Triton Poker Series in Asia: Stops, Buy-Ins and Who Can Play

What the Triton Poker Series is

Triton is a tournament series built around very large buy-ins. It is not a casino's regular poker room schedule and it is not a low-stakes festival. The tour moves between host cities, sets up a schedule of high roller events, and draws a field of professional players, wealthy amateurs and businesspeople from across Asia and beyond.

If you are comparing Triton with other tours that visit the region, our guide to poker tours and series in Asia puts it alongside the APT, APPT and others.

Where the series plays: Jeju and beyond

The March 2026 festival was held at Les A Casino, Jeju Shinhwa World⁴. Jeju Shinhwa World is a resort complex on the island, and the casino there is one of several on Jeju.

Beyond Jeju, Triton has played London, where the £1,050,000 Triton Million was held in 2019². The tour has also staged events elsewhere in Asia over the years. If you want the wider picture of which tours stop where, the Asian poker tours comparison covers the main ones.

One practical point about Jeju: the island's casinos are foreigner-only. That is a standard rule for casinos in South Korea outside of the one licensed for locals, and it applies to you if you hold a Korean passport. Foreign residents and visitors can enter. Our South Korea gambling guide explains how the foreigner-only rule works in practice.

Buy-ins and formats, from $100K Short Deck to the biggest events in poker

Triton buy-ins are the headline feature. At the March 2026 Jeju stop, the schedule included a $50,000 PLO Mystery Bounty, won by Artur Martirosian, and a $150,000 NLH 10th Anniversary Special, won by Paul Phua¹. A $100,000 PLO Main Event at the same stop drew 65 entries and a $6,500,000 prize pool¹.

For context on what counts as high stakes generally, a buy-in of $1,000 and above is the usual threshold, and spending a thousand dollars on a buy-in typically puts a tournament in high-stakes territory⁵. Triton sits far above that line. Its regular events are 50 to 150 times that threshold.

If you want to understand how buy-ins, flights and payouts work in tournaments generally, our guide to how poker tournaments work covers the mechanics, and cash games vs tournaments explains why the two are different animals.

Who can play: entry rules for high rollers

Triton events are open entry. There is no qualification process, no satellite requirement and no invitation needed. If you can pay the buy-in, you can register and play¹. That is how the tour fills its fields: professionals buy in directly, and wealthy recreational players do the same.

In practice, the field is small and elite. The 10th Anniversary Special drew 81 entries⁴. A $100,000 PLO Main Event drew 65¹. These are not fields you stumble into. The real barrier is the buy-in, not the rules.

If you are coming from a smaller tour, note that registration procedures differ between series. The Asian Poker Tour, for example, requires all players to register with the APT to participate in any APT event⁶. Triton's process is simpler because the buy-in itself filters the field.

For a broader look at what you need as a visitor or expat entering poker rooms in the region, including ID and currency questions, see playing poker as a visitor or expat in Asia.

Jeju as a recurring home stop

Jeju works as a Triton host for practical reasons. It is a short flight from much of East Asia, it has several casinos, and the resort infrastructure can absorb a high roller festival.

The casinos on the island include:

• Dream Tower Casino
• Lotte Casino
• Oriental Casino
• Sun Casino
• Plaza Casino⁷

Paradise Casino Jeju Grand is close to Jeju airport with good access and has parking available⁸. It is open 24 hours⁹ and offers money exchange and ATMs¹⁰. Its address is 80, Noyeon-ro, Jeju-si, Jeju-do¹⁰.

Other Jeju venues worth knowing: Jeju Oriental Hotel Casino is on the first floor of the Oriental Hotel next to Jeju International Airport at Tapdong beach, and it is open 24 hours¹¹. Jeju KAL Hotel Casino is the largest casino on the island, open 24 hours and open all year¹². Jeju Shilla Hotel Casino is open all year round and is decorated in a traditional Western European style¹³; its address is 75 Jungmun Gwangwang-ro 72beon-gil, Seogwipo-si¹³.

Jeju is also a regular stop for other tours. The Asian Poker Tour launched its first Jeju event under its new era in 2024, sponsored by Natural8¹⁴. So if you are planning a poker trip to Jeju, Triton is not the only option, but it is the highest-stakes one.

Short Deck: the game Triton helped popularize

Short Deck, also called Six Plus Hold'em, is the format Triton is most closely tied to. The deck has 36 cards: the 2s, 3s, 4s and 5s are removed¹⁵. Each player still gets two hole cards, and there are still four betting rounds: preflop, flop, turn and river¹⁵.

The hand rankings change because the deck is smaller. A flush beats a full house¹⁵. In some Six Plus variants, three of a kind beats a straight¹⁵. The full order from strongest to weakest is royal flush, straight flush, four of a kind, flush, full house, straight, three of a kind, two pair, one pair, high card¹⁶.

The betting structure is different too. Most Short Deck games use a button blind setup where everyone pays an ante and the button posts a mandatory second ante¹⁵. The minimum raise preflop is equal to double the value of the ante¹⁵.

Because the deck is short, hands connect more often. A pocket pair appears twice as often in Short Deck as in Hold'em¹⁵. You have a 31.5% chance of hitting an open-ended straight draw¹⁵. A quick rule of thumb for equity: multiply your outs by 3 with one card to come and by 6 with two cards remaining¹⁵.

If you want the full rules, our Short Deck poker rules page covers the 36-card deck, the antes and the hand rankings in detail. For how Short Deck rankings compare with standard poker, see poker hand rankings.