New Member! Got some questions for my next purchase. (2 Viewers)

MartinP30

Sitting Out
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Feb 12, 2020
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Location
Troy, Mi
Hello everyone!
I would like to say thank you to all of you who frequent this forum. I have learned a lot as i have read many many posts on these forums and just recently met a member from here in Metro Detroit who bought my old chips off of me. I live in Troy, Mi and was once an avid poker player but over the last few years work and life did not allow me to play much. My buddy recently bought a poker table and some chairs for his new home and we now get together once a month to play. Im looking into a new set of 500 and i cannot afford paulson or real clay so im looking mostly into China clays or a good ceramic. Dollar Denominations as we play cash and tourney with same chips or at least 1's, 5's, 25's and 100's. $ sing not important. So far these are my finalists.

Milano 10g which i have found for around $180
Nile Club around $180
Scroll chips around $205
Pharaohs, Majestic, and Dunes, for around same price at $210 on Apache poker

I hate chips that are too slippery and lots of ceramics i have tried i hated. All of these fit my price point and i know everyone knows this debate. We don't play heavy tournaments and we usually only have 8-10 players. Majestic chips look more like local casino chips (motor city casino) i have seen when considering the edges and they look nice im just worried about how slippery they are. Since these are pretty much at same price point what are your opinions? which ones are deff NO? I like the more casino sound and shuffling ability. Any suggestions or replies will be greatly appreciated. If anyone has some to sell let me know, maybe i'd be interested as well

Thank you!
 
Welcome, @MartinP30!

A couple questions first:
  • What stakes do you play in your cash game? What's the usual buy-in, and how many rebuys?
  • When you say...
    We don't play heavy tournaments and we usually only have 8-10 players.
    what do you mean? I assume it means you don't often play tourneys, but I just want to make sure.
 
I bought samples of Milanos and Majestics before purchasing Tikis.

Between the two CCs, I have a strong preference for the Majestics, based on my perception of quality control and also the bright and vibrant colors.
 
Welcome, @MartinP30!

A couple questions first:
  • What stakes do you play in your cash game? What's the usual buy-in, and how many rebuys?
  • When you say... what do you mean? I assume it means you don't often play tourneys, but I just want to make sure.
When we play cash games we buy-in for 50-100$. $1-2$ blinds. Tournament we play $50 buy in with $500 in chips blinds start at $1 and $2 and go up every 20 mins. Certain people do not like cash games so when they play we play a tournament to be more friendly.
 
But I can start answering some of you questions. Unfortunately, inexpensive and slippery go together in the chip world. In my experience, some cheaper ceramics aren't necessarily slippery, but they have a weird texture, and there are some spinners, which make handling them somewhat unpleasant.

I have no experience with Milanos, but I like, don't love, the Majestics, Pharaohs, and Dunes. They look great, but they are slippery. However, if you have time...

https://www.pokerchipforum.com/threads/how-to-take-majestics-from-slippery-to-grippy.34811/

I did this with some Majestics, and will testify that it works nicely, but it's a PITA, for sure. I imagine it would work similarly for the Pharaohs and Dunes, since they all seem to be made from the same material.

The 43mm Royals from Apache, on the other hand, feel better, look better, and stack better (for some reason) than the other China clays. I highly recommend them.
 
The 43mm Royals from Apache, on the other hand, feel better, look better, and stack better (for some reason) than the other China clays. I highly recommend them.
^+1 to this. Apache may be out of some denominations, but are supposed to be restocked in a couple of months if you can wait. Get samples of them if you can, it may influence your choices.
 
There are a ton of home games in SE Michigan, mostly western burbs, tho (at least in the group I poker with). Anyway, get yourself an invite, feel the chips first hand...

You can get well loved Paulsons with lots of life for a decent price.
 
Anything you buy for 30c/chip or less is going to be slippery. Of the chips you listed, I would rank them as follows:
  1. Phaoroh's Club
  2. Dunes
  3. Majestic
  4. Milano
  5. Scroll
  6. Nile Club
....with the last two cheap ceramics as being so bad as to not being worth serious consideration.

And chances are, you don't really need 500 chips, either. Getting a well-structured set with a good breakdown that matches your actual needs allows you to get better chips for about the same cash outlay.

I'd recommend 59c/chip ceramics from @ABC Gifts and Awards/BRProPoker.com as being the cheapest alternative for new high-quality chips, unless you can find a nice set of used casino ceramics or used non-denominated clay chips for less.

YMMV -- get samples before you buy anything.
 
I've got some samples of most of the sets you're looking into, happy to send them to you for cost of shipping. Just PM me. I think I have dia de los muertos, CC pharohs, CC dunes and majestics if I'm not mistaken....
 
Nexgen pro for the win. non-slippery and low price point. con: very common and thus not as secure for your cash game.
I honestly don’t like the way next gens look. I hear great things about them though

Would you consider high end plastics?
Yea if they are anything like casino chips lol. Never felt a high end plastic.

There are a ton of home games in SE Michigan, mostly western burbs, tho (at least in the group I poker with). Anyway, get yourself an invite, feel the chips first hand...

You can get well loved Paulsons with lots of life for a decent price.
Yea, I’ve actually never played at a local game with strangers unless it was charity poker. I usually play at casino or with close friends. Hopefully I get invited sometime.
 
I'm new too!

I actually bought Scrolls for my first set of chips recently and my buddies loved it! I was worried about them being slippery in the sense that it would be impossible to stack properly but the scrolls have a sort of "grippy" texture that prevents that from happening. I know you mentioned hating ceramics but I would try to buy a sample set of scrolls and anything else you can find and see if they're to your liking!
 
I own a set of Laurels (essentially a Scroll with a different design) as well as a set of Milanos.

We have an almost weekly poker game and we moved to Milanos from the Laurels because primarily they felt more like casino-type chips.

I chose the Milanos because of the clean aesthetics and easy to read black-on-white background denominations (we have some seniors in the group so they appreciate big fonts on top of the color coding).

If I were to buy a new one I would seriously take a look at the oversized Royals or the Majestics, they just look awesome and the fonts are white on black so good readability too.
 
I'm new too!

I actually bought Scrolls for my first set of chips recently and my buddies loved it! I was worried about them being slippery in the sense that it would be impossible to stack properly but the scrolls have a sort of "grippy" texture that prevents that from happening. I know you mentioned hating ceramics but I would try to buy a sample set of scrolls and anything else you can find and see if they're to your liking!
My Laurels are pretty much the same as the Scrolls, as you may see with some video reviews of the ceramics is that the QC is a little off on some which results in "spinners", meaning that in any given stack you can probably spin the chips while they lay since a number of them arent perfectly flat.

Not that I hate them, I like the durability and vibrant colors as well as the design on a lot of them. Just pointing out the QC issue
 
Welcome. I have some family that lives near you, and a buddy who lived near the Hooters on Big Beaver. Just wanted to type out the words “Big Beaver” in context, before being taken out-of-context.

Good luck with your search.
 
Welcome. I have some family that lives near you, and a buddy who lived near the Hooters on Big Beaver. Just wanted to type out the words “Big Beaver” in context, before being taken out-of-context.

Good luck with your search.
Hahaha Hooters is shut down now on "BIG BEAVER" some cantina i think opened up. I live like 2 miles from there.
 
not at all. Might be just me. for context I thought the majestics were terribly slippery.

To the op: Happy to ship you some nexgen and majestic samples. PM me. I might have a few milanos around. I'll just have to smell for them.
Nexgens have different feel depending on line...I like Multicolor Series 2..softer plastic...for a cheap chips they suprisingly nice
 
Hello everyone!
I would like to say thank you to all of you who frequent this forum. I have learned a lot as i have read many many posts on these forums and.....
Like @BGinGA said, I would also say look at the brpro offerings. I have samples of 75% give or take of what is available on brpro or apache. After handling them I was sold on the ceramics.

*I never got samples of the Nevada Jacks since I hear they are made on inferior blanks. So I cant speak to those. Check out Hobbyphilic's youtube videos, he has a detailed review on every set you mentioned.

I also picked up Laural Crown & Scroll samples and they do not compare to brpro ceramics at all. They are only slightly cheaper and have quality control and manufacture characteristics far inferior to BRP. 20200215_134030.jpg
 
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Nexgens have different feel depending on line...I like Multicolor Series 2..softer plastic...for a cheap chips they suprisingly nice
So all the nex gens i see online are all the same. Where can i find diff versions?
 
When we play cash games we buy-in for 50-100$. $1-2$ blinds.

You should either lower the blinds or increase the buy-ins. Some people only buy-in 25 big blinds deep? Seems too short to be fun - you should shoot for 40-100 big blind buy-ins minimum, and maybe even up to 200 big blinds.

Also, many on here will advise not to use the same chips for cash & tourneys.
 

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