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Chips for super microstakes home game (2 Viewers)

SeductiveOnion

SeductiveOnion

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Greetings!

I have introduced poker to my physics department and my group of graduate students and we have enjoyed playing. However, bearing in mind that we are all broke (what with being grad students and all) the only amount people are comfortable with losing a couple buyins in a given night seems to be right around (2.50cad). We play 10 handed at the moment with 1c/2c blinds. We decided on this amount as we figured worst case someone would burn through 4 buyins for 10cad and no one will feel bad. At the moment, we have been using a Bicycle branded poker set, however we have had 2 issues:

1. The are unlabeled and people seem to get mixed up pretty often
2. The Bicycle set seems to be focused towards Tournament play with only 150 of the 2 smallest denomination chips (150xWhite, 150xRed).

I'm primarily looking for a set which has
1. more of the smaller denominations (hopefully 250-300) and
2 (optional). labeled denominations.

Is there any such set that is labeled down to 1c and 5c denominations? Most I see are at minimum 25c chips. I know sampling is a must but at the moment I havent even seen any option that I *could* sample.

Glad to be posting here for the first time. I hope I'm not posting in a drastically wrong sub-forum.
 
Welcome! I run a game for our grad students as well and have found 5c/10cent to be our sweet spot, buyins for $5 or $10. We're already playing tiny stakes, can't bring pennies into it. For cheap penny options you'll have to go customs and ceramics can be cheap.


Here's the set I use for the tiny games. $20s and $100s are mostly for show. Worked out really well, clear denominations.
https://www.pokerchipforum.com/threads/the-ice-cardroom-antarctic-cash-set.98574/

Breakdown wise, you only need 80-100 of the bottom (1cent in your case), then a few hundred of the next highest. So:
80 1c
200 25c
120 $1

Is the least number of chips I would buy and gives you a bank of $170+, but this is thin and can't even fully support a full ring game of $10 buyins, I wouldn't feel comfortable. I really think, if you're buying a decent set of chips you'll move up in stakes, so my choice would be:

80 1c
200 25c
200 $1
120 $5s

Just gives you more playability, grows the bank in case you have people buying in for $20 or $50 at some point. You can also slash the 5s down to only 20, then you've still got $300 for the bank.

Good luck in grad school, I'm on my way out but this set has been wonderful for teaching broke beginners how to play.
 
Welcome!​

Hopefully, you've seen my New Members Start Here post; if not you can find a link in my signature (landscape on mobile)

Such a great first post!

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Pardon me while I am sometimes a prescriptivist, I love it when people are pedantic and get value out me being ...
SeductiveOnion said:
1. The are unlabeled and people seem to get mixed up pretty often
Click to expand...

These chips technically don't have a label or inlay as I think its all a single piece of plastic, but 'Bicycle' on the chip would be considered a label, the term which you use correctly later on is denomination or denom for short.

I think these are the chips you are referring to:

1741366676786.png



I like the Apache chips, you can get them with denominations and they go down to 5c, you can also relabel them, but that's likely going to cost the same amount as the chips themselves, and you can accomplish your goals right out of the box, better yet, they ship quickly so you'll have them in no time.

You can trust the vendor as they are a supporter here on this website. The same could be said about BRPro as well, also a great vendor and easy to work with.

Here is the set I put together for my son:

Here is his post about the chips
https://www.pokerchipforum.com/threads/the-office-u-s-version-cc-cash.127626/

This is a custom-labeled set, and the X will allow him to use them as 5c chips or, later in life, use them as 100s, or sell the set with yellow as the hundo

1741367040168.png



Another aspect that I like about this is that you can buy small and then scale up as needed. Often, first-timers overbuy or don't understand the dynamics of banking and supporting with the correct amount of chips.

I would also move up the blinds but to .05/.05, this will allow you to buy chips straight off the shelf and put them into the game without any issues.

For your game, I would buy 100 x .05, 100 x .25, and 100 x 1. If you are short, I would let people have $5 bills play. Then, take note of where you are short on chips, and you can buy 25 of those chips.


Happy chipping!
 
2.50 CAD EH? ;)

There aren't many sets with 1c denominations. I do what @merkong suggested - divide by 100/tell my players to pretend the dollar sign is a cent sign, and use $5, $25, $100, and $500 denom chips for .05/.10 no limit (and higher stakes). Players have no problems with this.

1000007182.jpg


What's your budget? I'm assuming it's not much given you're students an all, BUT if I'm wrong, check out the broken arrow group buy for Tina hybrids. You could get customs, with 1c denominations if you really wanted, and it would cost about .80 CAD/chip.

If the budget is tight, the prestige chips here have been recommended by a veteran member here:

https://www.straightpokersupplies.com/prestige-poker-chips-12g-chips-sold-by-the-roll.html

@philhut
 
Last edited:
Thinking you are not looking to spend allot, you can get a variety of chip sets for about $.18 each. one of the types like that is Poker Knights. I happen to receive a rack of 25¢ chips when I ordered $25 chips and they replaced them for free. You could buy the dollar amounts (1,2,5) and use them like they are cents and I would be happy to send you the 25¢ chips for free.
 
GreatWhiteDope said:
Thinking you are not looking to spend allot, you can get a variety of chip sets for about $.18 each. one of the types like that is Poker Knights. I happen to receive a rack of 25¢ chips when I ordered $25 chips and they replaced them for free. You could buy the dollar amounts (1,2,5) and use them like they are cents and I would be happy to send you the 25¢ chips for free.
Click to expand...
I believe Outlaws are also around that price point from Poker Store maybe? I’ve handled a buddies chips and they’re pretty nice.
 
GreatWhiteDope said:
Thinking you are not looking to spend allot, you can get a variety of chip sets for about $.18 each. one of the types like that is Poker Knights. I happen to receive a rack of 25¢ chips when I ordered $25 chips and they replaced them for free. You could buy the dollar amounts (1,2,5) and use them like they are cents and I would be happy to send you the 25¢ chips for free.
Click to expand...
Oh yeah, I didn’t see that you had some relief chips available. Good community are we.
 
Wow thank you so much for all of the responses, everyone! I really wasn't expecting so much feedback back it gives me so much relief that I will have so much input. I have to get a lot of my errands done this morning, but afterwards I will give them all a read and respond to you all!

Thanks again! :)
 
NotRealNameNoSir said:
Welcome! I run a game for our grad students as well and have found 5c/10cent to be our sweet spot, buyins for $5 or $10. We're already playing tiny stakes, can't bring pennies into it. For cheap penny options you'll have to go customs and ceramics can be cheap.


Here's the set I use for the tiny games. $20s and $100s are mostly for show. Worked out really well, clear denominations.
https://www.pokerchipforum.com/threads/the-ice-cardroom-antarctic-cash-set.98574/

Breakdown wise, you only need 80-100 of the bottom (1cent in your case), then a few hundred of the next highest. So:
80 1c
200 25c
120 $1

Is the least number of chips I would buy and gives you a bank of $170+, but this is thin and can't even fully support a full ring game of $10 buyins, I wouldn't feel comfortable. I really think, if you're buying a decent set of chips you'll move up in stakes, so my choice would be:

80 1c
200 25c
200 $1
120 $5s

Just gives you more playability, grows the bank in case you have people buying in for $20 or $50 at some point. You can also slash the 5s down to only 20, then you've still got $300 for the bank.

Good luck in grad school, I'm on my way out but this set has been wonderful for teaching broke beginners how to play.
Click to expand...

Hi! Thanks for all the suggestions. I do have a question though: is it normal to have such a large gap between the smallest and second smallest denomination? I could see someone raising for 10c and suddenly after the pot if a lot of people went in one person has all of the smallest chips?

The poker set is super gorgeous by the way! A strong contender so far :)
 
tabletalker7 said:
Semi Custom options from our good friends @BR Pro Poker are great for micro stakes games.

IMG_20200228_115314.jpg

IMG_20200228_115314.jpg

quick breakdown

IMG_20200228_115231.jpg

IMG_20200228_115231.jpg

Micro Stakes

My home game is better because of them.
Click to expand...
oh wow those are very impressive! So just so I understand the text on there that reads like "Studio", "Poker club", "western new york" is that just something you send to them and they design or would you have to have created the image entirely and they stuck it on?
 
Machine said:
Welcome!​

Hopefully, you've seen my New Members Start Here post; if not you can find a link in my signature (landscape on mobile)

Such a great first post!

Creative fun Avatar name
Punctuation
Paragraphs
bulleted lists
comprehensive message!

Pardon me while I am sometimes a prescriptivist, I love it when people are pedantic and get value out me being ...


These chips technically don't have a label or inlay as I think its all a single piece of plastic, but 'Bicycle' on the chip would be considered a label, the term which you use correctly later on is denomination or denom for short.

I think these are the chips you are referring to:

View attachment 1474544


I like the Apache chips, you can get them with denominations and they go down to 5c, you can also relabel them, but that's likely going to cost the same amount as the chips themselves, and you can accomplish your goals right out of the box, better yet, they ship quickly so you'll have them in no time.

You can trust the vendor as they are a supporter here on this website. The same could be said about BRPro as well, also a great vendor and easy to work with.

Here is the set I put together for my son:

Here is his post about the chips
https://www.pokerchipforum.com/threads/the-office-u-s-version-cc-cash.127626/

This is a custom-labeled set, and the X will allow him to use them as 5c chips or, later in life, use them as 100s, or sell the set with yellow as the hundo

View attachment 1474550


Another aspect that I like about this is that you can buy small and then scale up as needed. Often, first-timers overbuy or don't understand the dynamics of banking and supporting with the correct amount of chips.

I would also move up the blinds but to .05/.05, this will allow you to buy chips straight off the shelf and put them into the game without any issues.

For your game, I would buy 100 x .05, 100 x .25, and 100 x 1. If you are short, I would let people have $5 bills play. Then, take note of where you are short on chips, and you can buy 25 of those chips.


Happy chipping!
Click to expand...
Thanks for the info! Before I went back to school, I used to play at a friends home game so I didn't have to think about any of these details before!

You can help me with terminology again actually :D The office chips you showed that you got for your son, what is the name of the rim pattern/colour? I really like the designs on the ones you showed. I'm a big office fan so I really love the design :). The idea of labeling one of the chips as "X" is also a great way to add flexibility to the chipset.
 
SeductiveOnion said:
Hi! Thanks for all the suggestions. I do have a question though: is it normal to have such a large gap between the smallest and second smallest denomination? I could see someone raising for 10c and suddenly after the pot if a lot of people went in one person has all of the smallest chips?

The poker set is super gorgeous by the way! A strong contender so far :)
Click to expand...
Yes, that gap is common. In many games itll be $1s and $5s. I actually got 200 nickels for my game for this reason, handing out a barrel was easier and my game was limpy, but thats too many.

If you want an efficient breakdown, people will have to learn how to make change or buy more from a neighbor. In a 5cent/10cent game the nickels really should only be for the blinds and most experienced players will raise to a quarter. If that happens, just make sure to tell people they can take their nickels back instead of throwing out 5.

Thanks for the kind words! Its great, love it. Very thankful for this place.
 
SteveEH said:
2.50 CAD EH? ;)

There aren't many sets with 1c denominations. I do what @merkong suggested - divide by 100/tell my players to pretend the dollar sign is a cent sign, and use $5, $25, $100, and $500 denom chips for .05/.10 no limit (and higher stakes). Players have no problems with this.

View attachment 1475040

What's your budget? I'm assuming it's not much given you're students an all, BUT if I'm wrong, check out the broken arrow group buy for Tina hybrids. You could get customs, with 1c denominations if you really wanted, and it would cost about .80 CAD/chip.

If the budget is tight, the prestige chips here have been recommended by a veteran member here:

https://www.straightpokersupplies.com/prestige-poker-chips-12g-chips-sold-by-the-roll.html

@philhut
Click to expand...
My budget isn't toooo bad. I'm coming back to school after government work for a while, so I probably have more spending money than most in the program. I'm more hesitant on buying something too nice for such a low stakes game. I'm thinking of it more as an investment in a fun group activity
 
GreatWhiteDope said:
Thinking you are not looking to spend allot, you can get a variety of chip sets for about $.18 each. one of the types like that is Poker Knights. I happen to receive a rack of 25¢ chips when I ordered $25 chips and they replaced them for free. You could buy the dollar amounts (1,2,5) and use them like they are cents and I would be happy to send you the 25¢ chips for free.
Click to expand...
Oh wow! Thats a very generous offer! :) I really love the colour of that set as well. I am going to summarize in a final post after responding to everyone but I think after reading a lot of the posts I'm going to give it a few more weekly sessions and see if people are open to increasing to a 5c/5c game to save a bit of the hassel.
 
SeductiveOnion said:
I'm more hesitant on buying something too nice for such a low stakes game.
Click to expand...
Don’t think this way! If you have a set of beautiful whiskey glasses, can you only drink expensive whiskey from them? Is it ok to drive your Ferrari to the market?
Don’t feel funny about using nice chips on a low-stakes game.
 
Okay, so thank you to everyone that has been so kind. I have a lot to think about at the moment. I think I will give it about 3 sessions and see how people's comfort levels are with poker and if they are willing to play a 2c/5c or a 5c/5c game, which would make the selection of chips a lot easier.

Depending on that there were a lot of suggestions I like:
1. Just getting regular denominations of dividing by 100
2. Ordering down to the lowest denomination and custom ordering a chip labeled "x"
3. Fully custom ordering chips

I also like A LOT of the chip suggestions that were posted here. For my own convenience later I'm listing the chips posted in this thread:
1. Yin Yan
2. Taj Mahal
3. Outlaws
4. Poker Knights
5. Presteige Poker chips
6. BRPro poker custom
7. Iceroom

P.s. sorry I just realized there is a multi-quote button which would have saved me from a bunch of numerous different replies
 
SeductiveOnion said:
Okay, so thank you to everyone that has been so kind. I have a lot to think about at the moment. I think I will give it about 3 sessions and see how people's comfort levels are with poker and if they are willing to play a 2c/5c or a 5c/5c game, which would make the selection of chips a lot easier.

Depending on that there were a lot of suggestions I like:
1. Just getting regular denominations of dividing by 100
2. Ordering down to the lowest denomination and custom ordering a chip labeled "x"
3. Fully custom ordering chips

I also like A LOT of the chip suggestions that were posted here. For my own convenience later I'm listing the chips posted in this thread:
1. Yin Yan
2. Taj Mahal
3. Outlaws
4. Poker Knights
5. Presteige Poker chips
6. BRPro poker custom
7. Iceroom

P.s. sorry I just realized there is a multi-quote button which would have saved me from a bunch of numerous different replies
Click to expand...
Hey, just being clear that Iceroom is my own custom set. Just wanted to give an example of tiny stakes sets, they aren't for sale.
 
SeductiveOnion said:
oh wow those are very impressive! So just so I understand the text on there that reads like "Studio", "Poker club", "western new york" is that just something you send to them and they design or would you have to have created the image entirely and they stuck it on?
Click to expand...
The design is theirs. I just told them what I wanted it to say and what colors and they took care of it. They do send you proofs to approve before they make the chips so you will be happy with how they look beforehand.
 

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