Many Sites Have A Token System For Their Poker Tournaments – This Article Explains How They Work And Shows You How To Get The Most From Each Site
Tournament tokens take many forms across different poker sites. The basic premise is that you can use these instead of cash to enter tournaments or sit n goes. Some sites give them away for free (for example depositors freerolls) while others give you the opportunity to win them via satellite tournaments or Steps Sit N Goes.
To complicate the picture a little more, there are different rules across sites to how you can use your tokens. For example, with PokerStars you can win a ticket to a big tournament (for example the Sunday Million), then unregister and spit the $215 ticket between any SNGs or MTTs you like. At Full Tilt you win tickets of fixed amounts ($26 / $75) and can choose between any game of that buy-in amount. Other sites will let you unregister, but only use your ticket for the next running of the same tournament… in other words you need to know the rules before you jump in.
The Key Advantages Of Tournament Tokens
There are three main reasons that you might be interested in tourney tokens, depending on your experience level and poker bankroll.
- You can qualify for tournaments you might not otherwise have been able to afford to enter. This is a legitimate way to ‘take a shot’ and sees many small stakes players walking away with huge payouts every day.
- If you are a winning player then you will find the qualifiers which distribute tournament tokens to be very easy to beat. This gives you a positive expectation on the time invested, and so boosts your profit overall. Of course, if you are a pro or semi-pro then you do need to account for the time spent in the qualifier games. Occasional runs in the satellites (especially at the weekend) can build up a good bankroll of T$ (tournament dollars) to play with through the week.
- If you are a novice or do not have much spare cash to start off with , then tourney tokens can give you a shot at some extra bankroll building cash. This includes those beginner freerolls as well as special deals like the Fishmarket at OnGame which gives tickets to a regular $10+1 game for new depositors.
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How Tokens Work At Different Poker Sites
I will start with the biggest sites with established ticket systems. First I will describe the need to know info on how these work – then give my tips for how best to use the system in place for your benefit.
Tournament Tokens At PokerStars.com – T-Money And VIP Games
As the biggest site (by a long way) PokerStars give players a massive choice of qualifiers. These range from satellites to big live events around the world, to big online games like the Sunday Million and World Championships and much smaller tournaments too – you can win seats in $11 games.
PokerStars have a ‘Tournament Money’ system in both dollars and Euros. What you can do is win a seat in a tournament via a satellite, then unregister to have the T$ added to your account instead. You can spend this balance on any tournament you wish, for example instead of playing the $215 Sunday Million, you can unregister and play a combination of smaller games, SNGs and some more satellites – you just use the T$ until it runs out.
Note: You can also win entry into the big $215 tournaments via Steps Sit N Goes. You should note that you can’t switch these tokens into T$ - if you register / unregister you will have your Step 4 token returned instead.
VIP Club Tournaments And Depositors Freerolls: There are plenty of generous free-to-enter games at PokerStars, though your entries to these are not listed anywhere. For example if you reach SilverStar in the loyalty club, you will be able to enter weekly $30k and monthly $100k games. You simply need to remember when they are and go ahead and register – the system will soon tell you if you are not qualified to join that particular game!
How You Can Get The Most From PokerStars Tournament Tokens
Weekends are the key to profiting from T$ at PokerStars. Recreational / Inexperienced players will be taking a shot to see if they can qualify for the Sunday Million, making the satellites very soft. Anyone with some poker experience can play these games with a big positive expectation – you simply bank the T$ and use it to enter your normal MTTS / SNGs through the week.
Tournament Tokens At Full Tilt Poker
There is also a T$ system at Full Tilt, and in addition you’ll find some great opportunities to win tokens to tournaments at various levels. This works great, since many of the scheduled tournaments are at standardized buy-in levels: $3+30c, $8+80c, $24+$2, $75+$5 and $200+$15. This means that once you win a ticket, say to the $26 level games , you have a big choice of exactly how you spend it. I should note that you can also break up the torney dollars between smaller games / sit n goes, the same as at PokerStars. You can also go the other way and save them up to enter a big event like the FTOPS or Sunday $350k Gtd.
Steps Sit N Goes are soft, though you will have to wait for action at the $26 and above levels. The regular satellites are busy, especially at weekends, and are prominently displayed on the main tournament lobby.
Making The Most From Full Tilt T$: I recommend you check out the ‘Token Frenzy’ satellites, which are running through the day. These fill up nicely and award $8+80 and $26 seats to a lot of players. I also love the rebuy satellites, which attract a lot of ‘dead money’ from people who either refuse to rebuy at all, or go crazy trying to build their stack!
Full Tilt also have regular points games, and often feature promotions involving extra tournament entries for their designated ‘Game Of The Month’ – keep an eye on their website for the latest offerings.
Tournament Tokens At Titan Poker
While Titan do not have a T$ system that allows you to break up your entries – they do have a lot of opportunities to win tokens to big prize games, including Steps SNGs and the chance to buy entries using points you’ll collect in their VIP club.
Steps Sit N Goes are worth checking out. What I like about these is that there are 10 levels, and you can swap these SNG entries for MTTs at any point from $3.30c through to $215. These are busiest at the lowest levels, and are very profitable. Each time you deposit you will get entry into 4 separate tournaments with $2500 each in the prize pool.
Making The Most Of Titan Poker T$: Here is a great use of Titan Points (which will accumulate fast). You can spend them on tourney tokens for the infamous Jackpot Sit N Goes, or even the weekly ‘Sunday Major’ which has a $200,000 guaranteed prize pool. The Jackpot games pay 3 players (6-max) and 4 players (10-max) which gives you a bigger chance of turning the points into some cash.
Tournament Tokens At Other Sites
You have to be more organized at some of the other sites. While there are qualifiers, the flexibility of the entries you win is limited.
Party Poker: Lots of opportunities to qualify for their bigger tournaments, however if you unregister then you can only re-register for the same game on a future running. There are also plenty of entries for new player free tournaments when you deposit.
Red Kings (OnGame): live event qualifiers are extremely soft at this site, and you will often get a choice of which event to enter if you win one of their live-event finals. The tickets that you win via the sub-qualifiers are not exchangeable for other events – so choose carefully at the early stages.
Getting The Most From T$ - I Recommend PokerStars
You really can not beat PokerStars when it comes to Tourney Tickets, both for the flexibility of what you can do with them, and the huge number of ways in which you can accumulate the tournament money in the first place.
If you have not tried them yet, then give the Sunday Million satellites a try next weekend. These extremely soft compared to regular games, and you can take the $215 prize and break it up into as many tournaments or sitngoes as you wish – or you could always take that shot at the big event you have been promising yourself!
You can claim up to 3 signup bonuses at PokerStars.com up to a combined 100% to $600 max. Use Marketing Code PSP3108 when you register, and then bonus code STARS600 for up to 3 deposits. See you in the satellite qualifiers over at PokerStars.com!