Poker Minder Features
Poker Minder is a Home Poker Tournament Management application which runs on a mobile phone.
It was developed after the creator realised that just about every home poker tournament he'd played in involved using a mobile phone to time the blinds.
Poker Minder is essentially a blind timer, but goes a step further to provide useful features for the assistance of new players and for the convenience of seasoned players.
There are other mobile phone poker tournament managers on the market, but they all make the mistake of trying to be a casino-grade tournament manager, with all the advance features you'd expect to see in a casino.
Well, for a start its not permitted to use a phone at any casino poker table and there is a dealer to make sure the tournament runs smoothly - so why try to replicate that? On the other hand if you ran your home poker tournament as rigidly as a casino, you'd struggle to get any players round for the next game!
Poker Minder's emphasis is on the Home Poker Tournament and the options are tailored around those differences.
Poker Minder Features
- Choose from 5 pre-defined popular tournament formats or create your own
- Choose between a freeze-out, add-on or re-buy format
- The starting chip total is broken down so you know what chips to distribute to each player
- Choose from 3 blind structures, depending on number of players and tournament type
- Tailor the 3 blind structures to your own preference
- Assign who will start as Dealer with the random Dealer selector
- In-Tournament screen gives you a summary of the tournament details
- Hand Poker Hand ranking chart available in-tournament
- Payout Calculator will distribute the prizepool fairly among the winners
Predefined Tournament Formats
Freezeout
Each player starts with 2000 chips, blinds increase every 15 minutes. A standard tournament blind structure is used. Once a player has lost all their chips they are out of the tournament. In a home poker tournament this format is best suited to smaller groups of up to 6 players, so that those who go out first aren't waiting around for hours for the start of the next tournament.
Bounty
Essentially a Freezeout Tournament but with an extra opportunity to win some side cash. The buy-in is split into two parts, a portion goes into the prizepool and the other portion is the bounty, for example the buyin is $20 with a $5 bounty. The $5 bounty goes into any pot where you are all-in. If you knock somebody out you receive their bounty. This is suited to larger home poker tournaments since everyone has a chance of winning some cash, even if they don't finish in the money.
Add-on
An add-on tournament essentially gives each player a second chance. If, during the re-buy period, you lose all your chips you may add-on the starting chip amount for the initial buy-in fee. You can only opt to add-on when you have lost all your chips and in-between hands. Alternatively you may stipulate that a player can add-on at any time when their chip stack is less than the starting chip amount. Players that have not required an add-on may do so at the end of the re-buy period regardless of what their total chip count is.
Turbo Re-Buy
The levels are short, the blinds increase exponentially and you don't have many chips to start with compared to other tournament formats. This tournament will suit players who like a fast paced game and aren't afraid to play loose-aggressive.
Any player who gets knocked out during the rebuy period may buy back in for the initial starting chip amount, an unlimited amount of times. If you've been shrewd and haven't bought a rebuy, you can still have an add-on at the end of the rebuy period.
It's recommended to have a small buyin for this tournament format, bearing in mind you may buy back in as many times as you want.
Heads Up
So its friday night, all your mates are out on the town but you fancy a night in playing poker. You only need one other player for this tournament so what better excuse to spend some quality time with your other half!
A heads-up tournament is like jumping in at the very end of a regular tournament, its instantly fast paced, the hands can last less than 30 seconds, most of that time was shuffling and dealing!
Playing heads up requires a very different strategy and playing the odd game will sharpen your skills ready for when they are needed in a bigger tournament.
Like the Turbo Re-Buy, a small buy-in is recommended since you will probably play several tournaments in a short space of time.
My Tournament
If you prefer a different tournament format than the pre-defined tournaments above, you can configure My Tournament to your exact requirements. You can choose between 3 different blind structures (even adjust each structure if you prefer), change the level length, starting chips and re-buy level.