Cash Game Thoughts on first Cash set .25 -> 1$ (cheap or EU), Micro/Low Stakes (2 Viewers)

[MarlbOlo]

Hi Guys!
I live in PL and I'm looking for an upgrade from dice chips, don't need much, I'm haunting for some denominated ABS or cheap CCs, but yeah... That's not easy, as importing from US almost doubles the price (23% VAT + possible customs). I've spent some time researching want I need and what the options are in EU (none cheap'ish) or how expensive shipping from US can be. We're all beginners, so the games use to be pretty casual and passive. With this set I'd like to cover such games:

Avg. players number: 4-6 (8 max)
Blinds: .25/.25, .25/.50, .50/1
Bank: Most common would be 500/600$ starting bank, we never had >50% rebuys, so 1200$ bank should cover 95% of cases.
Budget: <300$ Shipped (incl. taxes)

I've done some math and ideally I would need sth like:

200 x .25
150 x 1
100 x 5 (or 150 x 5)
50 x 25

Which sums up to 1950$ (I know that 200$ Buy-in exceeds this set at maximum scenario, but it'd rather be played very rarely and with 4-6 people max).

Now the dilema:

I've found a couple of interesting options and 1 looks most affordable, it's Desert Heat (or similar) from eBay. I can buy there racks or 50s only, due to "Buy 2, Get 1 Free" I could make a set of 600 pcs for 212$ Shipped + ~50$ Tax. As racks make the best deal (cheapest thing is discounted, so mixing racks and 50s isn't too atractive anymore :/), I'm wondering if such a set would do the trick here:

200 x .25
200 x 1
200 x 5 (alt. 100 x 5 and 100 x 25 but I'm worried to run out of 5s)

I could make a set of 500 chips for same price, but that's 100 chips less which I think is a bit nonsense :/

In this price range I like Outlaws the most, but the best deal I found on Amazon is 216$ Shipped + 50$ Tax for 500 chips but currently 25s can't be shipped to my location, so not sure how long that can take.

My chips per person breakdown might not be the best, but it feels efficient for our current experience / behaviour. It would be helpful if you could share your thoughts on this topic. Opinions on the mentioned chips are also welcome

 

[Jp74]

Don’t have any experience with either of those particular chips but my thought would be 1 rack of .25 is plenty. I get the logic of buy 2 get 1 free but if you never play more than 8 handed that just means 40 chips never hit the table. Give yourself a little room for growth on the upper with another rack of 5’s. If your game grows beyondd that you can just buy some 25’s as an add on.

What will most likely happen is you will fall down this rabbit hole of chips and decide you want a different set.then another, then another… pretty soon you will be wondering how you got to 4000 chips and haven’t played a single time in 6 months.

At that point you will be a full fledged member of the degen club international!

Welcome!

Oh and you should check out @Machine post on breakdowns for new members. Very informative and will save you some time.

 

[MarlbOlo]

Thanks, I already have that feeling of never ending story and that's great, the biggest issue now is how fast my wife will figure out the value of these new shiny chips
Well that's a good point with those .25s, I'm not sure how to think about that. On one end, everybody's limping, throwing chips, let's say someone is SB, BB and then limps and loses all, it mean 5-6 .25s lost in 3 hands. Can get short on them fast.
On the other hand these .25s are always somewhere on the table so they can exchange pretty easily but that's a bit annoying, no?

Sorry for dummy questions but I've only played with some stupid breakdowns and denomination is a first step to make the game more comfortable for everyone.

I have that post for newcomers on my watchlist, but it's already 1am at my place so it's for another day

 

[Jimulacrum]

I agree with @Jp74 that 1 rack of fracs is sufficient.

If 600 is the magic number, and you want it to be viable for 0.25/0.25 through 0.5/1, something like this is a better use of the denoms:

• 100 × 0.25 (value: 25)
• 200 × 1 (value: 200)
• 200 × 5 (value: 1,000)
• 50 × 25 (value: 1,250)
• 50 × 100 (value: 5,000)
• Total bank value: 7,475

I'm assuming just one table. You may have different considerations for two tables.

A rack of fracs is quite enough. Any more than that is unnecessary for one table.

Two racks each of 1s and 5s should give you more than enough workhorse and basic value chips to keep things moving smoothly at all times.

The rest is there for value stock, half a rack each of 25s and 100s. It may seem like excess, but (a) you have all your other bases covered already, so no loss there, and (b) the best use of the last 100 chips is to ensure your bank covers every plausible scenario, not just the near-average scenarios.

 

[ChipFinderSK]

Desert Heat/Outlaw chips are only a small upgrade from dice chips, and you’ll likely end up losing money if/when you decide to sell.

You’re better off using the dice chips short term, and saving up some money (est. $500-600, including VAT etc.) to buy a decent set of ceramic chips through a Tina group buy. Or save a little more for a decent set of used Paulsons.

Also, +1 on not needing more than 100 fracs.

 

[Jimulacrum]

Desert Heat/Outlaw chips are only a small upgrade from dice chips, and you’ll likely end up losing money if/when you decide to sell.

I used to own a set of "The Mint" chips by Claysmith. These are basically the same thing reskinned, right?

If so, I agree with this assessment. They're not a terrible value if they're the most your budget can support, but I felt they had a cheap look and a dissatisfying feel compared not just to high-quality chips like Paulsons but also mid sluggo 13 g chips like Nexgens. One notch above dice chips, like you said.

 

[ChipFinderSK]

I used to own a set of "The Mint" chips by Claysmith. These are basically the same thing reskinned, right?

If so, I agree with this assessment. They're not a terrible value if they're the most your budget can support, but I felt they had a cheap look and a dissatisfying feel compared not just to high-quality chips like Paulsons but also mid sluggo 13 g chips like Nexgens. One notch above dice chips, like you said.

I believe so. I never had a set of any of them, but before I found PCF I spent way too much time looking into all the Claysmith/similar options.

I just think most people, especially those asking for advice on PCF, are better off skipping this 13.5g/sluggo tier altogether (and even the China clay/Tina tier if their disposable income allows).

 

[Machine]

Welcome!
​

You can find some helpful links in my signature below, Landscape (sideways) on mobile

 

[vulp]

Hey!

We usually play a $.25/$.50 Cashgame, $50 buyin/rebuy, 5-7 handed.
I play with a wide variety of players and I had no problem with this setup for the past 12 months:

300 pcs chipset: 100/100/40/50/10 [100x $.25, 100x $1, 40x $5, 50x $10, 10x $50 (300 pcs, $1325) -> 26+ buyins altogether, more than enough]
Starting stack for 6 players: 16/16/6 (38 pcs, $50)
Rebuy stacks: 5x $10 or 1x $50

If you want to play 7 or 8 handed, give the 7th and 8th player a rebuy stack to start with and players can change for them.
The most money we had on the table was $850.

I would check these MIX IT sets (you get to decide the breakdown of denominations):
pokershop.de/300pc-Poker-Sets

As others mentioned, this probably won't be your last set, but its a good start - also if you want to expand it, you can just simply additional chips from here.

Good luck!

update: edited link

 

[MarlbOlo]

Thanks for the tips, I think I can lower the amount of chips and leave some space for upgrade in the future. Biggest upgrade would be denominations, so sluggos do the work here too. I’ve also seen an OP with complaint about 5$ chips from Claysmith looking well… ugly. Can you relate? Unfortunately I can’t get any samples of these in EU, and US shipping cost for tests is just too much.

I’ll probably wait for some CC, sluggos and Tina samples shipped from EU, as long as Outlaws 25$ chips remain unavailable.

I think pokershop.de sells single chips and they also have acrylic chips cases, which I’d want anyway, so maybe that’s the first step.

 

[guyfleegman]

Hello!
I remember being in your position a few years ago.
My budget was slightly higher than yours and I went a strange route that I don’t recommend…
I bought a 2000 chip set of Crystal Park Paulsons and sold what I didn’t need.

This would be my plan based on your usual poker nights vs max case scenario.

8 player and 6 player Breakdown - $100 buy-in
100 fracs (12) (16)
140 $1 (17) (16)
140 $5 (11) (16)
20 $25 (1) (0)
That gives you an additional $260 in $5’s and $300 in $25’s to allow for an additional 5 rebuys with 8 players.
If you usually play 6 handed, that gives you enough for every player to rebuy.

Save up little more money and get RHC Paulsons.
Be patient and send a few PMs to active chippers from the EU area and I am confident they will be able to help you put a set together for under $2/chip for a set you can sell later.
You can always sell IFyou ever decide to change stakes, want something else or find you don’t host often enough.
Cheers

 

[golosefast]

unless limp pots are common, why not go for more 1's over the .25's?

 

[MarlbOlo]

Thanks all for cooling my enthusiasm, most probably saved a bunch of $$ on some rookie mistakes. Thanks @guyfleegman for your breakdown, I think it currently fits my needs most, so I’ll start with a set of 400 (plus some high denoms if possible, just for safety).

I’m waiting for a samples mix of Tina, CC, CPC and LukcyDragon ceramics, I’m curious to see the differencies ^^ I like Angry Mallard design a lot, so maybe I’ll make a tournament set of those if I like ceramics.

I’ve also started discovering this whole Paulsons lore lately sooo… Watch me post some Wanted threads soon