Owner's Setup

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Many customers ask me about what I use at home since I have already done all the research. I also used to be a General Manager of one of the largest casino resorts in America. Although I use all our products to make sure I am comfortable selling them, my personal setup gets the most use. Many people just want to buy what I have, so that's why I created this page.

• 1,500 Paulson Top Hat & Cane Chips (see color quantities in the table below)
• Rolling Chest 1,000 Chip Case
• Clear Carrier 1,000 Chip Case
• 15 Acrylic 100 Chip Trays
• KEM Narrow Arrow Playing Cards
• Full-size Portable Poker Table
• Tournament Dealer Button
• Bluegate Dealer Button
• Missed Blind Buttons
• Bluegate Spinner Card Cover

Click on the links above to learn about the different products. I've copied an excerpt from the "Help Me Choose!" section below to show you how this set gets worked out in a variety of different poker games. I love poker and if you do to, this is The Setup.

The Owner's Setup can only be delivered in Singapore, unless other arrangements are made beforehand (the table and Rolling Chest are very expensive to ship internationally).
Email Us for shipping rates outside of Singapore.
Shipping Info: 160lbs/72kg.

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Show me the Owner's Setup and how it is used in all games
Although I have a warehouse full of chips, I primarily use a standard Paulson 1,000 Chip Set in Clear Carrier for my own home games. In my actual Owner's Setup, I have an additional 500 chips, which give me more flexibility in running all the games I play. My set looks like this (the "+" quantities are in the additional chips added to the standard 1,000 chip set):

Quantity	Value	Color	Comment
+100	$0.25	Blue	Used for small stakes games (from the Paulson's "Pharaoh" line)
200	$1	White	Used primarily in 10-player $1/$2 no limit Texas hold 'em games
300	$5	Red	Ditto
200+100	$25	Green	I need an extra 100 Green for 20-person tournaments
100+200	$100	Black	Ditto, an extra 200 Black
100	$500	Purple	Used for tournaments or as a 50c chip in smaller cash games
100	$1,000	Yellow	Used for tournaments or as buy-in markers
+100	5,000	Silver	Used for big tournaments (from Paulson's "World" line)

When discussing my chip set, I will assume it is only 1,000 chips and then will make comments when I use the extra 500 chips. I usually travel with the chips in my Rolling Chest 1,000 Chip Case and keep the extras in my Clear Carrier 1,000 Chip Case. That way, the chips are always stored in their Acrylic 100 Chip Trays, and each tray is neatly comprised of only one color. I can move the trays in and out of each carrying case quite easily. The trays facilitate counting, coloring up, and moving the chips around games as well. The Paulson's have $-sign denominations printed on them. I'm an American living in Singapore, which also uses a $-sign in its currency (at about 35-40% of the value, i.e. S$1.00 = US$0.60). This makes it very convenient.

I will discuss below how I use my set for 4 different cash games and 2 types of tournaments, and in almost every case, except my main Saturday night game, using my original 1,000 chip set requires me to make a tweak or two (so that's why I added the extra 500 chips). You really need at least 1,000 chips to play everything from cash games to tournaments. You will use only 3-4 colors at any given time, but you will need the whole range of 6-8 colors for playing different cash limits or as tournaments progress through the higher blind levels. Generally speaking, cash games work out your lower and middle denominations while tournaments work out your middle and higher denominations. Even with 1,500 chips, I still need to make some tweaks here and there.

Micro stakes game: divide the chip denominations by 10. During the week, I play a micro stakes game with family members for lunch money and bragging rights. We divide all the chip denoms by 10, so play the $1 White as 10 cents, the $5 Red as 50 cents and so on. There are only 5 of us so we usually have enough of the White chips to go around and around. We use quite a few of the Reds, but rarely break out the other colors. When we bet, we call out "$1" and "$5," not "10 cents" and "50 cents." It makes it easier if you are always calling out what it says on the chip and it makes my 4-year old dream about the World Series of Poker. The difference is that the buy in amounts are merely a tenth of the value of what you get in chips. Using chips in this way is similar to tournaments (see below), where the actual cash buy-in amounts are significantly lower than the nominal value of the chips you receive. Many people buy standard denominated chips and routinely make a similar tweak for all their games. Micro stakes games work out my White, Red, and Green chips; the rest usually stay in the case. I don't use the $0.25 Blue Pharaoh chip since it would just confuse the issue.

Low-stakes no-limit game: use the $500 chip as 50 cents. During the week, I sometimes play in a "student of the game" no-limit hold 'em game with a $100 buy-in and 50c/$1 blinds. We usually use the $500 chips as 50 cent pieces. This gets them out of the case and into play so they will wear in and look like the rest of the chips over time. We call them out as "50 cents," which isn't quite consistent with my point above, but it makes sense in this game because the rest of the chips are called out exactly as their printed denoms. There are 10 players in this game, sometimes up to 12, so each player starts with 10 $500 Purple small blind chips (played as 50 cents) and 20 $1 White big blind chips. That wipes out all of my 100 Purple and 200 White chips at the start of the game, and we usually have to facilitate moving the Purple chips from person to person every once in a while to help them make their small blind when it is their turn. It is not a huge inconvenience, but it shows the limitation of the set. I suppose I could get more $500 Purple chips, but I already have 1,500 chips! If we play only 5-6 handed, then we will use the $0.25 Blue Pharoah chips and not have to rely on the $500 Purple tweak. The $25 Green chips will trickle out as players make rebuys, but all the Black and Yellow chips stay in the case.

Fixed limit games: need lots of chips in just 2 colors. It's rare, but when we play $3/$6 fixed limit hold 'em, all of my 200 $1 White chips get distributed immediately, with the rest of the initial buy-in made up in $5 Red chips. Most casinos will play this game strictly as a White-chip affair and issue racks of 100 chips at a time to each player making a $100 buy in. I don't have enough White chips to do that, so have to use the $5 Reds as well. Personally, I don't like mountains of chips on the table anyway because it slows down the game. The $5 Red chips speed up a $3/$6 limit hold em game considerably. As with most limit games, we only need 2 colors to play an entire $3/$6 game. My 300 $5 Red chips are usually enough for all the rebuys. I only break out the 3rd color, $25 Green in this case, to store value on the table within the big stacks while they make change for players who need to rebuy. When we play $5/$10 limit hold 'em, the game is obviously played primarily with $5 Red chips, as it is in a casino. My 300 $5 Red chips are enough to play $1,500 in total stakes. Divide $1,500 by 9 or 10 people, and I have enough $5 Red chips for about a $150 of buy-in power per player. Again, that is not quite enough, so I first distribute all my $5 Red chips during the initial buy-in and then make up the difference with the $25 Green chips. As players bust out and make rebuys, I give them $25 Green chips and the big stacks help make the change. Very rarely does the 3rd color, $100 Black in this case, come into play. The $500 Purple and $1,000 Yellow chips stay in the case as well.

Medium-to-high stakes no-limit game: use 4-5 denominations and a 6th color as a "marker" chip. On Saturday nights, I usually play in either a $200 buy-in $1/$2 blind no-limit game that has a zillion rebuys, or we just cut to the chase with a $2,000 $5/$10 no-limit game. In the former, it's a rather loose game and it is not uncommon for people to make 7, 8, or even a record 25 buy-ins over the course of the evening. In the $200 $1/$2 game, the initial $200 starting stack of 20 $1 Whites, 21 $5 Reds, and 3 $25 Greens wipes out all my $1 White chips immediately (I designed my set that way). The first few rebuyers are given $5 Red and $25 Green chips to get a few more of the Red chips out on the table. As the banker, it is important that I regulate the amount of chips of each color during the course of the night. A big stack player will usually change a couple of the $25 Green chips for some of his $1 White and $5 Red chips so that the rebuyer can make up his blinds. At some point, subsequent rebuyers are given only $100 Black chips, and again, someone at the table will help make change. The first four colors of the standard set have a total value of $16,700 (200x$1 White, 300x$5 Red, 200x$25 Green, 100x$100 Black). That means you can comfortably play a game with that amount of total buy-ins and rebuys. You'll need to break out the $500 Purple chips if you go over.

As you can see, such a $200 $1/$2 no-limit game is played with 4 colors eventually. Some people prefer to play with only 3 colors, but as I pointed out, I don't like mountains of lower denoms on the table since it slows down the game and you'll run out of chips. Save the scooping of monster pots and building a fortress stack for the casino! As I point out in several places in the Help Me Choose! buyer's guide, I can't emphasize enough that chip spacing should be in increments of 4-5x, not 2x. That is, $1, $5, $25, $100, $500, and so on. A 2x spacing ($1, $2, $5, $10, etc.) is very inefficient and you will end up with piles of chips on the table and then run out of chips very quickly, even if you have a 1,000 chip set. At any rate, when these $200 $1/$2 games get out of hand, a bunch of my $100 Black chips find their way to the table by the end of the night. I usually have some left over $5 Red and $25 Green in the case. The $500 Purple chips are never used, but we use the $1,000 Yellow chips as "markers" to keep track of the numerous rebuys. These chips don't play in the game; they just help keep the accounting straight. For every $200 rebuy, or multiple there of, the player gets a Yellow marker chip and the rebuy is written down on a piece of paper (which is shredded at the end of the night!). Every once and while we do a buy-in check so there won't be any disagreements later. At the end of the night, the players pay back each Yellow marker with $200 worth of playable chips and what ever is left over, if anything, are their winnings for the night (or morning by that point). Alternatively, you can just do the rebuys with cold hard cash and then the marker chip is not as important. I just like to use all my chips! And this crazy game does just that.

When we play a $2,000 buy-in with $5/$10 blinds game, I need my extra 100 $25 Green and 200 $100 Black chips. I'll usually distribute all of my 300 $5 Red chips at the beginning of the game so that each player starts with a stack of 30 Reds ($150). Then, each player gets a stack of 30 $25 Green chips ($750) and 11 $100 Black chips ($1,100), for a total of $2,000 worth of chips. This way, everyone starts with a nice stack of 71 chips. That setup wipes out my 300 Red and 300 Green chips in my extended 1,500 chip set. Re-buys are made with $100 Black chips until they are exhausted as well, and then we move onto the $500 Purple chips. We have yet to require the $1,000 Yellow chips, and for now, we use them as buy-in marker chips. If you buy only the standard set, you can still play this $2,000 $5/$10 game, but you would start with fewer Green chips and have to rely more on the $500 Purple chips. That inconveniences the players a little. Heck, if you are playing this level, then you should pony up for the extra chips! Alternatively, if you never need the 200 $1 White chips in the standard set, then you can replace them with more $25 Green and $100 Black chips. The extended 1,500 Owner's Setup has about $39k in value from the $5 Red, $25 Green, and $100 Black chips, $89k in value if you include the $500 Purple chips, and $189k in value if you include $1,000 Yellow chips. Although the standard set has a total value of $166k, it is misleading because over half of that value is stored in the 100 $1,000 Yellow chips, which rarely come into play at these levels. They would only be used to store value in the big stacks when you run out of the lower-denom chips (and of course they would be used in tournaments).

Medium-level tournaments: start with middle denominations. Once a month, I put on a 4-5 hour tournament for 10-20 players with a small buy-in but a $3,000 starting stack and $25/$50 starting blinds. This is typically how a casino does it as well (although they sometimes describe it as "T3,000 with 25/50 starting blinds" so as not to confuse anyone with $ signs). You aren't really playing $3,000, just whatever the actual buy-in amount is, whether it be $10 or $300. The White and Red chips, therefore, stay in the case the whole time. The starting stack of 20 $25 Green, 20 $100 Black, and 1 $500 Purple blows out 200 Green and 200 Black chips (I need to use some of my extra $100 Black chips). If you get only the standard 1,000-chip set, you would start each person with fewer $100 Black chips and add another $500 Purple or two, but my players like to have a nice size stack when they start the tournament. It's no fun having $3,000 in front of you but only a few measly chips. It's great to have a big enough chip set to give me this option. If I am running a two table tournament, however, I am forced to distribute fewer $100 Black chips to each person and more $500 Purple chips (or, again, use my "extra" chips that I bought just for this occasion). I can easily accommodate rebuys with $500 Purple or $1,000 Yellow chips, if I am running a rebuy tournament. Other players help make the change. At some point in the tournament, as the blinds increase to multiples of 100, I color up all the Greens and remove them from play (assuming they are not being used for antes). You don't have to do this in cash games, but it is customary in tournaments to color up the chips as the game progresses (again, you want only 3-4 colors on the table at any one point). By the end of the tournament, only $500 Purple chips are on the table, and I am just breaking out the $1,000 Yellow chips. This tournament puts all my middle and higher denom chips to pretty good use. There are no glaring drawbacks to the chip combination of my chip set in this case.

Fantasy stakes tournaments: need to add the extra 5,000 denominated chips. Once a quarter, we play an 8-hour mock World Series of Poker-style tournament for a bigger buy-in, $10,000 in starting chips, and a slower blind structure. This tournament works out the chip set similarly to the $3,000 tournament, but if the tournament has more than 15 entrants, all of my 100 $500 Purple and all my 100 $1,000 Yellow chips get on the table sooner or later by necessity. In fact, if you do the math, my original 1,000-chip set has a total chip value of $166,700. That's enough chips for only 15-16 players in a $10,000 buy-in tournament (15 players x 10,000 initial stack = 150,000 total value). In such a big tournament, I really need a 5th color. Although my $ denominated Paulson chip set comes in 6 colors, I start this tournament with the 3rd color in the progression, the $25 Green chip (and do not use the $1 White or $5 Red chips at all). So, if I am running more than 15 players, I will need a different solution to provide a higher denomination than the $1,000 Yellow. If Paulson made a $5,000 chip in the regular Top Hat & Cane line, then I wouldn't have a problem. Unfortunately, they chose to make a silly $10 Blue chip instead. I don't use that chip at all (it's morally reprehensible!). Paulson just released a "World" chip line, however, that has a chip printed with a 5,000 denomination on the inlay but no currency symbol. It's a good enough match, so I carry a tray of 100 of these 5,000 Silver chips just for big tournaments. I break out this chip when I color up the $500 Purple chips from the table. With this additional tweak to my set, I can run a 2 or even a 3-table, $10,000 fantasy-stakes tournament quite easily. If I have 2-3 tables, then I need to use my 100 extra $25 Green and 200 extra $100 Black chips so that everyone starts out with a decent stack of chips in the beginning.

Conclusion: I love my chip set! As you can see, a 6 or 7 color, 1,000 + 500 chip set is very flexible, but still has its limitations. If you get a 500 chip set, your options are cut in half, but that merely means you have to be twice as creative if you want to play all these games! If cost is a big issue, then perhaps you can choose a nicer Paulson Top Hat & Cane or Nevada Jacks 500 or 750 chip set for your cash games and buy a separate 1,000 chip, entry-level Striped Dice set for tournament play.