2025 WSOP!!

This what I encountered playing the Mini Main for the first time last year. Plenty of rec players approach these deep-stack events with the attitude of "hey, it's just like playing cash!" and open raise 4x-5x, then still call off a 3x 3-bet, never mind that they'll be playing their ATo from out of position in a pot that already has 32BB in it. It really sucks if you're the 3-better and flop a set of jacks, only to have your c-bet and turn bets called, then get shoved into on the river after a K gives the rec player their gut-shot draw to Broadway, and you call it off because how on earth could they show up with AT or a bigger set there? Not that I experienced anything like that...

It's really true that it's all about your table draw, and if you do end up at a table where a couple players are forcing the variance up with overly large bets, you'd better hope you find yourself on the winning side of a couple of those inflated pots so it's you who's sitting on that nice big early stack.

I will sit down to play in a week. This is my greatest concern -- table draw. A bad one with crazy aggro's will spike the variance and likely make for a bad experience. Once they build up a huge stack or stacks it is pretty much over for everyone else.

I welcome these players. You want to play with GTO machines who are much harder to play against? Is this the new move up to where they respect your raises?

" Once they build up a huge stack or stacks it is pretty much over for everyone else." So then play this strategy yourself?

Simple solution, late reg when average stacks are shorter.

I mean are we really complaining about rec players making it 4-5x pre and playing trash out of position?

What!?

Yeah, yeah I get it, you can certainly exploit that kind of play, but if there are several people playing that way, there's no arguing that the variance has increased significantly. For me, the WSOP is a rare opportunity to play true deep-stacked well-structured tournaments that just don't exist for me locally. The lower variance these tournaments should have is a far bigger part of the appeal to me than the potential big payouts for a deep run. I like the thought that I can use more of the game tree thanks to the deep stacks. Triple-barrel bluffs, 5-bets, and 4-bet bluffs that aren't mandatory shoves are rarely possible in the shorter/quicker events I get to play regularly. So yeah, I don't see it as a positive that bad players can turn the WSOP experience into the same kind of game I get in my local turbo and super-turbo events, never mind that it gives me a bit of an edge.

I'm like a kid at xmas, can't fricking wait to play

At the same table at the WSOP will be folks who really don’t know what they’re doing at all and true professionals. You just don’t get that kind of variance back home, pretty much no matter where one plays most of the time. It’s the wider variance in skill level that makes the WSOP special. And that requires different adjustments than just playing against lower-skilled or higher-skilled players.

Curious about how the Landmark satellites are being run. Once a player hits the target they win a seat and their chips are removed. Suppose the target was 100,000 chips and they hit 118,000 when they went over. Does the extra 18,000 chips that have been removed cause the target to be reduced? For example suppose there were now 9 players left; would the target get reduced to 98,000 (18000/9 = 2000)?

Does anyone have tricks or work arounds for paying for parking at Paris/HS? I have an active Gold and and Expired Diamond CET card, and it's looking like self park will be $20-25/day. Any ways to avoid this? Thinking my next best option is to park at the Bellagio (free for MGM Gold+) and walk over each day.

All chips gets removed. Target landmark does not change. Eventually it turns into a survivor because there's not enough chips in play / distribution of chips make it so that players left = seats left.

In small enough fields, it could get headsup and the losers gets the last place.

Park bellagio and walk over

Are there any single table satellites this year at the WSOP?

Yeah, I won one of these and my whole stack of 122, 000 was removed

Probably been asked before but i'm too lazy to search, does the WSOP+ app accept Revolut bank as a way to pay?

I'm a stingy bastard and I can save myself hundreds in conversion fees if I just use Revolut (I can get Revolut Premium for £9 a month with a 0% conversion fee rather than Luxon/PayPal which is a 2-3% conversion fee)

Thanks!

Way to go, Dr. Meh! And did you receive lammers as payment?

No

Oh

What if I link my Revolut bank to my PayPal and pay through PayPal instead?

Probably ok with that using PayPal, wsop doesn't care what payment option you choose in PayPal but can't say for sure

WSOP issued a statement that they are currently waiving fees, which implied that they may reinstate the fees at any time (listed as 3% for CC and I'm guessing PayPal too). So if you go that route watch your account and make sure they don't rug pull the zero fees.

Colossus numbers way down 19.3k last year to 16.3k this year and an extra flight this year.

(Buyin 400--> 500 and before main event to second weekend) but gladiator second weekend was 20.5k in 2024

I believe I have only bought a WSOP entry on CC one time, maybe the first year they had the fast track kiosks. So I don’t remember what the experience was like. But I’m pretty sure merchants are required to post CC fees they charge at the point of sale. So I doubt they will be able to change their policy w/o people knowing. I do agree this policy won’t last, at least for anything but the smallest buy-ins.

Of course, there probably isn’t much to stop them from jacking up the rake 2-3% to cover the fees on the smaller events. Would most players even notice?

Not sure it’s a valid comparison given the schedule change. But I think the ongoing proposition that WSOP attendance may be down somewhat this year is still in play.

Looking at the overall LV visitor numbers for April, it’s still in negative territory, year over year. But the trend is in a more positive direction compared to March. And convention attendance continues to be strong, with a double digit increase from last year.

I listened to an analysis recently that talked about how consumer sentiment and outlook is fairly low right now, but this has not yet impacted consumer spending. It doesn’t seem like that dichotomy can last. And maybe we’ll finally see that in the May numbers and going forward. But given the continued price increases (though lower rate of increase) in LV, they seem to be doing ok revenue-wise.

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Cheers for the replies guys

I was so wrong of my prediction for this year’s attendance. I really thought last years attendance was gonna be matched. I believe these are the prize pools:
2024: $2, 834, 370
2025: $2, 613, 487

25% increase of the buy-in couldn’t even bring the prize pool higher. I don’t understand that. Maybe the fees?

The Saturday Flight is the real disappointment from an entry standpoint. This is the flight where you expect to see many of the single-entry players that failed to materialize this year. This tournament time slot traditionally has a guarantee, which did not happen this year. The guarantee helps to hype the tournament. With the tournament in the late June/early July window, schools would be out nationwide, but with the earlier time slot, many states are still in school with graduations happening. You're not going to miss your child's graduation to attend a poker tournament, at least I hope not. Last year also had the Pokernews Deepstack, Warriors and Colossus in close proximity on the schedule, which was a value paradise. Each tournament helped the other with an increase in entries.

I think your overall prize pool numbers are way too low.