Crystal Oyster Poker Chips-Not Impressed, HELP!

[grandgnu]

I just received an 8-chip sample pack from www.holdempokerchips.com

I'm used to the 11.5 gram Dice Chips. I have a set of 1500 of those cheapies, but eventually want to replace them with something of a higher quality.

I figured I'd be looking at spending close to a buck per chip to get a nice quality set of chips. But something about these chips just doesn't do it for me. I can't quite put my finger on it though.

I mean, I love how they stick together so you can make larger stacks (the dice chips I have are slicker and prone to topple over in larger stacks)

I've played around shuffling these chips, and it works just fine. The sound is ok. But something about the feel of the chips, it just doesn't work for me. I've heard you need to "break-in" new chips like this, maybe I just need to play with them for awhile so that their texture will appeal to me more?

I was also thinking of getting a sample pack of the James Bond Chips, they look pretty nice and I like the edge spots on them.

Is there a difference in getting a sample of these type of chips from one site to the next? If I were to get the Crystal Oysters or James Bond from another website, would I notice any difference in them?

Is there a site you'd recommend for getting samples? Also, is there a specific chip that people recommend that is nice quality? I'm looking for chips that will be easy to stack, just like in the casino tournaments, and obviously have the nice clickity-click sound when shuffled.

And nice looking edge spots are important, as well as colors that stand out from one another (i.e. if I have 25, 100 and 500 value chips in the tournament they don't blend in with one another and make it difficult for players to figure things out)

[xTopdogx]

and?

[toots]

You're going to have break-in issues with any quality chips you can find. Paul-Son for one can be particularly sharp-edged and chalky when they're new.

Be careful when getting the James Bond chips, as there are at least three clear lines:

1) Original discontinued Paul-Son chips. Small inlays with a "linen" texture, with H&C molding and an outer grove around the molding. My favorite

2) Blue Chips. Grand inlays. Lighter than the Paul-Sons. The inlays tend to feel more like stickers, although they aren't any more easily removed than the Paul-Sons. They also have (to me) a cheesy feeling glossy finish and tend to be applied off-center. The molding is a shallow "clamshell", with no groved ring around the molding. With break-in, they can be comparable to the Paul-Sons, but you'd never confuse one for the other

3) The new Paul-Sons that Apache/Dice702 are advertising. Since they ain't out yet, no one has any experience with them.

With any of the higher end clays or ceramics (Paul-Son, ASM, TR King, Blue Chip, Chipco), I'd strongly recommend wearing them in hard before making any final decision. At least in the case of the more traditional clays (Paul-Son, ASM, Blue Chip), the colors and texture will come out only with use.

[grandgnu]

Hey, thanks for the reply and information. Do you have any specific vendors/websites and chips you recommend? Web links appreciated!

[toots]

I like dice702.com, at least for ordering samples (they aren't free, though). They carry Blue Chips, TR King and Chipcos and offer samples of all of them. They're also supposed to be coming out with the "new" Paul-Son Bond chips in january.

I've ordered a bunch of samples from them and beat the crap out of them to see how they hold up.

Mostly, I make my bulk purchases on eBay and pray.

[TenPercenter]

Keep in mind that any change is wierd at first. If you're used to dice chips, ALL other chips are gonna be wierd to you. Same for me with my Chipcos. One buddy has 13.5g "casino" chips, and the other has 11.5 dice. At the beginning of the night, all their chips are wierd. When I get home, MINE feel wierd.

Your second question: Your Crystal Oyster samples will be the exact same no matter where you get them from. In fact, ALL Chipcos will be exactly the same feel, only different graphics on the face and edges.

The Bond chips are likely to be the same as long as you get current stock. If you get old stock they might be different. But from what some people say, with Blue Chip (the current manufacturer) you may get slight differences even from a recent batch.

Ten

[tomb1]

I've recently been through the same evaluation, so I can feel your pain, gnu. Good places for lots of information are http://www.homepokertourney.com/chips_charts.htm and http://www.pokerchipreviews.com/ Other threads on this board also have a wealth of information.

First thing I had to do was choose among the major materials -- ceramic, clay, plastics, plastic with coin inerts, or composites (and I use all these terms loosely since none of them are really 100% of one material). You've got to get past this fork in the road first. You seem to be focused on Ceramic or Clay, so I'll talk only about these in this post.

Real casinos in North America primarily use Paulson (GPI) clay chips or Chipco ceramic chips. A few places use Bud Jones chips (made by Paulson/GPI), including those incredible WSOP chips at the Finals. So if you're trying to emulate a real casino chip, these are your choices.

I'll give you my opinions below. But here are 3 things to remember:

1. As they say on TV, your mileage may vary :-))... Much of it comes down to personal opinion and your priorities. For example, do you want good looks even if the feel is a little more slippery, or do you want chips that feel and wear well, even if the looks are somewhat subdued. Do you want denominations or not.

2. I ain't got no dog in this fight (as they'd say in the back woods). I don't sell chips and I'm not affiliated with anyone who does, period. Somebody may think I'm naive or just plain stupid, but you can't say that I'm not objective.

3. And finally, if somebody reading this doesn't want a lot of detail, just stop reading now, but please don't flame me.

- - - C E R A M I C - - -

Chipco pioneered ceramic and is the leader. Their web site http://www.chipco.com/home2.htm shows their ceramic line for home use, which you can buy from many places including your link above. All their chips are the same in look and feel, like the Suits, Classics, Casino, and Oysters, and you'll get the identical chips no matter which site you buy them from.

Many of the newer Chipco designs have their mark "CI" printed in small letters somewhere on the face (look at the closeup of the $1 Classic http://www.holdempokerchips.com/proddetail.asp?prod=CCE and Suits http://www.holdempokerchips.com/proddetail.asp?prod=SUB ). Many of the custom chips on this board and elsewhere are Chipco. Look at TenPercenter's outstanding Egyptian chips and be prepared to be blown away!

There are some other good non-Chipco ceramics out there -- notably the Nevada Jacks Dead Man (Skulls) and Desert Sands, the Mardi Gras chips, Apache Casino and Rounders from Apache/Dice702, and the Archetype chips from buypokerchips.com. These are a little different from the Chipcos in texture, feel, sound, edges, etc.

Here are some pictures of ceramic chips:







My take on ceramics is as follows, based on a couple dozen sample/actual chips I have:

LOOKS
- Ceramics offer stunning good looks. The faces can have photographs and bright colors, with excellent fine detail. These will "wow" you right away -- I mean, really knock your socks off!
- Great colors and spots available on the edges, and words or denominations may also be printed on the edge.

EDGES
- The colors and stripes on the edges are not molded through the chips (edge spots that go from the face into and through the edge, like clay chips). The colors and edge spots can be bright and sharp, though the marks on the edge will usually not line up with the spots on the face, since the edges are made separately.
- The edges on the Desert Sands have a marbleized look, not solid colors like Chipcos.
- All the sample home use Chipcos I've seen lately have a "pimple" on the edge, I assume from the molding process. None of the casino chips have this, so I can't explain it. This is not very good to me. The non-Chipco ceramics sample I have don't have this imperfection.

TEXTURE
- The face of a cermic chip is almost always flat and solid, with no indentations, ridges, etc.
- The Chipco faces are somewhat slippery, especially compared to clay. The professional casino Chipcos have a slight linen texture, but most of the home Chipcos IMO are pretty slick. The texture is not like glass, but more like hard paper.
- Because of their slickness, they don't stack as well as clay or even some composites. If you rub two new ceramics together between your thumb and finger, they'll slide around easily, almost like metal coins.
- The faces on the Nevada Jacks, Mardi Gras, and Desert Sands ceramics are much more textured than the Chipcos. The Desert Sands are the most textured, feeling almost like a hard cloth or even very fine sandpaper. Some people don't like this feel, but they definitely won't slide as much as Chipcos in your fingers.
- This texture makes the pictures and colors on the face a little duller, without as much sharpness. (Like a photo in a newspaper, vs. a glossy magazine.) The slicker Chipco faces make the colors really stand out.
- Ceramic texture will "break in" over time, but only a little. Well-worn casino Chipcos stack OK, but still they're somewhat slippery.

CHIP WEAR
- The worst thing about Chipcos is that their faces don't wear very well at all. Now I'm talking about A LOT of wear and tear, like the constant use at a casino. I'd defer to other people on how much wear shows on home chips used in weekly tournaments.
- If you look at casino Chipcos, you'll see two things. First, a white ring gets badly worn around the edge on the face. In fact I heard this was so bad in the old days, that now Chipco actually designs a white ring on the face for most of their chips, so it's part of the design and doesn't look bad over time.
- This top edge wear also happens because the Chipco edges are nice and square, and stay that way for life (unlike clays, where their sharp edges will get very rounded over the years from use). By comparison, the edge on the Mardi Gras is made more rounded, and the Desert Sands are very rounded. (They actually seemed smaller in diameter that Chipcos because of this rounded edge, but they're all 39mm.) The faces on these chips with rounded edges do not wear off like the Chipcos with square edges, but the Chipcos edges feel better and sharper to me. Take your pick...
- The second thing you see on well-used ceramics is general wear across the entire face. After lots of use, the colors get faded, the pictures get blurry, and they look washed out and just plain old. Like I said, this is from my collection of actual casino chips, and most home chips won't get this much use. But the "wow" that you get with new ceramics definitely goes away.

SOUND & TRICKS
- The sound of ceramics is more of a "clink" than clay. The Chipcos sound the most metallic to me of all the ceramics.
- Ceramics are very good for chip shuffling, and they make a distinct, crisp sound. I love shuffling my ceramics. As for other chip tricks, I can't say because I'm not that good.

- - - C L A Y - - -

When you're talking about clay, the first thing you talk about is Paulson. Paulson (the Endy family) was one of the pioneers of casino chips in Nevada, and Paulson chips are the REAL thing and the ONLY thing in most casinos. But since they were sold to a French gaming company, they haven't sold chips for consumer use.

All that's about to change with the new Paulson Chips coming out, see http://www.dice702.com/paulsonpokerchips.htm

I won't go through the history of Paulson fantasy chips, Blue Chip chips (made by the Endy family after the Paulson buy-out), or some of the remaining original clay chip manufacturers, notably ASM and T.R King. They all make good "clay" chips.

Each one has their own "mold" to identify their chips, shapes indented around the face of the chip. Paulson's Top Hat & Cane (in four versions) is the most famous, plus Paulson makes their chips in a "house mold" for many of the big casinos -- Hilton, Caesars, Ballys, Bellagio, Mirage, Venetian, Four Queens, etc. The new Paulson chips for consumers are going to be different from their casino mold, with the words "Paulson Chips" made into the mold.

But the Endy Flame mold (most people call it a Seashell), ASM Horsehead, "A" mold, T.R. King Crown, Nevada mold, Courts & Numerals, Martini Club Suits mold, Roman mold, Circle/Square, etc. are other good brands.

If you want real casino clay chips, you can buy used Paulson chips all over eBay, although they've gotten damn expensive lately. (Most claims of "clay" chips on eBay are bullshit, by the way.) The other true clay chips on various web sites or eBay may be called Paulson "style."

Almost all casino clays are 39mm in diameter, and most of the fanatsy chips or other true clay chips are the same size. A few Paulson fantasy chips were made in 43mm or other oversize molds, but I would stay away from these if you're ever going to mix-and-match a set or add to it over time.

LOOKS
- Clay chips have a distintive look and feel. Originally, these chips had very wide molded faces, with a small center area (1 inch or less). They were made with this printed center built into the chip, or some type of hot stamp. Often the center has a distinct texture, like the texture of the Desert Sands ceramic chip.
- The face of the chip is not flat. The molded shapes are indented around the chip on the face, and the center is almost always inlaid a little bit. In fact, this inlay is supposed to create a slight vacuum that prevents the chips from sliding when they are stacked.
- Once Chipco started making the flashy ceramic chips, Paulson had to adjust their chips to meet the desires of the casinos for flashy chips. When customers buy "collector" chips and take them home, thet's pure profit for the casino. So to keep competitive and encourage collecting, there are now tons of "limited" edition chips, and they have to look good. I think Hard Rock was probably the first to do this in a big way.
- So newer Paulson chips have larger inlays and smaller molded areas. On the newest Paulson chips, they can print pictures/colors almost to the edge. The Top Hat & Cane is actually indented into part of the picture on these chips. Look at the difference between these 3 Paulson chips:
http://www.oldvegaschips.com/caesars5bust.jpg
http://www.oldvegaschips.com/bellagio5.JPG
http://www.oldvegaschips.com/1hrvolleyball.htm
- As far as I can tell, most of the consumer clay chips have the standard 1 inch centers (approximately). I haven't seen consumer clays with the expanded/fancy faces that Paulson sells to casinos.
-But the bottom line is that the brightness and sharpness of clay chips isn't nearly as good as Chipco ceramics. The color of the clay itself is usually muted (unless they're Dayglo colors).

EDGES
- Clays are molded from a granular material, sometimes with brass shavings inserted. The new chip comes out of the mold with very sharp edges -- they will easily stand on edge.
- Clay chips can have edge spots molded into them. These are pieces of a different color clay material that is molded through the chip. It shows on the faces, and looks like stripes on the edge when you have a bunch of chips stacked up. Not all clay chips have edge spots, though.
- The molded edge spots have a "classic" look, but they definitely are not as bright or sharp as cermaic edges. I've never seen a clay chip with any printing or design on the edge.

TEXTURE
- Brand new clay chips can be chalky or dusty from the manufacturing process. They may have ridges in their mold, or have a linen or cross-hatch texture.
- Clay chips are absorbent, unlike plastic or ceramic. The oils from your hand soak in to the chip and actually improve the color and feel over time. They can get very dirty from use, if you've ever seen a stack from a casino. Check this board and other forums for lots of information about wearing in these chips.
- Clay chips do not seem as slick as ceramic, at least to me. When rubbing them together, they usually stick together just as much as you'd want. You can stack clay chips over 100 high very easily, and they won't fall over from vibration to the table, etc.
- The texture gets smoother over time and less granular, sometimes almost slick.

CHIP WEAR
- Clay chips definitely get worn. It's personal preference, but they seem to get old and still look good (like Cindy Crawford, Courtney Cox, Tea Leoni, Catherine Zeta-Jones, or Raquel Welch) vs. ceramics (like Courtney Love, Renee Zellweger, or Barbra Streisand).
- The indentations in the mold will get a little worn down, but they stay very identifiable.
- Clay edges will wear down and get very rounded with lots of use. Somewhat rounded edges are actually very desirable in a clay chip you want to bet with, rather than the brand new sharp edges which are prized for collecting and display.
- The printed inlays molded into the center of clay chips usually stay looking about the same over time, except for getting dirty. Some of this is due to the fact that the printed part is inlaid below the surface, and doesn't get constant rubbing. Hot stamps (like denominations or names stamped in gold) tend to wear off.

SOUND & TRICKS
- Clay chips have a "clack" sound. You may ask, what's "clack" versus "clink" versus "click" and I can't explain it. But you can hear the difference. Which do you like best? Beats the hell out of me!
- To me, clay chips are slightly harder to shuffle. The edges are usually worn, and different chips in a stack typically are worn different amounts, depending on how old they are. I can shuffle ceramic and plastic chips better than clays, but I'm not an expert. I think clay chips would work well for other various chip tricks that require some friction, but I can't say for sure.

[TenPercenter]

Great post Tomb. That sure is a lot of information. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] I agree with nearly everything you said.

Ten

[grandgnu]

Thanks for the advice from both of you (especially Tomb, for making such a lengthy and informative post)

I think I've figured out what I don't like about these ceramics. The flat face. I think I want chips that have more texture to them, like the Roman or Horsehead molds.

Aside from ebay, are there any specific websites anyone would recommend for true clay chips (with edge spots, denominations and the indendted mold)? I'm assuming for the most part, that true clay vs. ceramics winds up being the same price (roughly a buck a chip?)

Thanks again!

[Slow Play Ray]

[ QUOTE ]
I think I've figured out what I don't like about these ceramics. The flat face. I think I want chips that have more texture to them, like the Roman or Horsehead molds.

[/ QUOTE ]

For me, it's the fact that each ceramic chip feels like a tiny dinner plate...

If you're looking at clay, I highly recommend you get samples from T.R. King - check out www.trking.com and shoot Dennis an email. He will send out samples - he sent mine out for free, and I had them in 2 days. For my money, you just cannot beat the feel/sound of T.R. King clays (except for Paulson of course). I currently own a set of the Casbah Club T.R. Kings (http://www.apachepokerchips.com/casb...okerchips.html - I didn't buy from here, I bought "seconds" direct from T.R. King for $0.25 apiece), and everyone I play with loves the feel/sound, it's just that the look is pretty bland. I am organizing a group buy of chips with their King's Crown stock inlay, but with custom colors and dual edge spots. Right now the price is $0.85/chip, but I hope to maybe get it down a little lower. Get some samples, and shoot me a PM if you're interested in the group buy.