Millionare Chess Tournament in Las Vegas at October 2014

Yes, thats a bit suprising. But lets see if this is what they are thinking -

• To make the tournament a success we need 1500 to 2000 participants.
• Maximum we can accommodate 3000 participants
• So if we campaign for 1500 by end of March 31st, there is a good chance that we will end up crossing 1000 by that time at least.
• So at 31st March if we have 1000 instead of 1500, we can evaluate our enthusiasm and the reactions from the Chess Community to figure out whether we need to exercise the escape route of cancelling the tournament so that we dont have to tke loss.

For the last point, I think even if they get a good feeling that by October they will get 1500 participants (or even lot less), they won't cancel the event. My reasoning behind this is that, Maurice has done a similar half million dollar event in 2005, successfully. And by cancelling, they will be incurring loss of loosing almost a year of their time and energy, let alone expenses they are incurring. By cancelling the tournament, they wont gain much but just will be able to minimize the loss if they hold the tournament. In other words, if cancellking the tournament means 200k loss to them and holding the tournament means 400k loss to them, I think they will go for holding it. Its only if they see, they are going to loose by a wide marging, in terms of publicity, rather than money, they will cancel.

I stringly feel they won't have to cancel. 

This sounds really strange for me.

If canceling the tournament means 200k loss and holding the tournament means 100k loss, you should hold the tournament.

But you don´t hold the tournament if you are going to lose more than by cancelling it (200k bigger loss in your example).

I can´t see the logic.

The logic is that the negative publicity over cancelling the tournament may be evaluated at more than 200k cost. (not saying it is the case or not, it's just the reasoning I can read). If I promise to give you one cent to put a big sign "I am an idiot" on your house door, I guess you would refuse.

Might be the length of time they need in advance to book the venue. Also, probably doesn't want to risk much planning time.

IronTiger, you are correct on the reasoning. There is a face value outside of financial value just of holding or cancelling this tournament. Considering Ashley and Ami Lee's tracck records, that face value should be as much as 200k. Imagine, if this tournament is cancelled, will anyone ever try to arrange another high stake tournament? Probably not in near future.

If the tournament were to lose money, it would be a long time before anyone tried to organize another one.  What's the difference between cancelling the tournament or losing money as far as future high-stakes tournaments are concerned?

The major obstacle that this tournament (or any major tournament) faces is the high entry fee and travel costs, which give it a limited market.  If you assume that there will be about 200 players in the open section (the 2013 World Open had 100), their paid entries will not cover the open section prize fund.  Thus, the organizers are depending on the lower rated players, who will mainly be from the US, to subsidize the Open prize fund and cover the costs of the tournament.

The US has approximately 55,000 tournament players, 42,000 of whom are juniors.  I don't believe that many juniors will play in the tournament, thus, you have a pool of 13,000* players who might enter.  Most of them can afford neither the entry fee nor the travel costs.

*Probably less.  My Class D rating gives me a ranking of 14000 out of 55000.  There are a lot of juniors with ratings higher than mine (I'm assumming that few adults with ratings lower than mine would be interested).

The target rank-and-file is most probably the guy who decides to blow his money on a trip at Vegas, and might as well look intelligent in doing so by chess. Not the average tournament player.

(Knowing whether it will work is another question, of course)

Great idea.

I would love to enter but like many others unless I hit the lottery it's not going to happen for me.

bongcloudftw wrote:

in business interests, face value does not exist at all. Business people only evaluate how much profit they earn, and is it worth it. to evaluate it at 200k is ridiculous imo. 20k seems more reasonable.

Fair enough. lets assume, no face value at all. In that case, considering group discounts, we can argue that the break even for this tournament to Ashley and Amy is 1400 registrations. So by March if they get 1200 registrations (which is 300 below what they are expecting by march 31st at a minimum). I believe if the numbers stack upto this, they will not cancel although they have the provision to cancel the tournament.

They are already doing that; the prize funds cover each class. http://millionairechess.com/tournament/prize-fund/

Open section

1st place – $100,000
2nd place – $50,000
3rd place – $25,000
4th – $14,000
5th – $8,000
6th – $4,000
7th to 20th – each $2,000
21st to 50th – each $1,000

2350-2499
1st place – $40,000
2nd place – $20,000
3rd place – $10,000
4th place – $5,000

Under 2350
1st place – $40,000
2nd place – $20,000
3rd place – $10,000
4th place – $5,000

Under 2200, U2000, U1800, U1600

1st place – $40,000
2nd place – $20,000
3rd place – $10,000
4th place – $5,000
5th place – $3,000
6th place – $2,000
7th – 20th each $1,000
21st – 50th each $600

Under 1400 Section

1st place – $24,000
2nd place – $12,000
3rd place – $6,000
4th place – $4,000
5th place – $3,000
6th place – $2,000
7th – 20th each $1,000
21st – 50th each $600

Top Under 1200
1st place – $20,000
2nd place – $10,000
3rd place – $6,000
4th place – $4,000
5th place – $2,000

Top Under 1000
1st place – $8,000
2nd place – $4,000
3rd place – $2,000
4th place – $2,000
5th place – $2,000

While there will very likely be people that do a lot of study and non-tournament play that are much stronger than their published rating may reflect there are anti-sandbagging processes in place (from the FAQ):

USCF ratings alert: 

To prevent sandbagging, the tournament will use each players' highest published rating between December 1, 2013 and September 30, 2014. Also, the Tournament Director reserves the right to use CCA ratings, which are fair assessments based on Continental Chess Tournaments held by premier organizer Bill Goichberg over the last 40 years.

U1200s playing for 20k, U1400s playing for 24k, etc...just seems obscene to me.

Here's the dilemma.  In order to pay the higher section's prizes and to pay operating expenses, the organizers need to attract a large number of low-rated players.  As approximately 75% of USCF tournament players are rated less than 1336 (my rating, which ranks me in the top 25%),  the organizer has to offer them an incentive to enter the tournament.

When prizes exceed $600, players have to provide a Social Security number (the IRS want their share of your winnings).  Additionally, I think that the tournament organizers require photo identification.

This may not stop sandbagging, but it makes it more difficult.

Thats gonna be cheat central. I am rated 1700 USCF, I believe that if I could somehow enter the 1200 section I would STILL lose. Someone is going to have Houdini hooked up to his ear.

You will be competing against 200 people doing the exact same thing?

They play the "World Series Of Poker" for millions in Vegas and the cheaters are taking out shot and then buried in the desert.

Based on the FAQs on sandbagging and unrated players, I suspect that the TD would consider the player to be unrated and place them in the open section (the TD will have access to the player's tournament history via the USCF's site).