A poker VIP program in action

With the variety, types and variants of games available on a poker site, it can sometimes be difficult to decide what to play.  One thing that must be considered is the site's VIP program.

VIP programs can be complicated, and there are different types of rewards, and different VIP levels, within a program.  For example, as one goes up the levels in the PokerStars VIP program, there are multipliers, where the number of reward points you can get are first doubled, then tripled, etc.  As I've mentioned previously, when I was playing on PokerStars some players earned over $100,000 in rewards just for playing, which doesn't include the amount won at the poker tables.  One player (Dario Minieri from Italy) used his VIP points to buy a Porsche.

On americascardroom.com you can't do anything like that.  They have the levels and multipliers  but the rewards program is new and evolving, and the number of players on the site is too low to allow the number of games that are played on a site like PokerStars.  Quite a few PokerStars players play 24 tables at a time, and one German player plays 100 tables at a time.

The programs can be very difficult to figure out.  There is actually a web site with calculators that help players figure out the value of the rewards they could win on the PokerStars VIP program.  A few days ago I wrote down some before and after numbers while I was playing, and after about half a page of math I figured out a lot of what's going on.  Keep in mind that I'm playing at a very low level, and usually only one table at a time, while I steadily and carefully build a bankroll that will give me the financial room to work on things like multitabling.

When I play one Double or Nothing SNGs with an entry fee of $5.25, here is what happens.  I won't bore you with the details of how I calculated this:

I clear 4 cents of my deposit bonus.
I earn  9.45 cents in rakeback.
I earn 1.93 Combat Points.  Combat points can be used to buy into certain touraments, but since I don't play any of them right now, I didn't bother to figure out how much a point is worth.

That doesn't sound like a lot, and it isn't .  If I played 25 $5 DONs in a week (possible, if I was a little light on the studying and admin work that week) I could get $3.36 a week in rakeback and bonus, at least until I cleared all of my bonus ($50.05, the amount of my original deposit.)

I did a quick and dirty calculation and came up with this:  Let's say that someone was really working the AmericasCardroom VIP program, playing 24-tables of $55 SNGs, the average time to finish a SNG is 45 minutes, and he is clearing a bonus.

With those conditions (there are certainly players that can do that) every 45 minutes that player is making about $45 a minute in VIP rewards alone.  That's $60 per hour just for playing, without conidering tournament winnings.

I will probably never get anything near that in rewards, because numbers like that give tournment poker players an interesting choice.  If you want to make a good solid, steady, predictable income, you play SNGs.  You can turn them over fast, and really work the reward programs.
But at far as money won at the tables, playing large multitable tournament generate more income, but that income is much more volatile.  Someone could play on PokerStars at the highest levels and win little or nothing for several months, then play the week-long World Championship of Online Poker, cash in several events, and win a million dollars or more in a week.

If someone plays only very large tournaments and they're good, the ROI (retun on investment) will often be 100% or more. But those large tournaments take a long time to play, so you're not going to turn them over fast enough to make much from the rewards system.  My best finish in a very large tournament was 7th of 3,200 players. The entry was $3.30, and I won $384 dollars (ROI of 116%.)  It took about 6 hours.

Most tournament poker players making a living online specialize in either very small tournaments of under 50 players, or very large tournaments of over 1,000 players.  I would be playing the large tournaments if I had a bigger bankroll, but even then the large tournaments on AmericasCardroom aren't all that large, with hundreds of players instead of thousands.  Until online poker regulations change in the United States, I'll have to make the best choice from whatever is available, and have money ready to deposit when the good sites are once again open to US players.