A Play Money poker competition. You can legally play poker, but you can’t legally play it for money most places. You are not allowed to play for a thing of value. But awards (medals, trophies, plaques, etc.) aren’t considered a thing of value. I also believe that promotional items aren’t considered a thing of value either (Example: A mug with the club logo on it).
So, the idea is to make a poker competition in which people play for medals/trophies/plaques and perhaps some promotional items as well. The other idea is to establish a Hall of Fame for the club to give people something else to strive for.
The Competiton
The Competition will be broken up into three segments
- A monthly (4 week) competition in which members play for a Challenge Coin(s).
- A Season (12 weeks (3 Months)) competition in which members play for a Trophy(s).
- The Club Championship (36 weeks (3 Seasons)) competition in which members play for a plaque(s).
The Year will be broken up into three 12 Weeks seasons. There will be a month break in between each season. This way if we have to postpone any weeks or work around any Holidays, we can push them back into the off season and make them up. Plus, it would give us time to get new players if some players didn’t want to play the next season.
Monthly Points:
- If you had 12 Members in the club. 1st place would get 12pts, 2nd would get 11 pts, etc.
- Any tie breakers would be by flipping a coin, highest card, etc.
- After each month a new month starts from scratch.
Season Points:
- A total of three months points would be added up and 1st place would get 24pts, 2nd place would get 22pts, 3rd place would get 20pts, etc. Double the monthly points. (Based on 12 people)
- The Season Points would count towards the Club Championship, not the Single Season Championship.
- The Single Season Champion would be determined by just adding up the three individual month points of the Season. Any tie breakers would be decided first by the amount of total chips you had throughout the season and then by flipping a coin, highest card, etc.
- Then after a season, another 3-month season would start from scratch.
Club Championship:
- The Club Champion would be decided across all leagues (There will only be one Club Champion, not one for each individual League)
- All of your points would be added up from each month and all three seasons, and that would decide the Club Champion and place winners.
- Tie breakers would be decided first by the amount of total chips you had throughout the year and then by flipping a coin, highest card, etc.
- For the Club Championship, if there is a tie on points and chips, perhaps the players could decide to either flip a coin/cut cards or play a heads-up game at an agreed upon time and date.
- After the year, the club would start completely from scratch for a new year.
Substitute (Fill-in) Award:
- People that fill in during the year for players that are not there, will be entered into the Sub award competition.
- There will be a trophy to the Sub with the most chips for the year.
- Tie breakers would be decided by flipping a coin, highest card, etc.
Fee’s & The Game
Fees
- Day Fee: $5 (This will be my fee for hosting, keeping stats, supplies, awards, website, etc.)
- Sub (fill in) fee: $2
- Fees may go up at some point. Starting low for now as I get the hang of everything.
- Rebuys: $1
- Paying for rebuys will hopefully help with the integrity of the game. Keeping people from just going all-in all of the time and stuff like that. But, at the same time allowing us to not have a daily chip limit, and having people run out of chips.
The Game
- Texas Hold ’em or Omaha
- Table will vote to play Hold ’em, Omaha, Dealer’s Choice between the two, something like switching every time the button goes all the way around the table, or even something like switching every hour.
- Will always be
- 5/10 Blinds
- 1000 Max Buy in
- (25 Straddle)
- Table can decide if you want to put any limits or caps on the game.
- Example: In Omaha, you may want to cap each round of betting at 250.
- (Rebuys don’t carry over from night to night)
- First Night of the Month
- You get 1000 chips and 1 free rebuy
- Second night and following nights
- If you have 0 chips to start the night, you will get a free 1000 chips and that will count as your free rebuy.
- If you have under 1000 chips, you will be rounded up to 1000 chips to start the night (even if you only have 5 chips). You will then have a free rebuy for the night.
- If you have more than a thousand chips, a thousand will be deducted from your total and you will also have a free rebuy for the night.
- Everyone starting with 1000 chips every night will make the start of the night much smoother. People won’t have to be waiting in line to check in. Can just grab chips and get right to the table.
- Substitutes (Fill-ins)
- Will always start the night with 1000 chips and 1 free rebuy.
- In the Sub competition, Subs can only add chips to their overall total and never lose any. This will make it easier for stat keeping at this point in time. So, a sub will never draw from their total chips. Just their total from a night will be added to an overall total.
- Rebuy Policy
- You can never rebuy and have over 1000 chips. So, if you decide to use your rebuy as part of a reload, it will only bring your chip total up to 1000. (Example: If you were at the table and had 150 chips left and wanted to reload, a rebuy would only give you 850 chips)
- Reload Policy
- You can reload up to 1000 chips when you are under 500 chips. (This is to try and keep down the number of times I am doing reloads for players, subject to change while finding the right number).
- Tournaments
- If we have a tournament day. The tournament will be a Freeroll (everyone getting a free 1000 buy in).
- Then if a ring game starts afterwards. Normal day rules apply.
- (Thinking of maybe trying to do tournaments on the 3rd night of each individual month).
- High Hands
- Thinking of adding a High Hand element to poker nights. Something like 500 chips to whoever has the highest hand at the end of the night. Perhaps it would have to be a full house or better.
- This will be open for discussion.
Game Manager
- First priority will be managing game & hosting.
- Free to play in the game if not busy.
- Not included in the competition. Will not compete for awards or even a spot in the standings.
- Chips reset every month.
- Has chip total across all leagues (does not have individual stats for each league).
- Rebuys will go towards a charity. (Or perhaps something for the club?)
Out of Season Tournaments
- Down the road if there is a big enough pool of players and interest for them.
- Thinking of doing a tournament(s) in between seasons.
- Would more just be for fun and bragging rights. There would be no points involved. Wouldn’t go towards the Club Championship.
- Was thinking they would have some kind of theme. (Example: If we had one around Christmas time, have a Santa Clause trophy or something of that nature. Maybe get some Christmas themed poker cards and some other things to help get us in the Holiday mood).
- Could still keep records of winners and perhaps could find a place on the leader boards and Hall of Fame for out of season tournaments exclusively.
- Game Manager is allowed to win out of season trophies (Open to debate).
Other Ideas
- Got other ideas rolling around in my head, but will just wait to see what direction the club moves in.
- I figure this is a good starting point as we venture out into uncharted territory.
- I am sure players will have lots of feedback and ideas as well.
thedonkeypokerclub.com 