Are Unicorn All-Clay chips good for a beginner set? (1 Viewer)

[pierzinho]

Hey everyone,

I’m about to buy my first proper poker chip set and I’m leaning toward the Unicorn Casino All-Clay 500-piece set (9 g). I’ve read a bunch of reviews saying they feel really close to real casino chips — muted sound, nice texture, etc.

I saw these on @Hobbyphilic Amazon page, and I was wondering if they're legit, and a good value for buck set.

This is the link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07YBW4T94/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_bdcrb_top?ie=UTF8

Any advice appreciated. Thank you!

 

[Labrat]

Get samples. These are essentially injection molded Nexgen Pro poker chips.

I had a set of Dunes commemoratives which is what these chips are based off of and they were slippery as ice, in my opinion. Not horrible, but certainly nowhere near a casino chip.

I read the first review and it pegged my BS detector:

As someone who has played table games at over a dozen casinos around the world, I can tell you these are as close as it gets to real casino chips; they look, feel, and sound amazing. I would have a real hard time distinguishing between the real thing while blindfolded and going based on feel and sound alone. The All Clay set is a bit pricey, but well worth the money if you're looking for that authentic feel. I've been searching for years for a set that doesn't feel like cheap, smooth, heavy plastic and this is it!


EDIT: Just noticed this was your first post. Welcome to PCF!

 

[Labrat]

Oh, and "All Clay?"

 

[Bacon Dad]

If your small blind is $1 or more, then these could work for you. Check your math on how much money your game typically will have on the table at the end of the night so you have enough chips to cover it.

Shame you can’t get a sample to feel them first. Being at a price point of less than 30-cents per chip, they are going to feel, sound, smell, and taste like plastic chips. I don’t think these chips have any clay in them. If you like the look of these chips, buy them and never log onto this forum again. EVER!!! This forum will make you a poor man!!

You will find that most of us, if not all, will not buy chips like this. Not because they are bad, but because we know what better chips feel like and would rather invest more money on a better set of chips. That said, these could be perfect for you depending on your budget and needs.

 

[jamesjkim]

These were one of the few I bought first in my journey. Fairly immediately returned back to Amazon - not the casino chip feel I was looking for. Thankfully it’s easy to return with Amazon. They’re not terrible but in no way are they a Paulson.

 

[Beakertwang]

They’re fine for the price, but they are slippery, as noted above.

Don’t get a pre-assembled set. There’s no reason you would need a $1 chip and a $1000 chip. There are other vendors that make as good or better chips where you can customize your quantities to suit your needs.

I thought someone on here mentioned the new NexGen chips are improved over the older, slippery version, but don’t hold me to that.

 

[Beakertwang]

Some questions for you:

• Do you play cash or tourneys?
• If cash, what stakes?
• How many players?
• What’s your chipping budget?

Welcome to the forum!

 

[pierzinho]

hey everyone, thanks a ton for all the input, super helpful stuff.

to answer a few of the questions:
i mostly play cash games with 6–8 players, low stakes (€0.05/€0.10). i’d probably just use the chip values as cent amounts (like $10 = 10c, $100 = €1, etc).
i’m based in italy, so ideally something that ships within the EU would be great.
My budget would be around €200, but can spend a bit more (or maybe get some of my mates to chip in) if we can get a nice set.

for context, i’m a broke college student just playing with my boys, but i still wanted to get something that actually feels nice and not like really cheap plastic ones I have. the unicorn set was just one of the first ones i saw with decent reviews, but i’m happy to take advice from people who know what they’re talking about.

i’d love some suggestions for solid sets that are good for beginners, relatively cheap, but still feel somewhat nice, if that makes sense.

 

[jamesjkim]

If your budget is around the price of the Unicorns, I highly recommend getting in on @justincarothers group buy for a set of hybrids. He has lots of stock designs or you can make a custom one. In addition, you can customize the chip breakdown - as others have mentioned, the Unicorn breakdown is far from ideal.

You could look in the classifieds for the same as they come up fairly regularly.

 

[justsomedude]

Do they hold a flame?

 

[Gus]

The Unicorn chips are fine for a budget poker chip. You're choosing from a couple different chip styles at this ~$0.25/chip price point and most folks here on PCF have moved on to pricier options for a variety of reasons. Best not to obsess too much over a smaller purchase like this, grab the unicorn chips, get your friends together and have some fun.

Unicorns = plastic injection molded chips with no metal insert. A little lighter weight, and a nice soft feel
"Die Slug" = hard ABS plastic chips with a metal core for weight. Clackier, slippery, heavier
China Clay = softer feel, grippier

Hobbyphilic's YouTube channel is your best bet for seeing different chips being handled and talked about.

One of the trickiest parts of this budget chip market is the uncertainty around product quality. Are you getting the original unicorn chips that are pretty good, or have they been knocked off, made cheaper, with a different material, etc. I've been sort of collecting budget chips lately and it's amazing to see chips sold from different sites arriving and simply being different chips... some with plastic flashing left on the edges, others with bad printing, etc... meaning they're not coming from the same factory, and are likely being undercut as sellers chase margins.

The TINA chips here, marketed by Justin Carothers / Broken Arrow are widely seen as superior to most of the budget chip options. They'll be closer to $0.50 each, and may have a significant wait time if you're joining a group buy. So if you're considering $150 for a set of unicorns delivered tomorrow, or $300 for some nicer TINA chips delivered in January... well, it's an option!

None of this is meant to demean or otherwise be negative about budget chips. Getting together to play with friends is the best thing, and the chips hardly matter in the grand scheme of things.

 

[Pippa]

Hey everyone,

I’m about to buy my first proper poker chip set and I’m leaning toward the Unicorn Casino All-Clay 500-piece set (9 g). I’ve read a bunch of reviews saying they feel really close to real casino chips — muted sound, nice texture, etc.

I saw these on @Hobbyphilic Amazon page, and I was wondering if they're legit, and a good value for buck set.

This is the link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07YBW4T94/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_bdcrb_top?ie=UTF8

Any advice appreciated. Thank you!

CIAO E BENVENUTO
WELCOME TO THE FAMILY
if you want to talk about this you can send me a PM
I'm italian btw

paolo

 

[Gus]

Quick demonstration. These chips are cheap slugged ABS plastic. They’d likely be sold under the same description on different sites.

-The orange weigh 10% more
-the purple are slightly larger diameter
-The orange have likely been ground down or tumbled or otherwise reworked to remove the plastic flashing that you can see on the purple chips. Or they were made on a higher quality machine, or perhaps are a different plastic entirely
-on closer inspection the suits on the faces are slightly different, as are the dot/dash patterns

The easiest way to avoid the issue of getting something you didn’t want (poorer quality than expected) is to first order samples or the lowest quantity offered, usually 25 chips. Then if you like them you can order the full set.

 

[BigGrizz]

For not much more money you can get Olympus chips. Since their release like a month ago, they have blown out the value proposition of early tier chips. With Olympus on the market, there is basically no reason to get things like unicorns, monte carlos, or casino royales. I honestly think they even kill the value proposition of nexgens, which tend to be pretty popular.

 

[Gus]

For not much more money you can get Olympus chips. Since their release like a month ago, they have blown out the value proposition of early tier chips. With Olympus on the market, there is basically no reason to get things like unicorns, monte carlos, or casino royales. I honestly think they even kill the value proposition of nexgens, which tend to be pretty popular.

Poster is in Italy I think and posted an Amazon link for his source.

I’m not familiar with what’s available where but it seems like Western Europe has a lot fewer options.

@pierzinho can you see if there’s any sellers of Olympus chips for your region? Hobbyphilic just put out a video of them recently if you haven’t seen it already.

 

[BigGrizz]

Oh for italy that might not be an option. For the US though, Olympus just killed the cheap chip market IMO. Its like if Majestics just got their price cut in half. ABS chips, pre-made ceramics, most china clays... the value proposition on the Olympus chips just murdered all these on the market.

Like Apache should be very worried because the value proposition of over half they chips just fell out.

 

[DrStrange]

This sort of chip is an acceptable first step for a budget conscious buyer. The unicorns aren't clay. They aren't casino quality. The unicorns are a huge upgrade to dice chips. They will serve you well enough considering the price point.

There are far better quality chips, but they are expensive and can be harder to find. Plus, international chippers have more difficulties in that they have fewer options and typically face higher costs including import taxes and shipping costs (and delays).

Getting samples is generally good advice to people buying chips for the first few times. The more you are looking to spend, the more you should be check out samples first. OP is planning to spend less than $200. It probably wouldn't be a tragedy if he didn't like the chips once he got them in play. I'd be a stronger proponent for samples if OP were looking to spend $1,000+.

As you can see, there are many more chipping options. Most of them are much more expensive. Get samples before you jump into these chips. There are often strong opinions about such sets. You want to be sure of your decision before spending several thousand dollars on fancy chips.

Good luck! It can be a wild ride that can prove to become an expensive hobby -=- DrStrange

 

[Beakertwang]

i mostly play cash games with 6–8 players, low stakes (€0.05/€0.10). i’d probably just use the chip values as cent amounts (like $10 = 10c, $100 = €1, etc).

If you play .05/.10, you could just use 5/25/100/500, with or without currency symbol's, and use them as cents.

Something like this would work great for your game.
5 x 100
25 x 200
100 x 150
500x 50

That would give you a bankroll of $445. If you think that isn’t enough, do 100/200/200/100, and let €20 notes play.

 

[mintyfreshtaste]

Get samples. These are essentially injection molded Nexgen Pro poker chips.

I had a set of Dunes commemoratives which is what these chips are based off of and they were slippery as ice, in my opinion. Not horrible, but certainly nowhere near a casino chip.

I read the first review and it pegged my BS detector:

As someone who has played table games at over a dozen casinos around the world, I can tell you these are as close as it gets to real casino chips; they look, feel, and sound amazing. I would have a real hard time distinguishing between the real thing while blindfolded and going based on feel and sound alone. The All Clay set is a bit pricey, but well worth the money if you're looking for that authentic feel. I've been searching for years for a set that doesn't feel like cheap, smooth, heavy plastic and this is it!


EDIT: Just noticed this was your first post. Welcome to PCF!

Screams ChatGPT review to me.

 

[RocAFella1]

@UnicornFlash

 

[Labrat]

Screams ChatGPT review to me.

It screams something, that's for sure.

 

[WedgeRock]

@UnicornFlash

@narwhal (OP, it's a condition precedent on PCF...50% of responses must be a snarky, obscure comment that won't make sense to newer users...ignore us.)

OP, welcome to PCF.

I think @DrStrange nails it. These are an upgrade, but they are not clay and are not casino quality. They may be good enough for your needs, but there are a lot of better options out there (with higher price tags).

Get samples, figure out the best chip you can get for your budget, and order those. If you start at or near the bottom and later order better chips, you've wasted money on the lesser set, because you can't resell them, at least not anywhere near what you paid for them.

Also, as a general rule, buy poker chips from a poker supplier/retailer, not Amazon.

 

[LowerBama1714]

Less clay…more cotton.