I'm a cash game player amd totally new to MTT's. I've began to play a few MTT's and some take 11 hours while many others take 5 hours or less. I'm a cash player and I can't handle sitting there for 11 hours. Some MTT's have 500 players and take 4 hours while others that have 200 players take 8 hours. Even the starting chips don't seem to make a difference. How can I tell which MTT's wont take 8-11 hours?
I'm looking to play MTT's that take 5 hours (or so) or less. Besides sit n gos what kind of structure and formats should I be looking for.
Thanks for your patience with what is probably a dumb question.
Take the starting stack, multiply be expected number of players (guarantee usually helps with that), divide by 9 (if FH) and you have an average stack for the FT. Depending on the site I assume it would be 20-40xbbs. Now you can figure out at which blind level the FT starts, which gives you a solid basis for further estimates.
I always assume a tourney will end with around 40BBs in HU (if not sooner). So to calculate it I multiply the starting stack by runners, and divide this number by 40 to find out what the blind level is in HU. Once you know how many levels it takes you can easily calculate how long it's going to take (add 5min per hour for breaks).
To me it is more like where one plays (stars or not), counting out some evening RE-tourneys that can last too long. I have a list of tourneys I play and I can expect it to be over in 5 hours generally, possibly sooner, depending on what I pick. If I drop out faster, I can add a tourney from my list.
A turbo or no turbo might make relatively little difference or then a lot; many turbos play slow enough to be on my non-turbo comparable list, and some tourneys let one rebuy as soon as one sits in. One gets a hang of it all finally; couldn't tell it all here, really, that much variety.
I have my favourite tourneys, coming much out of an experience, but overall I am not a turbo man, nor a big-field man that makes the tourneys last too long (maybe not too long, as you need not kill them all) or maybe one just sits around for an hour or longer before one gets to play really (not in my favourites).