Tourney OFC Tournament (1 Viewer)

[The Nuts]

So I want to host a pineapple OFC(Open Faced Chinese poker) tournament. I have some idea's on how I would do it but would like to know more from others who have played in or hosted their own OFC events in the past. I've personally never played in one and mostly play OFC online via apps. (only occasionally in person)

I'm planning on doing 15 max so we can do 5 groups of 3.

I imagine that similar to blinds going up the units will go up, so we start with 1 a unit etc and it goes up from there every so often.

When a player is all in how do you determine payout when they bust? Online it splits what they have left based on who they owed more units to, but that seems very difficult to do on the fly in person. Do you just go around from the dealer button and determine payouts in a particular order?

What are some reasonable starting stacks/structures?

Also for anyone who is interested I am doing a group buy for OFC playmats that I'm designing! Come check them out and get in on the buy! https://www.pokerchipforum.com/threads/open-face-chinese-ofc-poker-play-matts.89045/

 

[Kentucky]

Did you ever find out anything on this. My googling turned up very little. There was one article which talked about playing at a 2 handed table was a big advantage vs. 3 because you pay out to each individual player at the table, so it’s easier to bust out from a 3 player game than a 2. The standard approach of breaking tables as the player pool decreases has this problem. Instead, the author advocated a satellite pattern where 9 tables of 3 send 1 person each to 3 semi-final tables. Each of those turns sends a person to the final table.

I’d be interested to hear what you decide for your tournament.

 

[The Nuts]

I have not found much. @madforpancakes mentioned that the WSOP had a pOFC tournament a few years back so there should be some info somewhere about how that was run.

 

[The Nuts]

Since left of the bottom has the worst position, and when there is an extra chip left in reg poker left of the button gets it, I feel like they should be paid out first. Left of the button is usually first to act anyways so it just feels natural. So start with left of button and settle against your right player and then left and continue clockwise is what I'm thinking I'll do.

The question is

If we have say

D: 5 units
1st: 50 units
2nd: 40 units

D: Has a 10 unit hand
1st: Has a 20 unit hand
2nd: fouls

On payout, 1st would collect 10 from Dealer, but would only get 5 as they have only 5 left. And then 20 from 2nd.
2nd is fouled so they win nothing.
D who has 0 chips wins 10 from 2nd as they fouled.

So despite being felted and underpaying 1st, D would end the hand with 10 units.

If 2nd started the hand with 20 units(instead of 40), after 1st scored they would felt both other players and D would not get the payout from the foul of 2nd.

There's gotta be some guidance on this somewhere.

 

[Kentucky]

There’s an all-in/stack match equivalent so D can only win max 5 from 2nd. But… it’s moot anyway because once D can’t pay 1st the full 10 he’s eliminated and he never collects the chips from 2nd (I think). I don’t know what happens to those points that aren’t collected…

And I think you are right on the second one, unless you switch it to pay out all that’s left in the ratio of the winning scores- like 13 points to 1st, 7 to D.

Maybe you could always start settling with the big or small stack - depending if you wanted to get rid of people, or keep them in…

https://www.pokernews.com/strategy/what-makes-for-good-ofc-tournament-16944.htm

 

[The Nuts]

@madforpancakes found and shared this with me: https://www.theasianpokertour.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/APT-Philippines-2018-web-compressed.pdf

It's exactly what I was looking for. Page 20 has the rules for OFC, and 21 has the payout scenarios.


• Payouts start from the left of the button and that player must settle up with both players before the second player and the player on the button settle up.
• Once chips are put into action against one player, those chips cannot be used in action against the next player.
• Chips won by a player are not part of the player’s stack until the round of payouts is completed.
• If a player exhausts all of their chips before getting to the last player to act, that player is automatically eliminated from the tournament.


So In my above example, D is eliminated when 1st to act collects. 2nd player doesn't have to pay him out.

 

[The Nuts]

What those rules don't really cover is the scenario where:

1st: 10 units - fouls
2nd: 50 units - has 10 pt hand
3rd: 50 units - has 10 point hand

It simple says 1st to act settles up with both players before the 2nd player settles up with the button.
So since they fouled they owe 10 to both players but only have 10 total.

I think I'm going to enforce settle with your Left and then Right as dealer has an advantage during the actual game.

 

[Kentucky]

These scenarios make me more confused.
Scenario 1 - "Player A beats C for 30 points", yet he only collects 1,000 chips despite it being 100 chips/point.
Scenario 2 - "Player A beats B for 10 points and C for 20 points... Player C does not lose any chips" That means A beats C also, right? So C not loose chips because B is eliminated. Whaaat?
Scenario 3 - "Player C beats A for 30 points. Player C collects 1000 from Player A". WTF?

I'm going to lie down...

 

[Kentucky]

What those rules don't really cover is the scenario where:

1st: 10 units - fouls
2nd: 50 units - has 10 pt hand
3rd: 50 units - has 10 point hand

It simple says 1st to act settles up with both players before the 2nd player settles up with the button.
So since they fouled they owe 10 to both players but only have 10 total.

I think I'm going to enforce settle with your Left and then Right as dealer has an advantage during the actual game.

I think settle Left then Right is a perfect House Rule - and easier than trying to do the math on the fly to split the available chips between both winners though it would be 5 each in this case .

 

[The Nuts]

These scenarios make me more confused.
Scenario 1 - "Player A beats C for 30 points", yet he only collects 1,000 chips despite it being 100 chips/point.
Scenario 2 - "Player A beats B for 10 points and C for 20 points... Player C does not lose any chips" That means A beats C also, right? So C not loose chips because B is eliminated. Whaaat?
Scenario 3 - "Player C beats A for 30 points. Player C collects 1000 from Player A". WTF?
View attachment 906054

I'm going to lie down...

Yeah the scenarios seem almost like a typos lol


For scenario 1
A beats both players and eliminates both of them would be the actual result.

Scenario 2
It seems like it meant that C owed B points but doesn't because B has been eliminated. Otherwise it literally makes no sense.

Scenario 3
Seems like it's supposed to be an example that demonstrates the chips you win aren't in play, but fails miserably. Should be like
* A starts with 10 units
* A wins 20 units from B
* A loses 40 to C
* A still has 20 units.

 

[The Nuts]

Oh wow I finally get the examples and its really weird and super complicated.

It all revolves around the rule: Once chips are put into action against one player, those chips cannot be used in action against the next player.

It's basically saying, in very unclear terms, that you can't win more chips than you have.

Scenario 1:

Scenario 1 (100/point):
Player A – 2,000
Player B – 1,000
Player C (Button) – 3,000
Player A beats Player B for 10 Points, so Player B is eliminated.
Player A beats Player C for 30 Points.
Player A collects 1,000 from Player C.
Player A now has a total of 4,000 in chips while Player C has 2,000 in chips.

So Player A has 2k chips. Since they won 1k chips off B, they only have 1k chips, so despite winning 3k in chips, they only get 1k from C.


Scenario 2:

Scenario 2 (100/point):
Player A – 1,000
Player B – 1,000
Player C (Button) – 1,000
Player A beats Player B for 10 Points and C for 20 Points
Player B is eliminated and Player C does not lose any chips due to no action.
Player A now has a total of 2,000.

Player A only has 1k in chips so after they beats player B for 1k, they have nothing left to win against C.

Scenario 3 (100/point):
Player A – 2,000
Player B – 1,000
Player C (Button) – 3,000
Player A beats Player B for 10 Points, so Player B is eliminated.
Player C beats Player A for 30 Points.
Player C collects 1,000 from Player A.
Player A still has 2,000 in chips while Player C now has 4,000 in chips.

A uses 1k chips as collateral to win 1k in chips off player B. They lose 30 points to player C but since they only have 1k in chips not being used player C can only win 1k.
Scenario 3 is especially weird, basically calls out that when you win chips, the amount you won in your original stack cannot be used when determining your winnings/losings against the next opponent. Super confusing and not what you'd think would be going on.


I'm not going to run my tournament this way, its way to confusing. Your winnings will be separate from your losings. I am not going to count the amount you won as like "collateral" that can't be used in the next settle up. I'm also likely not to cap the amount you can win based off the # of chips you have. I get why they would want to do it in a tournament, but that is lame for this kind of game.

 

[Kentucky]

Ahhhh....
That makes sense now you explain it.
And it is super complicated.
I wonder what led them to this system - like maybe it is to mitigate against tables with different numbers of players, etc. It's a choice to make it this complicated. I totally get why you don't want to do it though. I have enough trouble explaining to my players why they haven't made the min raise.

Good luck with the tourney.

 

[CrazyEddie]

Give everyone a buffer of chips so that in every hand everyone can payout everyone no matter what. Once all payments are settled, anyone with less than the buffer is eliminated. Any chips they had are removed from play.

A good way to do this is to say that anyone who has less than 18 points worth of chips after payments have been made at the end of a hand is out; that way anyone who starts a hand is guaranteed to have enough to pay off all three opponents even if they foul, meaning the hand can simply be paid out as normal without having to worry about who gets whose chips in which order.

For simplicity you could make it 20 points instead of 18, so that it's easy to calculate and easy to count.

If it becomes an issue anyway (because of royalties) then you can use this very simple procedure to resolve it quickly and fairly: if one player is short of chips and can't pay all his debts, all other players give him an equal number of chips, the minimum necessary to cover what he owes. That way everyone gets paid, and all remaining players share equally in getting shorted by the loser.

Start the tournament with 1 point = 1 chip and give everyone a ton of chips and then every so often raise the stakes; 1 point = 2 chips, 1 point = 3 chips, 1 point = 5 chips, and so forth. If you give everyone 1000 chips to start then by the time 1 point = 50 chips the average player will be below the elimination threshold and the field will have been approximately cut in half. The field will continue to narrow dramatically with each hand played even without further increasing the stakes; since eliminated players take their chips with them which, chips leave the game rather than merely getting concentrated among the winners as in a NLHE tournament. So you can start small giving players time to jockey for position and build up safety, and then over time as the stakes raise it will become a bloodbath near the end as the short players find themselves right up against the wall. Plan your levels and timing accordingly based on how long you want the tourney to last.

If you don't want chips to leave the game, you can say that anyone who falls under the 20-point threshold is out and any chips they have at that time are split evenly between the remaining players. If you like, you wouldn't even have to make it an even split - give half to the left-hand player and one quarter to each of the other two (with odd chips going to the left-most players) in order to introduce some asymmetry and strategy.

Anyway, the concept is very doable and can be done much more simply than was described in that ruleset above.

 

[The Nuts]

Give everyone a buffer of chips so that in every hand everyone can payout everyone no matter what. Once all payments are settled, anyone with less than the buffer is eliminated. Any chips they had are removed from play.

A good way to do this is to say that anyone who has less than 18 points worth of chips after payments have been made at the end of a hand is out; that way anyone who starts a hand is guaranteed to have enough to pay off all three opponents even if they foul, meaning the hand can simply be paid out as normal without having to worry about who gets whose chips in which order.

For simplicity you could make it 20 points instead of 18, so that it's easy to calculate and easy to count.

If it becomes an issue anyway (because of royalties) then you can use this very simple procedure to resolve it quickly and fairly: if one player is short of chips and can't pay all his debts, all other players give him an equal number of chips, the minimum necessary to cover what he owes. That way everyone gets paid, and all remaining players share equally in getting shorted by the loser.

Start the tournament with 1 point = 1 chip and give everyone a ton of chips and then every so often raise the stakes; 1 point = 2 chips, 1 point = 3 chips, 1 point = 5 chips, and so forth. If you give everyone 1000 chips to start then by the time 1 point = 50 chips the average player will be below the elimination threshold and the field will have been approximately cut in half. The field will continue to narrow dramatically with each hand played even without further increasing the stakes; since eliminated players take their chips with them which, chips leave the game rather than merely getting concentrated among the winners as in a NLHE tournament. So you can start small giving players time to jockey for position and build up safety, and then over time as the stakes raise it will become a bloodbath near the end as the short players find themselves right up against the wall. Plan your levels and timing accordingly based on how long you want the tourney to last.

If you don't want chips to leave the game, you can say that anyone who falls under the 20-point threshold is out and any chips they have at that time are split evenly between the remaining players. If you like, you wouldn't even have to make it an even split - give half to the left-hand player and one quarter to each of the other two (with odd chips going to the left-most players) in order to introduce some asymmetry and strategy.

Anyway, the concept is very doable and can be done much more simply than was described in that ruleset above.

I think just doing left of the dealer settles first and settles left then right and if they bust they are out will be easier to explain and enforce.

If I did go a route where a player always got paid what was due to them regardless of whether a player had busted I would make the bank pay that money. But I prefer to just have players get eliminated as they go so I don't need to go help settle up whenever someone gets eliminated (since I will be the bank).

What I plan to do is:
$400 starting stack. Starting unit price is $1

Every 6 hands (2 rotations w/ 3 players) the unit value goes up. (This seems more fair than time based as a table with 3 fantasy lands will get through way fewer hands than a table with no fantasy lands).

How I do the table breakdown and consolidation will really be determined by the # of players I can get to play in the event