Advice needed on the format and rules for a Home NL Holdem Tourney

[nevadabob]

Hello all, I am an infrequent lurker of this site and just registered. I won a NL tourney that some friends of mine put on (only 8 players for $60 each) and, as such, I must host the next incarnation. I am looking to clean up the rules a little bit and make it more standard; they didn't know all that much about holdem and had some silly rules.

Here's the basics: 15-20 players starting on 2 tables, $60 each buy-in, no rebuys, over in 4-6 hours.

If you have advice on the format (starting chips, starting blinds, when blinds increase, etc) and any special rules (I am well-versed in the "standard" holdem tourney rules) please let me know! I googled for a site that would have a breakdown of home tourney formats to no avail. If there is a site that you know of, please link me.

Thank you!

[nixma]

Here's what we use:

Each player is given 2000 in chips.
Blinds go up every 15 minutes. The number in the parentheses is the ante:

25/50 (-)
50/100 (-)
100/200 (-)
100/200 (25)
200/400 (50)
300/600 (75)
400/800 (100)
500/1000 (100)
1000/2000 (200)
1500/3000 (300)
2000/4000 (500)

Pays top 4 players. Usually results in about 2 to 2.5 hour tourney.

Now, if that seems a bit fast for your liking, you could always make the rounds 20 minutes long, which will probably add 40-60 minutes to the length. Other than that, I can't think of any special rules. We usually use cards to determine table selection and seat assignment. For example, if there are 16 people, we use 2-9c and 2-9d, mix them all together face down on a table, everyone draws one card. All clubs at one table, all diamonds at the other, 9c and 9d choose their seats and everyone else sits to their right according to the card that they drew (8c immediately right of 9c, etc). Then shuffle up and high card for the button.

We've been doing two tournaments one night a week for at least 9 months now, and the above format is what we've refined over that time.

[fishfeet]

I have a group of friends here at school that get together to play in NLHE tournys every other weekend.

Since we are college stuends, we keep the buyin low. Usually 12-18 people show up at a buy-in of $10 or $15.
3rd gets his money back.
2nd take home 30% of whats left after you take out 3rd.
1st takes the rest.
So 11 people at $10 each means:
3rd $10
2nd $30
1st $70

The guys that usually host the tourny have only cheap plastic chips (I am about to change that since I have bought a nice large set of 11.5g chips)
Anyway.. we give out $200 in chips. 3 different chips at $1, $5, $10

Blinds start out $2/$4
about every 50 min we double the blinds and take a break. (smokers /images/graemlins/tongue.gif )

And thats about it. Play until someone wins.
As the number of players reduce to say, 4 or 5 we will usually raise the blinds higher each time, and more frequently.
We are all friends and keep the game friendly. We also like it to last a long time. Makes for a good cheap fun time that lasts a while.

And, thats about it.

[Hedge Henderson]

I would say that there are a number of sites on the Internet that will give you a standard set of tourney rules, but it sounds like you've already found them.

In most home games I've played, 15 minute levels would be a little short. Between the shuffling, the thinking, and the bullsh*t, we might take as much as 3 minutes per hand. At 15 minute rounds, our tourneys would be nearly all luck.

Not that it makes a difference, but our tourney chips are related to the real money involved. With T$20 in chips, our blinds are as follows:

$0.05/$0.10
$0.10/$0.20
$0.20/$0.40
Break/Chip race
$0.50/$1.00
$1.00/$2.00
$2.50/$5.00
$5.00/$10.00
$10.00/$20.00

Since I host. I fixed the format the way it is for a number of reasons, some personal. I set the first round at 60 minutes, and subsequent rounds at 40 minutes. Playing until 5:00 AM was a tad inconvenient but I still wanted the new players to feel they got their money's worth. In addition, I figure the low blinds early on help me establish that "tight" table image. Some of our players don't pay attention to the size of the pot when making a decision. If I raise $3.00 in the cutoff in level IV, it seems to mean a lot more than if I had raised $0.30 in level I, even though it's essentially the same raise.

The structure of your tournament depends a lot on what experience you want the participants to have. After some trial and error, I determined that our current format works pretty well for our game. It's rare that someone gets busted before level IV, so even the inexperienced players we often see can have 3+ hours of fun. The rapidly increasing blinds late also mean that the tournament won't last forever. We start at 8:00, and, even including breaks, we usually have a winner by 2:30 AM.

Our payout is very flat as well. With 16 players, we pay the top five. It helps some of the weaker players feel they did well when they do win, and it still means the winners take home more money than they would during a good night at our regular ring game. In short, I've tried to make sure the good players in our tourney usually win at least some money, and the bad players don't leave too early.

You'll have to find a balance for your game. You need to determine how much a factor you want skill to play versus luck and, if you prefer the former, how you want to weigh that against your time constraints.

[Eric P]

the one above me is the best listed. But make it 25 or 30 minute levels if you want it to last 6 hours

[Peter Harris]

No-one has yet mentioned table balancing. If you have 2 tables of 10, suppose 4 players get knocked out of one table - you have a 6-person and a 10-person table. The blinds move around the former table much quicker than the other, and that is a hindrance to said table.

You need to consider some options, like:
1) how big will the final table be? 10? 8?
2) will you play to (for 10-final table) 5 on each table, and stop each table in turn when they reach 5?

the other option is when there is an unbalanced table [one with 9, another with 7), then the shortstack/middlestack from table 1 moves to the place they were sitting off the button on table 2. That makes 8 on each table. you then play to a final table situation.

You might want to clarify things like burning cards, announcing raises to stop string-betting, keeping cards above tables, using a "dealer card" to stop players seeing [or, depending on honesty, dealing] the base card. Time to make decisions, posting blinds if away [smoking/peeing/chatting] and so on. There is a lot to consider to make sure the game is fair, and perhaps fun too.

All the best, hope you win,
Pete

[nevadabob]

Thanks to everyone for your advice. I think what I will do is start everyone with $100, blinds at .5/1 doubling every 40 mins, and pay about 1/4 of the participants.

The biggest problem we had in the last tourney was getting people to play faster. These kids are agonizing over petty decisions and i didnt want to make them feel too uncomfortable in getting them to hurry up.

[Hedge Henderson]

[ QUOTE ]
The biggest problem we had in the last tourney was getting people to play faster. These kids are agonizing over petty decisions and i didnt want to make them feel too uncomfortable in getting them to hurry up.

[/ QUOTE ]

It's a pain but, unfortunately, it's something you're going to have to deal with for a while. I see way too much of it in our home game, even in limit. Just be glad it's hold 'em. I timed a PLO8 round at our table last week for grins, and it took just over an hour for ten hands.

Ironically, all four of the players who usually take the most time are ones who have been playing with us for a year or more. The newbies are able to make decisions much quicker. I'd institute a time limit for decisions that didn't involve an all-in, but then I'd probably have a mutiny on my hands.