What Are Slot Tournaments and How Do You Win Big at One?
Slot tournaments is a casino competition between players, either in a real-world casino, or online, where a group of players compete against each other playing casino slot machines in order to win the designated prize, or rewards.
There are different kinds of slot tournaments, some with many players playing against each other, down to where only a few players play. Entry is by means of a fee, called the buy-in, and this may be for cash, or tokens, or offered for free by the casino to their premium players, or to attract new players to their games.
How Do Competitive Slot Tournaments Work?
In a real-world casino, a section of the casino slot floor is roped off and designated as the tournament area. This area contains special slot machines, called tournament slots, which can be either specifically-designed slot machines for tournaments only, or standard casino slots, but these have been equipped with a new program for play, which is called tournament mode.
What Is Tournament Mode?
In any casino, real-world or online, each type and kind of slot machine has a computer program inside its brain which tells the machine how to play the game which is selected by the player, or which is housed in that slot machine cabinet.
If one of these regular slot machines is selected to become part of slot tournament play, it’s internal program is changed from its regular play programming into what is called tournament mode. This is a special configuration which plays and pays differently to the way that the machine would normally play and pay.
Usually this means that while in tournament mode, the game will pay much more often and with much bigger pays.
Special Designated Tournament Slots
There are also specially-designated and built slot machines specifically for slot tournaments. for example, the slot machine manufacturer EVERI have a system called tourn-event, which is a designated bank of slots which are specifically configured to play only slot tournaments.
How Does A Slot Tournament Machine Work?
The principles are the same as all traditionally-available slot machines. Since most of these machines now use play buttons to initiate play – instead of the more traditional handle pulls – these tournament machines also work that way.
Players play them the same way, by pressing the play button as fast as they can to accumulate as many credits and wins as possible in the allocated time.
How To Get Into A Slot Tournament?
There are a number of different ways in which you can play in a slot tournament. The most common is to buy an entry, which is called the buy-in. The amount of this varies considerably from tournament to tournament, and from casino to casino. This can also be different with online slots, where the number of participating players is not limited by the space required to house the machines, as is the case in a real-world casino.
In most casinos, the standard buy-in for a slot tournament is usually about $25. But this can be as much as $1,000 per entry, and even more. I have played in such tournaments in the past where the entry was at least $1,000, and in some cases up to $10,000 per entry. But in general, the most that today’s casinos will charge for an entry will be about $100.
Free Entry For Slot Tournaments
On some occasions, players can often also enter a slot tournament for free! That’s because many casinos use slot tournaments either as a reward for their regular and premium players, but also to attract new players to their casino.
So, if you are already a regular player, you may get an invitation to a slot tournament with free entries for yourself and your spouse, or significant other. Or if you are new to the casino, you may get an offer in the mail, or text, or email, offering you a free entry, or perhaps a 2-for-1, and so on.
And finally, you can often also use your player reward points to enter the slot tournament. If you are a regular player at this casino, and use your player’s club card for your play, you will be accumulating bonus points which can then be used for a variety of extra benefits and bonuses. and entries into slot tournaments are often part of these rewards, which you will be able to access through the player’s club in your favorite casino.
How To Win A Slot Tournament?
Slot tournaments have different pay structures, depending on which kind of tournament this is If it’s what’s called a free-roll tournament, this means that entry into it is for free, and therefore the prizes which will be won may not be in cash, but perhaps in other types of gifts. the most common of this is to win free play credits, which are then added to your player’s club card account.
You can then use these as cash for your favorite regular casino slot machines. This you can do by inserting your player’s club card into the machine’s card reader, enter your pin, and then select free play credits from the menu, and then choose how many to add to that machine’s credit meter.
You can’t cash out these free play credits, but whatever you win by using them is yours, and this means that you can cash out these wins in real money.
Cash Reward Slot Tournaments
Most casino slot tournaments – as well as those online which require a cash buy-in – will have a tournament winners structure posted, and this will show how much each player will win if they reach those levels.
For most slot tournaments this will be usually be the top three players – and these will be those players who have accumulated the highest total of accumulated tournament credits throughout all of the rounds of the tournament.
These prizes are almost always in cash, and the amount of that cash will depend on whether of not this is a slot tournament which pays a percentage of the total entries for each prize, or if this is a slot tournament with a fixed prize structure.
Fixed Prize Structure for Slot Tournaments
A fixed prize structure means that the listed awards for the winners will have a specifically-designated amount. For example, most such slot tournaments will have, say, $1,000 as first prize, with $500 as the second prize, and $250 as the third place prize. These are the most common fixed prize structure pay scales which you will find in standard casino slot tournaments.
In many cases these types of tournaments will also offer consolation prizes as several runner-up prizes, and these can be either buffet coupons, or show coupons, or gifts, or perhaps a coffee mug, or some other type of thank you award for those who bought into the tournament, but did not win the major cash prizes.
Percentage Participation Prize Structure for Slot Tournaments
A percentage prize participation structure means that in this type of slot tournament the amount of the winning prizes will depend on how many players entered with their buy-in. This, therefore, means that the actual cash amount of the prizes will depend on the number of players who entered the tournament, and not on a fixed prize amount.
The value of the final cash awards in these percentage participation tournaments is decided by the percentage value of each award.
The advantage of these types of slot tournaments is that the more players who buy-in, the bigger the prizes will be, and, therefore, the more places will also be paid. in these tournaments the total amount of the buy-ins is called the prize pool, and it is from this that the stated percentages will be paid to the winners.
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What are the Different Types of Slot Tournaments?
We have already mentioned some of the types of slot tournaments which are popular with casino players, both in real-world casinos, as well as in online casinos. So here let’s briefly explore all of the most popular forms of such tournaments.
Multi-Player Slot Tournaments
These are the most popular tournaments, and it simply means that there are many players playing, all competing against each other. Most slot tournaments will be of this type.
Single-Player Slot Tournaments
This is a specialized type of slot tournament where there is only one player playing, and competing against a specified goal or objective.
For example, a single-player slot tournament machine may be available in the casino, and for the amount of the entry fee (whatever that may be) you can sit at that game and play only by yourself, and after the designated period of play the machine will then tell you if you won any of the qualifying prizes.
Buy-In Slot Tournaments
This is the type of tournament where you pay a cash fee to enter, and then play throughout the rounds of the tournament, and if you reach the qualifying advancement in each such successive round, you will progress to the finals, and there you may reach the top tier of the winners, and collect your prize.
Free-Roll Slot Tournaments
This is a tournament where the entry is free, and therefore you don’t need to buy-in for cash, or some other buy-in requirement. These free-roll slot tournaments are usually offered by the casino as a reward to their regular and premium players, but they can also be used to attract new players to that casino, or online casino.
Sit-n-Go Slot Tournaments
Sit-n-Go (SnG) are usually short tournaments with a number of specifically-designated player spots, usually around 10-to-12 players at a time. This tournament is usually a cash buy-in type of tournament, and it begins automatically when all the designated player spots have been bought.
A SnG tournament ends when the designated amount of play time has been completed, which is usually about 10 minutes of really fast play. When the time expires, the machines will shut down automatically, and the tournament staff will verify who has the highest scores, and those players are then awarded the top prizes.
One-Shot Slot Tournaments
In the majority of slot tournaments, there are usually several rounds before a winner is decided. In one-shot slot tournaments you only get one chance at placing in the winning tier.
Feeder Slot Tournaments
A Feeder Slot Tournament has the same structure as all the other similar tournaments, except here the idea is to score enough points to advance into a bigger tournament, with much larger prizes.
For example, let’s say that a Feeder Slot Tournament is offered with only a $25 Buy-In. But this tournament does not offer a cash prize. Instead, the Top Prize is an Entry into a $1,000 Slot Tournament, where the Prize Pool is much bigger, and therefore offers a chance to walk away with a lot more money.
Scheduled Slot Tournaments
These are the most popular slot tournaments, because the casino, or online casino, can schedule them in advance, usually several weeks, or perhaps by even a few months. This often results in larger turnouts with more players, and, therefore, more money for the prize pool and the prizes.
These tournaments are also popular with casual players, because they can then schedule their casino trip, or vacation, in advance, to coincide with these scheduled tournaments. These slot tournaments are especially popular in casino destinations like Las Vegas, where the major casinos can attract and invite a great many players from all over the country.
Survival Slot Tournaments
These are among the type of slot tournament where players compete in rounds, each round usually about 10 minutes, with the top players from each round advancing into the next round, and so on. How many players advance into the next round depends on the specific rules for that tournament, and for that casino, either real-world or online.
These rules can be substantially different, so it is in your interest to check just exactly what is required to advance into the next round, and how many players will so advance. In most such Slot Tournaments, the top three player will advance, but this can be the top 5 players, or even more, depending on how many players compete in each round.
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What is the Best Strategy to Win Slot Tournaments?
All Slot Machines are random, and all winning spins are based solely on luck.
However, slot tournaments are not without skill and speed and dexterity are among the most important skills!
This means that you must hit the play button as fast as possible, and in a rhythmic pattern to coincide with the activation of the reels, and re-activation of the next spin at the most optimum point.
When the slot machine hits a win, it will temporarily disable the play button, while the winning amount runs up on the credit meter. During this time pressing the button makes no difference, because the player cannot re-activate the next spin while the machine is busy running up the credits from the current win.
Keeping the rhythm of the game and not distracted by the spinning wheels or symbols on the display screen any of the bells and whistles that will happen as you play is the most critical skill to learn when it comes to slot tournaments.
There are however a few other skills that can help get you in the winner’s circle:
Skills Needed to Win Slot Tournaments
- Always play all the available pay lines
- Always play maximum credits – whatever this may be
- Learn to play fast – you can practice on regular slots in the casino
- Lear to push the play button rhythmically and as fast as you can press it
- Keep your mind clear and do not be distracted
- Focus on speed – this is most important, next to playing fast on the play button
- Learn what will get you into the next round – is it the most points, or how fast you can play through the tournament credits
Title image credit: eskystudio/Shutterstock
