Leaving smaller denomination chips in play

Flushdraw

Bit of a rant, but its something that bugs me playing in the SE.

I've always had a gripe about playing in the sporting emporium because they chip up far far too early IMO.I've had a few run-ins with varies TDs asking them to leave the smaller denom chips in play longer, and they have allowed them to stay in play.

I dont know whether it seems petty or silly, but i'm not a big fan of betting in round numbers and i hate to have only a handful of chips in my stack.

Played the Sporting last night for the first time in ages. Once the blinds went to 200/400, off came the 25 chips. My standard open at this level is 950 or 1050. I hate betting 1000 or 1200 so settle for 1100. Sporting games are never deepstacked at this level and the difference between c-betting when you make it 950 and get 2 callers and when you make it 1200 and get 2 callers is huge. Most of my game is built around 3betting and playing post-flop poker. I'm not saying i'm fantastic or anything, but its were most players make mistakes. You should be able to have enough chips in play to make a bet you feel comfortable with, rather than have to bet an amount just because the chips have been taken off the table.

If there's a limper at 200/400 and i make it 1475 to go, it a) makes it harder for players to work out whats in the pot b) some of them dont even know what extra they have to put in c) looks stronger than a 1500 bet (meh its only a red and a blue chip, i call) d) if called, i know whats in the pot and what to cbet, sometimes they havent a clue.

Having the 25 chips in play also allows you to get reads from players by the way they play with their chips and what demoninations they bet with. It can also be quite intimidating when you hold a couple of stacks of chips rather than 7 or 8 1k chips.

Its similar, but more annoying when they take the 100 chips out of play at an early level. I think its the 1000/2000 or 1500/3000.

In some circumstances it can slow the game down if players keep betting their smaller amounts, but all in all, i dont see any harm in leaving the smaller denom chips in play for an extra couple of levels.

In Cellbridge the other night, John didnt chip up for what seemed like an eternity, and i felt far more comfortable and enjoyed the game far more as a result.

Any thoughts?

fatguy

What about the annoying bar stewards who count out 12x25 and 4x50 chips, to "get rid of them", instead of sticking in a 500? ARGH.

Flushdraw

fatguy wrote: »

What about the annoying bar stewards who count out 12x25 and 4x50 chips, to "get rid of them", instead of sticking in a 500? ARGH.

Lovely...Raise....I'll take them thanks..

Hyzepher

I have to agree with this. There is nothing I hate more than having an average stack and only having a few chips in front of me.

Other weaker players find it easier to call of their whole stack if it's just a few chips - not giving any thought to the entire value etc. And you should never under estimate the strength of using a large stack of chips to make a bet when a few of the higher value ones would surfice.

Slash/ED

I actually do think it makes a psychological difference, when I play live I tend to make pretty small raises around 2.5x using my smallest demonination chips and I genuinely do think it has a slight effect on peoples ranges in the blinds. Only weaker players obviously, but these are live small stakes tournaments.

I think a raise to 2k at the 400/800/ante level say, with 20 100 chips does effect how people respond to it rather than throwing in two 1k chips, though I'd imagine most people would think that's just silly I really do think it makes a difference.

Tony3004

i would say that a fair percentage of players would be in the same boat as you on this one, I am anyway, or maybe we have mild OCD and everything has to be odd number

some players are so bad sometimes that if you do c-bet 2k (2 single chips) with AK on a dry flop

the deciding factor might just be " hey its only 2 chips, i have middle pair " wereas 1950 is so much better, using about 7 or 8 chips, id feel more confident of getting the bet through


Good point but dont think TDs will leave chips in play cos you like odd numbers

LTL

The other arguement here is that everytime you make it 1050 with 25's and 100's the dealer has to count out each raise to make sure there's no mistakes and this constant counting actually slows down the game quite a bit. So you really have to decide which you'd prefere, the physcological edge you might get off some weaker players who consider a big stack a big stack despite denominations OR the advantage you would be getting of playing more pots each level when the dealer can deal more hands faster?

RichieLawlor

LTL wrote: »

the advantage you would be getting of playing more pots each level when the dealer can deal more hands faster?

There is no advantage here for Tony, the more pots per level the more chips he can lose.

doke

LTL wrote: »

The other arguement here is that everytime you make it 1050 with 25's and 100's the dealer has to count out each raise to make sure there's no mistakes and this constant counting actually slows down the game quite a bit. So you really have to decide which you'd prefere, the physcological edge you might get off some weaker players who consider a big stack a big stack despite denominations OR the advantage you would be getting of playing more pots each level when the dealer can deal more hands faster?

Yeah, certainly slows the game down. Played with one maniac in the IO (Michael Tureniec) who was sitting with about 90% of the small denomination chips in the tournament in front of him (it seemed) and opening or raising 90% of pots using piles of them. Sample pot at the 1000/2000 level: he'd raise to 5500 (which he'd count out slowly for maximum intimidatory effect in 55 100 chips), then after eventually working out how much the raise was, one of the blinds would call. Then he'd count out and cbet 63 100 chips, blind would look confused, ask the dealer to spread the spot, spend about 3 minutes staring at the pot, then call. Michael would bet 102 100 chips at the turn, and after staring at the pot a while more, blind would fold. Then the dealer would push the enormous pile of chips to Michael. We were playing 1 hand for every 3 or 4 on the tables around.

eoghan104

Jesus Ive thought this loads and never said anything because it does sound a bit stupid. I hate only having the bare minimum in chips at the table. Having loads of chips is an advantage for all the reasons stated above.....

tylerdurden94

I actually had a guy say something along the lines of this last night, when i was raising i would mix it between noraml amounts and mix amounts, he was making normal raises like 500/1200 etc where as i would make it 525/575/1050/1125 he felt his raises where getting snapped off alot easier, he started mixing amounts and was getting them through a little easier.

I know for me i hate counting a mix amount bet (crap at maths i am ) i can understand getting rid of the small denomination chips but maybe in places they could leave out the middle denomination chips.

Looking at your stack last week in Celbridge it was just a wall of chips! Playing in JP's sat last night a guy at my table has a pretty impressive stack, they were chipping up and when we came back it didnt look so good all of a sudden because he had 1 25k chip.

Coillte_Bhoy

As a player i prefer to have a big a stack as possible and hate chipping up. However as a pub tourney organiser i find most players would rather chipping up asap. Even in the later stages of a tourney when there would be small denomination chips in play, some players always want me to 'take away all these 1,000's and give me a few 5,000's'. Though as one poster said having loads of chips in play does tend to slow things down and a lot of my toruneys are self deal.

mdwexford

Yeah much better having stacks of chips in front of you Vegas style.

thechamp87

I hate when they chip up early. I love collecting all the 25 chips.

Also, when you say "I am the captain of this ship" it doesn't ring the same as when you have a castle of chips.

ditpoker

when i ran tournaments in dit they way we did was just to leave all chips in play, and only chip up a specific player's stack IF that specific player asked for it.

Admittedly this was largely down to laziness of my behalf as TD, but i'm a firm believer in trying to break a table under the weight of mountains of chips, its more fun!

granted there is the "slow's the game down" argument, which i do appreciate, but if i was at a table and a player got so upset by my slowing down technique removing chips isnt going to make me play any faster, i will play as slow or as fast as needed to help me.

in summary, remove all chip-ups... (in fields with 40-100 players, obviously if you had the 25's still in play in day 4 of the IO or wsop its a bit extreme... )

fatguy

thechamp87 wrote: »

I hate when they chip up early. I love collecting all the 25 chips.

Also, when you say "I am the captain of this ship" it doesn't ring the same as when you have a castle of chips.

Rubbish! Clearly it's better when you're the only guy on the table holding a 1 bajillion chip.

ozpoker

Well - I'll be a dissenting voice on this subject. As much as it feeds egos and looks intimidating, the huge stacks of chips issue simply slows play down. Especially near the end of the tournament when most betting is done by the flop with someone all in. Counting/recounting huge numbers of chips is slow and error prone.

Chip up early/chip up often is my vote.

Degag

In the pub tournies i run, i take the small denomination chips off as soon as possible because

1. everyone bets with them, trying to get rid of them.
2. Alot of players play with dirty stacks so it's hell seperating and counting them
3. All ins are alot more difficult.

I personally wouldn't mind playing with them in a game with a competent dealer and players who didn't abuse no 1 and no 2 above.

strewelpeter

Flushdraw wrote: »

Any thoughts?

Good post, lots of good reasons to keep the chips in play longer and not really much to be gained by removing them too soon.

In the later stages and particularly the FT of one night tourneys it can be worthwhile just reducing the sheer number of chips in play by introducing 10K 25 K etc but no need to take all the denominations out of play.

aodea

ditpoker wrote: »

when i ran tournaments in dit they way we did was just to leave all chips in play, and only chip up a specific player's stack IF that specific player asked for it.

Admittedly this was largely down to laziness of my behalf as TD, but i'm a firm believer in trying to break a table under the weight of mountains of chips, its more fun!

granted there is the "slow's the game down" argument, which i do appreciate, but if i was at a table and a player got so upset by my slowing down technique removing chips isnt going to make me play any faster, i will play as slow or as fast as needed to help me.

in summary, remove all chip-ups... (in fields with 40-100 players, obviously if you had the 25's still in play in day 4 of the IO or wsop its a bit extreme... )

You never chipped up cause i did. But really do prefer chips to stay in play as its amazing as flushdraw said the difference a raise of say 1075 instead of 1200 can make.

kincsem

I prefer when the small denomination chips are removed as it is easier to know how much people are playing. If a player bets an odd amount (725, 1075) I will be tempted to call as I figure he/she is trying to confuse.

I also like players making continuation bets as I respond by making "continuation calls" (copyright). You are going to have to show me a hand. We're going to the river.

The C Kid

Do you not just type in the size of your bet into the bet-sizing box?

Flushdraw

LTL wrote: »

The other arguement here is that everytime you make it 1050 with 25's and 100's the dealer has to count out each raise to make sure there's no mistakes and this constant counting actually slows down the game quite a bit. So you really have to decide which you'd prefere, the physcological edge you might get off some weaker players who consider a big stack a big stack despite denominations OR the advantage you would be getting of playing more pots each level when the dealer can deal more hands faster?

Well you've picked me up wrong for starters. I said i like to raise to 950 or 1050. I didnt mention anything about usung all 25s or all 100s to make the bet. I could have 30x100 chips and my raise to 1050 will consist of 1x1k chip plus 2x25 chips. I'm not interested in shovelling a ton of chips into the pot. I like to bet exactly what i want. If other people want to bet or call with lower denom chips, thats fine with me.

doke wrote: »

Yeah, certainly slows the game down. Played with one maniac in the IO (Michael Tureniec) who was sitting with about 90% of the small denomination chips in the tournament in front of him (it seemed) and opening or raising 90% of pots using piles of them. Sample pot at the 1000/2000 level: he'd raise to 5500 (which he'd count out slowly for maximum intimidatory effect in 55 100 chips), then after eventually working out how much the raise was, one of the blinds would call. Then he'd count out and cbet 63 100 chips, blind would look confused, ask the dealer to spread the spot, spend about 3 minutes staring at the pot, then call. Michael would bet 102 100 chips at the turn, and after staring at the pot a while more, blind would fold. Then the dealer would push the enormous pile of chips to Michael. We were playing 1 hand for every 3 or 4 on the tables around.

Again Dara, i'd never make a bet mae entirely from low denom chips. Its the variance in bet size being my main gripe. A lot of weeker players will call bets with all the raises with weak hands by using the low denom chips. That makes me happy. What you've said above is ridiculous and bang out of order and can understand how frustrating that would be.

ozpoker wrote: »

Well - I'll be a dissenting voice on this subject. As much as it feeds egos and looks intimidating, the huge stacks of chips issue simply slows play down. Especially near the end of the tournament when most betting is done by the flop with someone all in. Counting/recounting huge numbers of chips is slow and error prone.

Chip up early/chip up often is my vote.

I wouldnt expect the 25 chips to be still in play come the business end of a tournie. I'd like them to be left on for a couple of extra levels past the 200/400 level. Taking them off when we hit 800/1600 or 1000/2000 would be fine. I'm also not against chipping up during play to tidy stacks up, but leaving a decent amount of 25s or 100s chips isnt going to harm anyone really

Degag wrote: »

In the pub tournies i run, i take the small denomination chips off as soon as possible because

1. everyone bets with them, trying to get rid of them.
2. Alot of players play with dirty stacks so it's hell seperating and counting them
3. All ins are alot more difficult.

I personally wouldn't mind playing with them in a game with a competent dealer and players who didn't abuse no 1 and no 2 above.

In a pub tournie, i think its ok to chip up often to speed things up. For all the reasons above and others. That would obv slow the game down, and where its generally self deal and the blind levels are short and skip 75/150s etc.

I was talking about professionally run tournies like the SE where dealers are top class and we dont have time constraints.

strewelpeter wrote: »

Good post, lots of good reasons to keep the chips in play longer and not really much to be gained by removing them too soon.

In the later stages and particularly the FT of one night tourneys it can be worthwhile just reducing the sheer number of chips in play by introducing 10K 25 K etc but no need to take all the denominations out of play.

Yeah Tony. Maybe remove the 25s but the SE for example will only have 1k and 500 chips in play when you get to the business end in the majority of tournaments

kincsem wrote: »

I prefer when the small denomination chips are removed as it is easier to know how much people are playing. If a player bets an odd amount (725, 1075) I will be tempted to call as I figure he/she is trying to confuse.

I also like players making continuation bets as I respond by making "continuation calls" (copyright). You are going to have to show me a hand. We're going to the river.

I dont mind calls at all. Its more profitable for me to get a call and take the pot away on the flop/turn, than to just pick up the blinds preflop.

RoundTower

sounds like a crap idea. Speeding play up improves the game much more than pandering to the donk who would rather bet 1175 than 1200 in the 200-400 level.

Flushdraw

bohsman

If you have Doke on your table and theres antes in play it doesnt matter how many small chips are in play you still wont have any to raise odd numbers with as Dara will have them all - and not because hes raising every hand either.

eagle eye

More hands >>>>>>> Small demonition chips (for good players)

cooker3

Why would you raise to either 950 or 1050 but not want to raise to 1,000 if it's not about the physical amounts of chips per bet size.
What's the difference?

bigbadpat

Chip up a.s.a.p. :P

JP Poker

I haven't had a chance to to read through all of this but afaik the lowest chip is play is which ever is the lowest chip needed to pay the blinds and ante's.

So techically the 25's should be removed from a game that doesn't have an ante after 150-300 level. I'm sure most card club's leave them in play until their next break as this makes more sense as we get a break say every 2 hours.

JP Poker

tylerdurden94 wrote: »

I actually had a guy say something along the lines of this last night, when i was raising i would mix it between noraml amounts and mix amounts, he was making normal raises like 500/1200 etc where as i would make it 525/575/1050/1125 he felt his raises where getting snapped off alot easier, he started mixing amounts and was getting them through a little easier.

I know for me i hate counting a mix amount bet (crap at maths i am ) i can understand getting rid of the small denomination chips but maybe in places they could leave out the middle denomination chips.

Looking at your stack last week in Celbridge it was just a wall of chips! Playing in JP's sat last night a guy at my table has a pretty impressive stack, they were chipping up and when we came back it didnt look so good all of a sudden because he had 1 25k chip.

We actually ran out of smaller chips which is why we had to introduce the 25k chip at this stage.