New to poker need help setting up.

Artoria

I'm gonna make a Long story short.

I'm gonna start having some friends come over to play poker maybe once a week. Probably Saturday nights. There is going to be 4-7 people playing at any given time and it will be kind of a mixed group meaning guys and girls age ranging from 20-38. We are not playing for money just for fun.

I'm gonna be the one hosting all of this and I've never hosted poker ever. Heck the only poker I've played is old fashioned 5 car draw. Don't know a lot about Texas hold em (unless that is the slag name for 5 card draw I didn't keep up on it). and I need some help.

So far I've got.

4 decks of cards
1 shuffler (because I shuffle terribly)
2 packs of chips with 100 chips each, 50 ivory chips, 25 red chips, and 25 blue chips. For a total of 200, chips 100 ivory chips, 50 red chips, 50 blue chips.

If anyone cares I've also got.

2 six packs of beer. Corona and Kirin.
12 pack of coke
1 pitcher of lemonade
2 bags of tortilla chips and 2 big things of salsa from a close by Fajita Willies (cheaper and better than Store bought stuff)
2 Rubik cubes (for people knocked out early and getting bored)
1 PS3 with Tekken Dark Resurrection (JP version) loaded on it and Virtua Fighter 5 (again for people knocked out early and bored)
1 stereo with random music playing in the background.

For a game with a max of 7 players how many decks of card should I use? I'm thinking about 4 decks of the same make/color. how many chips per player seem good? We won't want people sitting out for too long so short series might be best. What Value should I assign the chips?

gundam470

Me and my friends play Hold 'Em in a tournament style game.

That is, we all put our entry fees into a pot and then everyone gets the same amount of chips (usually, a lot. probably 500 or more chips divided between 4-6 people). This way everyone gets the chance to stay in for a while.

Then we just raise the "blinds" by whatever increments every 15-20 minutes to make sure that people start to lose.

We only use one deck of cards per table and appoint someone (who knows what they're doing) the role of dealer.

Winner gets the pot.

edit: I see you're not playing for money :P

We also play with our chips valued at 1, 5, 10, 25, 50. The ones are really only useful to us because we start blinds at something like 2-4 and they usually get traded out and get assigned the value of $100 late in the game

Sarcastro

When we do it, our chips are 100, 200, 500 and 1k. 1k in 100's, 2k in 200's, five 500's and 5 1k's.

You can either use an ante or blinds, I find blinds are best, keeps at least two players in the game and at least some money on the table.

Only one deck, it's standard for up to 11 players, poker is an odds game like blackjack, only casino's use a multideck shoe, and only vs. dealer- tourneys at all levels use just 1.

If you don't use money (BTW a buy-in for all chips at 5 bucks or something works great, you don't need to assign real cash value to your chips), I'd recommend having a prize, otherwise people bet stupid and start acting crazy because the chips have no value. Poker tends to work out better when you have a fair number of people who are actually trying to win. *shrug* Whatever works.

lordswing

If it's less than 8 or 9 ppl, I would use 2 decks of DIFFERENT colors, as it sucks when they get mixed together, 4 decks would be overkill. I would go to a Linens N Things, Kohls, or some other store and see if they have poker chips on clearance. I saw a 500 pc set at LNT for $20, but I had already picked up a 300 pc set before, as well as a shuffler and this felt thing you can put on top of a table with cup/chip holders

I wouldn't have any greasy foods, but that's just me, as I hate it when my cards get dirty.

At my school's tournament, they raised the blinds every 30 minutes, so I guess you could do that every 15 minutes since you want a fast game.

20 $10 chips
8 $25 chips
4 $50 chips
2 $100 chips->$1000

I think that's what my school tourny used, blinds were $10/20, and again, they were raised every 30 minutes.

Sentry

Yeah, I found if there is no buy-in the game just doesn't work very well. There's no incentive to win and no pain in losing... people tend to get bored quickly without stakes.

We always did a five dollar buy in, and if you got knocked out early you can do a second buy in within the first 1-2 hours of playing. We always seemed to have one person going all-in within the first few hands, then getting knocked out.

Most importantly, have fun... poker nights are awesome, don't stress out too much over them or you won't enjoy it.

chuck steak

I've never understood why people would play poker without money involved. If you don't care about losing your chips the whole spirit of the game is lost. Have a buy in of at least a couple of bucks so people don't just all in all the time and play stupidly. Whenever I've been around a moneyless game of poker, about half way through most people realise it has become a waste of time and the game doesn't even finish. But I guess give it a test run first, your results may vary.

Also, I wouldn't bother supplying any beer. If you tell everybody you are supplying it they will probably get annoyed that they are only allowed to have 1 or 2, and will wish they brought their own. Unless these people aren't big into drinking I guess.

Just search online for rules of the game (Texas Hold'em is by far the most popular game so I'd go with that) and make sure you know them well so you can answere any questions anybody else has. Most importantly make sure you have the hand order memorized. It's rather annoying when in the middle of a hand somebody is unsure if a flush is better than a straight.

Artoria

So pretty much a buy in is needed to keep the game going? Five dollars a person winner keeps the pot sounds fair and not too much. The idea is more about having fun than making money anyways.

Unfortunately I already bought the 4 decks but I can return 2 of them since it seams 1-2 decks will be all I need and it sounds like I might need some more chips. I didn't see any poker sets at the places I went that were close, so I guess I'll buy a couple more boxes of chips and I should be set.

As far as the beer none of these people are big drinkers (that I have ever seen) but maybe I should make it a BYOB event.

I already know most of the rules form 5 card draw but I'll keep a chart handle just in case.

Thanatos

Yeah, I'll just second everyone telling you to play with money. Usually, my friends and I play with $10 apiece. That's like going to a movie, without the popcorn. Even if it were just $5, with 7 people that's $35 for the winner to get, which is a few cases of beer.

Glaeal

Try bounties. When we play, everyone puts $5 in the pot that gets split up for the top positions depending on the number of people. Everyone also puts $2 in a side pot that is awarded to someone for eliminating another player. *edit* To clarify, that's $2 each time you eliminate someone, with the overall winner getting back their bounty in addition to the bounty of the person they beat to win the game.

It makes people play slightly more aggressively, which means shorter, more exciting games.

localh77

dragonsama wrote: »

For a game with a max of 7 players how many decks of card should I use? I'm thinking about 4 decks of the same make/color. how many chips per player seem good? We won't want people sitting out for too long so short series might be best. What Value should I assign the chips?

I would recommend Texas Hold 'Em, in which case you only need one deck (sometimes it's nice to have an extra deck that the next dealer can shuffle during the current hand). I'm sure there are plenty of websites that give a quick run down of hold 'em, it's easy.

You may need more cards if you play draw, but trust me, it's not as exciting, and it won't last as long. Same as what everyone said about having a buy-in. 5 bucks probably won't mean much to anyone there, but without the chance to lose real money, the game just breaks down.

gundam470

Bounties are a nice twist also :^:

Fellhand

The greatest thing you will EVER learn about poker is patience.

JohnnyCache

a cheap buy in - say 5 dollars at a six person table - gives you the chance to win 30 dollars for five. That's good odds at less money then it would take to go to a movie.

I recommend 1 prize for every three full people - IE if 1-3 people pay 5 bucks, the winner gets everything. If you have 4-6 people, do a 66/33 or 75/25 split for first and second, and if you get 7-9 people do 60, 30, 10 or give third his money back and go 75/25 with what's left.

If you just have winner take all tournaments, many people will never, ever win and people will draw out for those last couple places quite a bit.

you probably won't be playing fast enough to need 2 decks and you will probably find if you aren't shuffling a shoe together for blackjack you won't like the shuffler as much as you think. Just take a deck to work or school or whatever and shuffle, you'll actually probably figure it out in about a day.

on blinds, I would say since you guys won't be playing fast and will be drinking, you will probably want to up them one level every 45 minutes.

One level does NOT mean double them, that's a huge mistake that many people make because it seems to not make a difference early in a tourney.

This is one level (more or less):

blinds of 1-2, then 2-4, then 3-5, then 3-6 OR 4-8, then 5-10, then 10-20, then 15-30, then 20-40, then 25-50, etc.

this is doubling: 1-2, 2-4, 4-8, 8-16, 16-32, 32-64, 64-128, 128-256

people like to go "Hey cowboy, let's double the blinds" but if you just double them, you can get some odd amounts. The levels used in casinos are better for making change and stuff.

make sure everyone knows how to play, make sure everyone understands that an ace plays high or low.

If you are playing with blinds, explain the blind structure to people just like this (otherwise they will not get it the first time):

"Blinds are simple. It's like this. I dealt [use yourself as the dealer] and since this is TEXAS holdem and we've all got TEXAS sized balls tonight, the guy to my left DIDN'T EVEN WAIT FOR HIS CARDS. He bet without looking! And it impressed the guy to HIS left so much, he RAISED it once already, also without looking. So now the third guy has to at least call him, and after that it goes normally"

This is the ONLY scientifically valid way to explain blinds to an entire table of people and have at least 80% of them "get it."

Keep a book of card rules handy and basically have everyone shake hands on the fact that any disputes on rules that do arise unforseen will be resolved by what's in the book. Yes, even at a five dollar game. Another thing that's good to do if you're going to play tournament style is to talk before hand about people that have to get up and leave early or people that have to step away from the table - I strongly recommend that are just blinded down in their abscence and they get no refund. Any other way out of the situation is REALLY complicated.

A third thing i mention you decide how to arbitrate before hand - because it will come up within six games - is what happens if someone turns over their cards, sees how their opponent reacts (IE going "Well I couldn't have beat that" and turning over his own cards) and then player one says "I didn't fold. I just turned over my cards. I raise."

This is a dick move and in most formal games or casino games it's regarded as a fold to turn over your cards to the table without placing your chips for a call or calling verbally.

Start with hold'em at first because everybody knows the rules. If you want more variety, add other games in later sessions. You can also theoretically deal holdem to 22 people with one deck (supposedly the reason for the invention of the game), but I personally split my tables at nine for reasons of sanity and elbow room.

Finally, teach everyone to bet in front and let the dealer gather. This takes a little formality at first but it is the only way all-ins and side pots and such will be handled smoothly at a beer game.

What this means is everyone puts their bet in front of their cards, instead of throwing it directly into the middle. When the dealer sees everyone who is keeping their cards has the same sized stack in front of them, he gathers the chips into the center. This is a pretty foolproof way of keeping the pot right and elmininating several fairly gauche ways to cheat.


The 'standard' casino colors for chips most places are:

White, $1
Yellow, $2
Red, $5
Blue, $10
Grey, $20
Green, $25
Orange, $50
Black, $100
Pink, $250
Purple, $500
Burgundy, $1000
Light Blue, $2000
Brown, $5000

It doesn't really matter if you keep to that (not even all casinos go by it religiously), but hey, if you're gonna play, why not play right, right?

and if you still need more help

http://www.homepokertourney.com/ is a great link and I recommend you start with their structure page.

also:

Don't bet Knob at tekken.

Blake T

Everything the man above me said was correct.

The only thing I would suggest is to raise the blinds every full revolution of the table. (ie. when the person who was first the dealer becomes the dealer again.

Orestes

I found another good way to keep the blinds raising is to tripple them or so every time someone is knocked out. Or double them every time the dealer chip goes around the table and back to someone.

JohnnyCache

See, personally, I don't even think you REALLY need to raise the blinds at a tournament like this very often. The concept behind raising the blinds is pressuring conservative players a bit so the game doesn't take all night - there's no intrensic need to kick up the blinds every 10 hands (Blanket, how does your system work when people start to go out? If we get heads up, do they raise every other hand?)

2and2is5

Yeah, just raise the blinds after some set period of time goes by. It works much better that way.

Blake T

JohnnyCache wrote: »

See, personally, I don't even think you REALLY need to raise the blinds at a tournament like this very often. The concept behind raising the blinds is pressuring conservative players a bit so the game doesn't take all night - there's no intrensic need to kick up the blinds every 10 hands (Blanket, how does your system work when people start to go out? If we get heads up, do they raise every other hand?)

I play with conservative players (which is frustrating since I'm the only aggressive one so when they do go aggressive they target me) so raising it constantly is a good way to push it along. I like doing every full lap purely because it's easy to keep track of. If people know when the blinds are about to raise they are less likely to complain since it's part of the set rules.

Two players is once every three rounds.

nexuscrawler

in a 5-7 person game I like to play whre you raise the blinds whenever someone is knocked out.

Also having multiple decks is a good idea. You can have someone shuffle a deck while another one deals a different one. That way you never have to wait for someone ot shuffle between hands