Technical issues led to the cancellation of GGPoker’s $150 GGMasters Anniversary event on Monday.
The event featured a $5 million guarantee on the online poker tournament’s prize pool, and GG ended up on the hook for an overlay of about $100,000.
GGPoker staff decided to cancel the event after the platform failed to perform correctly with the massive field. The tournament was schedule to start on Feb. 23 with more than 20,000 entries registered. However, officials postponed the event due to a “system issue.”
Then, GG rescheduled the event for Sunday, March 2. It went off without a hitch and there were about 12,000 players remaining for Day 2 on Monday. That’s when the real problems began.
The software experienced table balancing issues and numerous players said they were playing heads-up. GG paused the tournament while they tried to fix the problems. First, they decided to restart the tournament from the blind levels corresponding with the start of Day 2.
But shortly after, they decided to cancel the event altogether.
“After encountering further issues, the unfortunate decision has been made to cancel the tournament,” GG noted on Twitter.”We understand the inconveniences for players throughout, and we sincerely apologize.”
Refunds Were Awarded To Remaining Players
GG promised refunds for players in the event. Some players were frustrated that the technical issues couldn’t be resolved over the week since the first attempt to run the event fizzled.
Others weren’t happy with the refund policy, which would pay out 50% of the buy-in for players who remained in the field and 50% paid out to players “according to the chip count of the remaining players at the time of cancellation.”
“Refunds (aren’t) good enough,” one player noted on Twitter. “What about the compensation on the time not over two days but the previous weekend. Not one person is happy with the refund, you still make rake, we as loyal players should expect ICM chop of the remaining.”
Some felt that GG should resolve the issue and try again. Another player pointed out that the technical issues affected some players’ stacks on Monday, resulting in a smaller amount from the ICM chop.
“Great, I am being shafted because I busted (at the) beginning of day two because I got forced to play HU (heads-up) and three-handed with the announcement obstructing the board and busted,” a player said.
GG’s parent company purchased the World Series of Poker last year for $500 million. After banning 31 accounts for breaking terms of service, one of their ambassadors said those cheaters could could be “banned from the live series. “:https://www.cardplayer.com/poker-news/29886-new-world-series-of-poker-ownership-could-ban-online-cheats-from-live-play