The Basics Of Tournament Play

What you will learn:

• The basic structure of poker tournaments and how they work

Many new players start off with cash games. You sit down straight away and when you’ve won (or lost) enough you just get and go. A poker tournament, on the other hand, can appear to be a daunting beast with things like blind structures and rebuys and antes to consider.

This needn’t be the case - tourneys are just a different form of playing poker and are just as exhilarating. In fact, once you’ve won one and realised just how many people you’ve defeated with your skill, you might start picking these as your preferred form of poker.

Unlike a cash game where you could gamble your entire bankroll, you sit down at a tournament after paying an entry fee and buy-in. For this you will receive a set number of chips which is exactly the same amount as all the other players in the tournament. So, rather than gambling with actual money, your currency in a tournament is these chips. Once you’ve lost all your chips, you’re out and the winner is the player who ends up holding all the chips.

All tournaments will have a prize pool and the amounts and payout structure will be known before the start of play so you’ll know how high up you have to finish in order to get paid.

As well as a payout structure a tournament will also have a blinds structure. To make sure the action in a tournament doesn’t go stale, the small and big blinds will continuously increase in set, specified values at regular intervals. When the blinds reach a certain level, an ante will be introduced. This is a forced payment by all players before each hand that goes into the pot, as well as the blinds.

As stated, once you lose all your chips in a tournament, you hit the rail. When you completely run out of chips, though, depends on if the tournament allows you to rebuy.

In a rebuy tourney, a busted out player can get back into the tournament by paying a specified amount for a set amount of chips. Depending on that tournament’s rules, the number of rebuys may be unlimited, limited to a set number or limited to a set period of time from the tournament’s start.

You don’t even have to be out to make a rebuys as they may be available to players with short stacks or even to all players. At the end of a rebuy period there is usually an additional amount of chips that everyone is allowed to buy. This is called an add on.

A tournament with no rebuys is called a ‘freezeout’.

Tournaments attract a lot of players and you’ll find you’ll often be moved to a different seat as the field reduces and spaces appear on tables. This constant consolidation of seats means eventually the last group of players will be brought to the final table. On the final table you may also see or be involved in making a deal when it comes to the big money being awarded. As the payout structure will indicate there is often a big jump in prizes between the top places and, rather than miss out on huge payday, the last surviving players may decide to make a deal and divide up the prize money on offer.

Now you’re a bit familiar with what to expect in a tournament, go try some out. Start with our low-cost Sit & Gos and see how much fun you have before entering something bigger with a really tasty prize pool. You might also want to read our page on Sit & Go tactics. It’ll definitely come in handy.