Tourney Tourney wants MOAR!!! (1 Viewer)

[mummel]

I got to say, Im loving my Milanos. Each time I play with them I come to appreciate them more. However, in the latest tourney, there was one thing missing....... MOAR!!!

In cash games with the rebuys, everyone has 40-60 chips in front of them. In tourneys, folks start off with 35 chips and unless you are winning hands, the stacks are slim for most of the game. I wonder whats the best way to add MOAR for fun, but not mess with the mechanics of the blinds & denoms, and color ups etc, because the 12-12-5-6 breakdown for T10,000 worked really nicely (thanks @BGinGA).

Everything ran smoothly. No one really needed change. They had the right size chips to bet and didnt have to bet 8X a certain denom etc. It just works. But I missed the MOAR sitting in front of me

 

[Ghoti]

I do 16-16-4-6. You could also do 20-20-5-5. Or you could just increase the stack size while speeding up the blind structure (higher jumps or shorter levels, or a combination of both) that the tourney still lasts about as long as it did before.

 

[CraigT78]

I do 16-16-4-6. You could also do 20-20-5-5.

This. I start with 16-16-6-5 as we also like bigger starting stacks.

 

[mummel]

Levels were 15min and I used BGINGA's blinds structure (33% & 50% jumps). Stacks started off 200BB deep. It worked really well for flowed smoothly. I wouldnt want to change any of this.

Plus by the first color up (level 6, 150/300), we were definitely using the $1000 chips already, so adding more $25s or $100s may be inefficient unless I color up sooner. So yeah, I wouldnt want to mess with the efficiency of the game just for MOAR, but in case anyone has tweaked the basic T10,000 structure to get MOAR, and its just as efficient, please let me know!

 

[justsomedude]

How many tables are you running?

 

[mummel]

How many tables are you running?

Just 1 table, 10 guys, ~5 hours.

 

[justsomedude]

Just 1 table, 10 guys, ~5 hours.

Your total chips in play is simply a function of the number of players you have. At most you'll only ever have 100,000 in play with 10 guys, maybe a little more with rebuys. When you color up to 1ks, you'll still only have one rack of chips in play. It's just the nature of your selected structure.

I run a T10k tourney, but we have three tables. When it gets down to the final table there are tons of chips in play, and we may have 350,000-400,000 on the table spread across 250-350 chips, if not more (depending on rebuys).

If you really want to get more chips out there with only 10 guys, then you'll need to run a Deepstack tourney with 30k or 50k starting stacks. You could do something like 12-12-5-6-4. After color-ups you'll have a good number of 1ks and 5ks in play. You'll also need to adjust your blind levels, as you shouldn't start at 25/50 with 30k stacks. Otherwise you'll be playing until 4am.

Also... FWIW, I think your 15 minute levels are too short. That's barely enough time for a single orbit with 10 guys. I think 20 minute levels is the lower limit for a practical tournament to develop any type of meaningful strategy. Although I really think 25 minutes is the sweet-spot on the low end of the spectrum.

 

[mummel]

Also... FWIW, I think your 15 minute levels are too short. That's barely enough time for a single orbit with 10 guys. I think 20 minute levels is the lower limit for a practical tournament to develop any type of meaningful strategy. Although I really think 25 minutes is the sweet-spot on the low end of the spectrum.

I agree with this, but we ran 5 hours with 15min blinds, and we do it on week nights so cant go later (or start earlier because of guys have kids etc).

If I up the levels to 25min, I cant see players busting out at level 8. How do you ensure everyone goes home after ~5 hours?

 

[Mr. Cheese]

I run a T2500 to T3500 tourney.

Starting blinds are 5/10

Starting stacks are:
5 x 20
25 x 20
100 x 14
500 x 1-3 depending on what size.

That way everyone has almost 60 chips in play which I think is more fun.

 

[Ghoti]

I agree with this, but we ran 5 hours with 15min blinds, and we do it on week nights so cant go later (or start earlier because of guys have kids etc).

If I up the levels to 25min, I cant see players busting out at level 8. How do you ensure everyone goes home after ~5 hours?

If you take out some blind levels/make the jumps steeper, you can have 20 minute levels and have it take just as long (roughly) as with 15 minutes. As far as a specific structure, I'll let BG take care of that.

 

[Ghoti]

Did the same thing with my game. Was tired of upping the blinds every 15 minutes, so just made the levels 20 min. and removed a few levels.

 

[BPTDirector]

If you want MOAR then get a big stack by playing well and taking them from other players. You lose that feeling once you are paying $1 or more per chip for your sets. I do 8/8/4/7 for 10k starting stacks and no complaints from my players ever.

 

[mummel]

If you take out some blind levels/make the jumps steeper, you can have 20 minute levels and have it take just as long (roughly) as with 15 minutes. As far as a specific structure, I'll let BG take care of that.

This structure already came from BG:

Lv SB BB
L1 25 50
L2 25 75
L3 50 100
L4 75 150
L5 100 200
L6 150 300
~remove T25 chips
L7 200 400
L8 300 600
L9 400 800
L10 600 1200
L11 800 1600
L12 1200 2400
~remove T100 chips
L13 1500 3000
L14 2000 4000
L15 3000 6000
L16 4000 8000
L17 5000 10000
L18 7500 15000
~remove T500/T1000 chips
L19 10000 20000
L20 15000 30000
L21 20000 40000
L22 30000 60000
L23 40000 80000
~remove T5000 chips
L24 50000 100000
L25 75000 150000
L26 100000 200000
L27 150000 300000
~remove T25000 chips
L28 200000 400000
L29 300000 600000
L30 400000 800000
L31 600000 1200000
L32 800000 1600000

 

[justsomedude]

If I up the levels to 25min, I cant see players busting out at level 8. How do you ensure everyone goes home after ~5 hours?

Did the same thing with my game. Was tired of upping the blinds every 15 minutes, so just made the levels 20 min. and removed a few levels.

As Ghoti says, just make a more aggressive blind schedule, but allow for longer levels.

It's always going to be a compromise... you can't have short levels, a fair blind progression, and quality play. Similarly, you can't have longer levels with quality play, a fair blind progression, and expect everyone to get home by midnight. Something's gotta give.

But most people seem to prefer allowing for quality play, and just letting the blinds progress at a faster clip.

Just looking at your structure you could take out 25/75, and 150/300. Then replace 800/1600 and 1200/2400 with 1000/2000, and you just gave yourself 45 more minutes to work with to extend the rest of the levels.

 

[mummel]

As Ghoti says, just make a more aggressive blind schedule, but allow for longer levels.

It's always going to be a compromise... you can't have short levels, a fair blind progression, and quality play. Similarly, you can't have longer levels with quality play, a fair blind progression, and expect everyone to get home by midnight. Something's gotta give.

But most people seem to prefer allowing for quality play, and just letting the blinds progress at a faster clip.

Just looking at your structure you could take out 25/75, and 150/300. Then replace 800/1600 and 1200/2400 with 1000/2000, and you just gave yourself 45 more minutes to work with to extend the rest of the levels.

I'm thinking that bigger blind jumps later on in the evening may be a better idea. That way everyone gets decent play in until the first color up, and then the bust outs start coming. I'll have to think about it.

 

[Adam Crowley]

The other way to do it is just have a lot of smaller denoms. Nothing wrong with betting in barrels of chips rather than three. Instead of having 1k chips. Use lots more 500. Have starting stack me of 25/100/500 and use a lot of them. As long as people can handle chips and stack in 20s. It won't slow the game down much. But the only thing it will accomplish is that you will end up with a bunch of useless chips in play. Having so many 25 chips is kinda pointless and just there for decoration. You really could use the 500 chip for a lot longer and use 2 500 chips and 2 100 chips for 600/1200 fe. It takes me no longer to grab 2 chips then one chip.

Ask players to announce their bet size when they bet so people can keep track of the pot size and everything should still be pretty smooth.

20 x 25
20 x 100
15 x 500

Would be the new starting stacks. When one player gets knocked out you have potentially 90 chips in front of one player.

Edit: If your tournament never grows into a larger field, it may not be long until it's just a cash game.

 

[mummel]

The other way to do it is just have a lot of smaller denoms. Nothing wrong with betting in barrels of chips rather than three. Instead of having 1k chips. Use lots more 500. Have starting stack me of 25/100/500 and use a lot of them. As long as people can handle chips and stack in 20s. It won't slow the game down much. But the only thing it will accomplish is that you will end up with a bunch of useless chips in play. Having so many 25 chips is kinda pointless and just there for decoration. You really could use the 500 chip for a lot longer and use 2 500 chips and 2 100 chips for 600/1200 fe. It takes me no longer to grab 2 chips then one chip.

Ask players to announce their bet size when they bet so people can keep track of the pot size and everything should still be pretty smooth.

I ran a 3X standard bet pre-flop on the blind structure above, and the $25s came out useless. However, there is a lot of demand on the $100s up until the first color up. Thats probably where I could add more chips.

But like you say, you probably end up with useless tips sitting on the table for decor. Not really worth it, even though I do love MOAR.

 

[Adam Crowley]

I ran a 3X standard bet pre-flop on the blind structure above, and the $25s came out useless. However, there is a lot of demand on the $100s up until the first color up. Thats probably where I could add more chips.

But like you say, you probably end up with useless tips sitting on the table for decor. Not really worth it, even though I do love MOAR.

Yeah. It's not too bad if you have a ton of chips. You could colour up the 25s for hundos, and only ever have 100/500/1000 chips is play until the end of the game. As the stacks get shorter everyone betting in barrels. But what you really need is more players. With 10 x 10k start stacks. That's only one barrel of 5k chips, so you can see how it's hard to have a lot of chips. It makes it especially hard with the stupid 500 - 1k chip jumps. There just isn't a lot of sense having so many 500 chips out with 1k chips on the table. Maybe you could do a 1k/5k/25k break down tourney instead and then you can maybe justify having more chips in play.

 

[justsomedude]

... But what you really need is more players. With 10 x 10k start stacks. That's only one barrel of 5k chips, so you can see how it's hard to have a lot of chips. ...

This.