Starting A Home Poker Cash Game
Many home poker games exclusively play poker tournaments. Although poker tournaments are fun and are often well suited to home poker games, there are disadvantages. If a player busts in a tournament, they are often done for the night. If they are running late, then the tournament has to wait for them or they can’t play poker that night. Playing a cash game can solve some of these problems. Although some poker tournament regulars might be wary of a cash game, and resistant to change, it can be worth while to try and make the switch.
Here are some tips on how to host the cash game -
- Keep the Buy Ins Low – Don’t make the buy ins more than people are accustomed to playing for at your tournaments. Keeping the buyins smaller than the tournament buy in will ensure that players who bust are willing to buy in again and keep the night going.
- Don’t Play Too Deep Stacked – Your home game isn’t the internet. You don’t want people to sit on their stacks and be nit’s the entire night. Playing with a 100 Big Blind stack does give an advantage to the better players, but it also helps kill the action. Try going with 50 Big Blinds buy in. So if you are playing a buy in of $25 – make the blinds $.25 – $.50. Games that give too much of an edge to the experienced poker players are not games that keep going.
- If People are worried, lower the stakes – Don’t let low stakes fool you. Even a $.10-$.20 game with a $10 max buy in can build up reasonable pots. If people are rebuying, then it wouldn’t be uncommon to have 15-20 stacks worth of chips on the table at the end of the night. Err on the side of low stakes, you can always increase them later.
- Try a cash game at the end of a short tournament – To give people a taste of playing a cash game, try starting with a tournament, and then when it is over play a cash game. Or have 2 tables set up, and as people bust out they can join the cash game. That gives people the option of leaving after they have played the tournament, but also lets people dip a tow in the water for the cash game. If enough people like it, you may be able to make the switch for the entire night.
It can be tough to get a cash game going. You aren’t going to be able to force it on people. Although, if you are reading this website, you are a likely an experience poker player who has played many hands, either live or online, many of your friends will be nervous and are really looking for a night out with fixed risk.
Comments are closed.