Blackjack tournaments

[What me worry]

I would like to know what everyone's thoughts are on entering Bj tournaments while on a week or month long trip. Do you risk giving up your identity for a chance of splitting a 100k pot or less?

I live and work in 2 different parts of the country. Where I live there are some very lucrative tournaments in a 250 mile radius. I keep my A.p. play to a minimum at home because I am saving my face and profile for a time that I will not be required to travel as much in the future (hopefully 5 years or less) In the area I work it is possible for me to visit a different store 4 nights a week with a choice of more than one store to play. There is very little local interest in tournament play in the areas I work.


Since I began counting I have married and started a business and spent my bankroll starting my business to generate more and steady income. I had a very slow and expensive start up but I can finally see a bright light at the end of the tunnel. I have what I would consider a replenishable br of 10k. If I lost 1500.00 a week for a month of play it wouldn't be detrimental to my lifestyle. My wife would only suggest I slow down, practice, and analyze my mistakes.

Any ideas of using or not using tournament play to build a definite bankroll (for lack of a better word)? I have won 2, and placed 2nd in Bj tourney's (low stakes) while traveling to my work destinations these tourney's are in a state that require an ante to play live bj rarely do I play any live ante games.

[Banker]

You can make money from tournaments. Not sure what you meant by lucrative tournaments. The variance is big though even for very skilled players. What size are these tournaments? If they are $35k or higher, then they might be worth your time.

[What me worry]

what I call local tourneys are over 20k most are over 40k and 1 is 100k

[Banker]

Do you have to pay to play if so, do all the money go the prizes? If they are invitational, how much play you need to do.
If you put an email address, I can send you some suggestion that I do not want casinos to read.

[Gronbog]

I would like to know what everyone's thoughts are on entering Bj tournaments while on a week or month long trip. Do you risk giving up your identity for a chance of splitting a 100k pot or less?

Tournaments are just like any other AP play in that you must accurately estimate your EV and variance at each event in order to decide whether you should enter and how much you should be risking when you do so. There are many factors which go into this. The easy one is the purse. From this and the number of entrants you can estimate your EV by luck alone. You can then factor in your own skill level and (very importantly) the skill level of the field. Based on this you can then decide whether it's worth giving up your ID.

For what it's worth, I play many tournaments in my local area and I also engage in other AP play in the same area. The key is that I'm known as a tournament guy who also plays the tables. Since they have my ID, I tread lightly and play politely. Because of this, I have made much more in my local area playing tournaments than anything else. But I am lucky to be able to get in the repetition and I have enough bankroll to withstand the variance.

Any ideas of using or not using tournament play to build a definite bankroll (for lack of a better word)? I have won 2, and placed 2nd in Bj tourney's (low stakes) while traveling to my work destinations these tourney's are in a state that require an ante to play live bj rarely do I play any live ante games.

I recommend tournament play as something to consider once you have established the necessary bankroll. As has been said, the variance is extreme. Many small losses followed by one larger win. Not even close to being a steady source of income.

[What me worry]

yes all but one are entry fees, one is invitational, because of pot sizes there will be tax forms. [email protected] thanks!! entry fees range from $60-$500

[Three]

I would defer to Gronbog on anything concerning tournaments. My first comment on what makes a tournament worthwhile is how stupid is the competition or field. You want a bunch of rubes that don't understand why you do things but knows you do a lot of stupid things from a casino BJ perspective in tournaments. This will have them doing stupid things at stupid times rather than at the appropriate time to make a tournament move that is a bad move in the casino. Second is the format of the tournament. Playing against the field for a limited number of spots is easy from a strategy standpoint but from a success rate standpoint it is hard. Playing against your table allows you t se exactly where you are and allow you to time your moves to take the biggest advantage of your position during the round.

As for building a BR that from buy-in tournament play would be a high variance way of doing it. If you hit a top prize early you are golden but it is more likely you will be on the other side of variance. As I understand it, the Ante state has to give back the BJ profits to the players and just profit from the ante. There are many ways of doing this and one is tournaments that benefit players with players cards. It is likely most of the prize pool comes from the untouchable BJ profit pool unless they can keep the buy-in money and have the prize pool be from the BJ profits.

[Gronbog]

Playing against the field for a limited number of spots is easy from a strategy standpoint but from a success rate standpoint it is hard

This also depends on the experience/skill level of the field. I have one event with this format for which my advancement rate is much higher than for the table-advance format for the sole reason that the players there don't know the proper strategy. A large percentage of the field has almost no chance at all of advancing because of this.

[What me worry]

This also depends on the experience/skill level of the field. I have one event with this format for which my advancement rate is much higher than for the table-advance format for the sole reason that the players there don't know the proper strategy. A large percentage of the field has almost no chance at all of advancing because of this.

I believe in full that is the reason for my winning and placing in the small local yocal tournaments. I paid close attention to chip stacks, chip leader current bets, and number of small cards on previous hand. Thanks for all the insight and pointing me in the right direction.

[Marlene]

I paid close attention to number of small cards on previous hand.

This is a waste of time.