I know there’s all kinds of discussions about this, but the late registration should be limited to 5 minutes, not 15 in most cases. Kinda takes away from everyone that’s been playing from the start and 20 players jump in and you get knocked out right away because you have limited chips left. It gets frustrating to see the player count in a contest look like a speedometer as time closes for entry.
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Or simply get rid of it.
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i agree, if you cant make the start of the game then you don’t play.
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You’re right, the question has come up many times and I too wonder why there is such a thing.
I would think a minute or two would not affect the game but I really don’t understand the purpose of 15 or 20 minutes.
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When I log on, I want to play, not wait for something to start. Late reg means I can find something running right away more often.
Late reg is a part of tournament poker in the real world, why shouldn’t it be here?
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It increases the usability of the site.
I don’t schedule my life around play money poker. I expect the site to conform to my life, not the other way around.
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Many people don’t bother registering on time for tournaments as they know they have 15 minutes or so to play. One negative result is that many tournaments are cancelled simply because not enough people have turned up two minutes before the start time to play. If there was no late registration then I am convinced this would not happen.
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Without the late registration I would miss many of my favorite tournaments, as I don’t always make it on time. It’s not always done on purpose, there are always legitimate reasons for someone to be 5 to 10 minutes late to sign up to a tournament they want to play. If I don’t make it on time, I have to wait for the next similar tournament which in most cases is not before 2 hours (if not 24 hours for some of the tournaments).
I think the grace period is very useful and encourages players (like me) to keep coming back as they don’t miss their favorite games over few minutes.
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Okay, I see y’alls point but…20 minutes?
Even your doctor will cancel your appointment if you’re more than 10 minutes late.
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Late registration also makes bigger fields and bigger prize pools. To me, this makes for better tournaments.
If you think it’s an advantage to register late, then register late. It’s not rocket science.
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Most of the tournaments I play have a 10 minute grace period. Only very few have 15 minutes. I’m not sure which ones have 20 minutes late registration time but I’m pretty sure they’re not that many!
Late registration time for freerolls is 5 minutes.
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Personally I think it should be raised if anything. Registering late doesn’t give you an advantage- it just gives you less hands to be able to have an edge over your opponents. It would be nice to be able to hop into an MTT with a buyin which you want to play at more often without having to preschedule when you’re going to play.
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I think late registration is fine exactly how it is and should not be changed.
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So why can’t players register on time? Registration opens 3 hours prior to its start time, you all know everyday when favorite tournament starts. Maybe have all registration open at all times, then get rid of late registration or least reduce it 5 mins.
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For many reasons… Many, many reasons…
What if I register and then can’t make it? The solution of just registering hours or days before the tournament is not at all better than having 10-15 minutes late registration.
I agree with @SunPowerGuru; I want to join a tournament immediately when I want to play, not prepare hours before. It’s just a free chips online poker game, not my wedding lol.
I also agree with @puggywug
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Not funny. there are players want to play mtts without late registration. We should be able too
If the goal is to maximize the usability of the site and to cater to as many players as possible, the obvious answer is to allow late registration until the tourney is over.
If there is truly no advantage to late registration there can be no principled opposition.
How would a tournament ever end if there could always be an endless string of new players joining late at any time?
Everyone could only join once. Eventually you’ll run out of players. 
Obviously it would be absurd to let players join and immediately be in the money. I was making a point to the folks who say late registration cannot be an advantage. It can sometimes be an advantage, which is why people are upset when they play for 14 minutes, paying all those blinds and then someone new comes in with a bigger stack, having risked nothing .
It is incumbent on those who say late registration cannot be an advantage to explain why a 15 minute late entry is fair but a 100 minute late entry is unfair. They need to explain logically when the transition happens. Is it 22 minutes? 49? When does it change from dis-advantage to advantage? They can’t of course. Which is why one of two things should happen. Either late registration should be eliminated, or late entries should forfeit chips approximating the blinds they missed. And technically, those forfeited chips should go to the other players.
Remember, tourney points are being won based on position of finish. How absurd that someone could play for 14 minutes, bust out, and earn fewer tourney chips than someone who hasn’t played a hand, risked a chip or paid a blind.
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I’ve written about it elsewhere on these forums, I view late reg as having pros and cons. They roughly cancel each other out. They can give an advantage , depending on the field, and depending on your playing style.
A few months ago, MTTs were all about the shove for the first few orbits, players would just idiot-shove and idiot-call any two cards, it seemed like, trying to double up off the bat and use that to maximum advantage. It was a poor strategy, but disruptive to better strategies, and annoying to have to survive through the early rounds. Late registration was a good way to avoid it, getting in late when things had calmed down and most of the donkey-shovers were gone. You’d start with a middle position on the leaderboard, half of the field above you, the losers who gave the upper half their chips below you. You’d still have to play good and get good cards to have a hope of winning. On the other hand, you missed out on the first fish to die and all their chips, if the opportunity was there to get them for you. But that was largely a matter of having the right cards at the right time, and wasn’t really bankable, so I liked late reg.
I haven’t seen the shove parties in recent weeks, so maybe that was just a fad or phase.
I don’t think it matters all that much; I’ll come on time or I’ll come in late. It doesn’t affect my strategy or the outcomes all that much from what I can see. If I play the cards I’m dealt well, I’ll do well, and if I don’t, I won’t. Sometimes I’ll go bust despite playing my cards well, just because that’s how the cards fall. But as long as I don’t have that kind of misfortune, which is about 50% of the time, it’s pretty likely I’ll make the final table.