Poker Manager was let go around the end of August. They went back to regular straddle after this.

I'm going out west next summer and looking to put together a small tourney circuit for myself.

I will probably be in Edmonton on a Wed, Thurs and Fri. What would be the best casinos to play a tourney each of those nights? (but preferably morning on Friday?)

Casino Edmonton http://www.casinoabs.com/casino-edmo...g-information/

Yellowhead Casino http://www.casinoabs.com/casino-yell...g-information/

Generally, if I am looking to get out of the house for a tournament, these would be my first two choices. Between the two of them, they cover off the nights you are looking for.

A couple of other choices may be

Century Casino http://edmonton.cnty.com/casino/poker/tournaments/

River Cree Casino http://www.rivercreeresort.com/poker.php posts a monthly tournament calendar. I would say this is the "nicest" casino, except that they allow smoking and their poker area is right in the middle of the table game / slot machine area. And if you are playing cash games, they close at 3am, where other rooms are open longer on the weekends.

Hope you enjoy your time in Edmonton.

Any serious/semi-serious online grinders from Edmonton here?

I play a good amount of online plo. I'll play at Argyll casino once in a while for a couple weeks at a time, they have a 2/5 DC (plo is the only game picked) game running almost around the clock.

any high stakes NL games? i'm relocating there in a few weeks.

I have played live poker in a while so my info may not be up to date. Most of the high stakes games tend to be PLO. If I remember right I think there was high stakes NL games at the Cree occasionally.

stopped by argyle and cree today and the floor person working said nothing bigger than 2/5 NL.

thursday nights and cree has a group of guys playing 25/50 plo...

any other suggestion for high stakes NL?

High Stakes NL is dead in Edmonton. Anyone with a decently sized BR is playing the (very deep) 5/5 PLO which can easily turn into a 10/25 on any given night.

About 4 months ago we had a 5/10NL going on for a month or so every friday at cree but that has since died. I think if that was started again at YH or Argyll it could become more common.

Why do you think all bigger NL games died in Edmonton? And why is PLO so popular here?

I'd like to start a 5/10 or 10/25 no limit game regularly if anyone else is interested.

Does anyone have any experience buying chips with $USD in these rooms? Like what rate they give you etc

I know Argyll does offer to let you buy chips with American dollars but they do take a commission. I am not sure the exact rate you would get though. Your best bet is to just ask around. Honestly if I was at the casino and you seemed decently trustworthy, I would probably sell you Canadian dollars at the fair market rate.

thanks for the advice fun101!

where's the best place to play no limit holdem on the weekends? argyll? cree? yellowhead?

The only holdem games at all these casinos will be 1/2 $500 max NLHE. The rake is the same everywhere.

River Cree is the worst of the three IMO. The poker tables are on the floor and they close at 3am.

Yellowhead is the nicest room and they are open 24/7 but it's so damn far from everything.

Argyll is not as nice as YH but it's location is convenient. It's also open24/7.

Two things.

One, a lot of players dried up their BR taking shots far too big at these games, for the few months they were running.

Two, majority of reg Edmonton whales have drug money. There's a few of these guys who are good players, but mainly terrible LAGs with big BRs. Big money can be made from these players clearly. So naturally people would rather sit a 5/5 PLO game with these players then 6 pros and 1 fish and 1 nit retiree at a 5/10 NLH.

Whales seem to have taken to PLO mainly because it's a lot easier for them to play their high variance, pressure style game at PLO where in general they have a lot more equity, then similar situations in NLH.

The games vary, a 1/2 YH PLO could see anywhere from 3k on the table to over 20k. 5/5 Argyll more along the lines of 5k - 40k. But the game gets bumped up pretty quickly the deeper it gets.

Good, profitable games but very high variance, over the last year or so i've re-assessed my life EV. As of now, the edge I have at these games is not worth the toll of the variance for me personally. When I get stuck 4k in a night I am effected far too much. I rather stay away from the game, and the swings because they effect me outside poker.

So I don't blame people for not wanting to leave these games. Though I'd love bigger, regular NLH games to become common. I was beating 1/2 PLO @ ~45bb/hr and 5/5 at ~30bb/hr over ~500hrs, to give an idea at what a competent player can expect.

Anyone here know when Baccarat will re-open?

I don't think the poker room at Baccarat will ever reopen. A casino is part of the arena district plans and Baccarat will close down permanently. I hope this new casino has a poker room. It would be awesome to play poker with drunk hockey fans after Oilers games.

Apparently the mass murderer in Edmonton frequented casinos where he racked up 100s of thousands in debt. Anyone recognize the guy Phu Lam? Just curious.

Playing a trip too E-town for a weekend. Is there a casino that runs PLO on the weekends?

Your best bet is Casino Edmonton (known as Argyll Casino) in the southeast. 2-5 PLO goes most every night. Casino Yellowhead on the north end will also have PLO going on weekends.

Heading to Edmonton in a couple weeks. Curious what you experienced local regs would recommend for a good 1/2 NL game?

And what casino(s) have the best MTT structure as well?

Thanks a lot!

1/2 games are good across the city, but you'll find the best game selection at Casino Yellowhead on the north side and Casino Edmonton (also known as Argyll) in the south-east. The other 3 casinos will run 1/2 but often only 1 or 2 games a night.

Small buyin tournaments in the city are more or less unbeatable due to the massive juice. Yellowhead runs $100 tourneys Mon/Wed/Fri/Sat with a 20 minute structure but the buyin works out to $67 + $33 once all the fees and withholding is done. Ain't no one beating that rake. Larger tournaments are better but don't run weekly.

Thanks. Yeah, that confirms a lot of what I was thinking too from having looked at pokeratlas.

Makes sense. Prob just stick to 1/2 while there.

GL

I was playing at Argyll tonight and a player told me there was talk of the River Cree moving Poker back from the Slot area to either the original room or where the nightclub used to be. He said both Sefik and a dealer had mentioned it within the past two weeks. Does anybody have any more information on this? Would be overjoyed if true, haven't played there in ages as I can't handle the smoke from all the darts in the pit area.