Americas Cardroom Launches Jackpot-Style SNG 2.0

Gambling911.com-endorsed Americas Cardroom has launched its highly anticipated “SNG 2.0” jackpot-hybrid tourneys. 

SNG stands for “Sit & Go”.  These are single-table online poker tournaments. Sit-and-Go tournaments do not have a scheduled start time. A sit and go begins as soon as there are enough people registered at a table.

So what exactly is the hybrid SNG 2.0?

Flushdraw.net explains:

It’s a combination of a traditional turbo sit-‘n’-go, combined with a significant chance element.  WPN’s SNG 2.0 offering differs from most other sites’ and networks’ jackpot-tourney offerings in that the chance element here is participatory.  Rather than having the odds of an increased-payout tourney determined by a simple (and invisible) computerized chance, the players themselves have a role.

Each of the nine players selects a card from a 55-card-deck in turn with 26 of the cards green, 26 ed, and three gold.  As long each player in turn selects either a green or gold card, the drawing process continues.  Green cards add both money and extra payout positions to the SNG’s pool.  Gold cards build eligibility toward a Mini, Medium, or Mega Jackpot. 

The objective is for all players to select a green card prior to a red card being chosen.  Even if all nine participants successfully draw a green card, it’s still likely to be a jackpot-free SNG, even if everyone gets paid something, Flushdraw notes.

Flushdraw.net calculated the likely jackpot odds as such:

    Odds of all nine players succssfully drawing a green card, with no gold cards showing — 1 in 2,035

    Odds of the nine players drawing 8 green cards and 1 gold card, and that ninth player then replacing the gold card with a green one — 1 in 3,467

    Odds that two (2) gold cards appear before all nine (9) green cards needed are successfully drawn (the golds could be drawn by two different players or by the same player, repeating a lucky draw) — 1 in 15,601

    Odds that all three (3) gold cards appear before all nine (9) green cards needed are successfully drawn — 1 in 187,265

These, of course, are mighty long odds. 

So what’s the catch?

In traditional 9-player SNGs, three spots are paid.  But in these, if a red card is drawn before a green card appears, then the SNG pays only two spots, and for only 78% of the total payout for a regular-format SNG at the same stakes.  That unpaid prize money from all those first-card/red-card jackpot SNGs funds all the prizes awarded elsewhere, with what appears to be a little bit of extra rake left over for WPN and ACR once all things are factored in.

The Mega Jackpot, should it be hit, pays out 75% of the jackpot balance, distributed among all players at the lucky table according to order of finish.  The Medium Jackpot pays out 25%, and the Mini 10%.  The remaining amount in the jackpot balance is rolled over in all three instances.

Online poker players have shown a willingness to pay more rake to participate in this type of tournament, and there are always developmental and operational costs involved, flushdraw.net suggests.

Currently, the Americas Cardroom is the only online poker room in the Winning Poker Network offering the new jackpot style SNG 2.0.  Winning Poker Network this week became the 5^th largest Internet poker network in the world.

- Ace King, Gambling911.com