Crazy house rules at Agua Caliente observed first hand this week:

nightly tournament:
pot was raised pre, bet / call on the flop, and now the action is checked to the player in position. he tosses out a t5000 chip. the dealer immediately says, "400 to go" (the size of the big blind). this is my first time playing in this room, but i'm thinking wtf? 400?? he just tossed out a t5000 chip!!?

the dealer and a busy body player go on to explain that Agua's oversize chip rule APPLIES TO ALL STREETS! NOT JUST PREFLOP! A VERBAL DECLARATION IS REQUIRED TO BET THE AMOUNT OF THE CHIP. i don't even know where to begin, but someone upstairs obviously needs to buy a clue for $1.

an hour later. blinds are crazy big as you would expect in a nightly. folds to me on the button. the player in the big blind happened to be outside the poker room at the time, so there was a fair amount of free money in the pot. how can i not raise with two blank napkins?? so i obv i raise.

the SB tanks for a minute and considers his options. meanwhile, i'm silently wondering why the dealer hasn't killed the BB's hand. while the SB is literally in the act of folding, the guy in the BB comes rushing back over to the table to find his two cards sitting in front of his chip stack. i finally say "dealer, kill that hand."

nothing. "why isn't that hand dead?"

the same busy body player and the dealer explain that it is another house rule, that a player's hand isn't dead until it is his turn to act. WTF??!! this isn't a cash game where we are paying time! this is a tournament where every tournament rule book from san diego to maine says the hand is dead once all cards are dealt and the player is not in the seat.

just pure amazement at the bizarre rule interpretations.

lots of smaller casinos have house rules that give the locals lots of leeway as they believe their games are more liberal.

agua caliente....get used to those rules.
Honestly, its a legitimate knock on the place. I play there enough as a "visitor" when caddying in the area. And, its a real nice room, layout and amenity wise.

But, perhaps venting here and to the right person may actually get some attention. They are locals-dependent for eight months of the year- and staff/dealers are kind of over-chummy with the locals as well. I see that as a deterrent to visitors in general and anti-growth to a poker room. Truly, why have rules that are completely at odds with industry-accepted practice, unless you have the ability to be totally clear about that daily.
Announce "you hand will be killed if you do not act when it is your turn to act, in your seat"....OK, fine. By not announcing anything, you say.."visitors will learn about our locals rules as perceived infractions arise".....

AC has gone from a small room that catered to locals, to a stand-alone big room, with nice, quiet playing areas, enclosed in a great poker environment. Great service, roomy, great sight-lines, nice games and buy-ins.
The mentality is still catering to locals. I hope that changes to catering to all players soon.

I played at AC last night, its a good medium sized room.

Had 3-4 $1/3nl and 1 $2-5nl, 1 5/5 PLO.

Action was good. Obviously a sample size of 6hours on a Saturday night isn't much, but I got the impression that 80% the players were local regs and they were almost all bad. The one player I pegged as good made a really weak play, and I got the impression it was a soft player pool.

Comp system was down, regular rate is $.50/hr

Food was sub-par

Dealers were very friendly to me. In fact, I was very happy with the dealers. On the other hand, the players were not social with me at all-- I suppose young white nerdy guys don't add too much value to the small player pool.

I don't feel the room should cater to outsiders when such a high % of the player pool consists of locals. The casino is in the middle of a desert in a city without much going on.

Any updates on the 5/10nl and plo recently?

Is was there Thur/fri, at 2am Fri there was 3 tables 1/3nl, 2/5, a 4/8L and a full table PLO that didn't break till after 4, 4k stack playing. Any recent opinions on morongo

when playing in casinos full of local you need to blend in and not try to be an outsider. which of course you are, and cant change that. but your normal way of acting in your own local games may not and probably isnt appropriate for the new venue.

What are the opinions on Agua vs Morongo. I havent been enough to form a solid opinion but favor Agua for everything. It is just loaded with regulars and daily players. Do you guys think morongo is more profitable?

Morongo is cramped, hectic and noisy. The bathrooms are equivalent to a wal-mart, ive used nicer restrooms in lowes. And the dealers seem less professional with no soda machine.

It might be more profitable though. The min buy in is 100 instead of 60 at Agua, with 5$ chips instead of 2$. There is more tourists, a lot of Chinese gamblers, and its a 18+ room. The young players are douche bags with sunglasses and poker shirts with not much money but quick to get it in. These things could be put up with if its worth it but i dont like going enough to get a reliable opinion. What do you guys think?

Also it isnt the season for the coachella valley so this winter it good be a lot better game.

I'm going to have a weekend to kill down in the area, next weekend, and was wondering about which place I should go.

Is it better to just drive down to Pechanga, since I have to be LA on Monday? Or should I just skip it all and go to Commerce?

I would try Agua. It is a good room, and since the last comments last spring, they took some action. They have published a complete set of rules, which are available for inspection at the cashiers cage next to the podium. Someone really took heed to the complaints and, maybe, comments here on this forum. 3-6 limit, juicy O/8- usually 6/12, as well as 1/3 300max and 2/5 big max, maybe no max. If you are there for the weekend, you really owe it to yourself to see the best casino/poker room in the area.
The cafe is good, the steakhouse better, but the buffet I found lacking. Guest rooms are sumptuous- comparable to Caesars Palace.

when a room listens to its players and makes changes i always give it praise. in the long run it helps both sides.

I like AC as well. Wouldn't say the O/8 is juicy. But it's not tough either and most of the non-super senior citizen regs are pretty friendly. Don't waste your time or money w any of their LHE games. It's really all about NLH. 1/3 is soft and pretty goofy to say the least. There's usually a at least a couple pretty good players in 2/5 but as long your comfortable playing somewhat deep I've found it to be the best game they offer. I mostly give them props for offering a number of different games at players request. I've seen them offer 5/10 NL, 10/20 NL (with a min buy in of 3k) and even a heads up 10/20 Omaha game pop up. I got nothin on the tourneys tho, except for the one on thurs pm gets a pretty solid turn-out.

I will be in Palm Springs for a 4-day golfing trip with college buddies in early December. Will there be any 5/10 NL games going at Morongo or Agua Caliente on THU-SAT? Or will it be 2/5 NL at best with maybe a random 5/5 PLO game going?

I really don't want to play 2/5 NL or PLO, but I might be tempted to go play some poker if there will be some 5/10 NL running in Palm Springs next month.

Thanks in advance to any Palm Springs regs who can answer this question.

Doing a golf/poker trip in Jan. any chance Agua will have 5/10nl+ ?

Also coming in January for some golf and was wondering if there was any reliable PLO or 20-40+ LHE