Multi-Tiered Buy-ins

[no_hoper]

Hey All, hope someone can help me out here and tell me if this can be done before I go asking for enhancements...

I run a tournament where we use a multi-tiered pool structure.  Here's how it works; the standard, minimum buy-in is say $60 but players can buy-in for an additional amount, let's say another $40.  For example, say I have 20 players.  Each player pays their $60 for the tourney.  Of these 20 people, let's assume 10 of them also pay the additional $40.  We now have two pools - one at $1200 (20 x $60) and another at $400 (10 x $40).  I now want to be able to award the first pool to the top 4 finishers and the second pool to the top 3 finishers from those who paid the extra 40. Kind of like two seperate games rolled into 1.  Problem is, it appears there's no way to do this automatically.  At the moment I have to record the minimum buy-in using the standard fields, track the extra buy in using a spreadsheet and announce the second pool prizes after the game begins.  Once the game is over I have no record within TTM of who paid the additional buy-in.   

Note: The reason I do this is to cater to both the minimum amount players and the higher rollers in one game.  Since I started doing this I have some players asking if I can add another tier.  This gets me to thinking it should be possible to add any number of tiers if only the software could handle mutliple by-in levels. I'm hesitant to add another tier right now because of the complexity of calculating the additional prize pool and tracking who finished where and how much they should get by hand.  The players, by the way, love the arrangement and I for one have not noticed any difference in the way anyone plays no matter what amount they bought in for. 

Any ideas...?

[dik9]

This is something I would also find useful, as I run a weekly split level entry, they get the same amount amount of chips so thats fine, but I have a £50 entry and a £100 entry for the same comp. If you have paid the £100 then you are "in" for all the loot, however if you only pay £50 to enter, you can only win £50 of each player. Making it really 2 comps in one. The last man standing for £100 wins that part of the comp.

[Phaze]

Uhhhh, I just woke up and you are making it hard on me head, heh

I don't know if I'm right or not, but let me take a shot at this. You are going to have to use the add on feature as your tiered extra buyin amount. If you structure your payment right, you just have to put in extra add ons to reflect the payment. Example: your buyin is $50. Tier 1 is $40. Tier 2 is $80. On the Game tab you set up the buy in for $50 and the addons for $40. You will have to addon the player twice if he's tier 2 to show that he has paid $130 total

Now comes the tricky part, but I think it might just work automatically for ya. If you create a formula in the points section, I think you can do an IF statement to see if the player had an addon and if so to include that into his points. I'm pretty sure that a formula will tell you exactly how much money the player will take. I just can't think of it now.

[no_hoper]

Thanks for the suggestion but I don't think that's gonna do it.  Using points is no good because we also track points throughout the season.  Once you use an add-on, the total prize pool is updated as well so it will also throw out my cash accounting.  I was hoping that there was some way to do this using the current cash/buy-in fields but after playing with the program today I just can't see any way to make it work without having to manually adjust the payouts once the tourney is over.

One thing I notice is that the players screen allows you to enter different buy-in amounts but the prize payout calculation does not calculate the prizes relative to how much you put into the pot.  If only it did my problem would probably be solved....

[Corey Cooper]

You are correct - you can adjust the buy-in amount for any particular player, so using an Add-on isn't necessary.  Structuring your payouts is going to be the hard part, and my guess is that you'll have to do it manually.  You can still use the TD, you'll just need to create fixed-amount prizes after you determine how they will pay out.

[mrticsay]

I use the add-on for the 2nd pool/tier and specify that the add-on has a rake equal to the add-on fee and that they get no additional chips.  This removes the amount from the main prize pool.

I have setup payout files with fixed amount payouts where the prize is predetermined and locked based on the number of players in the 2nd pool.  I give each prize a display name that distinguishes it from the main pool.  I need a different file for each number of players since there is not a way to make this a formula.

I load the appropriate 2nd pool payout file before loading the automatic prizes at the top of the prizes list.  Now, all your prizes are loaded.

At the end of the tourney, you can go to the Prizes/Edit Prizes screen an assign these prizes to the players who won them.

I haven't found a way for the system to track these players and calculate payouts...but this turned out to be an easy alternative (I'm just responsible for tracking who is in the second pool...and we've had no problems with that)

[mrticsay]

As a follow-up to my prior note, you can use the player buy-in screen to increase the amount of their buy-in and their rake.  This would adjust the main pool to payout properly.  You could then use the fixed 2nd pool payout files as I described in the earlier post.

What I like about doing the "add-on" approach is that TD now has a nice, simple record/indicdator of who did the larger buy-in.  You could use the buy-in amount to tell you this as well. 

In addition, using the add-on has things setup to quickly buy-in the players this way.  If you use the buy-in screen, you have to increase each person's buy-in and their rake.

Either approach works basically the same, so its largely a matter of preference.

[jhisey]

This is a great idea..  I've always wanted to bump the entry fee to our league up but was afraid I'd alienate some players.  Being able to have multiple buy-in amounts, awarded respectively, sounds like a good way to do this.