Need help with setting up a home game...

[Jackal]

I'm trying to setup a home game and could use some help. Currently, we have a $5 buy-in that gets you 1500 in chips with the blinds at 20/40. Is this a good setup? Is there a better way of doing it? I'm just curious how people have setup their games. Thanks in advance.

[blackaces13]

Are you playing a tournament here? If not then $5 should get you $5 in chips. Also, if it is a freeze out tourny then you need to raise the blinds every so often (every 10 hands, or 15 minutes), you can't leave em at 20/40.

You need to be more specific about exactly what kind of a home game you have here. How many players, do you want to eliminate payers (often this sucks cause people don't want to come to your house to bust out and watch people play for an hour or more), how much money are the players willing to gamble with/lose, how long do you want to play for.

You need to at least think about these questions and ballpark them before anyone can tell you how to set your game up.

[Jackal]

Sorry, should have provided more info. Up until now, we had been doing a tourney format (freeze out) where once your chips were gone, you were out. Started with 1500 in chips ($5 buy-in), blinds at 10/20 and they doubled every 20 min. The problem is two-fold, the number of players is always different (anywhere between 4-9) and i think the people who go out early are getting sick of driving to someone's house only to go out after 30 min. So now i'm thinking of doing buy-in's so people don't have to worry about going out early.

I know we could make the chip values total $5 but does that really matter? As long as we know 300 chips = $1, we just convert at the end? Also, the skill level is extremely varied...some beginners and some relatively advanced people. Basically, we are not playing to win big money, it's mostly just for fun. Is 1500 starting chips with 20/40 blinds was a good starting point? (for a buy-in format) Is it imperative that the chips be based on the buy-in value? i.e. 10 cents, 25 cents, 50 cents, 1 dollar, etc.

[LetsRock]

With a tourney, you need to choose between 2 options:

1) The tourney is the main event.
2) The tourney is just part of the night, another touney or ring game will follow.

If the answer is "main event", you want to set up your blind structure to advance pretty slowly so that the players have the opportunity to get some time for their money.

If the answer is "just part of the evening", you want ot have a very fast tourney so that those who bust out early won't be stuck hanging around waiting for the tourney to end.

In one of the home games I play, we often do a series of very quick NL tourneys when we're short handed. We all get X amount of chips and all put in $Y, winner take all. WE have very quick blind advances (doubling every 10 or 15 minutes) and they usually run pretty quick (under an hour).

We also do multi table tourneys that pay out 2 or 3 players. The buy ins are more significant and everyone gets a ton of chips and the blinds progress much slower to give everyone a chance to hang around for a while. This is a main event.

In another home game, we play a NL ring game, but the chips are valued like a tourney night be. A buy in could be $25 or $50 (for the night) but it always equals $1000 in chips. You can cash out whenever you want or rebuy when your stack get low. It takes a bit of getting used to, but it works quite well (cashing out is much more complicated as you pretty much need a calculator), but it is more fun to "Raise $100" than to raise $1. Unfortunately, some of the guys joke about how their only risking $.25 with a $5 chip, but in general it does keep the tone of the game more like a "big stakes" game - some of the decisions are really tough.

It's hard to tell you what will be right for your group. I'd experiment with different structures until you find what works best for your group.

[Jackal]

When you do your ring game for $1000 in chips, what blinds do you use?

[blackaces13]

I play an NL ring game and we play with $.25 and $.50 small and big blinds. I really don't see the point of inflating the chip values to feel like a big gambler, but if you like that sort of thing then that's your prerogative of course and feel free. The way I do it is if you buy in for $5 then you get 8 quarter chips, 4 50 cent chips, and 1 dollar chip. Then you play your $.25/.50 NL game. I also don't see the point of forcing everyone to buy in a certain amount. If someone wants to load up for $20 let them, if someone else wants to buy in $5 increments then let them too. Stacks matter in NL so as long as everyone is buying within reason there's nothing wrong with giving people a little leeway and freedom. Maybe make the minimum buy in $5 and the max $20 or however you want to do it but its not necessary to have a set amount.

One rule, that I got from the Hellmuth book (forgive me), is to have a table minimum but let people "pocket" anything that they win above this if they feel more comfortable doing that. For instance, suppose some guy who's new to the game and doesn't like the idea of losing $30 in 1 hand is playing with you and he buys in for $5. After getting a ton of great hands lets say this guy builds up to $25 and the guy he took most of it from now re-buys for $30. Sooner or later they may end up in a heads up pot where the new guy flops a set and bets the size of the pot and then the guy who just bought in for $30 calls and the turn brings the 3rd of a suit. Now the new guy bets like $3 and the pot is only say $4 and the other guy pushes his entire $27 stack into the pot. Now this is a crappy situation for the new guy who is not comfortable losing $25 in one hand but who also doesn't want to muck a set.

So you can have a rule that anyone at the table only has to keep $5 in front of them or any amount above that that they're comfortable with but they can put the rest in their pocket and only have to pull it out again if their table stack drops below $5. If you don't do this your game WILL get out of hand as people get busted because now there is by definition more $$$ on the table.

Another way to prevent this is to try and have players who bust buy their new chips from the big stack if the big stack is ok with that, that works too. Its not fun starting off with $30 total on the table and ending up with $200 and people with a chip on their shoulder, and this can happen as the night wears on and alcohol gets drank.

Again sorry this took me so long, being consise is not my strong suit, I'm working on it. I think a no limit ring game works great and everyone seems to love it, at least that's been my experience. Tournaments don't work because its no fun for the people who bust out and have to sit there. I hope I gave you at least some worthwhile suggestions here. Obviously your house = your rules but what I've described is what works for me and it took some experimenting.

I'm done. /images/graemlins/smile.gif

[blackaces13]

[ QUOTE ]
When you do your ring game for $1000 in chips, what blinds do you use?

[/ QUOTE ]

I would go with 25/50.

[benkath1]

we play with from 5 to 10 guys with a $10 buy in for $10 in chips tourney style. Blinds start at .25 and .50 and we just double them as a guy gets knocked out. Then when it is heads up we set a timer and increase them every ten minutes. We also make the first guy knocked off the dealer for the rest of that game and to start the next. Gives you a reason not to go out first. /images/graemlins/wink.gif Usually the games only last between 60 and 90 minutes, so we play around 5 games a night. We also pay out through third. Tons of fun!!

[Boris]

if you are playing with friends the most important thing is that if someone has a bad night they will not feel too bad. Otherwise just pick the highest limit that you think you can sustain.

[Jackal]

Thanks for all the info guys. I've decided to go with $5 buy-in worth 1500 in chips and 20/40 blinds. (only cause our chip values are 10, 20, 50 and 100) The main thing is, as already mentioned by others, i don't want people to lose a lot of money.