How a Poker League season works
This is the rulebook of a league run on Poker League: how points are given, how the standings are sorted, how a night's prizes are split, how a player earns a seat at the Masters, and what the Specials, awards and ratings do. Every number is the app's default; the organiser can change most of them per season. Share this page with your players so the rules are the same for everyone.
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A season at a glance
A league is a series of seasons; a season is a series of tournaments. Every tournament hands out points by finishing place, the points add up in the standings, and the season ends with the Masters: a final table for the best players of the year. Everything below is the default; most of it can be changed per season in the league settings.
- Tournaments: one night, one winner. Buy-in, rebuys and add-ons are recorded per player; the clock runs the blinds and records every knockout.
- Points: fixed by finishing place and the size of the field. The same table or formula applies to every tournament of the season.
- Standings: every finished tournament counts. There is no best-of and no dropped results — a missed night simply scores nothing.
- Masters: at the end of the season the best players by points, the best by percentage and the winners of the Wild Card sit at one final table.
- Specials: a Summer and an Autumn Special with double stakes break up the calendar without changing the rules.
Points per tournament
Points depend on two things only: the finishing place and how many players sat down. Buy-in, rebuys, add-ons and knockouts do not change them, so a cheap night and an expensive night are worth the same in the standings. Points are whole numbers; last place always scores at least 1.
| Players | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th | Last |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 14 | 10 | 7 | 4 | 2 | 1 |
| 8 | 18 | 14 | 10 | 8 | 6 | 1 |
| 10 | 25 | 18 | 15 | 12 | 10 | 1 |
| 12 | 35 | 26 | 20 | 17 | 14 | 1 |
| 16 | 55 | 42 | 35 | 29 | 25 | 1 |
| 20 | 75 | 58 | 48 | 41 | 35 | 1 |
Leagues that prefer a formula can switch the season to one: points = multiplier × field^weight ÷ place^steepness, with four presets (Balanced, Top places, Flat, Field size ignored) and a participation point for everyone who plays. A change to the scoring applies to results saved from then on; nights already in the books keep their points.
Standings, rating and form
The standings add up every finished tournament of the season. Next to the raw points, two derived numbers tell you who is actually playing well:
- Points % — points won divided by the maximum a player could have won in the nights they played (the winner's points of each of those nights).
- Rating — points × 2 × points %. It rewards winning the nights you show up to over simply turning up; a player who wins 3 of 4 nights can out-rate one who finishes mid-table in all 12. The table is sorted by rating by default; the organiser can switch it to points.
- Form — the last five results as coloured dots: green for a win, yellow for 2nd or 3rd, blue for the top half, orange for the bottom half, red for last place. Ribbons mark win streaks, three podiums in a row and a rising player.
- Leader badges — Winner (most wins), Mr. Silver (most 2nd places), Moneymaker (best net result), Assassin (most knockouts), Rebuy Master, Add-on Master and On the rise (most points in the last 30 days).
- Also shown: wins, nights played, attendance %, rebuys, add-ons used out of the season allowance, prizes won, invested and net.
Buy-in, rebuys and add-ons
Every season has three amounts: the buy-in, the rebuy and the add-on. They are entered once in the season settings and copied to every new tournament; the organiser can still change them on a single night.
- Rebuy — by default one per player per tournament. The season can allow more, any number, or none, and can cap the total rebuys of one night.
- Add-on — by default one per player per tournament and three per season, so the add-on is a card to play wisely, not a routine.
- Players sign themselves up until the start time; after that only the organiser can add a late player. The Wild Card and the Masters can close registration at a blind level set for the season.
- Rebuys and add-ons raise the prize fund and the entry count that decides how many places are paid. They never change the points.
Prize payouts
The prize fund of a night is every buy-in, rebuy and add-on added together, and all of it is paid out: the league takes no rake. Paid places default to a quarter of the entries, at least one and never everyone, up to ten places. The split follows a fixed curve, so a bigger field pays more places without anyone arguing about percentages.
| Entries | Paid places | Split |
|---|---|---|
| 6 | 2 | 66% / 34% |
| 10 | 3 | 53% / 28% / 19% |
| 16 | 4 | 47% / 24% / 16% / 13% |
| 20 | 5 | 43% / 22% / 15% / 11% / 9% |
| 30 | 8 | 38% / 18% / 12% / 9% / 7% / 6% / 5% / 5% |
Poker League keeps the records — who paid what and who won what. No money is collected, held or paid out through the app.
The season pot
A season can collect a pot on top of the buy-in: a fixed amount per player at every tournament, plus an optional collection fee per night. The pot is off by default. When it is on, the clock shows tonight's contribution and the season total, and the finances page keeps the balance: pot plus donations minus expenses, with a CSV export. Most leagues play the pot out at the Masters; the organiser enters the Masters prizes per position, and the app records them like any other result.
The Masters final
The Masters is the last tournament of the season and the only one with an entry list decided by the standings. By default there are 9 seats, won three ways. Seat counts, the attendance minimum and direct qualifiers are settings of each season, and the standings show every player's current status as a badge.
- By points — the 5 players with the most season points (badges M1 to M5). Ties are broken by rating.
- By percentage — the 2 best players by points % who are not already in by points and have played at least 33% of the season's tournaments (badge %). Quality over attendance.
- Wild Card — the last 2 seats go to the top finishers of the Wild Card tournament (badge Wild).
- Direct — the organiser can qualify players directly (badge D), for example a defending champion. Direct seats come on top.
- Starting chips at the Masters are the season points × 100, so the leader sits down with the biggest stack but every seat has a real chance.
- The Masters is a tournament of the season like any other: its results count in the standings and its buy-ins form the prize fund of the night, on top of any pot.
The Wild Card tournament
Played before the Masters, usually on the same day. Every player without a Masters seat can enter. It is a freeze-out: rebuys and add-ons are switched off, and the last players standing win the Wild Card seats. If the Wild Card is not played, the organiser can hand out those seats by hand.
Summer and Autumn Special
Twice a year a tournament can be marked as a Special. The buy-in, rebuy and add-on are doubled, the invitation and the clock get the season's theme, and the night has its own results e-mail. Points are awarded exactly as on any other night — there is no multiplier — so a Special raises the stakes without distorting the standings.
Night awards and season badges
After every tournament the app hands out four awards for the night, and over the season players collect badges that show up on their profile. None of them give points.
- Hunter of the night — most knockouts (at least two; ties go to the better finish). Comeback — the best finisher who rebought and still cashed. Bubble — the first place outside the money. First out — last place, in fields of four or more.
- Participation badges: Newcomer (1 tournament), Regular (10), Veteran (25), Grinder (50), Iron Man (100) and Always There (10 season nights in a row).
- Winning badges: First Blood (1 win), Champion (5), Legend (10), Dynasty (25); Podium, Consistent and Elite for 1, 5 and 10 top-three finishes; Hot Streak (2 wins in a row), Domination (3), Podium Streak (3 podiums), Cash Streak (5 cashes).
- Knockout badges: Hunter (10 knockouts), Executioner (50), Last Standing (a win with at least 3 knockouts), Giant Killer (knocking out the season leader), Revenge.
- Comeback and money badges: Comeback Kid (a win after a rebuy), Phoenix (3 of them), Underdog (a win from 10th place or lower), Profitable, Big Winner and Perfect Attendance.
- Each badge has a rarity — common, rare, epic or legendary — based on how many players in the league have earned it.
Elo rating
Alongside the points, every player has an Elo rating that starts at 1500. After each tournament every pair of players is treated as a match: finishing ahead wins it. The K-factor is 32 and is spread over the field, so one night can move a rating by at most 32 points either way. A rating is provisional until the player has five tournaments. Elo has no effect on the standings or the Masters; it is there to settle who is really the strongest.
Eliminator, rivalries, records and predictions
Four more boards run off the same results. None of them affect the standings.
- Eliminator — the season's knockout board: who knocked out whom, the most dangerous player, the night shift and the wall of shame.
- Rivalries — any two players head-to-head over the nights they both played: better finishes, knockouts, net result and points.
- Records — single-night and all-time records: biggest win, cheapest point, longest win, podium and cash streaks, the longest drought, attendance and hours at the table.
- Predictions — before a night, players pick a 1st, 2nd and 3rd. Picks lock when the tournament starts (a grace period of 30 minutes). A correct pick scores 3, 2 or 1 point, multiplied by how bold it was: picking the season leader counts half, picking a player ranked 16th or lower counts two and a half times. Predictions are points only, with their own table.
What the app leaves to you
The app settles points, payouts and seats so nobody has to. The rest is the league's own rulebook: how late a player may still buy in, how the dealer button moves, what happens to a no-show, how disputes at the table are settled. Agree those with the players once, put them in the invitation e-mail, and let the standings do the rest.
Frequently asked questions
Do all tournaments count in the standings?
Yes. Every finished tournament of the season counts, including the Specials, the Wild Card and the Masters. There is no best-N-of and no dropping of results; a missed night simply scores nothing.
Can I change the points table during the season?
Yes. A new table or formula applies to results saved from then on. Tournaments already finished keep the points they were given.
How are ties in the standings broken?
The table is sorted by rating by default, so two players on the same points are separated by their points percentage. For Masters seats the order is points, then rating.
Does the league take a rake?
No. The whole prize fund of a night is paid out by the payout table. A season pot, if you switch it on, is collected separately on top of the buy-in and is recorded, not paid, by the app.
Do I need the Masters, the pot or the Specials?
No. The pot is off by default, a Special is just a flag on one tournament, and a season without a Masters is simply a season whose standings decide the champion. The Masters, finances and the predictions game are in the Pro package and above.
Does any money go through the app?
No. Poker League records buy-ins, prizes and the pot so the standings and finances are right; it never collects, holds or pays out money.