Blind Structures

The blind structure in a tournament also varies greatly than that of a cash game. Whereas the blind levels and limits of a cash game always stay the same, the blind levels in a tourney tend to generally go up every 15, 30, or even 60 minutes for deeper-stacked events. Blinds (also known as “forced bets” required from the small and big blinds) in most tournaments occasionally start at $10/$20 and can get as high as $25K/$50K and above towards the end of play, depending on the amount of the buy-in and the size of the field.  Since all the entrants of a tournament start with the same amount of chips, players must adjust to each level accordingly and realize that one’s chip stack is very relevant to what the blinds are.  

Lower stacks are normally forced to push all-in more often than not once those aformentioned later levels come along, while chip leaders can usually sit back and accumulate chips off the short stacks during these same levels as well.  Blind structures tend to move on at a faster pace once the money bubble hits, and players will tend to get more comfortable and open up their games a lot more as the final table gets nears.  Keep in mind that this structure is a very balanced method that is designed to keep tournaments moving along in a timely manner.

Tournament Chip Values

On an ending note to this quick tutorial regarding tournaments and an explanation of how blinds work, I just want to delve into tournament chip values. A lot of players who first start playing MTT’s (multi-table tournaments) think that tournament chips are somehow similar to cash game chips. This is a common misconception, and it’s important to note that while chips at a ring table actually represent real cash, chips at a tournament table have notional value only. Tournament chips can’t be cashed out and are only usable during the tournament for which they were assigned.  This will come in handy down the road – probably because most players don’t want to be on the laughing end of table jokes when they decide to tip a cocktail waitress with a $5 tournament chip from their stack.

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