Tourney How would you structure a 3(ish)-hour tournament? (1 Viewer)

[springbox]

I have a 1k/5k/25k/100k tournament chip set, and I'm looking to make our usual cash game night a tournament next time. We play Friday evenings, but people tend to start dropping after about 3 hours, with a 4 or 5 hour night being very rare. As most players are fairly casual, I think a longer event would also be somewhat daunting. We always have 7-9 players. The goal is to essentially start at about 7:15 and be done by 11.

I know 3 hours (plus a little for breaks) is halfway to being a turbo, what do people typically find is the sweet spot between blind jumps/level length/starting stacks? I was thinking maybe a 50BB starting stack along with 20 minute levels. Larger starting stacks may be nice, but then I need even shorter levels or more drastic blind jumps. 15 minute levels sound a bit too short for my liking, and I'm not a fan of doubling blinds. I would probably allow up to 1 re-buy per player for the first hour, especially considering the small starting stack. I would expect 3~4 rebuys at most, re-buys would be for a starting stack. No add-ons, I'm not worried about people gaming the re-buy by hunting a double up right before the freeze.

Starting stacks would be
15 x 1,000
12 x 5,000
5 x 25,000
=200,000

That might not be the optimal count, but it'll get lots of chips in play and people like their big stacks.

I also consider halving the blind timer to 10 minutes past the 3-hour mark to force the last few players to finish up quickly.

​

Time​	Small Blind​	Big Blind​	% Increase​	Total Blinds in Play (8-handed)​	+ 4 rebuys​
0​	2000​	4000​	---​	400​	600​
20​	3000​	6000​	50​	266.6​	400​
40​	4000​	8000​	33.3​	200​	300​
60​	6000​	12000​	50​	133.3​	200​
80​	8000​	16000​	33.3​	100​	150​
100​	10000​	20000​	25​	80​	120​
120​	1500​	30000​	50​	53.3​	80​
140​	20000​	40000​	33.3​	40​	60​
160​	30000​	60000​	50​	26.6​	40​
180​	40000​	80000​	33.3​	20​	30​
190​	60000​	120000​	50​	13.3​	20​
200​	80000​	160000​	33.3​	10​	15​
210​	100000​	200000​	25​	8​	12​
220​	150000​	300000​	50​	5.33​	8​

 

[CSW]

This looks pretty good to me given your constrains and preferences. I have two suggestions for you to consider to get those starting stacks a bit higher (a 50 bb stack sounds fine, but within just 40 minutes you are down to 25, which is pretty short).

The first suggestion would be to go to 18-minute blinds. You said 15 would be too short, but 18 should still get you about one orbit per level at a 9-max table. That will buy you one more level over the course of 3 hours of play, which means you could start with 75 bbs (300k).

Alternatively, you could go with a slightly more aggressive blind schedule. You would not have to double the blinds. You could go with the following:

2000/4000
3000/6000
5000/10000
8000/16000
12000/24000
20000/40000
30000/60000
50000/100000
80000/160000
120000/240000
200000/400000
Etc.

With that blind schedule, which I use for my faster-paced events, you could increase your starting stacks all the way to 600k (150 bbs) and still end around the same time. Or you could start with 400k (100 bbs) and end about one level (20 min) earlier on average.

 

[springbox]

A more aggressive blind schedule is a good idea. I think I'll bump the starting stack to about 500k, keep the first four levels the same, but then start bumping blinds 50~67% every level thereafter. Hopefully that would allow for some more reasonably deep play at the beginning, re-buys that aren't tiny, and still hits the 20BB remaining threshold at the 10th level. I'm sure this won't be final, but I like this blueprint better.

 

[BGinGA]

If you are going to keep the starting stacks at 500k (125bb) while starting at 2k/4k with 20-minute levels, I think I'd extend the smaller increases for a round or two:

L1 2000/4000
L2 3000/6000 (50%)
L3 4000/8000 (33%)
optional break
L4 6000/12000 (50%)
L5 8000/16000 (33%)
L6 11000/22000 (38%)
remove T1000 chips
L7 15000/30000 (36%)
L8 25000/50000 (67%)
L9 40000/80000 (60%)
L10 60000/120000 (50%)
remove T5000 chips
L11 100000/200000 (67%)
L12 175000/350000 (75%)

The event will still finish no later than L12 (and likely by L11, even with re-buys), while adding a lot more play and maneuverability during the middle stages of the tournament -- the first six increases average 40%, while the last five levels average 64% (and only 61% to the estimated eot at L11). Easily completes in your allotted 3-hour time frame.

With the larger stacks and smoother play, I seriously doubt you will have more than 2-3 re-buys, even if allowed through L6 (22.7bb).