This article is part of our DFS Football 101 series.

Subject to the applicable Pools Game Conditions, a correct Pick will be determined by DraftKings with reference to the DraftKings house rules that are applicable to the Settlement of the Pick in question as determined by DraftKings. Picks are settled on the official result published by the governing body or as otherwise verified by DraftKings. DraftKings MMA Scoring and Rules For all DraftKings UFC and MMA contests, you will be given a fictional $50,000 salary cap to draft your five man roster. The list of fighters consists of all those that are anticipated to participate in the event and their salaries will not change once the contest has been posted.

Fantasy Sports, Daily and Weekly Fantasy Drafts for Cash Prizes. Fantasy Sports, Daily and Weekly Fantasy Drafts for Cash Prizes.

The advantage of playing on DraftKings is simple: the site's popularity allows it to host a wide variety of contests, including some with massive payouts at the top. The weekly NFL 'millionaire maker' is the largest regularly running tournament in the DFS industry, typically containing a prize pool of more than $3 million, including a $1 million prize for first place.

Contest offerings have expanded to include a 'Tiers' game and a 'Showdown' mode, but the traditional salary-based game still accounts for the vast majority of their business. The setup here is pretty simple: we get $50,000 to fill out a nine-man roster with 1 QB, 2 RB, 3 WR, 1 TE, 1 FLEX (RB/WR/TE) and 1 D/ST. Player salaries generally land in the following ranges: $4,000-7,500 for QB; $3,000-10,000 for RB; $3,000-9,500 for WR; $2,500-7,500 for TE; $2,000-4,000 for D/ST.

Compared to other large DFS sites, player pricing on DraftKings tends to be a bit sharper, quickly responding to role changes in a way that limits the number of obvious bargains. On the other hand, huge price gaps between the top and bottom players can lead to some really stunning values when an injury to a starter initially goes unreported or occurs during a mid-week practice. This is particularly true at running back, where the gap between a starter and his backup can, in some cases, approach $6,000.

DraftKings will raise a backup's price for the next week if the starter in front of him gets injured during a Sunday afternoon game, but there's nothing the site can do if the injury isn't public information until after contests for the following week have opened. Given the otherwise sharp pricing, it's important to jump on these opportunities when they arise — particularly in cash games where you tend to target higher-owned players.

Cash Games vs. Tournaments (GPPs)

The term 'cash game' covers a few different types of contests, including head-to-heads, double-ups and 50/50s. What all these games have in common is relatively good odds to make a small amount of money. The goal is simply to create a lineup with the highest mean projection — a.k.a. the one you expect to score the most points — without worrying too much about inter-player correlations or which players will be significantly under-owned by a majority of the field.

In a 50-50, for example, half the participants will receive a payout, with the highest-scoring lineup receiving the same amount of money as a lineup that finished in the 51st percentile. Each prize is a bit less than double the entry fee, as the site takes out a 'rake' of 10-15 percent. A double-up contest does exactly what its name implies, but it only pays out 42-46 percent of the field to leave room for the rake.

For those chasing a bigger payday at slimmer odds, large-field tournaments — referred to as Guaranteed Prize Pools (GPPs) — are the way to go. These are the main attractions on DraftKings and most other daily fantasy sites, with descending prize structures that allow for huge rewards in the 99th percentile, though they only pay out to the top 20-25 percent of lineups.

Tournament strategy demands a more risk-tolerant approach, most notably encouraging the use of multiple players from a single real-life game (also known as 'game stacking'). With no financial difference between a mediocre lineup and a lousy one, it almost always makes sense to use at least one pass catcher from the same team as your quarterback. There's also a good argument for using a wide receiver or tight end from the other side of that game, hoping to take advantage of a shootout that forces both teams to continue passing throughout the second half. Long story short, we're focused on the upside scenario without giving much thought to the downside if things don't work out.

There's also an element of game theory to tournament strategy, as the relative value of a huge individual performance isn't nearly as big if the player is in a high percentage of our opponents' lineups. While you may not think this is an integral part of the overall DFS strategy, it may be one of the most important aspects when it comes to large-field tournaments.

DraftKings Scoring System

DraftKings scoring is full PPR (point per reception), with 25/10 yardage and 4/6 touchdowns — basically the general standard across the fantasy football industry. However, there is one major difference in the form of three-point bonuses for 300+ passing yards, 100+ rushing yards or 100+ receiving yards. Between the PPR scoring and yardage bonuses, players can put up big point totals without scoring touchdowns. Generally speaking, the format encourages volume hunting over TD hunting, though in many cases those two goals are one and the same.

Draftkings Survivor Pool Rules

For example, an 8-110-0 receiving line is worth 22 points on DraftKings compared to 15 points on a half-PPR site without yardage bonuses like FanDuel. A 6-80-1 line would be more valuable on FanDuel (17 points), but it's actually less valuable than the first line on DraftKings (20 points). The relative de-emphasis on touchdowns encourages us to roster high-volume players in bad offenses for our DraftKings lineups, while we might favor a medium-volume player on a better team on FanDuel.

Here's the complete list of scoring settings on DK:

You might have noticed that D/ST scoring doesn't include yards allowed and doesn't account for much of a difference between yielding 14 points or 34. This isn't atypical, but it is a bit of a change for anyone who was weaned on ESPN standard scoring. As is the case on many other fantasy sites, we should focus on defenses with the best chance to pile up takeaways, rather than worrying about points or yards allowed. In practice, this would favor a team like the Rams or Browns over the Vikings or Titans.

Draftkings Tax Rules

This article is part of our DraftKings LoL series.

DraftKings offers a wide variety of contests for each of the four major regions involved in League of Legends: China's LPL, Korea's LCK, Europe's LEC, and North America's LCS, as well as North American academy slates on Mondays. Users construct a team of six players and one team slot using a salary cap of $50,000. Each player you choose has a set price, and you must roster at least one from each position: Top Lane, Jungle, Mid Lane, AD Carry (bottom lane), Support and Team. Additionally, there is a captain slot, also found in most other sports in their 'showdown' formats, which scores 1.5 times the fantasy points of a player in a regular lineup spot. Please read the contest rules provided by DraftKings here: https://www.draftkings.com/help/lol.

Draftkings Golf Rules

Europe and North America compete in best-of-1 formats, which is more straightforward than Korea's or China's best-of-three series. There is more volatility in best-of-1s, which makes upsets more likely. In best-of-3 series, Draftkings' offers 20 extra points per player if their team completes a 2-0 sweep, in lieu of points from a third game they won't have to play.

When building rosters, you want to focus on winning teams and a stacking approach, rather than selecting at least one player from each team. A popular lineup construction is four spots from one team and three spots from another, usually with a jungler from one of the teams as captain. All of this is price and slate dependent, of course, as it would be better to play an ADC or Mid Laner in the captain spot; however, favorites are priced so highly in the captain role that it's difficult to do. League of Legends is different than most DFS sports in that losing teams and players rarely score enough points to be worthwhile, especially in best-of-1s.

Here is my general advice for roster construction for League of Legends contests on DraftKings:

1. Top Lane: Top lane is the most volatile position on the map. Top laners usually have the lowest kill participation on the team, which limits their upside because they won't get as many kills or assists as other roles. A bad top lane performance could also result in more deaths. Top lane is usually priced as the third-highest role, but it's often difficult for most top laners to fully pay off their salaries if they aren't heavily involved in the game flow. On certain teams, top laners act as one of the team's 'Carry' options and are more worth paying up for, but this is completely team and slate dependent.
2. Jungle: Jungle is a bit of a wild-card position as well, as they are dependent on players in other positions. Junglers will typically pick up more assists because they look to give kills to their mid laners or bottom laners, who are usually the ones who carry games. Junglers are often priced cheaper than top laners but can outscore their top lane counterparts because they are involved in more kills. Using a jungler in the captain spot is a solid play if you cannot fit a bottom laner or a mid laner.
3. Mid Lane and AD Carry (Bottom lane): The two main carry roles, mid laners and bottom laners, are usually the main sources of damage on their teams and, therefore, often hold the majority of their team's kill shares. Using a mid laner or bottom laner in the captain spot is highly preferred, but it is often difficult to do because they are the most expensive players on the slate. AD Carry can be a somewhat safer role to use as they have longer range than most other roles and have a dedicated support player looking to peel for them in fights.
4. Support: Support is the cheapest player role, but it's the role that can often have the highest 'floor.' Supports are designed to do just what their name entails: support the rest of the team. Because of this, they often pile up assists, which are easier to grab than kills. Supports can sometimes outscore junglers and top laners based on a higher number of assists and a high kill participation share. While using a support in a captain spot could be viable for cash games, it caps upside in GPP because supports aren't looking to pick up the more valuable kills when they can help it.
5. Team: With the bonus in mind, the team slot gets a bump in best-of-3 series, while it is deemphasized in best-of-1s. Most teams that win their game in best-of-1 formats will score similarly to other winning teams. Team is a decent spot to 'punt' in best-of-1 games if you have to, as losing teams can sometimes still pay off if they take enough objectives during the game.
6. Stacking: Simply put, if you're not stacking, you're likely not winning. Stacking is the best way to construct lineups because League of Legends is a very correlative game. Common lineup constructions will stack four spots from one team and three from another. Positionally, stacking an AD Carry with their support has heavy correlation, while mid laners and junglers is another common combination. Junglers have free roam of the map, so they can be freely stacked with anyone else on their team.

This information is all very general, but it's a good place to get started on what to look for if you're jumping into daily fantasy League of Legends for the first time. If you'd like to discuss specific slates with RotoWire contributors and subscribers, you can join our Discord chat here.

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