The DeepStack Series is the event behind Venetian Poker Room popularity. The event has been drawing both local and international players, thus making it one of the biggest poker destination. From the fame that the event has brought, Venetian Poker Room has now announced a unique tournament series, which is already attracting massive opposition.
The upcoming Venetian event is dubbed as Lucky Shot Poker Series & Drawing slated to run for six days. The $225000 guaranteed series is scheduled to begin on October 21 and run until October 27. The $250 buy-in hold’em no-limit series will feature seven events. The prize pool is set to remain at $150000 regardless of the number of entry. There will also be six flight to be won in the controversial event.
A unique series
It’s the prize pool value that attracts poker players to an event. In most series, the prize pool is always decided based on the number of entries. Traditionally, it means that the higher the number of participants in a given event, the bigger the prize pool amount.
Venetian on its own wisdom has seen it fit to introduce a series whose pool prize value doesn’t increase accordingly with the rise of players. The $150000 will be fixed, and further stakes from more entries will remain with the house. Indeed the saying that the “house always wins” is true and will be super true if the Venetian event brings in an unprecedented crowd. Here’s how Venetian made the announcement:
“100% of all funds collected will go to meet the $150,000 Total Prize Pool. Any funds collected above and beyond the total prize pool will be the sole property of The Venetian Poker Room.”
It occurs that Venetian doesn’t target the seasoned poker players with the series. The event is meant to cater to players who “like promotions.” The series is “providing two ways to win,” so it means that you can still land on something via the draw. The event is designed to be a reliever for amateur and recreational players who can fall into the draw for a chance to win $52000.
The fixed prize pool value was at the center of condemnation by leading poker players, but Venetian was up armed with the response. This is how the Venetian PR spokesperson answered the critics of the series:
“The tournament [series] is designed so that the Venetian funds $225,000 in total prizes, regardless of how many players join. This is similar to how other tables and slot tournaments are conducted.”
In truth, the Venetian defense was realistic. While the Lucky Pot Poker Series is a willing entry event, slot tournaments are mostly invite-only contest.
Players’ Attack
The announcement of the Venetian event was quickly met with poker players’ responses, especially on Twitter. The Two Plus forum was the platform that some poker players used to condemn the series. The players didn’t stop at the rebukes alone; they also called on other players to boycott the event. Doug Polk, a seasoned content creator, was among the people who ran the #BoycottTheVenetian on Twitter.
While speaking to PokerNews, the Venetian spokesperson promised the players that other events would remain the same and never feature the format of Lucky Pot Poker Series.
