Season Seven Discussion (Pre-Announcement)

[Des]

It"s that time of the year again!  

The pre season discussion threads often become some of the largest and most interesting threads of the year on the forum and I suspect this year will be no different.

The planning process has already begun and Leigh, Matt and myself would love to hear members thoughts on all aspects of APAT, and what you"d like to see improve next season.

I expect that we"ll largely focus on the live schedule and developments in this thread, but please feel free to put online on the table also if you"ve a suggestion to make.  That aside, we will run a separate similar thread for online a little closer to the season starting.

In looking for feedback, you need to be aware of certain limitations of course.  Main events need to finish at a reasonable time on a Sunday night, so if you say "can we have starting stacks of 25,000", then you probably need to make that a reasonable option by adding "...and reduce the close to 30m levels" or similar.  This is just an example of course.

I"m sure there are lots of things you will want to put on the table, but some of the things that I"m interested in hearing your views on are as follows:-

Buy ins - Stay at £75?  Increase?  Decrease?  Side events?

Festival style three and four day events - good? or too long?

Timing - An event every month, every two months, or four big festivals every year maybe?

WCOAP - Should it extend further with the addition of two day side events and an even larger main event?

Team events - Should we invite multiple teams from same communities? structure?

Formats - Should we be looking to include anything new?  Should we run one of the nationals in a different format, outside of the WCOAP and ECOAP?

Registration - Thoughts on satellites, direct buy in via client, generic satellite packages versus specific satellite packages, should satellites packages include a contribution towards travel and hotel?

Seat reservation - Should this continue?  If so, why?  If we added a Paypal button to enable players to pay the 10% fee upfront, would this work?  So players not taking up their reservation would lose the fee element of their buy in?

Locations - Overseas?  New locations?  For example we could take the ECOAP to Western Europe.  Would players come, if destination was cheap and outside of holiday periods?

Commercial - To increase our budgets we might ask you to qualify for events at a third party site, or join us for a crazy night of blackjack or slots tournaments.  Is this acceptable, not acceptable, would stop you playing, etc?

Awards - Further develop the medals?  More bracelets?  Differentiate between live and online event awards?  Added value?

Merchandise - Should we sell stuff?  Shirts, cards, chip set, card protectors?  How deep should the range be?  High quality or cheap?  Would you buy high resolution pictures of yourself at events, branded with the event name, APAT logo and in an APAT sleeve?

There is a ton of other stuff that I can think of but I don"t want to limit your thinking, so please feedback / debate on any topic and this will help us greatly in our planning for season seven.

[nosey-p]

Wayne likes this thread

[Waz1892]

Will look to provide a much detailed reply to S7 - but my immediate thought is on the normal APAT events,

What is the thinking/reason for Day 2 (brag I"ve made one at last) start at 2-2.30pm?

Imo, this means a lot of hanging around the hotel/casino for most people who book overnight, and a later finish on the Sunday night, which is generally a school night.

Even for those that go home as they are local-ish, you"re just hanging around at home waiting to leave.

Starting Day 2 at 12-12.30 would help both ends.  Despite a late finish on Day 1 of 2-3am, bed at 4ish, up at 9-10ish, to me seems reasonable, and better than the current situ.

[Paulie_D]

Buy ins - Stay at £75?  Increase?  Decrease?  Side events?

I"m very happy to the £75+10% for the standard buy-ins. £25-£40 for the non-festival Side Events is fine.

Festival style three and four day events - good? or too long?

The S6 ECOAP & WCOAP were fine with me. Spot on IMO.

Timing - An event every month, every two months, or four big festivals every year maybe?

Every two months + ECOAP + WCOAP worked wonderfully for me. One every month would really strain the budget.

Just having four big festivals a year would be my last option.

WCOAP - Should it extend further with the addition of two day side events and an even larger main event?

I don"t think two-day side events is required. There is enough decision making as to what events I can play already without further narrowing my options.

Team events - Should we invite multiple teams from same communities? structure?

I"m not in favour of multiple teams from the same communities (I might even extend this to APAT).

Formats - Should we be looking to include anything new?  Should we run one of the nationals in a different format, outside of the WCOAP and ECOAP?

WCOAP or ECOAP should definitely include PLO8 even at the expense of one the Stud / HORSE / HU events.

Nationals as anything other than HE would surely cut the attraction to the local community?

Registration - Thoughts on satellites, direct buy in via client, generic satellite packages versus specific satellite packages, should satellites packages include a contribution towards travel and hotel?

Not really bothered on registration assuming that there is no currency conversion issue. I hate having to sign up for another site just to register though. I"m pretty much withdrawn from online poker so perhaps I"m not your target market.

Seat reservation - Should this continue?  If so, why?  If we added a Paypal button to enable players to pay the 10% fee upfront, would this work?  So players not taking up their reservation would lose the fee element of their buy in?

I like it here on the forum...but then I"m biased as I"m here pretty much all the time so I get in early doors.

I don"t think Paypal will process "gaming" transactions but overall I"m not in favour of pre-paying the vig.

Locations - Overseas?  New locations?  For example we could take the ECOAP to Western Europe.  Would players come, if destination was cheap and outside of holiday periods?

YES, YES, YES.

Commercial - To increase our budgets we might ask you to qualify for events at a third party site, or join us for a crazy night of blackjack or slots tournaments.  Is this acceptable, not acceptable, would stop you playing, etc?

See my comment above about Registration.

Awards - Further develop the medals?  More bracelets?  Differentiate between live and online event awards?  Added value?

Love the medals...love the additional Bracelet for the event winner. I"ve always contended that the live event medals are better than the online ones   ...no need to add a bracelet for those IMO.

Merchandise - Should we sell stuff?  Shirts, cards, chip set, card protectors?  How deep should the range be?  High quality or cheap?  Would you buy high resolution pictures of yourself at events, branded with the event name, APAT logo and in an APAT sleeve?

Reasonable quality shirts as long as you do my size.   I liked the ones we had for the Stoke Team Championships.

I wouldn"t buy a photo of me [/opens door] but I"m sure others might like pictures of themselves.



As you know I"m an APAT enthusiast so I like the existing product. The Season 6 event schedule and so on was just about perfect for me and I"m very much in the "if it ain"t broke" category.

Enhance by all means but I"m old and large scale change scares me.

[Sugar_Free]

The S6 ECOAP & WCOAP were fine with me.

As you seem to have an insight can you tell me how I got on so I know whether or not to bother turning up

[Jon MW]

I"ve never been keen on the bracelets - a medal is self explanatory, a big shiny cup is self explanatory - a bracelet is a bit meh. Not exactly something you can show off on the mantlepiece, the relevance is only ever going to be known to other poker players who are almost certainly going to already know what you won anyway. Even after you explain it to non players it"s still not going to look impressive.

I think merchandising is a good idea, even if it just starts at the level of playing cards and card protectors I think there would definitely be a market for the APAT brand.

[Fatcatstu]

The only thing I want to see added back in is the abroad APATs please.

As someone who has attended 3 of them (Spain, Estonia and Vegas) I would love to do it all again.

I heard thee might be a few APAT players going to Vegas in November... Just sayin"....

Ps. Can we go back to Estonia pretty please?

[Paulie_D]

The S6 ECOAP & WCOAP were fine with me.

As you seem to have an insight can you tell me how I got on so I know whether or not to bother turning up

Event Lengthwise, of course.

As it happens...you did rubbish,

[AAroddersAA]

Buyins are fine £75+£7.50 is fine for the recreational poker player. Makes for a good prize pool but not too expensive. WCOAP main event at £100+£10 also sounds good. I also like about $50 for the online main events and £10 for the online league.

Format for a 2 day event is fine although if we can a 3 day main event for the WCOAP (DTD Deepstack style) that would be even better (maybe up the reg fee to accomadate this as I think most people would happily pay it). As far as the festivals go I liked the ECOAP and think it should stay as it is. WCOAP I would love to see the addition of PLO8 and a bit more cash action going, maybe an APAT table all weekend if this can be agreed with DTD somehow. It would get used so is there a way the rake could be split between DTD and APAT? I reckon we could even self deal at a push so DTD don"t need to provide a dealer and just charge a small fee per hour even.

Personally I like the online registration as you can pay for it there and then and I like to have everything paid upfront well in advance but that is not big deal really. Paypal would also be fine I would have thought it would be an advantage to APAT as you know you are going to get drop outs when you don"t have to pay anything up front.

Locations. If we are going to make ECOAP a fly away, 3 words here - Lloret de Mar. I will await Ger and Stu"s arrival to tell us about Tallin :-). However I think DTD is the best location with all thing considered.

If we can make Vegas happen in November some of us are going anyway.

May - Welsh Amteaur Championship, Les Croupiers, Cardiff
July - Irish Amteaur CHampionship, Dublin
August - ECOAP (Bank Holiday Weekend) - DTD
October - UK Amteaur Championship, London (ideally The Vic)
November - APAT Vegas
Early December - English Amteaur Championship, Coventry
Jan - UK Team Championship - Manchester
Feb - Scottish Amteaur Championship - Glasgow
April - Easter Time WCOAP at DTD

One Day Home Nations Championship inserted into one of the events. Use this event to try things out. Allow two teams from each of the Home Nations, maybe have some sort of qualifiers for people to win a place. Allow people members to elect captains for each of their teams with nominations having to be made and seconded by members with more than 300 post"s or who have played in more than 10 APAT events?

Maybe have each team made up of two online qualifiers. This gives everybody the chance to play for their National Team.

UK Team event only one team from each forum, I would include APAT in this as I think having 3 or 4 teams devalues the achievement of being selected.

I would happily play qualifiers on a third party site. Would probably play a very small stakes slots or Blackjack event but not to qualify for a poker event.

Please keep the braclets for WCOAP only (Not even for ECOAP). I think that there are already far too many medals floating about (literally EVERYBODY within APAT has a few it seems) and would like to see the braclets retain some prestige. No medals for winning teams in team events imo either only for individuals. NO Medals for side events either.

Online. I think the mini festivals are overkill except for Worlds and Europeans. One decent NLHE online event is fine for each National. Give the winner of that event the added value seat if there is one.

Bunch of 5"s is good I would like to see some of those run.

Online National League. Probably need a new thread for this one. It seems to work fine as it is tbh but my personal preference would be to allow players to form their own teams or say 8 people (the online cup suggests this would be even more successful) and play it out with any added value split between individual and team leagues. Maybe have a gold and silver medal play off. No automatic places in National Teams for WCOAP (I honestly really dislike this idea). Top team maybe invited to UK Team Event but only the top team.

[Paulie_D]

May - Welsh Amteaur Championship, Les Croupiers, Cardiff
July - Irish Amteaur CHampionship, Dublin Cork is more likely
August - ECOAP (Bank Holiday Weekend) - DTD
October - UK Amteaur Championship, London (ideally The Vic) Luton
November - APAT Vegas
Early December - English Amteaur Championship, Coventry
Jan - UK Team Championship - Manchester
Feb - Scottish Amteaur Championship - Glasgow
April - Easter Time WCOAP at DTD

I"m fully mostly in agreement with Steve.

Dublin or Cork frankly but Dublin is a tough "get" as far as venues go.

My only problem with the above is where do we fit in / switch an overseas event?

If I had to lose one it would probably be the "forum" team event...but I understand the reasons why it probably won"t be.

[Curlarge]

Annoyingly I find myself agreeing with much of the aforesaid points, even Paulie"s

Almost all of the APAT tournament weekends are superb, (buy-ins, structure etc..) except for one thing.

As Waz mentioned, the start times of the Sunday events, Day 2"s and Side Events, should be no later than 1pm, for the following reasons.

All players staying in local hotels have to be out by midday at the latest and I"m sure that I am not alone when, after a frenetic few days on the felt and at the bar, fatigue has taken over and the thought of sitting around for 2-3 hours waiting for the side event to start is less than appealing.

I have, on more than one occasion, decided that as I can drive and get home before the event starts I have chosen to leave and not bothered with the side event. (memo to self here, MAKE MORE DAY 2"s!!!!!).

I"m sure it would encourage more people to stay for the side events if the "waiting around" time were made to disappear.

Bracelets - No  
Medals    - Yes (just my opinion)

The new online cup structure and format is great fun and should be retained as is.

Overseas APAT's are great fun and I would particularly love to go back to Lloret as it was superb, and maybe Vilamoura (this years scouting mission proved a great success), in fact almost anywhere tbh.

WCOAP - PLO8 please.

One last point.

I know that the thrill and excitement of each seasons new schedule announcement comes with a certain amount of trumpet blowing and fanfare, and rightly so, but would there be a way of announcing each individual event as it is agreed with the host casino, so that players that have to travel from afar can take advantage of the lowest hotel prices by booking as early as possible?

[Paulie_D]

...would there be a way of announcing each individual event as it is agreed with the host casino, so that players that have to travel from afar can take advantage of the lowest hotel prices by booking as early as possible?

This....

Generally, however, once the schedule is out I assume that the venue is "locked down" and thus hotels can be booked.

I know that in the past there have been issues but, IIRC, in recent years anything that hasn"t been nailed is listed as "TBA".

I don"t recall, other than absolute unforeseen emergencies, any instance in the last couple of years where the venue has suddenly changed after being announced.

Or is my memory failing?



I do agree on the Day 2 starts but realise that this is often down to casino staffing availability.

[duke3016]

[fandango]

I"m pretty happy with with every thing mentioned above, agree with most points especially starting times for day 2 but I understand that staffing can sometimes be an issue..

Def PLO8 at festivals

Abroad isn"t really a goer for me at the moment, def once the kids have flown the nest..

Structure and buy ins are spot on IMO

Six events a year maybe a couple too short, 8 would be great, as if you can"t make them all your still have a good choice..

Genting Southend please please and pretty please as a venue  

More live feeds when possible with commentary

Medals fine , Bracelet I like but maybe just for WCOAP?

[Fatcatstu]

Ger owns thread.