Chessmoso
Saturday, May 26, 2012
THERE are some significant differences between poker tournaments and chess.
Both attract about 50 to 100 players per tournament, although chess accommodates more children while poker clubs do not allow players below 21. There are, however, more lady poker players than chess players. There are also more foreigners playing poker--mostly Koreans, Japanese, Americans and Europeans.
Poker tournaments are played almost daily with bigger prizes . Although chess most often have sponsors, poker rely mostly on registration fees.
There are five poker clubs in Cebu and all are licensed and regulated by Pagcor, though I am not familiar with Tulip Club in Mactan.
Diamond Poker Club, beside the Grand Convention Center, only has cash games. These are P10/20 blinds with a minimum buy-in of P200 and maximum of P1,000; P20/40 blinds with a minimum of P1,000 and maximum P10,000 and P25/50 with a minimum of P2,000 and maximum P20,00. Bad Beat jackpot is now P3.7 million.
Metrocard in Mandaue features some unique tournaments and prizes. In its cash games, they have some special prizes like P1,000 for losing with pocket aces, P2,000 if you have a hand of four-of-a-kind, P3,000 for straight flush and P5,000 for royal straight.
Metro also has a freeroll (no buy-in) every Tuesday and Thursday at 4 p.m. followed by a P25,000 tournament with a buy-in of P500. Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, they have a P25,000 tournament. On Sundays, they have a P20,000 tournament.
Tomorrow there is a P200,000 tournament at 5 p.m.
All-in Poker Club at Waterfront Lahug in the casino area now has a Bad Beat jackpot of P2.8 million. Every Tuesday it has a no limit turbo with a buy-in of P1,000 and knockout bounty with a buy-in of P1,000k + P300 every Thursday. Both tourneys start at 630 p.m.
It is now planning to hold a P2-million tournament.
Oriental Poker Club in Parkmall, Mandaue is also active. Bad Beat is now P376,789. On June 1 to 3 at 2 p.m. they have a P400,000 tournament with a buy-in of P3,200 + P300 and the final table on June 4.
It also has a turbo satellite for this big event every Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday and also daily from May 28 to 31 at P300 at 2pm.
On May 30, it has the Casino Filipino heads up challenge with a buy-in of P2,000 + P200 at 5 p.m. and on May 31, it is a P30,000 pot limit Omaha with buy-in of P500+50, also at 5 p.m.
Bad Beat happens when a player holds at least a fullhouse of aces and tens and gets beaten by quads or straight flush. The loser gets 40 percent while the winning hand gets 20 percent and the rest is shared by the all the players equally in the table.
Majority of the Cebuano players also play poker on the Internet. It has been mostly responsible for the dramatic increase in the number of poker players worldwide, now numbering an estimated 300 million.
Deep Blue Our kiddie chess player and journalist KC Morala sent in this report: “NM Merben Roque walked off with the champion’s title in the DeepBlue Chess Tournament held at SM Cebu last May 22 to 23.
The champ drew his fifth round match with Rhenzi Kyle Sevillano, an incoming sophomore at University of San Carlos, and won the rest of his games, including that against FM Anthony Makinano and NM Richard Natividad.
Rommel Ganzon nabbed second place, half a point behind Roque, having recovered from his defeat in the second round with Allan Pason and winning the next five rounds, including the fifth game with third-placer Sevillano (5.5). The latter had shown a mind blowing feat of straight wins on the first four rounds, facing head-on the veteran players of Cebu.
The rest of the top-ten winners were FM Makinano, Natividad, Peterson Sia, Eden Diano, Pason, Bonn Tibod, and Diego Claro.
