so I move to sacramento next thursday and really excited that I can play live again cuz where I live it's illegal/poor games etc...

I found this place that looks kinda nice on sunday there's deep $50+10 with about 80-90 players as they say


http://www.capitol-casino.com/tournaments.asp

anyone knows this place? any other good place worth a visit?

Not too many good tourneys in the area, but there are plenty of good NL cash games.

Capitol is probably the best place to play if you're looking for tournaments, but again they are just the best choice and that doesn't mean they're great. They also have the best higher NL games, with a recent rule change you can now buy-in for as much as the largest stack in the room.

My preference as far as NL games go is Casino Royale. They are one of the newer rooms and are very good at getting players in the door. Due to many of their promotions they have the largest choice of smaller NL cash games. They run a 1-2 NL game with a $100 max and it is 4 chips to open limp. This causes a ton of action for such a small game. They also have a juicy 2-3 NL game with a $100-$300 buy-in. This pretty much runs every night with busier nights (Thurs-Sun) getting two games going. However, I wouldn't touch their tourneys with a 10ft pole. They are all $10 or $20 rebuys and have virtually a Hyper-Turbo structure.

There are also several other rooms in the area, however I feel that the two above have just about everything you can need for live poker.

Feel free to PM me anytime. I'm in Vegas until the 21st but I'd be glad to get together sometime and welcome you to the area.

The local tournaments in the area generally all suck IMO. If there is a good one I haven't found it yet. The cash game options are great, and bosox has covered them well. In addition to the Capital Casino and Casino Royale, there are: the Limelight, the new Rancho Casino, the Phoenix, the Lucky Derby, Red Hawk, Jackson (about an hour away) and a few other places as well that I'm forgetting. The 2/5 game at the Derby used to be really juicy but I haven't played there much.

You can be in Reno or South Lake Tahoe in under two hours generally and both locations have casinos that regularly run excellent tournaments. The Grand Sierra Resort, the Peppeermill, and Harvey's South Lake Tahoe all run tournament series several times a year. There are not very many months devoid of tournament action.

Plus there is the WPT Shooting Star tournament at the Bay 101 in San Jose, also less than two hours away.

I live in Lodi and would like to go back to being a prop..I know I can get a gig at the California Grand but would rather only have to drive to Sac..Do you guys know of any Sac cardrooms that are currently hiring props?

Thanks for any info.

Lucky Derby and Capitol Casino were both hiring props in the past. Must be willing to play 2/5nl at derby and I believe 5/10nl is optional at cap but they pay $30 an hr.

Now back on topic of the OP, the only good tourneys seem to be the capitol casino deep stack tourneys (220 or 550 buy in once a month on the 2nd saturday of every month), and capitol draws the biggest amount of players for each of their tourneys. As far as live play goes, most card rooms in the sac area have soft players. I now almost play exclusively at capitol, but have played at lucky derby, phoenix, lime light and casino royale. Go card room hopping and find the one you like imo.

Look out for Thunder Valley (lincoln) to get live poker in May 7th. I'm sure they will be able to host some sizable tournaments and they will definitely be able to draw a large amount of tables full of soft players when their hotel addition opens up this summer.

I used to go to school in NorCal and played quite a bit at Capitol Casino, but then again, this was 4+ years ago and a lot may (or may not) have changed.

I used to play the limit hold em games there, 9-18 specifically, but I've heard thats pretty much dried up now and the highest limit game they typically offer is 4-8.

The NL action has always been their bread and butter and the games looked juicy, I think the highest being a 5-10 NL game, but I'm not really quite sure.

They have good tournaments, decent promotions, and acceptable food.
The environment is nice enough inside, although outside is kind of a ghetto.

I would be extremely careful about walking very far near the Capital at night with any cash in my pocket.

I was going to post exactly this after reading the OP. Another option for tournaments with structures that don't suck is to go to Oroville. About an hour 20 away from downtown Sac., has two Indian casinos, Gold Country and Feather Falls.

Casino royale- ****ty casino, sketchy dealears and players. they run a 1-2-4 game with 100 buyin and a 3/6 limit game

limelight- sketchy place, great games, lots of sick degens. Always 1-3 running sometimes 2/5-5/10.

Phoenix- has 5/10 running at night, full of regs and props.

Cordova casino- Just opened up but its probably the worst run cardroom i have ever been too. Avoid at all costs.

Capitol- This is where the "bigger" games in sacramento happen. usually 5/10 running every night. sometimes you can convince the degens to play 10/20. people are sketchy and they dont have boxes.

As far as tournaments go you are out of luck. Nothing good runs around here.

Capitol Casino is one of the best card rooms in the area. They almost always have games going at all levels and if they don't have a game they most certainly have a board. The other thing to think about is that the local Indian Casino, Thunder Valley will be getting live dealt games in May so there will be another room to play at. My suggestion is go to each room once or twice and see what you like. I have listed them in my order of favorites below:

Capitol Casino
Thunder Valley
Lucky Derby
Casino Royale
Phoenix Casino
Limelight Card Room
Silver Fox poker room

Capitol almost exclusively spreads a 6 12 game but that is the highest I have seen in the area for limit. I heard Bay 101 spreads 10 20 occasionally. I have also seen the 6 12 at the Lucky Derby

Welcome to Sacramento! Here are my impressions and experiences in the local rooms I have been to.

*Capitol Casino -- Probably the best room in the area for action and constant games. Unfortunately, located in the worst part of Sacramento, a block from a huge homeless shelter.

*Casino Royale -- Newer room, good restaurant, I like the floors and dealers. As bosox noted, their 1/2 game is actually a 1-2-4 game with a max $100 buy-in. That's not a structure I'm a fan of. Their tourneys are very soft but the vig is high and they mostly run rebuys and the only deep-stack is on Saturday nights I think.

*Limelight -- haven't been there in a couple of years. It was small, dark and I found it unfriendly. I have heard they have made some significant changes since then but haven't been back.

*Folsom Lake Bowl -- PokerTek tables. That should be all you need to know.

*Cordova Casino -- This one is closest to my house. I stopped in once after they recently opened and it was dead. I think they may have one table of 1/3 going and, at peak times, add one table of 2/5. I expect that they may run some promotions soon after the gaming commission approves their tournament and BBJ structures.

Indian Casinos

*Jackson Rancheria -- About 45 minutes outside Sacto. It spreads a decent variety of games and has good traffic on weekends (the only times I have been there). Between the bad regs and tourists staying at the hotel, the games are pretty good. The rake is $4 max w/$1 jackpot drop. They are also building a new poker room that I was told should be open in about six months so they are investing more in it.

*Red Hawk -- I haven't tried this one yet and it is pretty new. I heard crazy stories about a $10 rake early on but never confirmed it.

*Thunder Valley -- In Lincoln, this one is the closest to metro Sacto and probably has the best overall traffic of the area Indian Casinos. They've had automated tables for a while and have been promising real dealers for several months. As noted above, the new "deadline" for getting the live dealers in place is May 7. I'm sure I will check it out when they make the switch. There are a number of golf courses in that area that I play so It would make for a good golf in the morning/poker in the evening day.

*Cache Creek, Black Oak -- Haven't been to either so can't comment on them but Cache Creek has a great new golf course that brings in a fair number of tourists. I don't know how that translates to traffic in the poker room.

Feel free to PM me if you have any questions about the area and welcome!

Folsom Lake Bowl has gone back to live dealers. I haven't been there since so I can't comment on the action but it's a pretty small room.

Where exactly are you going to be in the Sacramento Area skate?

I would definitely check out Casino Royale, they have been giving a lot of promotions away like free steak & lobster dinners and Drinks! plus the Wheel & Free Big Screen TV Sundays promotions... As for tournaments here is the webpage:

http://www.playcasinoroyale.com/tour...e-jackpot.html

Im sure all the cardrooms are doing their best to compete, you will just have to go and test a few of them out...your probably best staying within the Captiol Casino - Casino Royale - Limelight circuit..... I agree with the above comments, Casino Royale is one of the best for Live games...Tournaments are decent...

Hope this helps...

PA

Talk with Buddy over at Casino Royale...I think he's looking...
Plus check over at the Phoenix or Capitol...

PA

What do props get paid fron the house on Avg?

Who ever said limelight had alot of sick degens is dead on, to me this is the best place to play, though I don;t play there that much as lot of other places are much closer to me.

Do you have an update on what game Royale and Capital have been spreading lately?

Thanks.

casino raoyale is a **** hole raking like 7 dollars a hand on the one two three game i think it was waht a joke ill play at the limelight 2-5even though it hasnt been runing lately i dont c y it has the cheapest rake in sac i come all the way from lodi to play.

I'm surprised that the casinos that are listed above in the sacramento area doesn't have Phoenix casino listed. They have a get paid to play rebate program and other promotions that you may like. Check out there website for promotions and tournaments:

Http://www.playphoenixcasino.com

Just to add another casino in the sacramento area that wasn't mentioned above.

Hope this helps.

LSL

i just played the other night at casino royale and had a couple of notes:

when i walked in, i was surprised to see lists for 1-2nl and 5-10nl, but nothing in between. i asked if they spread something like 2-3nl or 2-5nl and he said "not now". ok, guy, reeeeeeal helpful. anyway, got a seat quickly at 1-2nl with my name on the 5-10nl interest list.

the 1-2nl game has a max buy of $200 (at least that's how many chips i bought when i sat down). the limp for $4 was surprising, and seemed to limit the preflop raising. or maybe the small amount of preflop raising was due to the fact that it was a 1-2nl game. there were a lot of raises to $8, which would be appropriate for a normal 1-2 game, but it was $4 just to limp in. anyway, it was a weird structure, since the small blind was jackpot dropped before the hand was dealt, leaving only $2 for a blind stealer. i would think the action would be a small bit better if they changed their policy to drop the jackpot $1 after the action was complete preflop (giving the illusion that there is $3 to win instead of $2).

later on, maybe 9pm or so, the 5-10nl game started up. people were surprised that it started so late as apparently it usually starts up earlier. i didn't get a seat until about 10:30pm and the game was in full swing. the 3 betting was in effect and the gambling was no-limitless.

there was a 50-ish guy who kept talking about how all these young players were much better than him after the flop so he had to get the $ in before the flop, but he didn't care about losing cuz he had so much money laying around. he proceeded to show his tail feathers when he plopped a $5k bank wrap on the table in an apparent challenge to another gambler. he then said to call up the casino manager and tell him that "Steve" wants $10,000 and see how fast he okays it. anyway, kind of a weird scene.

for a stretch, there was a personal war going on between 2 other guys where the action was insane. they played a few $3-4k pots against each other in the span of about 20 minutes plus about 4-5 other pots in the 1-$2k range.

needless to say the action was great. about 2 hands in i lost a pretty good sized pot with AK after flopping no pair, and then 2 hands after that i was stacked with AJ on a AJ2cc board. all the money went in on the flop and i knew i was dead on the 8c turn. QTcc ftw obv.

i did end up having a pretty decent session though and logged a win. would like to play in that game more often. the relentless 3 betting wasnt that hard to neutralize and after i did, they left my opens alone for the most part. plus after i called a river bet with K high, i got some street cred. it was probably just that i was a new face in the mix and they wanted to see if i had "it".

the place seemed nice enough and the games were good, so i would go back there if i'm in the area again.

Are you a big tournament guy or do you play the live games too? The reason I ask is that the best places to play would probably be Thunder Valley, and for a more targeted approach to the poker rooms, I would go with Capitol or the Phoenix for live games.

The Phoenix just gave away about $115,000 for that big tournament, but their forte is mostly live games as you can see on their site..
http://www.playphoenixcasino.com/cas...acramento.html

New here to the 2+2 forum so feel free to welcome me as mostly was stuck down in LA, now on to bigger adventures here in Sacramento. Exciting forum though...havent seen this much action in a forum ever.

Thought im just an old guy that sticks to what I know... ha ha
See you later Gentlemen.

Sincerely,

Big Dave

This is so hilarious! I completely agree. This has been a major problem with them, aside from all the robbery's, killings, and the like... lol

Very Good.

I moved away a while ago, does anyone spread Omaha 8 anymore on a regular basis? I know phoenix had a good game a while ago but that all dried up.