Buy in & blinds structure

[Anemro]

This is a further question from my original post of some days ago.
I run a small home poker game for close friends. I need to change my buy in/blinds structure because I have been told £5 buy-in & 10p SB, 20p BB is not good.
I now know that the standard is 100x BB.
So my options are a buy in for £10 0.5SB & 10BB or buy in for £20 10SB & 20BB.

I'm not sure what to go for. The guys are used to the £5 buy in and to raise it to £20 is a huge jump for them. However if we go for the £10 buyin we have to deal with 5p chips which seems fiddly and odd. We are all used to the 10p & 20p chips so it may confuse things etc

I think the guys don't know what I am on about and think we should just leave it as it is but I have been told that a new structure will allow more post flop play. Any thoughts?

Cheers

[Jauron]

I assume this is a cash game...establish the blinds, let them worry about how much they want to buy in for. If this is a cash game, forcing someone to buy in for X amount hurts the game. Let them buy in for 1000 the BB, let them buy in for 20BB, just have them buy in.

[jimmer]

For cash games....

...establish the blinds, let them worry about how much they want to buy in for. If this is a cash game, forcing someone to buy in for X amount hurts the game. Let them buy in for 1000 the BB, let them buy in for 20BB, just have them buy in.

This.

For tourneys....

There is no right or wrong answer. It just depends on what you are looking to achieve.

On our homegames, we usually start with 1,000chips and start the blinds at 5 and 10, doubling them every 15 minutes.

However sometimes, for what ever reason, we change this.

Once a few lads suggested they wanted an all-nighter, so we each started with 2,000 chips and the blinds went up every hour.

Another time, one of the lads had to be away by 11pm, so we each started with 500 chips and started the blinds on 10 & 20.

[HalfSugar]

On our homegames, we usually start with 1,000chips and start the blinds at 5 and 10, doubling them every 15 minutes.

That's just horrible dude.

[jimmer]

On our homegames, we usually start with 1,000chips and start the blinds at 5 and 10, doubling them every 15 minutes.

That's just horrible dude.

Why?

[HalfSugar]

Doubling blinds on every level means you are exponentially reducing the BB/total chips ratio every X minutes. Even if you start the blinds super low, before long the game has to become an unavoidable crapshoot. We structure as follows when we play a freezeout (<20 players this lasts 6hrs or so)

5,000 starting chips, 20 minute levels

25/50
50/100
75/150
100/200
100/200 +25
150/300 +25
200/400 +50
300/600 +50
400/800 +100
500/1,000 +100
600/1,200 +200
800/1,600 +200
1,000/2,000
1,500/3,000
2,000/4,000
3,000/6,000

We've never gone higher than 3,000/6,000 and by the time the blinds reach 1,000/2,000 and beyond, players can opt to dump the antes if they like.

[jimmer]

I'm not disagreeing with that structure, as it looks good.

However, our structure works well because
-Some players can't get to the game until 9-9.30'ish
-Others have to leave by 11am 'ish
-Some don't have a clue and just come along for a 'catch up' with others.
-Some don't have much money.

Therefore, our structure allows each game to last around 80-100 minutes. This means we can usually play three games per night.

Some arrive for the second and third game, some for the first and second and the rest paly all three.