Poker Tourney Point System?

[Scotty O]

I have looked through the 2+2 forum and the web and cant find much with a point system. I have tried to look for the CardPlayer Mag point system and can't find there formula. I was wondering what other people use? I was going to use the money leader for the point system and some players don't like it. I was figuring that for the more people that play, up to 30, the harder it is to make the money. Also the higher the buy in the more reward for making the money. THoughts?

[DerryABU]

I run a monthly tourney at my work's club that ranges between 18 to 40 people.At last months tourney I started a league system with the format below.
<font color="blue">
For each game played in, 5 points will be awarded - so if you come to 8 tournaments you will earn 40 points.
Additionally, if you make a final table appearance, you will be awarded the following points:
1st - 20 points
2nd -15 points
3rd - 12 points
4th - 10 points
5th - 8 points
6th - 6 points
7th - 4 points
8th - 2 point
In the event of the last two players splitting the prize money 17 points will be awarded to each.
</font>

On the first night the last two did split the prizes and recieved 22pts each.
I realise its not a perfect system and some months may be easier to gain points in than others due to the number of players,but I feel it does favour the regulars that come and play due to the points for appearances.
Hope this helps.

[smoore]

easiest: however many people in the tourney, that's how many points 1st gets. Second gets (# of people)-1, third (#)-2 etc... you basically invert the ranking column in a spreadsheet and there's the points. Last place still gets one point! wooohoooo!

[trevorwc]

I'm not a fan of the "15 points for first no matter what" system myself, because it's obviously harder to win a 30 than a 12 person tourney. What we do is take the number of people, and that's what the winner gets - and then subtract 4 points per place until you're down to zero.

So in a 22 person tourney, the winner gets 22, 2nd gets 18, 3rd gets 14, 4th gets 10, 5th gets 6, and 6th gets 2. We then give one point to the rest of the final table.

[MickeyHoldem]

Here's a excel formula to use...

=ROUND(10*SQRT(NumberOfPlayers)/SQRT(FinishPosition),2)-9

nice feature: Finishing 4th in a 20 person tourney will get you the same points as finishing 6th in a 30 person field or 8th in a 40 person field.

[jalsing]

[ QUOTE ]
Here's a excel formula to use...

=ROUND(10*SQRT(NumberOfPlayers)/SQRT(FinishPosition),2)-9

nice feature: Finishing 4th in a 20 person tourney will get you the same points as finishing 6th in a 30 person field or 8th in a 40 person field.

[/ QUOTE ]

additionally if you want to adjust for the buyin amount, you can modify the formula further:
ROUND(10*SQRT(NumberOfPlayers)/SQRT(FinishPosition)*1+(log(buyin+.25)),2)

I believe this is the method pokerstars uses for its point system.

[Lottery Larry]

It's been a while for this stuff

"+(log(buyin+.25)),2)"

a) what's the ",2" ?

b) Someone remind me how to do the log function by hand?

c) why is it +.25 added to the buyin?

Thanks

[Lottery Larry]

Here's the one we use this year

POINTS ( Tourneys of 4 or less don't get points )
10 Bottom 1/2 of non-cash
15 Top 1/2 of non-cash (Bubble +2, or 17 points)
20 Cash place prize winners (below 3rd)
25 3rd (-5 for 3 places paid, -10 if 2)
35 2nd (-5 for 3 places paid, -10 if 2)
45 1st (-5 for 3 places paid, -10 if 2)

I tried to balance participation and finish, plus I didn't see a huge difference between beating 20 or 30 people, given the luck involved in tournaments.

[Lottery Larry]

My problem with this system is that there's too much of a gap between top and bottom finishers and not enough (one point?) between upper finishers.

Example- First hand of tourney, flop is xxy. Two players go all-in, Kx getting Qx to put all of his chips in. River Queen knocks out the dominating hand. Qx holder goes on to get 2nd place (under your system, 17 points) while the unlucky dominating hand gets 1 point.

Another example- I play in 5 tourneys, you get lucky in your only one and win. you have twice as many points as I do, but who was more important to the tournament players?

Luck plays too much of a factor to overweight it. Same goes for the prize pools.

[Fins]

[ QUOTE ]
It's been a while for this stuff

"+(log(buyin+.25)),2)"

a) what's the ",2" ?

b) Someone remind me how to do the log function by hand?

c) why is it +.25 added to the buyin?

Thanks

[/ QUOTE ]
The ",2" is part of the rounding function (ROUND) and rounds the result to two places.

I like the formula but still playing with it I don't like the "buy-in" part... I think it should be part of the equation but not like that... what's the point of adjusting less than a whole point for buy-in??

- Fins

[Lottery Larry]

thanks

I don't know why the buy-in amount should even matter. Why people think there's a difference in winning a 100-player tournament when the buy-in is $5 or $500 is beyond me. Other than you might see more throwaway play in the former, your reward for the "tougher" ? buy-in amount is a higher prize award.

Why should that affect points?

[Fins]

[ QUOTE ]
thanks

I don't know why the buy-in amount should even matter. Why people think there's a difference in winning a 100-player tournament when the buy-in is $5 or $500 is beyond me. Other than you might see more throwaway play in the former, your reward for the "tougher" ? buy-in amount is a higher prize award.

Why should that affect points?

[/ QUOTE ]
It really shouldn't but in reality if I only bought in for $5 I'd play much looser than if I bought in for $50... a new hole in my game /images/graemlins/shocked.gif. I wouldn't have it be a big factor but might account for it nonetheless... Now that I think about it, a bigger factor would be the structure and especially if/how rebuys are used. I guess most who track wouldn't change the format so it'd be moot.

- Fins

[Scotty O]

Did anyone find the Card Player Mag point system? They have one and I cant find the formula anywhere.

I like the formula posted by a previous poster. It looks like it can work. However, I want to see if CPM accounts for the buy in amount too.

[Scotty O]

LOL, this months article
http://www.cardplayer.com/poker_magazine/archives/showarticle.php?a_id=14488&amp;m_id=65554

[jalsing]

I don't know the exact reasoning behind it, actually. Here is the pokerstars tourney ranking page (http://www.pokerstars.com/tlb_tournament_rankings.html)

I like it for my home 'league' just because it adds a little juice to the occasional game where we up the buyin. As for the .25 I believe pokerstars only added that because they use $0 as the buyin for the free-rolls, and a 0 will mess up the log function

[Scotty O]

[ QUOTE ]
I don't know the exact reasoning behind it, actually. Here is the pokerstars tourney ranking page (http://www.pokerstars.com/tlb_tournament_rankings.html)

I like it for my home 'league' just because it adds a little juice to the occasional game where we up the buyin. As for the .25 I believe pokerstars only added that because they use $0 as the buyin for the free-rolls, and a 0 will mess up the log function

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree. Having the zero will mess up the log function. I believe there point system will only be awarded to the money winners (based on the Excel spread sheet they have). I (friend of mine as well) have been thinking though and have not fully worked it out yet. What about a universal point system based on the following criteria:

Total number of Players = TP
Place Finished = PL
Buyin = B (optional)
K = Constant
O = Offset
Point = Kf(TP, PL, B)+O
The equation may look like this
Points awarded to either top 10% of the total players in the tourney or just the final table (not sure which).

1st palce points awarded will be equal to TP + O
nth place points awarded will equal to 1 + O, where nth place is either the 10th place finisher for a final table or 10% place finisher

The difficulty is coming up with distribution between 1st and nth. The best way I see it is an Exponential decay from 1st to nth.

If we have any math experts out there, mine are a bit rusty, this would be great. We (my friend and I) will continue to work on it and hopefully come up with a universal one.

[Slacker13]

Here is a copy of our Q&amp;A and also our point system formula.


2004 Tournament Point Details



Q. What is the Tournament Leader Board?

A. The tournament leader board is used to determine the best and most consistent player on the tour. It rewards both good play and frequent play.



Q. Why do I care about the Leader Board?

A. First of all, it can win you money. The top finisher(s) will receive a cash award, a keepsake item like a hat or bracelet, and/or an entry into the final event. In addition, it gives you bragging rights over everyone else.



Q. How are points awarded?

A. In 2004, we will use a modified point award system. The formula will value some tournaments more than others.



Q. What contributes to the weight of a tournament?

A. The following are all part of the formula.

Is it the main event? The premier event will count for 50% more points.
How many players? The more players, the more the win is worth.
How much is the entry fee? The higher the stakes, the more the win is worth.


Q. Am I out of the running since I can’t make every event?

A. No. We will only use your 7 best point finishes towards the final ranking. This means you can take the top spot without even playing half the planned events. Of course, the more you play, the easier it will be.



Q. How many people get points each event?

A. Points will be awarded based on the formula listed above to the top 25% of a tournament's finishers (rounded up). For example, 25 entries would give points to 7 finishers.



Q. What is the exact formula?

A. The early and late game have a different factor:

Early Game Points = 3 * [sqrt(n)/sqrt(k)] * [1+log(b+0.25)]
Late Game Points = 2 * [sqrt(n)/sqrt(k)] * [1+log(b+0.25)]
n is the number of entrants
k is the place of finish (k=1 for the first-place finisher, and so on)
b is the buy-in amount in dollars


Q. Can you show an example?

A. Sure, here is a realistic example

Player Event Number Entries Entry Fee Finish Points

Brian G 1a 25 $40 1 39

Rick F 1a 25 $40 2 28

Adam M 1a 25 $40 3 23

Phil Hellmuth 1a 25 $40 4 20

[Scotty O]

I took a stab at the point system. I tried to make flexible for wide variety of factors. Looking for some feed back.

psys1.xls (http://www.geocities.com/thepokerfanatic/files/psys1.xls)


Scotty O

[mrmookid]

The league I run uses a system borrowed from Poker School Online. You can find a description of the system at our site (http://www.northjerseypoker.com/info/ranking-info.asp).

The only weakness I've noticed is that if someone plays only once and wins they will remain a top player. To combat this our quarterly ranking page (http://www.northjerseypoker.com/past/past-2005-q1.asp) requires that you play at least 40% of tourneys in a given quarter to be considered for the rankings.

[Lottery Larry]

I must be reading this incorrectly.

Point System Formula
pts=(1-T)/(ln(M))*ln(P)+aT+bB+c
where,
B=Buyin amount
T=Total players in field
P=Place finished
M=Max place for point payout
a, b and c = constant
Method 1 (a=1.0 ,b=1.0, c=0)
Method 2 (a=1.1, b=0.0, c=10)
Method 3 (a=1.0, b=0.1, c=0)
Method 4 (a=1.1, b=0.1, c=10)

** what are you accomplishing by adding c here? trying to penalize the "win one tourney, sit out" players?
** Also, I'm not translating "Max place for point payout" into English

Places paid
6 for 6-14 players
10 for 15-149
20 for 150-249

*** this is a really strange way of determining # of prize places. 149 players, only 10 places, but one more player adds 10 more prizes?

PF Method 1 Method 2 Method 3 Method 4
1 400.0 450.0 410.0 460.0
2 325.0 375.0 335.0 385.0
3 281.2 331.2 291.2 341.2

**Are these for 40 players or 200 players? When I summed the values, it added up to 40 players (but total prize amount picked up $67 for Method 1, etc)
Also, 1st place only gets 4x the buy-in?

[Scotty O]

Keep in mind, this is just a point system not a cash system

- c is used to offset the difference between making the point payout area.
- Max payout is the amount of spots that point are awarded. I wanted to make it to the final table for &lt;149 players but what happens if there are 14 players? I said top 6 would be better.
- Again this is for awarding points, not cash.

If anyone is savvy with Excel, they should be able to figure out the formula and the conditional If statement for the payout places.

Any feel free to tweek the XLS file and see if they come up with a better point distribution system.

I wanted to also make 4 different methods
1 - Based only on # players, with 1 point awarded for the last payout position. I thought this was a bit unfair for
that payout spot hence the offset value.
2 - Offset everyone by a constant to bump up last place
3 - Include the buyin without the offset
4 - Include everything

[Lottery Larry]

Sorry, I was confused by this:
"Places paid
6 for 6-14 players
10 for 15-149
20 for 150-249"

So, are the 6/10/20 points for the "c" value? Or the Max payout (# of places) earning points? It doesn't seem to be, I'm still confused by this

Giving 400 points for first and only two digits for the bottom 10 out of 40 places seems to overweight finishes, but that's up to you.

[Scotty O]

It is suppose to be overweighted for the top finishers, it just distributes it on a log scale. The "c" just bumps up the last place up to stand out from the players that did not place.


However, I looked at the system the previous poster put up and Like that one a lot more. I plan on using his system for the rankings.

[mlbobs]

I think the only way to do this fairly (and I base this on my math background, not my poker background) is a percentage based weighted scoring system. The exception would be a game with the exact same number of players every time (like a tourney that always is full). The reason I feel this way is because being 10 out of 20 should be a lot different then 10 out of a 100.

Take a players out position, subtract 1, divide by the number of players, multiply by 100, either round to the percent or the tenth of a percent (larger numbers of people will need finer gradation), and remove the decimal pt. (i.e. someone gets 0-99 or 0-999). The idea is to be the lowest point total at the end of the 'season'. 1st gets 0 pts. Last gets 99 pts. Everyone in between gets a properly weighted score whether there were 10 or 100 seats at the start.

IMHO
milo

[rmccurdy8]

Before you set up a ranking system you have to ask yourself hat you want. What I wanted was a system where:

1- every player that plays gets some points, this can create someequity in the game and make them want to get better.

2-Wild, loose and reckless play is not rewarded

3-Consistancy is rewarded above everything

4-A tourney winner gets a true bonus for winning points wise.

The following system we use I think does all those:

Point system is as follwed.

Place:
11+ 5 pt's each
10-6 increase by 5
10-10
9-15
8-20
7-25
6-30
5-1 increase by 10's
5-40
4-50
3-60
2-70
1-80pts + the amount of player in the tourney

The reason I like this scoring system is that it truley seperates the top 10, and gives an added bonus to the player that takes first place. Our season consits of only 4 tourneys, so the winner of each tourney is almsot guarenteed to get in the TOC.

My goal is to hopefully get people to care about there points and thus work on improving there game.

[Wesley N]

[ QUOTE ]
My problem with this system is that there's too much of a gap between top and bottom finishers and not enough (one point?) between upper finishers.

Example- First hand of tourney, flop is xxy. Two players go all-in, Kx getting Qx to put all of his chips in. River Queen knocks out the dominating hand. Qx holder goes on to get 2nd place (under your system, 17 points) while the unlucky dominating hand gets 1 point.

Another example- I play in 5 tourneys, you get lucky in your only one and win. you have twice as many points as I do, but who was more important to the tournament players?

Luck plays too much of a factor to overweight it. Same goes for the prize pools.

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree with this a lot... so in our group we do this:
3 points to everyone just for playing;
a 2 point bonus for making the final table;
yet a 1 point deduction if you re-buy (when available)
then amongst the top finishers is as follows:
20 pts = 1st
15 = 2nd
12
10
8
7 = 7th
field = only the playing points

this allows eveyone who consistantly plays a "fair" shot at gaining points while it allows those who happen to excell -- whether by luck or skill -- more of an advantage. This system is like the best of both worlds and it work out great in our 1st season which lasted 17 weeks; it also laid out an awesome final rank of players for a huge tourney as well as the tournament of champions we held afterwards.