Tournament format, etc

I am thinking about holding a tournament with some friends of mine and guys i play with quite a bit. What is a good number of people to have and what are some common pay-out ratios for 1st, 2nd and 3rd,or possible just 1st and 2nd? it will probably be a 20 dollar buy in no limit hold em tourney and im thinkin between 10-20 poeple, how many tables should i have and at what point do we combine into 1 table? Also what would be a good amount of chips for everyone to get in relation to the size of the blinds? Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, Dave

Good number of people?


You can have a fine tournament with as few as 2 people and as many as you can fit in your house.


Payout?


If you have 10 or less people - 1 place, 100%

If you have 11-20 people - 2 places, 70-30%

If you have 21-30 people - 3 places, (60-30-10) OR (55-30-15)OR (50-30-20)


If you don't want it to last too long, start everyone with 200 in chips and the blinds at 5/10. Double the blinds every 15 or 20 minutes. If you're going to have rebuys, make it 100 in chips for $20. Good luck.

Make sure you address the question of elimination of 2+ people in a single hand on the final table. For example, 2 people go all-in against a third guy who has a huge stack at the final table. The third guy has the best hand, and the 2 all-in players go bust. Let's say you're paying 3 places and these 3 guys are the last players in the tourney.


Obviously, the guy who wins it all takes first place, but you need to decide how to handle the 2 players who went bust - who gets second place and who gets third? Personally, I'm a total newbie so I can't answer this.


Anyone?

I believe that the person (of those two) who started with more chips before the hand started gets the higher rank. Am I right on this?


Jeff