In my home game, our leader sent a rules update to the players. Btw, this is a social, unraked game been going on a decade plus.

This is what he said:

BUY INS. All tables are $100 buy in to start the game. If you accidentally buy in for more than 100, quit and come back with the correct buy in. It is unfair to other players to sit down at $100 table with $800 in chips. I’m sure you all realize, ,as we discovered last last night, or anytime you’ve ever played in a casino, if you START with a substantially larger chip stack than all other players, it is a HUGE advantage for you and a disadvantage for everyone else.

It was always my understanding that you only play for your opponents stack size. This obviously applies to cash, not tournament games.

Comments?

The guy is probably wrong period but there are some specific things that may make it true.

1 - Covering everyone else is only good if you have an advantage on them. This gets more complicated with position on other players etc but is besides the point.

2 - In a live game I imagine if you buy in with 800 but everyone else has 100 effective stacks are 100 but if covering everyone else is advantageous to you (i.e. you are the best) then when other people gain chips you are now playing deeper which is good for you and you also don't chip down so say buy in with 100, lose 20 then you are playing effectively 80 deep which if you are the best and others are 100 deep is bad for you.

In terms of being able to push people around, bully them with a big stack. It's nonsense. I suppose it can have a psychological edge on people who don't understand and think it matters but w/e.

It's an advantage if you are a better player vs. everyone, don't have competent shorties and have no-one whipsawing you or whatever. It's also an obvious EV advantage if you cover the table spot who is deep vs. other players.

It's not a de-facto advantage in any way to have the deepest stack in a cash game.

EDIT

Glass tapping rules apply as always though, so I wouldn't necessarily break it down as to why this supposition is wrong. If you are the type of player who wants to be the effective stack and can articulate why that isn't an advantage for you...it probably is.

He is wrong - but if that is how your group think be glad you've got a nice soft cashgame to play in.

That being said, if you are playing in a fun/social game where everyone starts on $100 and after 5 hours of play there are a few $1k stacks, and some young online cashgame hero comes and buyins in for $2k to cover the recs - then I can see why you'd want to prevent this. If on the other hand, you've got drunken Derek - a huge action fish who shows up and wants to sit with 5k and punt it off trying to be a hero - clearly he hasn't gained any advantage starting at 5k.

If it is a loose/aggro game, especially with straddles, the most advantageous stack to buyin for would be a really short one as you will be able to get into much more +EV spots.

but yeah, TLDR people should buyin to cover everyone IF they are better than the players they are covering (like MMSS said) but the default action of buying in deeper doesn't give you an automatic advantage (the worse player in the game buying in for $200 vs $100 doesn't suddenly gain any advantage)

your final comment suggests your host thinks that 2 players being all in puts the larger stack completely at risk. this is incorrect in any form of poker (edit: I'm sure you could design a game with this rule and call it 'poker' but I'm not playing it against anyone with a pulse if it's raked)

in multi-player cash, being a shorter stack actually offers a theoretical advantage at equilibrium in unraked games (don't worry about why this is OP, but I'm willing to offer a basic discussion of the reasons for this if the host of your game cares)

I also echo (no pun) everything TwistedEcho said above.

I'm just curious about what kind of game setup this is. You describe it as a long running home game with no rake. And that makes sense. But I've never been at a game like that where someone could buy in for $800 when the buyin is $100. Just not sure who would be selling the chips if one could "accidentally" buyin for more than the allowed amount. Do you just put money in a pot and pull out chips yourselves (it could be)?

With the pandemic, playing online now using pokerrr set up...players log in, and then choose buy in. This particular player, OMC, who never buys in for more than the minimum, accidentally bought in for 800 and couldn't figure out how to reverse it.

During our prepandemic home game, we would allow players to buy in for 200 or 300 as the evening progressed and by the end of the evening there could easily be $4000+ on the table...people have won in excess of 2K...lots of drinking, and lots of really loose play.

BTW, in this situation, player won a $1000 with pocket kings against a flopped ace...opponent, who would almost never bluff here, kept firing and player hit a King on the river! That's the kind of game it is.

At my NL50 home game, max buyin has always been $100 to protect people from their own drunken stupidity, ie buying in for $1k to match other deep stacks and punting it off. It's a competitive game but still friendly (not to mention inside my house) and I want people to come back and not lose their rent money.

Sounds like a software issue. You should be able to limit the buy-in to whatever you want.

Yes, once he got sat with 800, it's virtually impossible to go south. Was confused by your 'quit' statement, but now it makes sense. He would have to quite and then sit out the proper amount of time within the software/site rules.

I would much rather have a guy sit down with 'all' of his money than have built up profit in his stack. But either way, having someone sit down and be able to undo all my 'hard work' of building a stack in one hand is perplexing but can be part of the rules at some tables.

'We' typically have a max buy-in the first 'x' hours and then open it up to match-the-stack. GL