Poker Stars free rolls suggestion

[Big DP]

In lieu of the $ 50k weekly tournies and the $ 100k monthly:

Have a random drawing among all Supernovas for 312 WSOP ME packages and/or PCA packages. Drawings would be on a weekly basis for 6 packages and a player must register for the weekly drawings and have a minimum number of VPP hands generated for the week to be eligible for the drawing. Once you win a package, you would not be eligible for future package drawings for that year. In addition to the 6 weekly top prizes, there would be 60 second place winners of $ 200.00 each. A person would only be eligible to win one second place prize a month and no more than 3 in anyone year. I personally would be more than happy to trade the free rolls or the suggested $ 100.00 monthly Nova bonus for this scenario.

BIG UPSIDE - This would have much more promo value for Stars than the monthly bonus suggested and the present free rolls and would reward at least 50% of Supernova players with something of value. If a player did not want the package, they could convert it to FPPs, or take a reduced cash value at 85% of the package value. Rewarding almost 1 out of 6 Novas with a WSOP or PCA package through out the year would be great for PokerStars due to the "buzz" the winners would create about playing at PokerStars.

Slight downside - More dollars might be leaving the poker economy.

A similar thing could be done with the weekly 20k free rolls. Replace them with a weekly drawing for Novas thru Silvers for $ 1k each for 6 players with the remaining 14k being given away in smaller increments, say 6 $ 250. winners, 60 $ 100.00 winners, and 600 $ 10.00 winners. In these drawings Stars could have repeat winners except for the big $ 1k winners. Once again players would have to register for the weekly drawings and play a minimum number of qualifying VPP hands to be eligible for the weekly drawings.

[a nonymous]

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Slight downside - More dollars might be leaving the poker economy.

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Please explain.

[1p0kerboy]

As a spin-off from this idea:

What about a VPP leaderboard where the top 300 or so players get a package to the WSOP/PCA?

[aoFrantic]

So again, most players will lose the hundreds-low thousands in EV, while a select, lucky few will gain 10k+.

This is great for everyone

[SmokeyRidesAgain]

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Slight downside - More dollars might be leaving the poker economy.

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Please explain.

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Harrahs.

[MicroBob]

the other downside to this is that it would discourage many of the SN's from playing in the satellites or to spend their hard-earned FPP's to purchase such packages. Because they might win one anyway OR after they already win one they will be les interested in playing the sats.

Also don't forget that Stars could not directly buy-in their customers into the WSOP last year. Lots of qualifiers just kept the cash that was deposited into their account that they were supposed to use to buy-in.

If Stars could directly buy-in these players without them being able to keep the money themselves then I think this idea would be a bit better but still doesn't stop the fact that it discourages those who would otherwise chase and chase and chase after an entry playing a zillion satellites.

[NewGuy]

A SuperNova lottery into a big tourney is fun idea and as someone said (MB maybe?) this could have a nice marketing spin.

For reasons others already stated, I think this lottery would work better as an extra perk on top of, but not as replacement for the SuperNova freerolls (or other form of SuperNova bonus). Stars could give away just a very few seats as a fun giveaway to promote and spend very few $/SuperNova to do so.

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As a spin-off from this idea:

What about a VPP leaderboard where the top 300 or so players get a package to the WSOP/PCA?

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Interesting concept, basically wouldn't this create another tier of SuperNova-almost-Elite reward for the top 10-20% of SuperNova VPP earners?

Downside seems to be that Stars has to increase their budget to accommodate this, but they won't be increasing the reward value for ~80-90% of SuperNovas in the process.

Combining this idea with the lottery, Party used to have a (very flawed) promo where you could spend as many Party Points as you chose to basically buy tickets for chances to win a lottery / prizes. I suppose Stars could do the same, but I don't remember people loving this particular Party promo. (Of course, Party always managed to annoy people with how buggy / poorly executed / screwball their promos were, maybe that was it.)

[Big DP]

How about this "compromise" suggestion?

Take the 2.6 million in the 50K free rolls and divide it up between a monthly bonus and a SN weekly lottery for PCA entries and cash prizes.

Take the proposed $ 100.00 monthly bonus/2000 FPPs down to a $ 50.00 bonus/1000 FPPs to purchase.

Take the remaining 1.3 million and do one of the following:

Give away two PCA entries only (no hotel package) each week. This should leave about 9K a week to give away in smaller prizes. Approximately 25 winners for $ 200.00 and another 40 winners of $ 100.00.

Or draw for one lucky Super Nova to win the complete PCA Package (12k)and give the other 13k away in smaller weekly cash prizes. You could break out the 13k this way:

1st - 1k
2nd - $ 500
3-8 - $ 250.00
the next 100 winners: $ 100.00

Once a player wins a big prize, PCA trip down to $ 200.00, they would only be eligible for the smaller cash prizes after that. Also put a cap on even the smaller cash prizes a player could win, no more than one a month, no more than 4 in a year. This would help to spread the value to more Supernovas.

To enter the weekly drawings, there should be certain requirements, such as you must register and Stars could even require a small amount of FPPs to enter the weekly drawings, say 100 FPPs or require a minimum number of VPP hands for the week to be eligible.

The weekly drawings might motivate some players to keep their SN status in 2008 and might help others to attempt to reach that level as soon as possible in 2008 to qualify for the drawings.

Definitely would be something to promote:

PokerStars are sponsoring 50 SuperNova players in next years PCA. One big winner each week will be announced! Also SuperNovas will have the chance at an additional 13K in weekly cash prizes. Just our way of saying thank you to our top players!

Definitely has waaay more excitement than just the bonus alone.

[Big DP]

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Slight downside - More dollars might be leaving the poker economy.

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Please explain.

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Missed this question earlier.

If Stars gave away PCA entries, these are dollars that will probably never see there way back onto their site, thus hurting the "poker economy" on Stars. This is one reason I think my "compromise suggestion" is the best solution if they canned the free rolls.

[ryanghall]

I'd be fine with this idea but I would not be fine with it if it was just for PCA. EPT of your choice would be much better (Monte Carlo excluded, I know) - I can't play PCA (and I'm sure many novas can't) due to work reasons and there's only 2 EPTs that don't conflict with work for me.