Patent ID: 7690996

Claim:
A table tournament gaming system for facilitating a table tournament including a plurality of players using a plurality of chips to play the table tournament, said tournament gaming system comprising: a central server; a tournament tracking system in communication with the central server, said tournament tracking system including a chip tracking system and a player tracking system; and said central server and said tournament tracking system configured to: (a) enable at least one player to play the table tournament at a gaming table and simultaneously enable at least one other player to play a non-tournament game at the gaming table, (b) for each player playing the table tournament at the gaming table: (i) enable the player to identify themselves through the player tracking system, (ii) maintain an identification of each chip the player starts the table tournament with, (iii) maintain an identification of each chip the player wins during the table tournament, and (iv) maintain an identification of each chip the player loses during the table tournament, (c) for each player playing the non-tournament game at the gaming table: (i) maintain an identification of each chip the player wins during said non-tournament game, and (ii) maintain an identification of each chip the player loses during said non-tournament game, (d) for each chip, if one of the players loses said chip playing the tournament game, change the identification of said chip from a tournament identification to a non-tournament identification such that said chip has the non-tournament identification if said chip is won as by one of the players as a result of playing the non-tournament game; (e) for each chip, if one of the players loses said chip playing the non-tournament game, change the identification of said chip from the non-tournament identification to the tournament identification such that said chip has the tournament identification if said chip is won by one of the players as a result of playing the tournament game; (f) upon completion of the table tournament, automatically determine at least one winner of the table tournament based on the identification of each of said chips, and (g) cause a notification of the winner of the table tournament.