[Stew]

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How many of you take these as serious tournaments? I mean they seem like crapshoots to me even at the late stages. Worst tournament structure and some of the most insane play - very tough to avoid bad beats. Any other opinions on this?

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Hi Gavin,

Congrats on your bracelet, welcome to the Zoo.

Anyway, I agree with you Paradise's tourney structure is awful. Stars, UB and Party's structures are all much better. I've quit playing them b/c the strcuture is so bad. It's not horrible for the first hour or so, but certainly after that they become all-in or nothing crapshoots. You can go from being on the bubble to among the chip leaders in like three hands b/c it's an all-in fest. If you are really, really good at playing the odds on being all-in pre-flop, then these tournaments are for you. If you are a really, really good, agressive, tricky post-flop player, then your skills are worthless in these tournaments. I think the bad beats are as unavoidable here as anyone else, but the structure makes a bad beat so much more penalizing here than the others I mentioned.