How much cash for your home game? (1 Viewer)

I played in a game with a cap on total buy-in. In theory, when a player busts his/her last time they are done for the night. Host has said everything said in this thread as why to do it.

Reality didn’t match theory. The first player to hit the cap and go bust did so in 90 minutes. He is bitching on the rail. Second and third guy are on the rail by the second hour. They propose a side table. Host objects a little then relents.

We end up with two short handed table for a while. Before midnight the whole ‘cap the buy-in’ idea is dropped.

The buy-in cap was too low, $400 for a $1/$2 game. The players often bought in thousands in my game, so it was certain to be an issue. And the biggest reason for problems was no one really understood why there was a cap at all.

I protect my weak players by hosting games with small buy-in’s. In the $0.25/$0.50 game the cap is $20. Buy in all you want, but only $20 at a time. I also host ‘match the big stack’ $1/$2 with a mostly different clientele. The players select what they prefer.

As for cash on hand to make change. . . . I have $500+ in the safe in $1s, $5s and $10. No coins. Loose chips can be gifted, raced off at the end of the night or left for the host to help defray the cost of food & drinks

Bottom line is HAVE FUN -=- DrStrange
 
Poker Zombie said:
This is why I love running tournaments. Blind Squirrels are happy to find a nut. Expert players dont care about a min-cash. That puts the Blind Squirrels in a perfect position to cash and double up - a rare occurrence for the outmatched player in a cash game.
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Tournaments are exactly the way to manage this!!
 
Poker Zombie said:
Super-nits won't ruin a game (but they can make it boring).
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I disagree. Super-nits making a game boring is much worse than having one guy who stirs up big action a lot. There's almost nothing worse than being at a table of players who won't give any action.
 
Kain8 said:
You're cashing out at the end of the night and everyone has odd amounts left over. How do you not just put the all the odd amounts into a pot and just run a single hand for the $5 - $10 that those amounts total?
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It took 35 posts for someone to mention flips for the loose change at the end of the night. Shame. If you ain't flippin', you ain't livin'.

That said, I will always pay players out to the penny. In some places, if the host holds, is gifted or receives anything back that can be the difference between a legal game, and an illegal game, so I'm diligent about it.

If they want to flip for change, they will usually set aside their "flippin' chips" or jump in once they have their change and see what they are missing out on.
 
Jimulacrum said:
I disagree. Super-nits making a game boring is much worse than having one guy who stirs up big action a lot. There's almost nothing worse than being at a table of players who won't give any action.
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Agreed - a full table of nits, not giving any action can be bad. The issue there is "the stakes are too high". If everyone is a maniac, the stakes are too low (like a freeroll).

One or two nits does nothing to harm the game. One or two maniacs can scare off players.

There are a lot of things a host has to balance. What works for the $10 buy-in Holdem crowd isn't going to work for the $1/$2 SoHe crowd. For what @masayako is doing, I think we're looking at the lower end of the spectrum to get the results he wants.
 
DrStrange said:
I protect my weak players by hosting games with small buy-in’s. In the $0.25/$0.50 game the cap is $20. Buy in all you want, but only $20 at a time. I also host ‘match the big stack’ $1/$2 with a mostly different clientele. The players select what they prefer.
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This. Out of all the games I play, this type of management trick is the one thing that seems to protect weaker players the best. Limit the max buy-in to something that's very low in terms of BBs.

The host implemented this exact structure to protect my regular game (from me, mostly). It used to be $0.50/$1 NLHE with $20/$40/$60 rebuys (scaled with biggest stack milestones of $100 and $200), which was okay for a while. But when I started playing regularly, I had a different play style that really threw people off and built up big stacks early. People were exhausting their poker budgets sometimes in the first hour or two, and a couple guys got tired of it and were going to stop coming. After a while, we'd find ourselves short-handed all night. Limiting buy-ins to $20 and cutting the blinds to $0.25/$0.50 really saved the game.

The $20 cap is great not just because it protects the players' wallets, but because it makes it a very short-stacked game for the first couple hours (and sometimes longer). In general, the deeper the stacks, the more it favors skilled players who have a strong post-flop game, and the opposite is true too. The edge of a skilled player is significantly smaller when everyone is 40 BB effective. It helps mitigate the fact that we're playing NLHE, which is one of the worst variants for protecting weaker players. And since the game plays so much smaller, it's much closer to the end of the night by the time people get deep-stacked, so they don't have as big a window to lose it all back.

We don't get short-handed so fast either, which is a pretty big deal. Often we're 8+ for the whole night, sometimes even as many as 11 or 12. (Yes, we will play with that many at the table.) Again, it's better for the weaker players for the table to remain fuller, and the $20 cap helps that happen more often. A decent LAG playing short-handed with deep stacks is murder.
 
masayako said:
As far as chip count per player:

8 x 25c
13 x $1
1 x $5
Total = $20 (min buyin)

Please let me know if it looks good for our 1st home game?

Thank you.
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Yeah I think this is good. Have max starting buy in. For .25-.50 I would set that at 40, 50, or 60.

Also I agree with those opposed to setting an overall cap. If you are feeling an overall cap is a good idea, it's probably a sign you are playing too big. Maybe do .25-.25 with a 20 or 30 cap for the first time out?

timinater said:
That said, I will always pay players out to the penny. In some places, if the host holds, is gifted or receives anything back that can be the difference between a legal game, and an illegal game, so I'm diligent about it.
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I agree with this as well. I always have change on hand just in case. It seems presumptuous and unprepared otherwise. Though I have no problem with those that make rounding practices clear at the outset

Fortunately the players in my group almost always leave it for the host :).
 
Jimulacrum said:
I disagree. Super-nits making a game boring is much worse than having one guy who stirs up big action a lot. There's almost nothing worse than being at a table of players who won't give any action.
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As a skilled Lag and host I LOVE a nit or two at my game. They almost never win, they almost always lose, though usually not more than 1 buy-in. They fill a couple of seats so that the average player feels the table is not short handed even though it is.

I always want a mix of players a the table. All lags and maniacs means too much money going in preflop and on the flop, too many nits means too little in the pot in general. A nice mix means I get to dictate how much goes in the pot most of the time! :D
 
Oh man
Set up 1 with Super a Diamond chips
300 - 5c
400 - 25c
600 -$1
400-$5
28-$20 plaques
8- $100 plaques

Starting stacks for $40
Two barrels of nickels
Two barrels of quarters
28 -$1

Set up 2 spirit mold
300 - 10c
440- 25c
660- $1
440-$5
40- $20
15- $50 plaque
10 - $100 plaque

Set up 3 8V (wip)
320 - 5c
600- 25c
600 - $1
400 - $5
100 - $20


I like a lot of chips.
 
No cap on buy in and the regular game is NL -10c ante 10c/20c blinds, PL- 10c/20c, FL-50c/$1.

Buy in range from $40 to 150 ish
 
This is the type of cash the CO crew brings to games! :ROFL: :ROFLMAO::ROFL: :ROFLMAO::ROFL: :ROFLMAO:
119D673C-D7E5-40F7-AD59-0403F4987205.jpeg
 
FL is fixed limit betting. For example $0.50 bets early in the hand and $1 bets the last two streets. NO variances - you bet / raise the fixed limit amounts or check. No all-in bets. No sizing issues. Little ambiguity. A good way to protect weaker players or people with a small budget. Also a good format when playing new games.
 
If these are close friends and you trust them, you can do Venmo, PayPal, google pay, Apple Pay or zelle. The benefits are easy pay outs, nothing physical to lose and people don’t have to bring more cash than they normally carry. Every time there is a buy in, I would text the player for secure record keeping.
As far as what stakes to play, try to gauge what your group is comfortable losing and how long you want to play for. If it’s around $200, I would set up .25/.50. Anywere around 3 to 5 buy ins on 100 x bb.
If you guys want to kill each other, no cap. If you want to have a more civilized game, cap could be 150/200 x bb. I might be bias for the kill each other camp because I always like seeing more chips on the table.
Good luck with your game(y) :thumbsup:
 
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yone said:
If these are close friends and you trust them, you can do Venmo, PayPal, google pay, Apple Pay or zelle. The benefits are easy pay outs, nothing physical to lose and people don’t have to bring more cash than they normally carry. Every time there is a buy in, I would text the player for secure record keeping.
Click to expand...

Downside #1: All of your players need to sign up for one of those services to make this feasible; if not, you'll have some cash and some e-wallet players, and you won't always be able to fully pay out the cash players. You could lose players or create messy situations that way.

Downside #2: New players can't just casually show up and have a good time; they have to deal with a sign-up process that both takes time away from playing poker and could cause significant delays (e.g., account verification steps).

Downside #3: Any of those services could suspend your account and/or freeze your funds because your series of buy-ins and cash-outs on the same day creates a fishy pattern that they don't like. After all, you're knowingly violating the terms of service. Every game you host makes the pattern bigger and fishier, and all of your players would be facing the same risk.

Downside #4: At least PayPal has a cap on the total amount of money you can transfer (in a month? year?). I believe some of the guys at the PCF home games (@BGinGA?) have run into this, despite only running baby-stakes tourneys.

Downside #5: You'll be creating a detailed, time-stamped record of all your poker transactions, tied to your SSN or other national ID. This could bite you (or any of your players) in the ass if you're not paying taxes on your winnings or if you have any other legal/financial issues to consider (child support, debts, etc.). There's little to gain from it that wouldn't be managed fine by a cash-in, cash-out approach.

Downside #6: Internet outages, website maintenance, account troubleshooting, or any other issues that prevent instant access to the e-wallet service could delay your game or prevent it from happening at all.

Downside #7: Some e-wallets allow you to transfer funds directly from your bank account, which could be a disaster for folks who are problem gamblers or are just less disciplined with their money. Budgeting poker money by segregating funds in cash is very important for some people.

Downside #8: It makes rebuys slower. You have to go into your phone/computer every time someone rebuys, as opposed to just grabbing cash off the table.

I'm sure I could come up with a few more downsides, but 8 should do. Suffice it to say that you can count me out of any game that requires the use of an e-wallet to play in person, and I'd be hesitant to even join a game where it's frequently used in lieu of cash in the till. I buy into live games for cash only, and I don't accept e-funds or IOUs when I'm cashing out. I trust that you'll find a lot of people like me in the poker scene anywhere you go.
 
I've had one player buy-in via PayPal (or Venmo, I don't remember). I covered the buy-in with my own funds. Also handled one rebuy that way.

It's not as terrible as Jim makes it sound, but I wouldn't do ins-and-outs electronically either. Fact is, we live in digital age. If the option is leaving the game to go to the ATM or zipping me a PayPal where I'll cover it, I'm happy to handle the PayPal (provided I have the cash available).

All Cash >PP > Running to the ATM > Floating a Loan
 
Jimulacrum said:
Downside #1: All of your players need to sign up for one of those services to make this feasible; if not, you'll have some cash and some e-wallet players, and you won't always be able to fully pay out the cash players. You could lose players or create messy situations that way.

Downside #2: New players can't just casually show up and have a good time; they have to deal with a sign-up process that both takes time away from playing poker and could cause significant delays (e.g., account verification steps).

Downside #3: Any of those services could suspend your account and/or freeze your funds because your series of buy-ins and cash-outs on the same day creates a fishy pattern that they don't like. After all, you're knowingly violating the terms of service. Every game you host makes the pattern bigger and fishier, and all of your players would be facing the same risk.

Downside #4: At least PayPal has a cap on the total amount of money you can transfer (in a month? year?). I believe some of the guys at the PCF home games (@BGinGA?) have run into this, despite only running baby-stakes tourneys.

Downside #5: You'll be creating a detailed, time-stamped record of all your poker transactions, tied to your SSN or other national ID. This could bite you (or any of your players) in the ass if you're not paying taxes on your winnings or if you have any other legal/financial issues to consider (child support, debts, etc.). There's little to gain from it that wouldn't be managed fine by a cash-in, cash-out approach.

Downside #6: Internet outages, website maintenance, account troubleshooting, or any other issues that prevent instant access to the e-wallet service could delay your game or prevent it from happening at all.

Downside #7: Some e-wallets allow you to transfer funds directly from your bank account, which could be a disaster for folks who are problem gamblers or are just less disciplined with their money. Budgeting poker money by segregating funds in cash is very important for some people.

Downside #8: It makes rebuys slower. You have to go into your phone/computer every time someone rebuys, as opposed to just grabbing cash off the table.

I'm sure I could come up with a few more downsides, but 8 should do. Suffice it to say that you can count me out of any game that requires the use of an e-wallet to play in person, and I'd be hesitant to even join a game where it's frequently used in lieu of cash in the till. I buy into live games for cash only, and I don't accept e-funds or IOUs when I'm cashing out. I trust that you'll find a lot of people like me in the poker scene anywhere you go.
Click to expand...
You are absolutely right. Sometimes, I do a game where it’s just very close friends, and we just do the pay outs electronically at the end. We don’t send money each time we buy in. We are friends before poker players, and it’s more of a get together.
However, if it’s a game that can grow with new players coming in by referral or some of the people are poker acquaintances, cash is definitely the way to go. I guess I should have made that more clear.
 
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Poker Zombie said:
I've had one player buy-in via PayPal (or Venmo, I don't remember). I covered the buy-in with my own funds. Also handled one rebuy that way.

It's not as terrible as Jim makes it sound, but I wouldn't do ins-and-outs electronically either. Fact is, we live in digital age. If the option is leaving the game to go to the ATM or zipping me a PayPal where I'll cover it, I'm happy to handle the PayPal (provided I have the cash available).

All Cash >PP > Running to the ATM > Floating a Loan
Click to expand...

I've boldfaced what I think is the most important point here. Ultimately, it's still a cash buy-in; there's just some behind-the-scenes legwork between you and the player. That's all good IMO. Important thing is that the money is on hand for cash-outs.

I agree with your inequality, though I've warmed up a bit over the past couple years to floating loans—as long as it's not me doing the lending. My regular host does it for small amounts, usually for the same couple players, and it's expected that they settle up ASAP. He always has backup cash stashed somewhere to cover the bank in case debts cause a shortage, so it never creates a problem for other players. Same idea as you covering a PP transfer. But of course cash is king.
 
SWEATER said:
As others have said, I wouldn't cap "rebuys." If it's a cash game, you might as well treat it like a cash game! That said, I'm usually the guy in for $300 with everyone else in for $25 sooooo... :whistle: :whistling:
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Me too sometimes, depending on the game. Last night, in for 9 buy-ins. Last week, in for 1 buy-in. Week before that, in for 18 buy-ins. Capping rebuys on any given night might send me packing early for no good reason when there's still lots of gambool to be had.
 
I’ve been hosting Thursday night cash games for 12 years or so. .25/.50 NL ,$60 max. It plays bigger than a typical.25/.50 game as theres almost always a straddle and red chips going in the pot. I keep it at $60 max to not scare off the cheaper players. You mentioned 8/13/1 stacks. I do 12/12/1 although quarters are pretty much only used for blinds.
You should not have a cap. You want as much money as possible on the table. If a player runs out of money they can go home or borrow off the kitty.
In Canada our smallest bill is $5 and i still dont pay out change. If someone is down on the night i will usually toss them the couple bucks to get them to a even $5 at cashout. Any money left over goes into the kitty fund where trusted players can borrow if they are hurtin. It helps fill seats
 
Jimulacrum said:
Downside #1: All of your players need to sign up for one of those services to make this feasible; if not, you'll have some cash and some e-wallet players, and you won't always be able to fully pay out the cash players. You could lose players or create messy situations that way.

Downside #2: New players can't just casually show up and have a good time; they have to deal with a sign-up process that both takes time away from playing poker and could cause significant delays (e.g., account verification steps).

Downside #3: Any of those services could suspend your account and/or freeze your funds because your series of buy-ins and cash-outs on the same day creates a fishy pattern that they don't like. After all, you're knowingly violating the terms of service. Every game you host makes the pattern bigger and fishier, and all of your players would be facing the same risk.

Downside #4: At least PayPal has a cap on the total amount of money you can transfer (in a month? year?). I believe some of the guys at the PCF home games (@BGinGA?) have run into this, despite only running baby-stakes tourneys.

Downside #5: You'll be creating a detailed, time-stamped record of all your poker transactions, tied to your SSN or other national ID. This could bite you (or any of your players) in the ass if you're not paying taxes on your winnings or if you have any other legal/financial issues to consider (child support, debts, etc.). There's little to gain from it that wouldn't be managed fine by a cash-in, cash-out approach.

Downside #6: Internet outages, website maintenance, account troubleshooting, or any other issues that prevent instant access to the e-wallet service could delay your game or prevent it from happening at all.

Downside #7: Some e-wallets allow you to transfer funds directly from your bank account, which could be a disaster for folks who are problem gamblers or are just less disciplined with their money. Budgeting poker money by segregating funds in cash is very important for some people.

Downside #8: It makes rebuys slower. You have to go into your phone/computer every time someone rebuys, as opposed to just grabbing cash off the table.

I'm sure I could come up with a few more downsides, but 8 should do. Suffice it to say that you can count me out of any game that requires the use of an e-wallet to play in person, and I'd be hesitant to even join a game where it's frequently used in lieu of cash in the till. I buy into live games for cash only, and I don't accept e-funds or IOUs when I'm cashing out. I trust that you'll find a lot of people like me in the poker scene anywhere you go.
Click to expand...

Agreed with all of the above - see my previous post for one of my most important rules: cash in for chips out. It's too much trouble and too risky to allow players to buy in with PP/Venmo/etc.

However, I have on several occasions given another player cash out of my pocket in exchange for a PP transfer so that they could use the cash for a rebuy.
 
Schmendr1ck said:
Agreed with all of the above - see my previous post for one of my most important rules: cash in for chips out. It's too much trouble and too risky to allow players to buy in with PP/Venmo/etc.

However, I have on several occasions given another player cash out of my pocket in exchange for a PP transfer so that they could use the cash for a rebuy.
Click to expand...

I also allow people to PP/Venmo/Quickpay if they're stuck and outta cash. I make sure to make the bank correct by putting in my money. Just be careful they dont put any type of notes in the transaction pertaining to "poker", "gambling", etc.
 
Lash said:
I’ve been hosting Thursday night cash games for 12 years or so. .25/.50 NL ,$60 max. It plays bigger than a typical.25/.50 game as theres almost always a straddle and red chips going in the pot. I keep it at $60 max to not scare off the cheaper players. You mentioned 8/13/1 stacks. I do 12/12/1 although quarters are pretty much only used for blinds.
You should not have a cap. You want as much money as possible on the table. If a player runs out of money they can go home or borrow off the kitty.
In Canada our smallest bill is $5 and i still dont pay out change. If someone is down on the night i will usually toss them the couple bucks to get them to a even $5 at cashout. Any money left over goes into the kitty fund where trusted players can borrow if they are hurtin. It helps fill seats
Click to expand...

Thanks for the insight. Quick question, do you guys have a dedicated person acted as a dealer (just dealing, no play) every game? Or, every player takes turn to be the dealer?

Just want to see what works the best in your game.
 
masayako said:
Thanks for the insight. Quick question, do you guys have a dedicated person acted as a dealer (just dealing, no play) every game? Or, every player takes turn to be the dealer?

Just want to see what works the best in your game.
Click to expand...
Love to have a dealer, we usually just tip them like in the casinos. I’m cheap as hell, but it makes the game go by so much smoother. In a small stake game with just friends, we usually selfdeal.
 

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