit the maximum amount of entries, but you have to remember that this is our first year and we don't want to get overwhelmed until we get our feet wet.

I just want to be fair to everyone. Does this seem fair enough for everyone? If anyone has any other suggestions, they will be evaluated before any final decisions are made.

Actually IMO I think your idea of seperating direct buy ins from qualifiers is a very bad idea. Many tournament regulars may direct buy in to a tournament because they do not want to spend the additional time. Many of those regulars also may view most (not all) qualifiers as dead money through whom they can accumulate chips through.
Its almost like you are keeping the sharks together and the fish seperate to only meet at the final two tables.

Now this is definitely not to say that all whom buy directly into a tournament are sharks, nor are all qualifiers fish. Most regulars like to have a good mix of the amateurs and regulars at their table. They want the opportunity to get involved in hands with people who might not be as comfortable in a bigger buy in. Even though they are still in for the same money as a smaller tournament as a qualifier it can still affect their psyche.

 

[Mortis]

Actually IMO I think your idea of seperating direct buy ins from qualifiers is a very bad idea. Many tournament regulars may direct buy in to a tournament because they do not want to spend the additional time. Many of those regulars also may view most (not all) qualifiers as dead money through whom they can accumulate chips through.
Its almost like you are keeping the sharks together and the fish seperate to only meet at the final two tables.

Now this is definitely not to say that all whom buy directly into a tournament are sharks, nor are all qualifiers fish. Most regulars like to have a good mix of the amateurs and regulars at their table. They want the opportunity to get involved in hands with people who might not be as comfortable in a bigger buy in. Even though they are still in for the same money as a smaller tournament as a qualifier it can still affect their psyche.

^ Gotta agree with CSuave here.

 

[MediaBLITZ]

Make me 3

 

[mer071898]

Actually IMO I think your idea of seperating direct buy ins from qualifiers is a very bad idea. Many tournament regulars may direct buy in to a tournament because they do not want to spend the additional time. Many of those regulars also may view most (not all) qualifiers as dead money through whom they can accumulate chips through.
Its almost like you are keeping the sharks together and the fish seperate to only meet at the final two tables.

Now this is definitely not to say that all whom buy directly into a tournament are sharks, nor are all qualifiers fish. Most regulars like to have a good mix of the amateurs and regulars at their table. They want the opportunity to get involved in hands with people who might not be as comfortable in a bigger buy in. Even though they are still in for the same money as a smaller tournament as a qualifier it can still affect their psyche.

Great input guys, thanks. This is why I ask for opinions so I get the bugs worked out waaaay before we started running these things.

 

[theking88]

Iowa has a new casino opening this year Memorial day, I am from South Dakota and actually going to be applying as a dealer there, it is going to be in Larchwood, which is JUST across the SD border, so CLEAR NW corner of Iowa...might be a good place to try to get in.

 

[mer071898]

Iowa has a new casino opening this year Memorial day

It already has been mentioned already, but thanks for chiming in. Actually, one of the poker room managers here in Riverside's poker room is transferring up there to run it, so I might already have a foot in the door already.

 

[mer071898]

I just wanted to stop in and update everyone on our progress. We have decided we need to scale down and test the waters first in Iowa only for now. Missouri will be added if all goes smoothly and if we can determine that we can be profitable in the long run. Illinois is not being cooperative with allowing us to come into their casinos, so we are not going into Illinois, sorry. We are working on the proposals and tournament schedules to be presented to all the casinos that have shown an interest in hosting our tournaments. We have meetings at the end of the month with 3 of the 6 casinos that are interested to discuss formats, fees and rakes, advertising info, hotel discounts for players, and several other details so they can approve them and submit the itinerary to the gaming commission. Website development is being worked on as we speak but will probably not be live until later in the year. My main goal is to have an online feature which will allow you to pay for your entry to the tournament on the website (for a small surcharge), similar to what pokertickets.com does, but that is not a for sure thing yet.

The schedule will initially consist of 11 tournaments plus the Iowa State Poker Championships. The standard buy-in will be $730 + $70 entry fee ($800 total) and a $1000 + $100 entry fee for the Iowa State Poker Championships. We will still have the mystery bounty in each tournament along with a variety of satellite tournaments during the week with the buy-ins still to be determined. We will also still be giving away a wsop Main Event seat to the Iowa State Champion. In order to maximize the number of entries, we will run 2 flights on Saturday and Sunday (A and B) starting with Flight A on Saturday at 10 am and ending at 3 pm. Flight B will start on Sunday at 1 pm and run til 6 pm. All remaining players will come back at 7 pm to finish the tournament and declare a winner. We are doing it this way to allow a couple of last chance satellite tournaments in between the flights to build up the main event for those who want one last crack at getting in. We may also have a few single day tournaments as well if the casino can support the tournament in a larger area other than the poker room.This will be discussed in our meetings with the casino management.

I did mention before that we were working with several sports insurance companies to check on premiums to be able to add additional prize money to the WSOP main event prize if it is won, but the premium are too high for what we wanted to do. So until our revenue allows us to afford those premiums, we are limited to giving the person who wins the state tournament and then goes on to win the WSOP Main Event and additional $100k. I know it's not much compared to the winnings you'll get from the Main Event, but it what is allowed with our budget and it is something extra that you won't get with the Heartland poker tour or with the WSOP Circuit events.

I will update everyone with the results from our meetings and keep you updated on further developments.

 

[CSuave]

mer071898, excellent work. GL. I look forward to traveling from Ohio to play in one of your tournamments in Iowa as I know there is plenty of good poker in Iowa. Couple of years ago took a nice little poker sojourn through Iowa and had a blast. Lost the whole time but was a great time. GL with your tour. Sounds great.

 

[mer071898]

I appreciate the support, I just want to be able to provide fun, competitive tournaments that are more affordable for the average player. It's not going to be as glamorous as a Heartland or WSOP Circuit event, but real poker players don't care about being on TV, they care about winning money!

 

[Mortis]

Did anything come out of this?

 

[CSuave]

Not that I have heard Mortis. With more states getting casinos maybe they should try again.
Although I know that Pinnacle Entertainment nows owns the HPT and plans on expanding it and there is another tour getting started in OK at Choctaw that works in conjunction with Cardplayer.

 

[MediaBLITZ]

So that HPT sale went through, eh? Of course there is Google...

Pinnacle’s ownership of the Heartland Poker Tour came to be as the result of its previous owner, Federated Sports + Gaming filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy back in February.
Pinnacle Entertainment acquired the assets of Federated, including the Epic Poker League, the EpicPoker.com website, and the Global Poker Index, for $300,000 in a bankruptcy auction in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Maryland. In a separate auction, Pinnacle bought the Heartland Poker Tour with the winning bid of $4.2 million.