A couple of newbie home game questions (1 Viewer)

[SaucyAussie]

I spend quite a bit of time on the forums but I still have so many questions!

1. Is it “OK” to start with uneven stacks, as long as the values are equal? I have a 900 chip T25 set that works great up to 16 players. But when I get to 18-20 players I run out of 25 and 100s. If I adjust everybody’s stack and I end up with a lot of wastage. So I go with two different stack sizes to maximize chip efficiency. Nobody has complained yet, but I’m waiting.

2. Do you comp your own tourney buy in or otherwise try to recover some of your costs? I haven’t done this yet, but this is getting expensive!

3. What’s the best resource for “how-to” calculate side pots? I’d love a Chris M. video. I get the concept of it, but some guys do it in a couple of seconds while I’m still teaching for my abacus.

Thanks all!

 

[upNdown]

1. yes, that's fine. just make sure there are enough of each chip on each table, and everything will work itself out

2. no. Opinions vary on this, but taking more money from your players than you're paying out is generally illegal in every US state that I'm aware of, so you're treading some dangerous waters, legally speaking if they're paying for your buyin.

3. Hopefully somebody else will help with a resource. Frankly, this is a concern. If you can't intuitively separate a side pot, you probably shouldn't be running a tournament. I don't mean that to be insulting, I'm just being practical and honest. Ideally you'd want to make sure that there's at least one person at each table who is honest and impartial and has enough tournament poker savvy to be able to handle sidepots and any other atypical situation that may arise.

 

[TheOffalo]

1. Absolutely, fine. If you have rebuys, you can also just have starting stacks of the rebuys in higher denoms and people can make change.

2. I've played in tournaments where hosts' entry is comped and also not. As long as the players are agreeable to it.

3. I dunno if there's a "resource". Easiest way, for me at least, is to just match amounts. Someone's in for $20, someone else is all in for $10, someone else is all in for $3. Put $3 x 3 into the pot that the shortest stack is in for, put 2 stacks of $7 into the side pot, etc.

 

[legonick]

I spend quite a bit of time on the forums but I still have so many questions!

1. Is it “OK” to start with uneven stacks, as long as the values are equal? I have a 900 chip T25 set that works great up to 16 players. But when I get to 18-20 players I run out of 25 and 100s. If I adjust everybody’s stack and I end up with a lot of wastage. So I go with two different stack sizes to maximize chip efficiency. Nobody has complained yet, but I’m waiting.

2. Do you comp your own tourney buy in or otherwise try to recover some of your costs? I haven’t done this yet, but this is getting expensive!

3. What’s the best resource for “how-to” calculate side pots? I’d love a Chris M. video. I get the concept of it, but some guys do it in a couple of seconds while I’m still teaching for my abacus.

Thanks all!

1. Not a fan, but you gotta do what you gotta do. A nice, clean table with the same starting stack everywhere looks so good! Good excuse to buy more chips.
2. No. It's hard to get a game, although I applaud you if you are hitting 18 - 20 players! It's tough to get 9 in my neck of the woods. (What's your buy-in? How did you build your player base?) But back to your original question, I wouldn't want to rock the boat with my players. I get enjoyment out of hosting - it's good to see friends, I enjoy the cards, I enjoy the season aspect, I enjoy imbibing in bourbon, etc. Also, usually illegal.
3. Yeah it's best to think of it like "match the lowest". Lowest match pile is the main pot, then you have a side pot. If it's the somewhat rare case of multiple all-ins, you can have multiple side pots. I play a bar league with many dealers, and I think practice makes perfect, because they are magical at creating side pots. So fast and efficient, and very rarely get it wrong. I think they "show off" a bit when doing it, so sometimes (rarely) they make a mistake, but it seems like someone always catches it.

 

[SaucyAussie]

Yeah I didn’t mean to suggest I don’t know how to do side pots. But there are some good resources out there for things like coloring up, dealing, shuffling, dead button rule, etc, just looking for a more practical “best practice”.

I think I just need to jump in and do it instead of letting the more experienced players take care of it.

 

[Legend5555]

1. Yes. As long as change making at the table isn't an issue.

2. No. No. No. If you are spending more on running a game then you are comfortable doing, then doing run them, or let people know you aren't going to be providing food and beverage anymore. We usually provide food, but it's BYOB.

3. It's easy if it's just a single side pot. If a short stack player goes all in and two other raise for more, just take the 2x that amount out of the combined total bets from the other two players and add that to the main pot with the short stacked player chips.

If a short stacked player goes all in for less that what the other two have bet, take the difference of the final bet and the short stacked all in, multiply by 2, and make that the side pot.

If you have a game where you are frequently dealing with more than one side pot at a time, then either it's a very good game, or your blind structure is really bad.

 

[moose]

2. I have a $5 late fee. Full stack if you arrive and pay 10 minutes before tourney start. Less than 10 minutes or after tourney begins, you lose 10%. A $5 late fee gets you a full stack. I usually get $5-$10 every tourney. Helps pay for new cards etc and makes sure the tourney starts on time without a bunch of late stragglers.

 

[Billy Baroo]

I’ll rock the boat on question #2 a little…

There is nothing wrong in comping your buy in if you’re getting 16+ players at your tournaments. Let’s just say for arguments sake that you have a two table tourney of 8 players per table…16 total players. If you comp your buy in, that puts 15 buy-ins into the prize pool. Now, let’s say you’re going to pay 4 places with those 15 buy-ins. As long as 4th place gets at least their money back, you’re good IMO. I play in a monthly tournament that the host regularly gets 30+ players at $150 a pop and NOBODY has one problem with him comping his entry for all of his troubles organizing and running his events. He probably provides close to that entry fee in food anyways. His way of dealing with late players is to issue bonus chips for those who arrive early…usually 15 minutes or more early.

I thought I knew every game out in my neck of the woods…they’re pretty juicy here in the Quay lol

 

[Machine]

#2) has been asked and answered several times, its likely illegal, and likely not a big deal in your game

Here is the last time it was answered

 

[SaucyAussie]

I thought I knew every game out in my neck of the woods…they’re pretty juicy here in the Quay lol

Ha! We play for peanuts compared to you guys.

 

[kaida]

Yeah I didn’t mean to suggest I don’t know how to do side pots. But there are some good resources out there for things like coloring up, dealing, shuffling, dead button rule, etc, just looking for a more practical “best practice”.

I think I just need to jump in and do it instead of letting the more experienced players take care of it.

I'd highly recommend @Chris Manzoni 's youtube channel. He discusses various aspects of running home tournaments that will clearly explain how and why he does things at his large home games. From there, you can adapt those concepts to your game.

Some of his videos that will be of interest:

Video 18 - Home Poker Tournament Tutorial - The PERFECT Starting Stack, Breakdown & Structure
Video 19 - Home Poker Tournament Tutorial - Coloring Up!
Video 25 - Home Poker Tournament Tutorial - SEATING
Poker Video 28 Home Poker Tutorial PLAYING CARDS & SHUFFLING

 

[SaucyAussie]

I'd highly recommend @Chris Manzoni 's youtube channel. He discusses various aspects of running home tournaments that will clearly explain how and why he does things at his large home games. From there, you can adapt those concepts to your game.

Some of his videos that will be of interest:

Video 18 - Home Poker Tournament Tutorial - The PERFECT Starting Stack, Breakdown & Structure
Video 19 - Home Poker Tournament Tutorial - Coloring Up!
Video 25 - Home Poker Tournament Tutorial - SEATING
Poker Video 28 Home Poker Tutorial PLAYING CARDS & SHUFFLING

Exactly. I’d love to see a similar video on multi side pots and other complicated situations.

 

[detroitdad]

I spend quite a bit of time on the forums but I still have so many questions!

1. Is it “OK” to start with uneven stacks, as long as the values are equal? I have a 900 chip T25 set that works great up to 16 players. But when I get to 18-20 players I run out of 25 and 100s. If I adjust everybody’s stack and I end up with a lot of wastage. So I go with two different stack sizes to maximize chip efficiency. Nobody has complained yet, but I’m waiting.

2. Do you comp your own tourney buy in or otherwise try to recover some of your costs? I haven’t done this yet, but this is getting expensive!

3. What’s the best resource for “how-to” calculate side pots? I’d love a Chris M. video. I get the concept of it, but some guys do it in a couple of seconds while I’m still teaching for my abacus.

Thanks all!

1. Yes. I will sometimes do this for cash or tourney stacks

2. Never

3. I outsource to to @Marc Hedrick

 

[Jake14mw]

I spend quite a bit of time on the forums but I still have so many questions!

1. Is it “OK” to start with uneven stacks, as long as the values are equal? I have a 900 chip T25 set that works great up to 16 players. But when I get to 18-20 players I run out of 25 and 100s. If I adjust everybody’s stack and I end up with a lot of wastage. So I go with two different stack sizes to maximize chip efficiency. Nobody has complained yet, but I’m waiting.

2. Do you comp your own tourney buy in or otherwise try to recover some of your costs? I haven’t done this yet, but this is getting expensive!

3. What’s the best resource for “how-to” calculate side pots? I’d love a Chris M. video. I get the concept of it, but some guys do it in a couple of seconds while I’m still teaching for my abacus.

Thanks all!

1) There should be no issue at all with this. If someone's OCD causes them to have an issue with this, then that's their problem.
2) No.
3) I'm sure someone will post a good video/link with helpful instructions on this.

 

[SaucyAussie]

Thanks all, very useful info.

Another one that's kind of bugged me is how many players to put on a table. I get the impression that many of you here like playing a full table, 9 or 10 players, but I prefer the 6-8 range.

If I have 16, I'll do two tables of 8, if have 18, I'll add an extra table and play 6 per.

The tricky number for me is 17. 9 is really tight on my tables but playing 5 handed for a couple of hours doesn't seem right either.

Same question comes up when I go to the final table - usually I'll let two tables run 4-handed, and when one table drops to 3, I'll combine for a final table of 7.

Should I be consolidating sooner than that?

 

[Legend5555]

I won't do 10. Flat out won't ever do it. I'll do 9 though over 3 tables of 6. I think 8 is the sweet spot.

 

[legonick]

Thanks all, very useful info.

Another one that's kind of bugged me is how many players to put on a table. I get the impression that many of you here like playing a full table, 9 or 10 players, but I prefer the 6-8 range.

If I have 16, I'll do two tables of 8, if have 18, I'll add an extra table and play 6 per.

The tricky number for me is 17. 9 is really tight on my tables but playing 5 handed for a couple of hours doesn't seem right either.

Same question comes up when I go to the final table - usually I'll let two tables run 4-handed, and when one table drops to 3, I'll combine for a final table of 7.

Should I be consolidating sooner than that?

For this, I think you should be sticking to more standard tournament rules, keeping it even, but breaking tables to hit 9. Some tournaments even kick off the final table at 10, but I think it's fine to kick off the final table at 9. However, I enjoy fuller-ring games. As long as your players are OK with some of the non-standard table sizes you are using when at, say, 18 players, I think it's fine.

 

[philhut]

2. Do you comp your own tourney buy in or otherwise try to recover some of your costs? I haven’t done this yet, but this is getting expensive!

unless you are running a card room and or have muscle/protection this action will eventually have either law enforcement or less friendly visitors knocking on your door so to speak. I suggest since you plan to have a home game that a portion of the pot is set aside for meals/snacks. Ie if you are ordering pizza or sandwiches/chips and players are in agreement that this be the mealtime break dinner or something then it makes sense to take this amount out of the pot. Pizza for ~16 players could easily cost 1-2 buy-in's or more. Hosting home games is not about profiteering as much fun as that would be. A game where everyone just shares the cost openly of food etc is much more contusive to fun and continued gaming than the perception of the host scheming players in and hustling free games out of the event. Other times you can simply make the games BYOB and also for food if some players are vegetarian /picky or difficult.

On the other side courteous guests bring beer, snacks, whiskey, entertainment, gifts etc... for the host and or party to enjoy.

 

[SaucyAussie]

OK, I'm going to isolate all my dumb questions to this thread, here's a couple that came up this weekend -

1. Is it ok to shorten the levels later in the tournament? Eg. the first 10 levels are 20 minutes, then switch to 15 minutes after that. The idea being that once we get down to the business end, things wrap up pretty quickly. I guess I could achieve the same thing by cutting out a level, but just thinking out loud.

2. I know strictly speaking seating should be random. But my little neighborhood home game has attracted some pretty good players. So, I have my original core group of neighbors (who are struggling to figure out cut cards), going up against guys who play several times a week and visit the casinos regularly.

This weekend I put all the really good players on one table, and the neighborhood guys on another table. That way a few of the neighbors make it to the last table and have a punchers chance at the money. Keep in mind that this is only a $20 buy in, so nobody is getting too worked up about it.

Thoughts?

 

[ekricket]

Yeah I didn’t mean to suggest I don’t know how to do side pots. But there are some good resources out there for things like coloring up, dealing, shuffling, dead button rule, etc, just looking for a more practical “best practice”.

I think I just need to jump in and do it instead of letting the more experienced players take care of it.

One very very important thing about side pots and it helps tremendously with managing them - building them is only half of it, probably the easiest half if you just match like has been mentioned - it is the AWARDING of the side pots that’s usually the issue. Everyone that still has cards wants to jump in and start claiming this pot or that pot, but you need to shut that shit down.


Award the side pots in the opposite order they were created - the last pot created us the first one awarded. Don’t award anything to anyone until ONLY the people involved in the last created pot show their cards and only award that pot.
Turn any losing hands face down but keep the winning hand up.
Move to the next pot, and compare hands of players in that pot and award it, turning the losers face down and leaving the winner up. If somebody lost a previous pot they are no longer in this pot because their hand has already been beat.
You will finally reach a main pot that has only the all in player and typically one other hand ( ties are possible from the previous side pot) and then award the last pot to the winning hand.

 

[legonick]

OK, I'm going to isolate all my dumb questions to this thread, here's a couple that came up this weekend -

1. Is it ok to shorten the levels later in the tournament? Eg. the first 10 levels are 20 minutes, then switch to 15 minutes after that. The idea being that once we get down to the business end, things wrap up pretty quickly. I guess I could achieve the same thing by cutting out a level, but just thinking out loud.

2. I know strictly speaking seating should be random. But my little neighborhood home game has attracted some pretty good players. So, I have my original core group of neighbors (who are struggling to figure out cut cards), going up against guys who play several times a week and visit the casinos regularly.

This weekend I put all the really good players on one table, and the neighborhood guys on another table. That way a few of the neighbors make it to the last table and have a punchers chance at the money. Keep in mind that this is only a $20 buy in, so nobody is getting too worked up about it.

Thoughts?

1. I guess you could, but I don't think that's standard, and I'm not a fan. The acceleration should come from the blind amounts going up.
2. How do you do it? Most of the "grinders" aren't interested in dinking around for $20. If they want real action, they'll just swing by a card room or casino. I'm impressed! That said, I'm not a fan of non-randomized seating, but I see why you did it. You may end up with 2 games as I can see the casuals getting annoyed being beat and not feeling like they ever have a chance at winning (over time), and the card sharks being annoyed about the speed of play, etc., and getting annoyed at the low stakes. But if you can keep 1 bigger game, all the more power to you! That's kind of my dream game, to have good players, and to have casuals that are loving the game and learning and getting better. But as to your original questions, maybe keep doing it, but at least randomize the seating at each of the tables?

 

[upNdown]

OK, I'm going to isolate all my dumb questions to this thread, here's a couple that came up this weekend -

1. Is it ok to shorten the levels later in the tournament? Eg. the first 10 levels are 20 minutes, then switch to 15 minutes after that. The idea being that once we get down to the business end, things wrap up pretty quickly. I guess I could achieve the same thing by cutting out a level, but just thinking out loud.

2. I know strictly speaking seating should be random. But my little neighborhood home game has attracted some pretty good players. So, I have my original core group of neighbors (who are struggling to figure out cut cards), going up against guys who play several times a week and visit the casinos regularly.

This weekend I put all the really good players on one table, and the neighborhood guys on another table. That way a few of the neighbors make it to the last table and have a punchers chance at the money. Keep in mind that this is only a $20 buy in, so nobody is getting too worked up about it.

Thoughts?

1) I’ve seen casinos that shorten levels later in the tournament. I don’t care for it personally - I’d rather they lengthen the levels later in the tournament, and I’ve seen that too. It’s all up to you and what your players like. My opinion is that it’s a bad idea because you’re effectively skewing the tournament away from skill, more toward luck, at the point of the tournament where where the money is on the line. But maybe increasing the luck factor is more important to you, considering #2

2) if everybody there is a good sport about it, then great! I wouldn’t like it if I had to fight through all the strongest players to get to the final table. But I can always choose not to come back, right?
It really seems more like a gimmicky, single night solution (Tonight is pros vs amateurs) than a viable long term strategy. Like, how do you decide who gets to play on the amateur table? And what happens when one of them starts improving quicker than the others? Does he get punished by being reassigned to the more skilled table? I think a lot of people here will suggest that you just have separate poker nights - one for the good players and one for the bad ones. I dunno. But it’s worth pointing out that EVERY tournament field has players of mixed skills, but the less skilled players keep coming back, hoping they’ll get lucky.

 

[Jake14mw]

OK, I'm going to isolate all my dumb questions to this thread, here's a couple that came up this weekend -

1. Is it ok to shorten the levels later in the tournament? Eg. the first 10 levels are 20 minutes, then switch to 15 minutes after that. The idea being that once we get down to the business end, things wrap up pretty quickly. I guess I could achieve the same thing by cutting out a level, but just thinking out loud.

2. I know strictly speaking seating should be random. But my little neighborhood home game has attracted some pretty good players. So, I have my original core group of neighbors (who are struggling to figure out cut cards), going up against guys who play several times a week and visit the casinos regularly.

This weekend I put all the really good players on one table, and the neighborhood guys on another table. That way a few of the neighbors make it to the last table and have a punchers chance at the money. Keep in mind that this is only a $20 buy in, so nobody is getting too worked up about it.

Thoughts?

1) I'd love to hear some opinions on this. I have done this in reverse at times. Having shorter rounds earlier, and then more normal lengths later.
2) I'm all for being flexible with seating, mostly to accomodate new players being able to play with at least some people that they know. But doing it the way that you describe I think is just too much of an advantage for someone playing at the easy table once the merge happens. I don't think new players should have any expectation of winning much against better players. As you say, it's only $20, they will come back based on whether the game is fun, not whether or not they win money. If they have fun for a few games, they will start to get better and put themselves in a better position to be more competitive.

 

[Josh Kifer]

1. It's fine. I intentionally do it on some sets to get more hundos on the table during a tourney without giving everyone big stacks.

2. No. Making any money thru the poker game by the game would be crossing a line for me and make it a no-no. I would say a credit would do the same. It's really not that expensive when chipping is my main hobby, as I own everything and they come over. I don't provide anything but space and dealing.

But, they will toss me a tip sometimes or bring beer for everyone. To me, that's even enough. I love my game.

3. Honestly, easiest way is to keep a clean pot, make change and put the totals in front of each position per player (yes, I know some people hate this, but it keeps my math right and keeps it easy if something ends up having a mistake), then match smallest stacks, then move on up. @natumes liked my process when I was sober....

 

[Goldfish]

Raking a game is generally considered illegal….. but nothing illegal about charging for toilet paper. $5 a square sounds about right.

 

[Josh Kifer]

Raking a game is generally considered illegal….. but nothing illegal about charging for toilet paper. $5 a square sounds about right.

Cigarettes are free. Matches are five bucks a stick, eh?