Blinds Are Up! Poker Timer Guide
Seating Management
A full range of Seating Management functions can be enabled when player tracking is set to use the Player Database:
- Automatic random seat assignments
- Automatic table balancing
- Manually assign or change a player's seat at any time
- Set Reserved Seats for player/dealers
- Break tables, add new tables, redraw for final table
- Show players their seat assignments on the blinds display
- View suggestions for keeping tables balanced during a game
Contents
Before the Game
Configuration
The Configure Seating screen (Set Up Tourney > Config Seating) is where you set the number of tables and seats to use at the start of a game, customise how the seating assignments are shown on the Blinds Display, and optionally give each of your tables a custom name to help players identify their seats.
Seating management supports a maximum of 25 tables with up to 12 seats per table.
The Initial table count and Seats per table settings define the total number of seats available at the start of your game.
Although these settings can't be changed after the first player takes their seat, you can add more tables as needed during a game using the Seating screen.
Display settings
Your players' seating assignments can be shown on the Blinds Display, both before and during the game.
The current list of seat assignments can be hidden or shown at any time using the Off or Show all seats options.
The Show recent option will, after the game starts, only show new or changed seat assignments that have occurred in the previous few minutes. This will avoid showing all the seats all the time, and will show a seat assignment only for the few minutes that a player needs to find the right seat. When there haven't been any seating changes for more than a few minutes, the blinds display will automatically return to normal and use the whole display for the timer and blind amounts.
The seating list normally occupies a maximum of half of the blinds display and will scroll through the seats and player names if needed. The option Show full-screen before start of game (turned on in the above screenshot) will instead cause most of the blinds display to be used for the seating list until the game starts, at which point it returns to using at most only half the display.
Also on the Configure Seating screen is the section where custom Table Names can be specified for cases where your venue requires more descriptive names than a simple number or letter system. This allows names such as "Table by the door", "Blue table" or "Feature table" to be used instead of the usual "Table 1", "Table 2" names.
During the game
Adding and knocking out players
When adding a player, the table balancing system will automatically select a random seat from amongst the least-populated tables to ensure all tables have a similar number of players. If needed, the randomly selected seat can be overriden with a different seat of your choice via the seating button.
During a knockout, the player is automatically removed from their seat. However, they can be kept in their seat, or moved to a different seat, by using the seating button. If the player is in a seat that's marked as Reserved, then by default they will remain in that seat to support cases where they are a player/dealer.
When seating is enabled, additional information is shown on the Tournament Players screen showing each player's assigned seat, and where they will be moved to depending on which player action is currently selected.
The seating button (with the chair icon) gives you the option to change the automatically selected random seat, or change a player's current seat at any time.
Seating screen
Most of the time during a game, when adding and knocking out players, the app automatically takes care of seating management for you.
There will be times, however, when tables need to be balanced by moving players between tables, or a table needs to be broken as the number of remaining players reduces.
The main Seating screen can be used at any time to move players between tables, add tables, break tables, or set Reserved Seats.
On the left side of the Seating screen is the list of tables showing the number of players at each table. Selecting one of the table items (as shown in this screenshot) will show you the list of seats and players for that table.
The Table Actions menu button (which says "Active" in the screenshot) indicates whether the selected table is currently Active (will receive randomly seated players) or Inactive (excluded from random seating and table balancing operations). Tapping this button will show a list of actions as described in the Table Actions section below.
Tapping a player's name will take you to the Tournament Players screen with that player automatically selected.
Tapping the seating button (with the chair icon) next a player's name will show the Select Seat dialog allowing you to manually change a player's seat.
Selecting the Unseated item will show you who is waiting to be seated, for cases where there were not enough free seats when adding players or breaking tables. The list of unseated players is ordered with the earliest entries (those who have been waiting the longest) at the top.
Reserved seats can be set and un-set on this screen by tapping the table-seat number.
Reserved seats are excluded from random seating assignments and table balancing. Players must be manually moved to and from seats that are marked as reserved. This feature can be used where certain seats should be occupied by specific player/dealers, or (for example) where easily accessible seats should be reserved for players with accessibility needs.
Table Actions
On the Seating screen, clicking a table's menu button will show the Table Actions dialog. This provides access to common operations you'll need to perform during a game, such as breaking tables and redrawing seats for a final table.
The table-specific actions on this dialog will be for the table that was selected on the Seating screen when you opened this dialog.
Selecting the Break Table item will show a dialog listing randomly selected seats that the players will be moved to.
Selecting the Final Table item will show a dialog allowing you to form a final table with all remaining players given randomly selected seats at the selected table. If the final table is to have more players than the current number of seats-per-table, the Adjust seat count option will add extra seats as necessary.
If the players already sitting at the final table should remain in their seats, then use the Break Table action on the other table(s) instead of using the Final Table action.
Table Balancing Suggestions will suggest moving players between tables, breaking tables, or making a final table, in order to keep all tables well populated and balanced.
You can Deactivate a table in order to stop it being used by the random seating and table balancing operations. Tables are automatically deactivated as part of the Break Table action. You also have the option to Activate a deactivated table so it's once again used for random seat assignments and table balancing. Manually managing the active state of a table can be useful if you need to restrict random seat selections to particular tables.
Add Table can be used to provide more seats in case the number of players grows larger than anticipated.
| << Tools |
