T10,000 Breakdown/Structure for 30

[Wsievern]

Hi guys,

Because we can't grind the micros online anymore, my friends and I are running a poker league this summer to get our MTT fix. We're going to try to have ~30 people in each tournament. To cover all these people, I'm upgrading my pharaoh's set from a 10 to a 30 person set. I'd like there to be an optional re-buy/full add-on available for each player. Right now, the breakdown I have in mind is this:

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T10000, 8/8/6/6 Starting stacks:
T25 - 240
T100 - 300
T500 - 200
T1000 - 220
T5000 - 90
T25000 - 2 (I know these plaques aren't needed, just wanted them around for the novelty. )
Total chips: 1052 (10 of the T5000's are plaques I already have, and 40 of the T25's chill in my cash-set; that's the reason for the non-rack filling numbers)

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Question one: Do you guys think that more than 1000 chips would be optimal here? Color-ups are pretty tight... the T25's are just covered by the T100's, so rebuys would have to be done with mostly T1000's and T5000's and the 20 500's left over. Assuming everyone re-bought/added-on, would the amount of change making at the table be overwhelming for newbies? Is the only way to fix this by adding more T100/T500 chips? Buying more than 1000 chips isn't a problem per-se, but I'd like to keep it at 1000 unless it'll be difficult to perform re-buys/add-ons.

Question two: With my current breakdown in mind, what would you change if anything for 30 players? I know some people prefer an 8/8/4/7 or an 8/8/2/8 starting stack... What are the advantages to those and what kind of adjustments should I make if I would like to switch?

It's getting late and I have calculus early tomorrow, so I'll come back later to post my tournament structure for you all to nit-pick.

Thanks a lot guys,

wsievern

[jldecarlo]

8/8/4/7 works fine, but 8/8/2/8 is too few T500s IMO. (but I prefer 8/8/6/6)

I wouldn't worry about the color ups. I say it almost every time I post in a thread like this, but I don't think you need AND extra T100s, T500s or T1K chips. None. Just take a T5000 to each table, and color up the chips of the biggest stack (all the lowest denomination chips, plus enough others to made 5K). Then use the extra chips from this color up to color up everybody else at the table. It works like a charm. This process will work fine for the later color-ups as well.

So the set you have will work very well for a 30 person T10K set.

L

[Schmendr1ck]

I think you're fine also. I have a 1000 chip tourney set that can comfortably cover 30 players with T10k stacks, and it's slightly smaller but very similar to yours:

240 x T25
300 x T100
200 x T500
200 x T1000
60 x T5000

I use starting stacks of 8-8-6-6, and the remainder can comfortably cover my color-ups. And jldecarlo makes a good point - you can always buy chips from the big stack if you run out during a color-up.

[BPTDirector]

I don't think you can go wrong with this - and I too like the 8/8/6/6 starting stack that L describes best for my tournaments.

BPT

Originally Posted by jldecarlo

8/8/4/7 works fine, but 8/8/2/8 is too few T500s IMO. (but I prefer 8/8/6/6)

I wouldn't worry about the color ups. I say it almost every time I post in a thread like this, but I don't think you need AND extra T100s, T500s or T1K chips. None. Just take a T5000 to each table, and color up the chips of the biggest stack (all the lowest denomination chips, plus enough others to made 5K). Then use the extra chips from this color up to color up everybody else at the table. It works like a charm. This process will work fine for the later color-ups as well.

So the set you have will work very well for a 30 person T10K set.

L

[albie]

T25 - 240
T100 - 240
T500 - 180
T1000 -190 (to colour up T25s)
T5000 - 150
makes a nice round 1000 chips
Plus 10 T5000 plaques & 2 T25000s allows you to play 30-max T10000 with 1 rebuy & add-on.

[Wsievern]

Awesome, sounds like re-buys will work fine then. Hopefully it won't be too hard of a concept for the more experienced to walk the less experienced through. As far as the set goes, I think I'll just go 240/300/200/200/110 just so each chip has only full racks available (the 2/5ths one color, 3/5ths another racks in my set right now bother me .)

Anyway, here is the tournament structure I'd like to use:

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T10000 - 20 min. blind levels

25/50
50/100
75/150
*color up T25's*
100/200
200/400
300/600
400/800
500/1000
700/1400
*color up T100's*
1000/2000 - (I'm slightly concerned the blind-jumps are getting too big at this statge in the tournament.)
1500/3000
*color up T500's*
2000/4000
3000/6000
4000/8000
*color up T1000's if needed*
5000/10000
10000/20000

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I have a few questions... Where would you end the re-buy/add-on period? I think after level three, one hour in, works the best especially because color-ups are happening at the same time. The only problem I foresee with this is that after three levels, the blinds aren't really pressuring anyone. Someone who hasn't played a pot will still be around 60 BBs - hardly a short-stack. This means only the über-fish and regs involved in an AA vs. KK-esque suck-out will re-buy. Everyone likes the re-buys and add-ons because it adds to the prize pool and promises everyone a long experience at the tables... so should I allow re-buys until the end of say, level 5 or 6? (Time is also a concern here - I'd like to have this done in six hours at the absolute max.)

As always, thanks for your time!

wsievern

[albie]

I'd change it slightly to get rid of the spots where the blinds double and smooth the jumps a bit.

50/100
75/150
100/200
150/300
end rebuy period & colour up T25
200/400
300/600
400/800
600/1200
800/1600
*color up T100's*
1000/2000 - (I'm slightly concerned the blind-jumps are getting too big at this statge in the tournament.)
1500/3000
*color up T500's*
2000/4000
3000/6000
4000/8000
6000/12000
8000/16000
*colour up T1000s*
10000/20000
15000/30000
20000/40000 etc

You could make the add-on for 12,000 chips instead of 10k to incentivise people to add-on (or discount it ie if it's a $50 tourny, charge $40 to add-on).

I think you're likely to overrun 6hrs because of breaks to colour up etc. Get rid of the rebuy or make blind levels 15 mins if you absolutely must be done in 6hrs imo. This might not be neccessary with my structure because blinds are twice the level they would be at the end of the rebuy period.

[Wsievern]

Originally Posted by albie

I'd change it slightly to get rid of the spots where the blinds double and smooth the jumps a bit.

...

You could make the add-on for 12,000 chips instead of 10k to incentivise people to add-on (or discount it ie if it's a $50 tourny, charge $40 to add-on).

I think you're likely to overrun 6hrs because of breaks to colour up etc. Get rid of the rebuy or make blind levels 15 mins if you absolutely must be done in 6hrs imo. This might not be neccessary with my structure because blinds are twice the level they would be at the end of the rebuy period.

Thanks for commenting on the structure. Yeah, a few of the x2 jumps do need to be smoothed out. I'll look at those more closely.

As far as the incentives go, I think that's good idea. I'll have to think about how to implement those.

With the timing, I'm worried purely about game time. Six hours (18 levels) should cover the entire tournament I think.

[takedown]

Consider adding in antes to the structure, most live tournaments are going to have antes so it's good practice, and it encourages people to play more aggressive instead of just waiting for big hands. It also provides plenty of play early, with some pretty deep stacks. 10K tournaments without antes are really slow moving, there is no pressure to move in until late in the tournament.

If you need to reduce the length of the tournament the levels to consider removing would be any of the 75/150, 100/200 or 150/300. Reducing to 15 minute levels would help too. I think it's important to have the 1200/2400 level, otherwise the jump is really big there. BTW the structure below is what Matt Savage uses in a lot of his tournaments and is what we use here for any tournament where we want a lot of play.

25/50
50/100
75/150
100/200
100/200/25
150/300/25
200/400/50
300/600/75
***Color up 25
400/800/100
500/1000/100
600/1200/100
800/1600/200
1000/2000/300
1200/2400/300
1500/3000/400
***Color up 100
2000/4000/500
3000/6000/500
4000/8000/1000
5000/10000/1000

Have fun, live home games are great.