Organizing a Poker Tournament - How Many Chips?

GrahamGraham
in General Poker Chat
Hey Guys,

I got an email from someone that is looking to organize a poker tournament but needs a little help. Since I haven't organized any home games (esp of this size) I thought I would post this here and see if anyone can help her figure out what she needs. Here is the email:

Subject: I need a poker expert!!

Hello,

I am running a poker (texas hold'em) tourney april 11th. It will be
hosted for approximately 65 people and intended to last 3 hrs.
Could you please help me to identify how many chips I should provide
everyone with (all levels of players - likely lots of novice players),
rules which would be appropriate to play with, and any tips on how to
structure the event (schedule it) best.

I am currently planning to run 8 tables of 8 and to increase the big and
baby blinds every half hour. Any idea's or suggestions on how to run
the tourney better would be of great assistance, especially on how many
chips I should prepare to distribute among the players!

Thanks so much!

Kimberly
Fitness & Sports Instructor
Canadian Forces ASU London


Some further info:
I would very much appreciate if you could post it for me?
Currently I am planning to distribute @ 100 chips/person of 4 different
denominations. The more intelligence I can gather before the event the
better!

Any help would be appreciated as I will send her the link to this thread right now.

Comments

  • HobbesHobbes
    Try sending a PM to Zithal Graham.

    He's the tourney chip master.
  • PinheadPinhead
    Graham wrote: »
    65 people and intended to last 3 hrs.

    I am currently planning to run 8 tables of 8 and to increase the big and
    baby blinds every half hour. Any idea's or suggestions on how to run
    the tourney better would be of great assistance, especially on how many
    chips I should prepare to distribute among the players!

    Currently I am planning to distribute @ 100 chips/person of 4 different
    denominations.

    By no means an expert on setting up tournaments of this size, but that is going to be one fast structure. The structure for the RC on Saturday got pretty fast and that was so we could finish each table of 10 within 3 hours.

    One thing you could consider would be a shootout style tournament where each of the 8 starting tables keep playing until there is a winner and then those 8 players would all play the final table. Then you're looking at about an hour and a half for the first rounds and the same for the final which imho is much more reasonable.
  • m_dolensm_dolens
    65 entrant tourney in 3 hours is crazy fast for a live game. if she wants it to end in 3 hours it has to be a very fast structure. also, 30 minute blinds means there's only 6 total blind levels? for the amount of people in the predetermined time, i'd suggest maybe every 20 minutes and possibly even doubling the blinds each time (uh...i cringe while writing this).

    i don't think the actual number of chips each person gets is very important. as long as each person has a decent amount of 'ante chips' (i.e. the lowest demonination) then it's all good. the higher chip demoninations don't (necessarily) have to be high in numbers (i.e. the amount of chips each person gets, not the demonination totals). this is assuming that you'll be chipping up at least once i would assume.
  • cadillaccadillac
    100 chips per person is too many especially if you have a structure this fast. You will constantly be counting chips.
  • GrahamGraham
    Hobbes wrote: »
    Try sending a PM to Zithal Graham.

    He's the tourney chip master.

    Thanks Hobbes... I just sent him a PM :)

    Thanks everyone else so far for the feedback. I thought that was quite fast for a 65 person event, but wasn't too sure.
  • m_dolensm_dolens
    also, a good rule of thumb for the blind levels is to take the total amount of the chips in play (i.e. their denomination totals) and divide by 30 (or so). this will give you a good idea of where to cap the blinds. for example, 65 people x 2000 starting chips = 130,000 total chips in play / 30 = approximately 4000. therefore a good blind cap would be something like 2000-4000 (or somewhere around there). this also helps with the blind structure because you can start with the final cap blind and work your way back to make the levels.
  • westside8westside8
    Pinhead wrote: »
    One thing you could consider would be a shootout style tournament where each of the 8 starting tables keep playing until there is a winner and then those 8 players would all play the final table. Then you're looking at about an hour and a half for the first rounds and the same for the final which imho is much more reasonable.

    Excellent idea.
  • moosemoose
    100 chips per person is way too many. 20-30 would be optimal.
  • DrTyoreDrTyore
    Personally I'd say the best balance of play there....

    Do a 6-max / table shootout, turbo. Winner from each table gets to FT.

    3 hours to get through 65 is just ridiculous.


    Mark
  • ReefAquariumReefAquarium
    check out Home Poker Tourney - How to Run a No-limit Texas Hold'em Poker Tournament
  • ZithalZithal
    Most everyone on the boards is up on good tournament design theory, so I don't have much to add. I third or fourth the double shootout idea. That would seem to give the most play in the least time.

    The 30 BB rules is usually pretty accurate. For 65 players and 100 chips, the final blind level should be ~100-200. If she only wants 6 blinds levels, that's silly. If the blind schedule was more realistic..

    1/2, 2/4, 3/6, 5/10, 10/20, 20/40..

    Then you'll see the BB here is 1/5th of the number you came up with, which means everyone should start with 1/5th of the chips, or 20. Having a tourney where everyone starts with 10BB's is pretty bad.

    There's really no good way to plan a structure for that many people in that amount of time.

    Unless she can expand to 6 hours, go 8x8 shootout (add a player or two if needed) have have each game run 1.5 hours with 100 chips to start.

    20 minute blinds of; 1/2, 2/4, 3/6, 5/10, 10/20, 20/40(widow maker level)

    Also, let her know that she doesn't need 4 denominations...

    10 x 1
    8 x 5
    5 x 10

    would work for her needs.
  • PantsonfirePantsonfire
    m_dolens wrote: »
    also, a good rule of thumb for the blind levels is to take the total amount of the chips in play (i.e. their denomination totals) and divide by 30 (or so). this will give you a good idea of where to cap the blinds. for example, 65 people x 2000 starting chips = 130,000 total chips in play / 30 = approximately 4000. therefore a good blind cap would be something like 2000-4000 (or somewhere around there). this also helps with the blind structure because you can start with the final cap blind and work your way back to make the levels.
    That's not bad advice. But I wouldn't cap the blind level. In your scenario you can have two guys heads up with 65,000 chips and 2000/4000 blinds. Good players can play 16BB for a while or if the luck goes back and forth it might not end when you want it to.

    This is of course very nitpicky but your formula is a good indication of what blind level will likely be the end of the tourney although like I said a 4000/8000 level might be needed.
  • PantsonfirePantsonfire
    You cannot do a reasonable tournament with 65 players in 3 hours (as has been pointed out before). The best advice given here is to do a shootout where the winner of each table goes to a final table. And one and a half hours for each is about right.

    Here is my suggested example chip distribution and blind structure (should be the same for the shootout round and the final table). It is still going to be fairly fast:

    Chips per player-500. This doesn't mean 500 total chips it means as follows:

    Chip Value - number of chips
    5 - 10
    25 - 6
    100 - 3

    Blinds with 20 minute levels:

    5/10
    10/20
    25/50 (if possible you can get rid of the 5 chips here)
    50/100
    100/200
    200/400

    I'd be surprised if this went more than an hour and a half.
  • 800OVER800OVER
    ReefAquarium wrote: »
    check out Home Poker Tourney - How to Run a No-limit Texas Hold'em Poker Tournament


    What he said. Excellent site.
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