Tourney T25 Tournament Structure for annual league (1 Viewer)

[Spikeh]

Getting a new set of chips at some point this year - likely custom Tinas via a UK group buy.

I think I'm fairly set on this, but wanted to set it out here for opinions.

It's a 5 hour tournament, max 10 players (though things are spicing up, so I may end up running a second table and merging in the third break), the group likes big starting stacks, and I want people to generally stay in until at least L7 (its a friendly home game with no rebuys or late reg - not planning on introducing them either).

Upgrading from what I assume is an cash set (Poker Night Pro from Amazon - 1, 5, 10, 50, 100 and 500 chips), which I feel like we've outgrown.

Here goes (/braces). Blind structure:

And the subsequent buying plan for the chip labels and counts (planning on getting a 500 set and reusing 20 plaques I already have for the T10k and T20k chips - so about half of a player's stack). Max starting stack size for a 10 player table is 65,800 (which I change depending on how many people show up):

How's that feel? I did similar with the PNP set, but I really wanted to get rid of those 1, 5 and 10 chips.

 

[TheRealStephen12]

For base T25 tournaments, the most efficient progression is 25/100/500/1000/5000. The set below allows for T10K starting stacks of 12/12/7/5 for up to 10 players, 12/12/5/6 for up to 12 players, and 8/8/4/7 for up to 18 players (with one player receiving 8/8/6/6).

150x T25
150x T100
75x T500
125x T1000

The plaques can be T5000 and used for color ups after the T25s (link on how to color up below if needed, though I'd suggest looking at racing off as it is fairer). If you want to be able to have a full 2-table, 18-player rebuy tournament comfortably, getting 75x T1Ks and 25x T5Ks would be more than enough chips and not require any plaques if you didn't want them (rebuy stacks being 0/0/0/5/1). It should not run more than 6 hours.

For a structure, the following will work fine even if you allowed a rebuy through the first break:

20 Minute Levels, 10 Minute Breaks
50/100
75/150
100/200
150/300
Break - CU T25s
200/400
300/600
400/800
600/1200
800/1600
Break - CU T100s
1000/2000
1500/3000
Break - CU T500s
2K/4K
3K/6K (EOT 12 entries, 4:50)
4K/8K (EOT 16 entries, 5:10)
6K/12K (EOT 24 entries, 5:30)
8K/16K (EOT 32 entries, 5:50)

 

[BGinGA]

I pretty much hate almost all of it.

The 50 and 10k denomination chips are needless, and the blind level increases are extremely inconsistent. L4 is really whack, increasing the blinds while also adding an ante -- resulting in a huge jump.

 

[krafticus]

for a 10-person, kill the antes. They'll just slow the game down and they aren't needed at all.

and I agree with Dave above ^^

I personally prefer the 12/12/5/6 starting stacks. If 5 hours is your goal, shorten the rounds, but don't just make the blinds go crazy.

I like @TheRealStephen12 structure if starting with 50/100. (except the break to remove the T500s.. you can just start removing them during play and keep playing). If you want to start with 25/50, do that, but add in a 25/75 level after. Nothing says that you need to have breaks every hour. Add the 2 in to start, and have your 1st break at 1:40.

and with 10k starting stacks, you shouldn't need but a few 5k chips, and shouldn't ever need the higher chips. If you have 2 racks of 1k chips, you shouldn't even need a 5k chip.

 

[Spikeh]

I pretty much hate almost all of it.

The 50 and 10k denomination chips are needless, and the blind level increases are extremely inconsistent. L4 is really whack, increasing the blinds while also adding an ante -- resulting in a huge jump.

Haha. Say what you feel mate! Still, good feedback

For base T25 tournaments, the most efficient progression is 25/100/500/1000/5000. The set below allows for T10K starting stacks of 12/12/7/5 for up to 10 players, 12/12/5/6 for up to 12 players, and 8/8/4/7 for up to 18 players (with one player receiving 8/8/6/6).

150x T25
150x T100
75x T500
125x T1000

The plaques can be T5000 and used for color ups after the T25s (link on how to color up below if needed, though I'd suggest looking at racing off as it is fairer). If you want to be able to have a full 2-table, 18-player rebuy tournament comfortably, getting 75x T1Ks and 25x T5Ks would be more than enough chips and not require any plaques if you didn't want them (rebuy stacks being 0/0/0/5/1). It should not run more than 6 hours.

For a structure, the following will work fine even if you allowed a rebuy through the first break:

20 Minute Levels, 10 Minute Breaks
50/100
75/150
100/200
150/300
Break - CU T25s
200/400
300/600
400/800
600/1200
800/1600
Break - CU T100s
1000/2000
1500/3000
Break - CU T500s
2K/4K
3K/6K (EOT 12 entries, 4:50)
4K/8K (EOT 16 entries, 5:10)
6K/12K (EOT 24 entries, 5:30)
8K/16K (EOT 32 entries, 5:50)

Much appreciated! I checked that video out (and some more videos on his channel). Colouring up goes fairly well in our game, though he's given me some good ideas there that I'll try out. One of the reasons I'm changing chips / blinds is to make colouring up and swapping change easier.

The entire playerbase likes the 20 min rounds + 20 min break every hour (we sometimes finish the break early, but not always), so I'll be keeping that whatever structure I end up with. I also like the idea of T25 chips, so maybe I use those instead of the T50s as per @BGinGA's little rant

I want to keep the plaques as the high chips, so I will probably get a few more and keep them as T1k and T2k (as we currently use them with my current set), with the difference being they won't make up half the starting stack, and will be a little more useful.

Thanks for the structure - will take a look and see what works for us.

for a 10-person, kill the antes. They'll just slow the game down and they aren't needed at all.

and I agree with Dave above ^^

I personally prefer the 12/12/5/6 starting stacks. If 5 hours is your goal, shorten the rounds, but don't just make the blinds go crazy.

I like @TheRealStephen12 structure if starting with 50/100. (except the break to remove the T500s.. you can just start removing them during play and keep playing). If you want to start with 25/50, do that, but add in a 25/75 level after. Nothing says that you need to have breaks every hour. Add the 2 in to start, and have your 1st break at 1:40.

and with 10k starting stacks, you shouldn't need but a few 5k chips, and shouldn't ever need the higher chips. If you have 2 racks of 1k chips, you shouldn't even need a 5k chip.

Antes are staying for sure (they are not BBAs btw, each player puts in). Players are used to them now, and it is actually making the nits play more aggressively, which is good for our game. "Slowing down the game" is not a concern at all, either; the game is slow anyway, because there's only maybe 2 or 3 serious players at the table (including me).

Although we've been playing together in various home games for over 20 years (mine is only 3 this year), none of the home games have been as organised as mine is... if that's the right word for it. One of our mates has held most of the games, and he's never had any of regular schedule - between 2 and 5 per year, even in its heyday. What I'm doing is quite different, and not something most people who come are used to (so I'm introducing changes slowly).

 

[Spikeh]

Here we go, modified based on comments and a bit more research. I appreciate this does not match what anyone has said, but as I keep hearing "it's your game", so trying to play devils advocate

Biggest difference is the much, much lower BB count in the final rounds. I assume this is to force the tourney to a close (though this has never been a problem in the past with around 20-30 BBs available in the last round).

I've reduced the break time to 15 mins. Might increase this again, not sure yet.

I've kept the ante + blind raise in L4. Everyone is used to this, so I'm comfortable keeping it in, and I don't think it really makes a difference to the play.

T5k and T25k are the plaques (need to buy another 10 x T5k plaques). T25k is not in play until colouring up late game. May make T25k plaques T20k instead... (they are unnumbered).

Means I need 560 chips in total to cater for up to 20 players. When I have 10 players, I might increase to 30k starting stack, or maybe I should keep things simple and keep the stacks the same regardless.

Note there are no rebuys, and I'm unlikely to ever introduce them. Much more likely to raise the buy-in (currently £10 - told you it was a casual game ;P).

Edit: Actually, I might do 160 T1ks so I've got 20 extra for bits and pieces.

 

[TheRealStephen12]

Tina orders have to be in rolls of 25 chips, so you would need to order 175/175/125/125 if you were to get them. I would probably choose to prepare for 8/8/4/7 starting stacks as bare-bones stacks for 20 payers to reduce the number of largely unimportant T500s, which would allow you to purchase 175/175/100/150, giving you extra 1Ks for the early color ups.

Your blinds are very large jumps, and will almost definitely be done in less than 4 hours with 200K in play. The following should be done within roughly 4.5 hours with 15 minute breaks (adding antes is optional).

25/50
50/100
75/150
125/250
Break - CU T25s
200/400
300/600
500/1000
800/1600
1200/2400
Break - CU T100s
2000/4000
3000/6000
5000/10000 (Estimated EOT)
8000/16000
12000/24000

 

[BGinGA]

Here we go, modified based on comments and a bit more research. I appreciate this does not match what anyone has said, but as I keep hearing "it's your game", so trying to play devils advocate

View attachment 1444431

Biggest difference is the much, much lower BB count in the final rounds. I assume this is to force the tourney to a close (though this has never been a problem in the past with around 20-30 BBs available in the last round).

I've reduced the break time to 15 mins. Might increase this again, not sure yet.

I've kept the ante + blind raise in L4. Everyone is used to this, so I'm comfortable keeping it in, and I don't think it really makes a difference to the play.

View attachment 1444432

T5k and T25k are the plaques (need to buy another 10 x T5k plaques). T25k is not in play until colouring up late game. May make T25k plaques T20k instead... (they are unnumbered).

Means I need 560 chips in total to cater for up to 20 players. When I have 10 players, I might increase to 30k starting stack, or maybe I should keep things simple and keep the stacks the same regardless.

Note there are no rebuys, and I'm unlikely to ever introduce them. Much more likely to raise the buy-in (currently £10 - told you it was a casual game ;P).

Edit: Actually, I might do 160 T1ks so I've got 20 extra for bits and pieces.

Much better, with consistent blind increases (although unnecessarily brutally large). You are essentially slicing starting stacks in half after just one level, and starting stack sizes are reduced to just 25% after only 40 minutes. This approach forces players to play very aggressively from the start to avoid becoming short-stacked, but it isn't conducive to high-level strategic strategy imo. Using blind increases of 33%-50% vs 100% jumps promotes smoother game play with fewer 'omg' surprises for players.

Your starting stacks need far fewer T500 chips and more T1000s. No more than a single T500 will ever be used to construct a bet, call, or raise, but up to four T1000s may be needed (making it a workhorse chip, unlike the T500). For this reason, 8/8/4/7/x is better than 8/8/6/6/x, and either 12/12/5/6/x or 12/12/5/11/x is vastly superior to any 8/8/x option. Similarly, an adequate number of T5000 chips will be needed towards the end of the event as blind and bet sizes get larger.

For 10 players, best-practice for building 20k T25-base starting stacks is 12/12/5/6/2 (using T1000s for T25/T100 color-ups) or 12/12/5/11/1 (using T5000s for T25/T100 color-ups). This results in improved chip set efficiency and game play flow (by minimizing time wastage). A typical set would consist of:

120 x T25 (125x with qty restrictions)
120 x T100 (125x)
50 x T500
75 x T1000 (15x for color-ups)
25 x T5000 (5x for T500 color-ups)
------------
390 (400) chips, minimum

Expanding the set size to handle 20 players (20k stacks of 8/7/4/7/2):

160 x T25 (175x with qty restrictions)
160 x T100 (175x)
80 x T500 (100x)
160 x T1000 (175x, 20x for color-ups)
48 x T5000 (50x, 8x for T500 color-ups)
---------------
608 (675) chips, minimum

And building the set to cover 20 players with 12/12/5/6/2 stacks and using T5000s for all color-ups:

240 x T25 (250x with qty restrictions)
240 x T100 (250x)
100 x T500
120 x T1000 (125x)
56 x T5000 (75x, 16x for color-ups)
----‐-----------
756 (800) chips total. No chips/plaques larger than T5000 are needed.

 

[Spikeh]

Seems that trying to reuse these plaques is the thing that's causing me the most pain. I have 2 colours of 10 unnumbered plaques (red and black), and getting more of the same would cost me roughly £2.70 per plaque - which is a bit daft. They are very nice ceramics, though.

Was trying to be efficient, but it looks like I may have wasted my money on them, unless I use them for very large colour ups towards the end of the game. The players like the "drama" of throwing a plaque in when they mean business (or are bluffing badly, as a few love to do).

Best-case, I could use all 20 plaques as a single denomination (I can get players to buy in to that I reckon), but even that seems restrictive based on what you guys are suggesting.

Maybe I bite the bullet, put it down as a lesson learned, and just prepare for a whole new set?

 

[Spikeh]

Finally settled on the following, after finally receiving my new chips yesterday!

Took advice from @Chris Manzoni's youtube videos (thanks Chris, I'm moving into two tables for the first time in 2 years and your other vis have helped with this a lot), with a few minor mods that make sense for my game.

Went with the following chips and a 12/12/5/6/2 structure. My players like lots of chips, and I want to keep the antes because they give players more incentive to play hands.

Will be using the plaques (as a single denom - I'm sure I'll have plenty of complains about that, though!) for late game colour ups (L15 break) as a single colour.

Will post pics of the new chips when I get time to line them all up!

Thanks for all the help people, very much appreciated