[jbones]

I want to use some of my FC's for a tourney set. I have a bunch but I want to be able to narrow it down to a 300 chip set so I can bring it places easily. We play 25/50 with 4k-5k starting stacks, and I want to be able to accomodate 10 players with 5k stacks and rebuys if at all possible. The way we do it now is:

16x25
11x100
7x500

with a standard 25/50 blind schedule and levels of 20 minutes. Obviously the bare minimum for this set up with 10 people and no rebuys is 340 chips. I like having 16x25 because I think it's an impetus for more action early on. However if I cut the starting stacks down to:

12x25
12x100
7x500

That's still 310 chips. I really prefer having just 3 denoms (so no 1K chip) but I may incorporate 1K chips for rebuys. A further option, if I include the 1K chip, is to have starting stacks of:

12x25
12x100
5x500
1x1000

This makes the set exactly 300 chips with 10 people, but allows 0 rebuys.

However, if rebuys are allowed, I don't really see a problem with shortening the starting stacks from 100xbb to 80xbb (from 5k to 4k). So I was thinking making the starting stacks:

12x25
12x100
3x500
1x1000

and letting players rebuy for

4x1000

But that's now 320 chips if every player is able to rebuy one time.

But if I only allow rebuys for the first 3 blind levels (first hour), then it's very doubtful that more than half the field (5 players) will have busted and want to rebuy.

So my final set of 300 chips allowing for 10 starting stacks of 4k and 5 rebuys of 4k would look like:

120x25
120x100
30x500
30x1000

But there are obviously problems with this set. It is the exact minimum of chips needed, so if I lose 1 or 2 I'm sort of screwed. Another problem I see is allowing rebuys for just the first hour. What if someone gets a real bad beat laid on them an hour and a half into my tourney? (What if it's me?!) I sort of want to allow an addon at the end of the first hour to accomodate this, perhaps 2k. The only way I see this working is if fewer than 5 people rebuy. For instance, if 3 people rebuy there are still 8k in chips left and 4 of the remaining players may take a 2k addon. Probably, though, everyone will want the addon. How should I solve these problems? Have I overlooked/ not considered anything?

[ntp]

What's your chip case like? Three racks? As a normal cheapo 300pc aluminium case usually takes well over 300 chips. Maybe 51-53 per row and another 40 or so in one of the two deck holes, if you put both decks to the other. And still 10 more chips into the dice slot. I counted my case to hold 376 clay chips plus two decks of cards..

[wijwij]

There is another option you may want to try, the 8/8/8 stacks for a T5000. This is fewer greens than you said you wanted, but you might give it a whirl. The greens get colored off anyway, if you aren't using antes.

Starting stacks (24 chips):

8 x 25 = 200
8 x 100 = 800
8 x 500 = 4000
----------------------
24 chips = T5000

Chips needed for 10 players:

80 x 25 = 80 green
80 x 100 + 20 for colorup = 100 black
80 x 500 + 20 for colorup = 100 purple
20 higher denomination chips

That's 300 chips exactly.

If you let your highest denomination chip be T2500 instead of T1000, then you would have the ability to offer 10 rebuys. A rebuy would be two of those high society chips. Consider getting some kind of unusual color for that last chip.

[jdunford]

The best I can come up with is a T2500 with:

12 x 25 (120 total)
7 x 100 (100 total)
3 x 500 (80 total)
------------------------
22 chips = T2500 (300 total chips)

This gives you enough 100s to colour-up all the 25s, and enough 500s for 10 re-buys (or colour-up the 100s, or have some add-ons, or some combination of those). If you start with 25-25 blinds, that gives the standard 100 x BB to each player... or 50 x BB if you start at 25-50.

Also, this set could double as a travelling $0.25/0.50 cash set with $20 buy-in (just take away a 500 for $20). That would give you 15 re-buys of $20.

[jbones]

Well I definitely don't want starting stacks lower than 2500, and I'd rather not have just 8x25 in starting stacks. We do use antes and I think they're pretty essential actually to ensure action on the bubble. Looks like I have more numbers to crunch.

[jdunford]

You could still use antes with a T2500. Just start the antes at 25 when the blinds get to 100-200. Obviously you can't have antes all the way along if you're looking for a 300-chip 3-denomination 10-player set with room for re-buys... The easiest (if not only) solution would be to get 500 chips in 4 denoms... Then you'd have some flexibility.

[jbones]

Well I do want to keep it 300 chips, and I don't want to run a t2500 tourney. It seems silly to haphazardly halve the starting stacks just so my chip set can accomodate the game.

ntp, that's a really good point about cases being able to hold probably more than 300 chips. I don't have a case yet but I'll have to evaluate how many chips it will actually hold.

[jdunford]

Sorry if I wasn't clear. I think the antes puts a wrench in the problem. For example, consider when the antes get to be 50. Each hand, you need 20 x 25s in the pot just for antes from 10 players. If you only have 8 x 25s per player, on average players will have to make change twice per orbit (at least, any players that haven't won a hand on that orbit)! That just doesn't seem reasonable to me. Even with 12 x 25s per player, you're pushing it. But if you go to 16 x 25s, you simply don't have enough chips in a 300-chip set to support a T2500, let alone a T5000.

For such a small set to accomodate 10 players, you're either going to have to give up antes (or at least only have them later in the tourney when the table is down to < 6 players), or significantly cut down on the total starting stacks (since most of your chips will be the lowest denom). You can't have a "deep-stack" 10-player touranment with 300 chips unless you have very few middle-denoms (i.e. mostly lowest and highest denoms), which is generally not recommended...

[jbones]

Ahh, that makes much more sense. I think I'll figure that out last since it is the easiest part of the breakdown to change.

Borrowing from wijwij's 3x8 idea, I might consider something like:

12x25
7x100
8x500

But I'm a little concerned this might not provoke as much action as with more 100's. It would certainly make everything else easier though.

Thanks everybody for your help so far.

[wijwij]

I have a traveling set of 300 pieces that can be used for a T1000 tournament.

If you can convince your players to go to a standard T1000 tourney, starting with blinds of 5/10 or 10/20 (see homepokertourney.com), the following can work:

100 red (T5)
100 green (T25)
80 black (T100)
20 purple (T500)

Starting stacks (27 chips each):

10 red + 10 green + 7 black = T1000

Rebuys:

2 purple

That puts 270 chips into play right away. It leaves you with 10 black chips and 20 purple chips. Set aside 10 blacks and 4 purples for coloring up purposes. The remaining 16 purples can be used for 8 rebuys.

Coloring up is not too difficult. You can exchange blacks for greens and use greens to color up the reds. (Or have one player buy up all the reds and then exchange them for blacks from the bank.) Later, you can color off the greens in the same way. You just exchange purples for blacks and use the blacks to color up the greens.

If you are certain you want to have exactly 10 rebuys available, then the set below could work:

100 red (T5)
100 green (T25)
75 black (T100)
25 purple (T500)

With the 10/10/7 stacks, you have 5 blacks and 25 purples left over. Use 5 blacks to color up the reds. Use 5 purples to color up the greens. This leaves you with 20 purples to use for exactly 10 rebuys. That looks like it might work for you.

Lastly, if you think you may need more than 10 rebuys/add-ons, then consider this set:

100 red (T5)
100 green (T25)
70 black (T100)
20 purple (T500)
10 orange (T1000)

That would have 17 rebuys. The coloring up is a bit more convoluted, but still doable. You'd exchange 1 purple for 5 blacks, then exchange those for greens as necessary to color off the reds. Later you'd exchange 5 purples for 25 blacks, and use those to color off the greens. [The remaining 14 purples = 7 rebuys and 10 orange = 10 rebuys.]

The starting stacks of 10/10/7 may be a little better than the 8/8/8 stacks at encouraging action early on.