M G TOURNAMENTS

[wayram]

Went into the $20,000 weekender tournament on Tomb Raider and thought I was made...got the free spins then got the free spins 4 more times on the free spins ,you ripper I thought i should really get a good score, guess what..tiddley squat , got only around 2000 coins, which was shithouse for the amount of freebie spins. Love the tournies but can be a trap if not carefull, What annoys me also is if it is a free tournie why do you have to pay $2 to continue ? Also what happens to the 500 plus players when the free one is over ,where do they go, why dont they play some of the smaller $2 and $5 games, seems the same players play those games most of the time, and it annoys when you are waiting for one or two players to fill the game..I have seen Simmo on them any one else playing them ?

[everyday]

You're not alone...I play them all the time but this past weekend was the first $20,000 tourney I tried. Saw free spins maybe twice and finished a few over 100th..just out of any cash prize. I've also wondered what happens to the 500 or 800 other people who disappear when the free tournies are over and have you noticed that on average about 200 never play at all. Why waste your time registering and then never show up? Casino generated players perhaps? Who knows lol. Also the average for the $200 tournies is about 60, usually the same people.

[brianzz]

Lots more people will play the free tourneys and if they win they'll go blow the winnings on slots, why pay to play in a tourney when you can wait 2 hours and get a free one. Juding from the tournaments I've played, you do alot better playing your money on a regular game.

[Jufo]

I have tried those tournaments as well. My best results are being top 6 and top 9 on a 1000 person freeroll. What disturbed me the most was that the prizes for these positions didn't even cover the cost of continue playing options. So you pay for the option to continue play and hit the top 10 out of 1000 players and you still lose money... not very nice...

By the way is there any way to speed up the spins? I am always left with 400-700 coins after 5 minutes is up but I have noticed that there are players who manage to play all their coins in five minutes.

[lojo]

Simmo! knows.... he posted it, I didn't get around to it so I don't remember how

[vinylweatherman]

Originally Posted by Jufo

I have tried those tournaments as well. My best results are being top 6 and top 9 on a 1000 person freeroll. What disturbed me the most was that the prizes for these positions didn't even cover the cost of continue playing options. So you pay for the option to continue play and hit the top 10 out of 1000 players and you still lose money... not very nice...

By the way is there any way to speed up the spins? I am always left with 400-700 coins after 5 minutes is up but I have noticed that there are players who manage to play all their coins in five minutes.

Not Now, Microgaming placed a "fix" at the server end to ensure slow spinning within the range of 5 to 6 seconds - this "fix" kicks in when there are two or three consecutive spins that fall within a present range, and the server holds onto the result for 5 seconds each spin, the player sees this as the "waiting server" indicator cycles and the reels just spin. Also to be noted that during this phase the coins left will NOT decrease when you press "spin", but when the server returns the result.
Spin speed is not a problem at the weekender, as the continues offer 10 minutes also, but only 5000 coins, so coins left over from the first round can normally be used up unless you hit loads of bonus rounds.
With a fast top notch PC, and a separate graphics card, it is possible to speed up the spins a little. Another trick for an old PC is to drop both the screen resolution and colour resolution.

Casinos register large numbers of players for the weekender, and while some require users to claim first, others just do it & tell you. This is why some 200 players seem to take the trouble of registering only then to not play. There is also a "dodge", whereby players can withdraw from the tournament the casino has paid for, pocketing the $20. Casinos are aware of this, and will respond accordingly under "bonus abuse" rules, usually not giving said players any more free entries.

As for no-one really playing the other tournaments, the answer is simple, the house edge is considerably greater than the 5% enjoyed by the casino in the lobby slot games. I some cases, the tournaments can pay back only around 50% of the money made from players from buyins and continues. The problem is that increased participation does not boost the prize pools, after declaring the prizes, casinos keep 100% of any revenue from an unexpected increase in interest.
Another reason is simply that, for the low prizes, the tournaments are boring because game play is just so damn SLOW. Rather than remedy this, MG have done the opposite in ensuring EVERYONE has to endure the boredom of a bonus round taking 1 minute to complete and pay nothing. Game play is even SLOWER during the free spins as every win is displayed, and unlike normal play, the player can't skip this by pressing "spin" if they just want to move on.
There is also a misconception with the $500 and $200 prize events. You get hundreds registering for the "free" ones, and only around 50 for the $2 or $5 buy-in one. This is plain silly, with 5 continues, it still costs 5x $2 or $5 to play out a free entry one where you are against hundreds, but only one extra $2 or $5 to compete against a much reduced field.

Unlike the slots games, MG DO NOT PUBLISH the average monthly payouts on the tournaments (prizes paid out as a percentage of total revenue from buy-ins and continues). For the sit & go, the calculation is easy! 90% is of the buy-ins are paid out as prizes, and 10% is kept by the participating casinos. This compares unfavourably with spending the money just playing the slots in the lobby, where 95% of all wagers placed are returned as prizes.
Where multiple continues are available, the house edge can increase to "embarrassing" levels, which might be why no figures are published.
With many tournaments, it is possible to estimate how many continues were bought by looking at the number of coins left when play has ended, the higher the figure, the more continues the player has bought.

Microgaming could easily make these tournaments more attractive, and this will make them more popular, the first hurdle is to publish figures and PROVE that the house edge is fair in the long term, and that tournaments with terrible 50% payout rates are balanced by some that pay out more than 100% to participating players.
Secondly, speed up game play to a level that allows the juices of excitement to flow, rather than having us fall asleep through naked spin boredom.
Thirdly, add some more games, including some non-slot offerings such as Video Poker. Blackjack would be hard though, the variance being too low for the current tournament system.

While some of this might happen, I'm not holding my breath - this is MG

[Jufo]

Thank you for your post vinylweatherman. I noticed too that 2/5$ buy-in tournaments are a better bang for the buck so in principle it is possible there are tournaments with more than 100% return but they are rare.

About the play time allocated, I got disconnected once while there was 1 minute play time left. I connected again and noticed that the timer had reset to 5 minutes left and I still had all my winnings from before the disconnection. So I got this free ride once because of disconnection. I admit I tried to manually disconnect later to see if I can repeat this but it didn't work anymore

I wish there was some strategy involved instead of just hitting spin. The only strategy now is whether it is worth it to use the continue play options. Why is the result calculated from win box only and not total balance (win box + unused credits), it would lead to more strategic play.

[Simmo!]

Slot Tournaments Troubleshooting Guide

[brianzz]

I see they're finally starting to add new games, Avalon and Loaded. Does the name "classic re-buys" supposed to mean anything? 1000 rebuys, wow, anyone want to max that one out?

[jas2587]

IMO a Free tourney should be just that Free
No Chance to re buy in
that is not a Free tourney

I don't play them for that reason
it took them all of a week to
add the rebuy feature after
they sucked every 1 in


Cindy