I run a home game with friends at .25/.25 or .25/.50 and we find the stacks awkward. Either too big or too small, coloring WAY too often. With 500 chips (100 $0.25, 175 $1, 150 $5, 75 $25), what denominations should I give players when they buy in for 25, 50, 100, etc.? Anyone have a similar experience struggling to nail the right stacks?
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Cash Game Running .25/.50 home cash games. Min/max buy-in? (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter jackb205
- Start date
This
If possible I would add 50 * $5 chips. I almost exclusively use 12 * 25 cents, 17 * $1 chips and 16 * $5 chips for a $100 buy-in.
Friday night we are upping the steaks to a $200 buy in. I'm doing 20 * $1 chips, 20 * $5 chips, four * $20 chips.
I wrote a post just for you, Optimal Chip Break Down
Could never be too big, could it?
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My game is usually 25¢/25¢ with $25 buy in, and I find 8 x 25¢, 13 x $1 and 2 x $5 starting stacks work well, as people use the fracs pretty much exclusively for the blinds.
JustinInMN
4 of a Kind
With this breakdown you can do 8 stacks of 12/17/6 of 25¢/1/5 to start. But after that you can do 10 more add ons of 0/0/10.
Now that's assuming you are doing buy ins of 50. If you do buy ins of 100, then I can see that you are very quickly running out of quarters, singles and fives.
All this to say, I think adding 100-150 fives would seem pretty helpful.
My guess is the awkwardness you are sensing is that you have to break into the 25s pretty quickly and there just aren't a lot of fives on the table to break them when needed.
MrCatPants
Full House
You are short on 5s.
Too many fracs is a thing.
Starting stacks of 8/23/the rest in fives works well. 8/18/x if you are 9 players. 8/18 for 9 players and 8/13 for the last person if 10.
Too many fracs is a thing.
Starting stacks of 8/23/the rest in fives works well. 8/18/x if you are 9 players. 8/18 for 9 players and 8/13 for the last person if 10.
Agree with the points above.
Couple of ways you could do it:
For the first 5 buy ins, everyone gets a barrel of fracs and ones, this gets all the fracs out
20x 0.25
20x $1
= $25
You then fill in the rest with the rest of your $1s and $5s up to their buyin, +5/10/15 x $5s etc:
I’ve varied this a little, don’t think you need more fracs, just get all 100 out on the table and folk who buy in 6th onwards/rebuy can make change.
I found 8 each a little light for .25/.50, 12 each worked better for me if you issue them out. For $0.5/$1 I give out 8 fracs.
You have enough bank, but light on $5s like MrCarParts said. It depends on your player base, how aggressive with rebuys etc, but I regularly issue out 300+ $5s in a 0.25/50 game. Recommend you buy another 150x $5s and you’re golden.
I’ve given all players a barrel of fracs before (20 each), but that can end up with too many. After a few all ins/ big pots, a few players end up with towers of them that don’t see play:
GL!
Couple of ways you could do it:
For the first 5 buy ins, everyone gets a barrel of fracs and ones, this gets all the fracs out
20x 0.25
20x $1
= $25
You then fill in the rest with the rest of your $1s and $5s up to their buyin, +5/10/15 x $5s etc:
I’ve varied this a little, don’t think you need more fracs, just get all 100 out on the table and folk who buy in 6th onwards/rebuy can make change.
I found 8 each a little light for .25/.50, 12 each worked better for me if you issue them out. For $0.5/$1 I give out 8 fracs.
You have enough bank, but light on $5s like MrCarParts said. It depends on your player base, how aggressive with rebuys etc, but I regularly issue out 300+ $5s in a 0.25/50 game. Recommend you buy another 150x $5s and you’re golden.
I’ve given all players a barrel of fracs before (20 each), but that can end up with too many. After a few all ins/ big pots, a few players end up with towers of them that don’t see play:
GL!
I agree with @Kam on handing out (with 100 fracs) 20 fracs and 20 $1's to the first five players, then filling in with $5's. That gets all the fracs out. And with the rest of the 1's, hand out $20 and then add in the $5's you need to make your starting stacks of $50 of $!00. So that would look like 20/20/5 for the first five players of .25/$1/5 and then one more $5 for the ones that don't get the fracs. When you have your chips stored in racks, which I recommend, it makes it really easy to hand out.
I'll admit when I started out, I had all my chips in a Versa 500 chip case, so they weren't in racks (that do 20 x 5, the 20 a barrel) so it didn't make sense at first to hand out in barrels, which is really fast and easy. I would do 12/12/7 for $50. That seemed to make sense, but when I made them before the game, it took way more time to prepare than doing by the barrel. I have since come around, and am way happier, and less stressful.
I'll admit when I started out, I had all my chips in a Versa 500 chip case, so they weren't in racks (that do 20 x 5, the 20 a barrel) so it didn't make sense at first to hand out in barrels, which is really fast and easy. I would do 12/12/7 for $50. That seemed to make sense, but when I made them before the game, it took way more time to prepare than doing by the barrel. I have since come around, and am way happier, and less stressful.
MrCatPants
Full House
I'm ok with the frac stacks - but, 100 is too many IMO. 3 barrels and you are done.
Even less if it's a .50/.50 game with .50 fracs.
Even less if it's a .50/.50 game with .50 fracs.
JustinInMN
4 of a Kind
The OP's breakdown is fine as far as quarters go. And as long as all 100 quarters and 175 singles get on the table right away, there should be enough change to go around to break the fives.
The issue here is there aren't enough fives to break the twenty-fives and they have to come into play as soon as there is 800 on the table. At 100 a buy-in, then there's nothing else but 25s left in the bank as soon as the first eight players buy in. A better ratio of 5s to 25s would be something like 250:50.
So yes, we can discuss our preferences with the quarters, bottom like is 100 is good enough for all options here. But no matter where you come down on the quarters, the main issue is we need at least another 100-150 fives here. #MoreFives
The issue here is there aren't enough fives to break the twenty-fives and they have to come into play as soon as there is 800 on the table. At 100 a buy-in, then there's nothing else but 25s left in the bank as soon as the first eight players buy in. A better ratio of 5s to 25s would be something like 250:50.
So yes, we can discuss our preferences with the quarters, bottom like is 100 is good enough for all options here. But no matter where you come down on the quarters, the main issue is we need at least another 100-150 fives here. #MoreFives
Yeah, I do the same. Whatever breakdown you go with, get individual racks setup so as folk buy in, hand ‘em a rack and good to go (here’s an example of the game last year that ended up with too many fracs):
RocAFella1
Royal Flush
100 $0.25
200 $1
400 $5
80 $25
20 $100
200 $1
400 $5
80 $25
20 $100
Yeah def 200 $1's. I believe OP has 175 because he has TINA chips, which come in 25 a time. I think OP should get 25 more $1s in addition to the $5's everyone agrees he needs. That way he can hand out a barrel of $1's to all 9 or 10 players.
For a $50 buy in (or less), I think you can get by with 200 $5's, but for $100 buy ins, def agree 300 or 400 is better.
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Regarding my post of handing out 5 barrels of fracs, and then none to the other 4 or 5 players, I have my players do change with the ones who got fracs, like has been said previously. At first they say, "Where are my quarters?" But I say "just get them from a neighbor." They have a light bulb moment, and no more is said.
jackb205
Waiting List
Sometimes we do get buy ins of $100, and we do run out of quarters but they just kinda float around the table. So it sounds like I should invest in more fracs and fives soon?
Chips look great btw. That's a nice setup IF everyone was consistent with the buy ins. They vary between 40, 100, and 200 bbs.
This actually sounds like it would work well. I'll run this for the game this weekend and update then!
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JustinInMN
4 of a Kind
I am actually trying to say you are fine on quarters, but you are very short on fives.
If you were asking for advice for buying a new set of 600 chips, I would probably tell you something like 100/200/250/50 of 25¢/1/5/25 for a bank of 2725.
100 quarters should be fine for a single table and there are many good suggestions here on how to go about it, I just don't think quarters are the issue.
The issue is really that you only have $950 in chips in the first 3 denominations forcing you to introduce the 25s early (especially if it's 100 buy ins) and and in a situation where there just aren't enough fives on the table. If all the fives are on the table, each player would on average have about 14 fives and would effectively have to give up a third of them to make change with a 25.
More quarters doesn't help this situation, more fives helps a lot.
So I guess I am saying is if you are getting 100 chips to fix this, I would get all fives. Don't worry about quarters.
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for .25/.50 i like to give each player 20 quarters, 20 $1 chips, and 15 $5 chips for $100.
MeridianFC
Flush
jamesjkim
Full House
I only have one rack of fracs in my sets and start with 12x per player for $0.25 ($0.50 fracs can be done with less). Rebuys are generally given in larger denoms and change is made at the table. Never had any issues.
We play 25¢/50¢ the majority of the time for our cash games. For starting stacks I take the super lazy approach and just give out a barrel each of 25¢ and $1's; then round out with $5's up to their buy-in amount.
Not lazy, you are a GENEROUS AND CONVIVIAL HOST.
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