Party Snowball Tournament - A Joke

The orginzation of this tournament was terrible. 57 people were preregistered and there was no sort of check in or anything to ensure that people were actually there. When the tournament started only 18 people of 57 registered people were actually playing.

The tournament had 6 tables.

2 tables consisted of 1 player who was there and 9 who were not there and in away mode. This allowed these 2 players to accumulate monster stacks by just calling the big blind each hand and watching the other players at their tables auto fold.

Another table had 2 players who were there and 8 who weren't. These 2 players worked out a deal so that they would take turns stealing the blinds of the away people.

Another table had a simular arangement between 3 players.

Then there was a table with 5 players that were actually there.

Then there was the table that I was seated at which had a whopping 6 players that were there.

Obviously I had no chance at the 4000$ in prize money for the top 8 finishers as the players at the other tables were able to just sit back and accumulate the blinds of players who did not show up. I was only able to build my starting stack from 1000 to 2700 by actually playing poker as I was unable to steal more than 200 worth of blinds from away players as I was seated in a very bad position relative to the away players at my table. Obviously my 2700 stack wasn't enough because when the away players fianlly blinded out and the tables started to combine I was moved to a table that had a 12000 stack a 6000 stack a 5000 stack and several 3000 and 4000 stacks. These players didn't actually get their stacks from beating live opponents, but by getting the blinds of people who were away.

I no longer see any point in being signed up under this snowball program thats monthly tournament winner will end up being whoever is lucky enough to be seated at a table full of away people.

[scrapperdog]

18 people showed up for a 4K freeroll where top 8 gets paid and you are complaining? This is embarassing. Would you make this post if you were lucky enough to get a good seat position? Somehow I doubt it. And now you say you are quitting site over this before the person has a chance to fix the problems with the tourney? Fantastic!

I think the problem here lies with Party and not the affiliate. I had tried to have a freeroll for our play money players to convert them to real money players and wanted to have one a month with 2000 new players each month. It seems Party has difficulty in communication between departments at times, and I just shelved the project out of frustration.

[ QUOTE ]
The orginzation of this tournament was terrible. 57 people were preregistered and there was no sort of check in or anything to ensure that people were actually there. When the tournament started only 18 people of 57 registered people were actually playing.

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OMG, they didn't push back the start time to see if the other players showed up?! Crazy! You had a random shot at getting one of the easy tables and missed, so you needed to play great poker. With a freeroll, you are trying not to piss people off. So you don't want to give away the seat if they haven't checked in by a certain time. I am sure you have thought about this, so instead of pointing out what went wrong, try this: "How would you fix this?"

[morgant]

first, this is a golden opportunity at a 4k prizepool with little if any competition, cant believe you are complaining about that.

second, freerolls are very hard events to organize as promotions. getting 50% of the players to show up is damn near impossible. i had a few freerolls and after seeing the turnouts, i have permantly shelved them. just my experiences, however, if i was a player, this snowball event with a prize pool like that and only a few players sounds like a golden opportunity. you may want to reconsider your view.

if you want a tournament with competition, just signup for a regularly scheduled tournament.

[Sniper]

You are complaining about a 4K freeroll, where you had a 45% chance of cashing? [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]

Its not a golden opportunity when Top 8 get paid and 2 people start with 10k in chips 2 start with 5k in chips and 3 start with 3.5k in chips while im stuck starting with 1k in chips. Want to explain to me how that makes me a 45% chance to cash?

[Jessica1]

Dear Vegetarian

As the others point out, the turn out is something we cannot control. Nor can we determine who sits where. This was the first month of the Snowball Scheme and 18 people for a $4k freeroll is pretty good odds.

Of course we will learn from any errors but running to the forums to complain is not the most constructive criticism you can give us. As we have always maintained, the Snowball Scheme is an evolving animal. We accept now that, whilst we will endeavour to make it as successful as possible, we will never be able to please all of the people all of the time, whether it's complaints like yours, those of late notice or complaints of people in the Far East for whom 4 am on a Monday is not the most conducive time for them to play Texas NL Hold'em.

The aim of this scheme is to build a large group of players who will benefit each month from such generous freerolls.

Now that Party have officially killed rakeback this is one of the few schemes that allows you to effectively get a chance at some form of rakeback as well as perhaps being entitled to rewards from the Party VIP team. It beats simply signing up with them direct anyhow.

If you wish to be removed from the scheme, simply email us and we will ask for you to be de-affiliatised (sounds like a 'Bushism'!).
But we would of course be happier if you stayed in and like KinkyKid suggests, send us some constructive criticism on how we can improve it.

Regards
RTR

(PS Thank you to the rest of you for your positive comments)

[scrapperdog]

[ QUOTE ]
Its not a golden opportunity when Top 8 get paid and 2 people start with 10k in chips 2 start with 5k in chips and 3 start with 3.5k in chips while im stuck starting with 1k in chips. Want to explain to me how that makes me a 45% chance to cash?

[/ QUOTE ]

Fine then quit playing these 18 man 4K freerolls where 8 cash like you threatened to. BTW after this post here I doubt next time it is gonna be an 18 man tourny next month. My guess is that your whining about seat position just cost you a lot of EV.

[NSchandler]

I think what we can gather from this post is that it's impossible to please a vegetarian.