Playing For Real Money... Sort of

Since Black Friday, it's become much harder to play online for real money. The biggest sites (where most of us had accounts) have closed their virtual doors to US players wanting to play in real money cash games and tournaments. You simply can't do it.

Well, sort of. It turns out there's a work-around. Sort of.

For the most part, US-based players cannot play in these types of real money games. The software of the sites clearly have some means of determining where you are located in the world; e.g., if your IP address indicates a US-based location for your butt, the software kills any ability for you to play for actual greenbacks. But there is an exception. Sort of.

Mr. Multi pointed out to me yesterday that it's still possible to join freeroll tournaments that pay out tournament ticket entries. The trick is that you have to access these freerolls via the play money portal of the sites. Even better, there appears to be freeroll tourneys that you can play that payout in actual cash amounts. Granted, the payouts are very small, but it's real poker for real money. Again, I found that you have access these tourneys through the play money path, but I'm proof positive that this works. I.e., I played in two Full Tilt freerolls last night, and I went very deep in both.

Sadly, I didn't quite make the money in either game. In the first, we started with 5500 players, and I busted out in 98th place (they only paid 45; yes, less than 1%!). In the other game, we started with 450 players, and I busted out in seventh place (they only paid one tournament entry ticket; yes, less than 0.2%!). Sigh. This is disappointing, of course, but it was also encouraging to be able to still play "real" poker on one of the sites that I've grown fond of. Well, sort of.

Now, if I'd won, the problem of getting my money off of the site is still in need of its own work-around.

All-in for now...
-Bug