I'd need stack sizes to analyze, but at 100bb or less effective, as played I'm jamming.

Truly terrible pre. Raise more pre at least 10$ if not 12$ (Or more if people have been calling more). I know we want some action, but 7$ is not meaningful to a lot of 1/2 players, especially the big blind who thinks "only one red chip" more on flop. If it's more than that, they may fold more garbage. 1/2 300$ max a 7$ PFR is totally burning money and just bloating pots. We can get more value by raising more and they will eventually call more. Bet more on flop, I'd easily pot it here and TP will still call. As played I don't think I'm folding. Dont be fooled by his 5. He probably did have 56 or 57.

What's that? The ordinary Grazie player's card?

Interesting. I have some more AA hands later this trip that I wouldn't mind your thoughts on!

Yes, bizarre isn't it? I always show the relevant loyalty card and ask if it "does anything here"? On this occasion he said he needed to check with his manager and then there was a 15% discount.


Day 3 part 2

For the evening meal my wife wanted something Chinese so we wondered towards MGM to see Ka and we looked at the options on the way. In the end the only appealing one was Hakkasan - i.e. the restaurant level of the nightclub at MGM.
It was predictably stylish, but also predictably empty at 6pm on a Wednesday.



I didn't eat anything but the food was pretty good (but not outstanding given it's supposed to be Michelin 1 star).



I tried the Dogfish 90 minute IPA which was probably the best beer I had on the trip. Then we went to use our free tickets to Ka.



Sorry for the crappy pic - all I could manage before being told to stop (this was even before the show had started - I think some shows encourage you to take pictures?).
I enjoyed the show, although I have to say the star was the set rather than the gymnastics. They must have spent millions and millions making that.
The final scene was still some sort of video, so I'm not sure when they are doing it live again.

After we got back to Aria, I used up my Five50 voucher:



It was nice and it did the job but not sure why it's described as the best pizza in Vegas by some on this forum.
While waiting to play some poker, I tried my second attempt to beat the heads up holdem machine:



Just like last trip I bought in short and played 1 hand! My 5s were good enough to double through my $10. 2 from 2 against the machine now.

In a short session of poker I was in for:


And out for $258 for another small profit. 3 out of 3 so far for the trip.
Only one hand I remember from it - another mishandling of a big pair and possibly shouldn't have folded?

I limp UTG with KK (I don't always do this!)
No raises unfortunately and we are 5 to the flop of QQ2. Blinds check and I bet $8 into $15 pot.
MP and button call.
Turn is a 9 (no flush possible).
I check, MP checks and button bets $18 (into a pot of $39).
I fold.

Something told me one of them had a queen.
Maybe I can b/f the turn to make sure but I can't see two many hands that both of them can have and still be ahead.
Flame away!

My only problem with the tr is how you stack your chips!

Please put them in stacks of 20 from now on

Thanks and good report so far

Good choice on the 90 minute IPA.

Just don't agree totally...folded to you in late position...sure charge the blinds a price....or raised inn front of you 3b all day....but 1st in early/middle iI always make it 3x ($6) with good success....it does several things....deception...if i make it 3x with AA and 56 soooted they never know where im at....if KK or QQ is out behind me they will make it something ridiculous like 15x and 82% of the time I will win all the money...sure you are going to have gross 5 way pots occasionally with AA and even have to fold some horrid runouts...but overall it works well for me

Day 4

Day 4 was quite a quiet day.
We got up late and ambled down to the Vietnamese restaurant at TI.
They also let you order off the standard US menu - so I went for steak and eggs.



I've been here a few times and I think it's good value.

Then we took the short tram to Mirage and were immediately sat down at a $1/$2 table together.

I was in for:

(Sorry for the way I stack my chips! I tend to start with 5s just to check I have the right amount, and then do stacks of 10.)

Neither of us started well - I topped up another $30 and my wife got stacked by some lunatic who once again chased a gutshot.
I did learn one of two new poker phrases for the trip:
J4 = spare tire (what's a Jack for?)
chopblocker = someone who limps in late position

Fortunately it went rather better for the rest of the session and 3 hours later my wife was over $100 up and meanwhile I had this:



So a 4th win from 4 which is pretty nice. Definitely running good...
In particular, I was pretty lucky in one big hand - I stacked off on the flop with top pair against the lunatic who had bottom two pair (he called $12 pre flop with Q8o in the SB) and I tripped up on the turn.
The guy had chased the gutshot before and was playing very loose so I figured I had to go with TPGK. Also I wanted to win back my wife's money!
I think I was a 29% underdog, so it was nice to draw out.

The session meant I was 4 wins from 4 and my graph was looking good:



Dinner was at Blossom again, so I won't bore you with more pictures of that.

Wow, thanks for being a cheapskate! I will start doing that also from now on.

I wouldn't fold AA in that hand either. The raise to $60 would concern me a lot but I'd still at least call and see the river (and see what villain does on the river).

Even with the looking at chips tell?
I regret is not checking the turn after seeing that... maybe I'm too nitty!
I tend to talk about a the hands I wasn't sure about - I'm not quite as tight as I sound and I do make loose calls / light raises when I've got more of a feeling for the opponent.


Day 5 part 1

Decided to sit down at Aria about 11:30am.
Right away the table looked tough. 2 or 3 young aggro players and the others looked like they knew what they were doing too.

I lost a couple of small pots before this one:

UTG, dealt 44. Raise to $11.
Button calls and aggro Spanish guy in BB calls.
Flop 772.
Spanish guy bets $15. I call and button folds.
Turn 4.
Spanish guy bets $25. I call.
River 4.
Spanish guy bets $50. I go all in for about $100 more.
Spanish guy calls and immediately shows Q7.

If you can't be good, be lucky, right?



After that pot I lost almost $100 of it back, and
generally felt I was being outplayed.
So since I have no pride and value money, I picked up my $135 profit and popped next door to Monte Carlo.

The first table I was at was 10-handed and was quite slow. I got dealt AdKd UTG on one of my first hands and raised to $10. MP raised to $25 and I called.
3 medium - low cards on the flop (no diamonds). I check and MP bets $40.
I fold.
It's a pity I hadn't been there longer because after that I saw him being pretty LAGgy, so I would have shipped pre with that information.

When a new table opened up, I moved over to that one and we played 4-handed for a while. That table was a lot more fun. 3 of us were bluffing a fair bit (unusual for me but I felt comfortable at the table) and the final player was one who liked to tell you exactly what he had with his bet sizing. E.g. raise to $17 meant AA/KK (and he showed it, giving the "I hate to be outdrawn" speech), raise to $12 meant AJ+/TT+, raise to $7 meant something mediocre.

A while later I cashed out even and headed over to Bellagio to meet my wife for lunch. The end of a 5-session winning streak but still yet to record a loss.



Noodles - we both like this place. Good food and not too expensive.

Thanks. Good luck!

Day 5 part 2

Once we'd had a late lunch it was time to check in to our second hotel - Mandarin Oriental. It was definitely step up in quality, although on balance my next trip will probably be at Venetian or Bellagio.
Here are some artistic photo montages from my wife:




And a look at the view which was decent but not amazing:




For the evening meal, we fancied something something easy and weren't too hungry so we tried the Mandarin Bar:



I tried the cocktail which mentioned Lagavulin:



I knew it wouldn't be worth the $18 plus tip and tax, but I must say I was disappointed with how small it was:



The bar food was decent and well presented, but the main attraction of this place was definitely the view.




After this we went to Monte Carlo, where my wife played poker and I used the MyVegas whiskey tasting voucher.

In for:



After a short 45 minute session I was out for:



I would definitely recommend the tasting if you play MyVegas.
I think it was 22,000 points or would have been $40 if you paid for it.

What I wouldn't particularly recommend is going to play poker straight away.
I had another drink or two at the table and managed to record my first losing session - $115 down. Actually, I don't think I played that bad - I was all in against a shortish stack when I flopped OESFD (and I missed), but neither did I play "that good".
Fortunately my wife recorded a +$301 at the same table, including a $400 pot against some crazy Korean gamblers who turned up about midnight.

Graph at end of day 5:

I think his check-raise is more scary than the tell.

I know what it feels like to post hands that I am unsure about. I've posted some hands before that really made me look bad. I sometimes will post my worst hands.

I think almost all low stakes players play too loose so I wouldn't be that concerned with the possibility that someone is too tight.

I think your hand is interesting enough that I'd be curious to see it posted in the live low stakes forum. There are posters there who are clearly better players than I am and I'm curious what they would say.

Your wish is my command.
http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/17.../#post45594728

Just saw this thread pop up again at the top of the LVL forum and I came in here to ask when you are making another trip to Vegas. Little did I know you just made another trip! Thanks for taking the time to post all of the pictures and reviews of bars/restaurants/hotels/poker rooms. This is one of my favorite trip reports and I look forward to reading more about the trip.

How many total hours do you think you put in playing the MyVegas app? I'm contemplating doing the same. Thanks

Thanks - it's very nice to hear that kind of feedback.
Only 2.5 days left of this report.

I probably spent something silly like 100 hours on MyVegas. So that's about $2 per hour return!
For some reason I quite enjoyed it at times but looking back it was a lot of time to waste. E.g. I could probably make about $10 per hour playing online poker (I have done in the past with super turbo SnGs).
I don't intend to do it again, although part of that is because I don't have another trip planned.

Day 6

For breakfast we decided to eat at the hotel.
As I learnt with the cocktail, Mandarin Oriental is pretty expensive but you can get by on a budget.
For one thing, there is free tea and coffee in the morning. Also, rather than order the $25+ breakfasts, you can order one portion of sausage and they give you 4 sausages and one egg which gets you four slices of toast and jams.

Cliffs - all this was $25:




The main plan for the day was to visit Premium Outlets South.
I was pretty impressed. If you go online and get the coupons, things are so cheap relative to the UK (at least for US brands).

For example, cheap US starting price + 40% outlet sale + 20% off coupon for UK customers = less than 50% of UK price;
3 pairs of Levi's was $100, Ralph Lauren hoodie was $35... pretty impressive.
Not much else to say, except that we had our cheapest meal of the trip courtesy of the culinary delights of Subway and China Max.


In the evening we tried Jasmine at Bellagio.
Pretty good location - surrounded on 3 sides by the famous fountains:



My food was a bit bland:



However my wife's was much better - I think the beef was wagyu; certainly tasted good.




After that we headed to Bellagio poker room.
It's a slightly strange room, in that it can sometimes be impossible to get a low stakes NL table - they just don't open new ones.
This is one of the more extreme examples:



Maybe they were running tournaments, although this sort of thing happened all week.
I do like the room though, and luckily on this occasion, we were seated relatively quickly, on different $1/$3 tables.
After about 2.5 hours my wife came over with a tidy profit of just over $100 and spent the last hour watching me.
Fortunately she brought some good luck as I went from being down a bit to $95 up an hour later.
Nothing too exciting but I had a few hands I remember being quite lucky in, e.g.:

I re-raise an open of $10 to $25 in MP with AQ.
4 players to a flop of J42 rainbow.

I wouldn't normally c-bet with nothing against 3 other players but this board was so dry and my image could rep overpairs, so I thought I might get away with it. I bet $50 and the BB called.

Turn and river are both blanks and I pretty much give up - we go check, check on both streets.
BB shows A5 for a missed gutshot and I scoop the $200 pot -
Always nice when a "bluff" gets called by worse.


Graph at end of day 6:

i think it was the 5 diamond thing. i saw allen kessler aka chainsaw complaining about them needing to close down all cash games for tourney. Then he later commented complementing the staff for doing so. So i think thats def not normal and due to a tournament.

not sure if i posted in here yet. but good TR

Day 7 part 1

The day was mainly about poker.
Breakfast was Starbucks, lunch was Noodles again (using the comps from Bellagio poker) and dinner was 4 cookies as too busy with the poker.

The poker was pretty weird. I was dealt pocket aces 7 times, starting with my morning session at Caesar's:

I'm in the BB with AsAd, $133 stack (in for $160).
UTG limps, MP (middle aged male, a bit loose) raises to $10, LP calls $10.
I raise to $31 and MP calls.
Flop is 942 with two spades.
I bet $60 into the $75 pot.
MP calls.
Turn is Js.
I put my remaining $42 in and MP calls.
River is brick and MP shows KsQs

Not sure what I could have done differently. Even if I know he has spades, flop bet means he doesn't have the odds to hit the turn and he has to call the remainder to see the river; and if he does hit the turn at least I have a re-draw. Plus I can't know he has spades - if anything I could bet smaller or check to induce some kind of bluff?
I have the feeling people will say the standard "bet more pre", "all in on flop".

Either way, not exactly a bad beat story - I wasn't too bothered.

After this $160 loss I reload for $200 and manage to claw my way back to record a $60 loss for the session. Part of my way back was two more pairs of aces - one a small pot won pre-flop and another a small pot won on the flop (possibly examples of why betting more isn't necessarily the perfect answer!).

After lunch at Noodles I came back to Caesar's.
There was a fairly clueless player on my right, which was great until he called my pre-flop open of $12 with K4o and hits two pair when I have AK. Manage to escape losing only about $50-$60 from that pot. I topped up with another $30 (high roller, lol) and continued to lose small pots for a while until things gradually turn round and over the course of 3 hours I turned things into a $50 profit:



At this stage my concentration is going but I want to get to +$60 to cancel out the morning session. Predictably terrible strategy!

A new player sits two to my right - young, with headphones and sunglasses and immediately plays quite aggressively.
A couple of hands later, it's folded to him on the button, he makes a small raise. I have QJo in the BB and decide to make the call.
Long story short I call him down with second pair since I have convinced myself he's FOS.
Instead he has TPGK and I donk off $100 of my stack to him.
I was pretty frustrated, having been so patient for the rest of the week and then doing that after hanging around when I wasn't playing well.


TL;DR - I got a bit unlucky and then played bad, cashing out a $52 loss.

After this I finally find one of those 100 hand video poker machines... and do nothing exciting - now down a whopping $38 in video poker for the trip.
No 2p2 VP rungood for me.


(This picture was played at very low level as I tried to understand what I was doing before playing more hands for more $.


In part 2... evening session at Planet Hollywood, where I am dealt AA four times in less than an hour!

Good luck!

Thanks.

Sorry for the dragging out the TR - bit busy with Christmas things but I'll wrap it up later in the week hopefully.

Happy Christmas everyone!

Day 7 part 2

We spent most of our remaining cash on a laptop, so for this evening's session I only had $150 in my pocket and I decided to try somewhere new for this trip - $1/$2 at Planet Hollywood:



The table was pretty "high variance". 4 players to a flop with an open of $15-$20 and showdowns often had people showing some pretty dreadful hands.
Just some crazy stuff really - some big stacks who bet any sort of draw and some small stacks who shoved given the chance.

I wish I had more money in my pocket - with only $150 (and not really wanting to go home after 1 hand) I wasn't sure quite how to play against this table.

During the (1.5 hr?!) session I was dealt aces four times later on (making seven for the day!), but very little at all else (nothing AT+, KJ+, 44+). On the two occasions I decided to take a bit of a flyer in position I missed flop and c-betting was predictably unsuccessful. As a result of this I was down to $34 before shoving against some dead money with a mediocre hand and getting lucky to come back to $90.


My 4 aces hands were as follows:

1) Stack ~$90. On button after 6 limpers I raise to $21. Everyone folds

2) Stack ~$100. Raise to $17 in late position after 4 limpers. Everyone folds. Why couldn't they fold when I played the two bad hands?

3) Stack ~$100. Raise to $16 (I'll keep going down to get a call!) in late position after 4 limpers.
1 caller, flop has an ace - check, check. Can't get a $17 call on the turn after the board becomes a bit too dangerous to risk a free card (not that I slowplay too often, regardless).

4) Stack ~$80. Raise to $14 in SB after 3 limpers. Now 4 people call (limpers + BB)!
Pot is $70 and I have ~$65 left... what I am doing here? Am I now limited to set mining, do I shove every flop or something else?!

Looking for some advice here! I really don't have a clue.
(For what it's worth, I know I should have bet more pre-flop; I was just getting frustrated that I couldn't get more than one call with the previous aces!)

Flop is Ks8s6s and I don't have a spade. I have to act first and decide I can't give a free card for a spade so bet $30. Fold, fold, fold,... all in.
I don't think I can fold my last $35, given he could have something like KxQs or As8x or just AsXx so I call and he shows Qs9s.

No crazy cards come and I'm out for the day.

I have to be honest, even outside of that hand I never felt like I knew what I was doing with that stack at that table. Any advice would be welcome. In the short term, leaving might have been the best option - although since I was quickly down to about $100 I couldn't really go anywhere else unless I wanted to pay all the fees to withdraw more money at the end of my holiday.

Anyway, the loss marked a losing day and left me with 1 win in 6 sessions. No big losses by most people's standards but still made me feel a bit frustrated, particularly since I didn't think I played at all well at the end of Caesar's when I lost $100 with second pair madness and for the duration of my Planet Hollywood session.



I had a great start to the holiday so I am still grateful for that.

if you raise to $16 with aces and get 1 call I think that's a pretty good result. With more opponents the hand gets harder to play (although I definitely wouldn't mind more callers).

It sounds like nobody had anything in the first two hands they all folded. That's just bad luck. Also your opponents were less likely to have AK, AQ, A8, A5, or ace-anything because you had two of the aces in the deck. I would have kept raising to $16 or more.

I probably just shove the flop and hope nobody hit. You're more likely to be up against 1 spade than a flush. Also with stack sizes I don't see any other decent option.

Yep, definitely should have raised to $16+.
Frustration was the main reason... ah well.

Time to wrap things up:

Day 8

Although I came back with nothing in my pocket from day 7, my wife came back with a profit so that meant we had a grand total of $140 each to play our last short session at Aria.

Really short-stacked for $1-$3 and after a couple of misplaced C-bets I was down to my last $95. I remember thinking what a bad idea it was to play so short-stacked, but also that I wasn't going to leave my last session in Vegas until I had to.

In late position I raise to $10 with KJo (UTG had limped).
BB and UTG both call and the flop is J84r.
Checked to me, I bet $20.
BB raises all in, to about $65 and UTG folds.

BB is one of those very new players who keeps rebuying for the $100 minimum and is destined to keep losing it... so this is an easy call.

Turn and river are blanks and BB shows AT, so I'm back up to something like $180.

Then I am dealt AsAd and I raise to $14. Shortstack rebuyer calls and flop is A89ccx. Checked to me, I bet $20 and shortstack folds. (Not sure I can slowplay with 89cc on the flop and a clueless player who likes to call?)

Anyway, after yesterday I'm just grateful to win the hand with AA.

Also manage to get some value with TT vs someone with top pair on a 9-high board, and when I have to leave I cash out $262 for a quick $122 profit.



Cards were very generous to me and it's nice to finish on a win.


We just have time to use out Aria comps for free takeaway crepes:



Not bad at all - I went for the chicken one and it was pretty filling. I think it's $11 (if you don't have any comps).


Time for the airport and a brief look at the "Duty Free" shop there.
Oh look, I see something...



For those of you who remember - this is the same bottle I bought on my way out to Vegas in June.
A great whisky, cheaper than in the UK and a nice way to end the Vegas 2014 trips... so of course I "snap call".


Pics from the plane:

Bye Vegas, I love you :




Not sure when I'll be back but my wife is keen - this is her already doing some more poker study!





Final graph for the trip:



Thanks for reading - I may do a short follow up with thoughts on the different poker rooms later.

Nice report, OP.

If you really want advice, stop trying to play a regular/deeper stack strategy when you are short stacked. If you are short stacked, you need to play an appropriate short stack strategy, which is going to involve a lot more variance and shoving than if you are sitting there with 100bb.

As far as the aces hands go - aces are best for small pots and coolers. You won a bunch of small pots with them, and that's fine. In hand 4 (and any hand where your SPR is 1:1 and the board didn't plaster villain ranges), yes, you are shoving there.

Another thing to keep in mind is that while most people at a 1/3 table can barely drool and hold their cards at the same time, there will usually be at least a couple that understand that you are almost always looking to jam if you are making a PFR with 20% of your stack, and that will narrow their pre flop calling range.

Thanks. Good to know committing on that flop against 4 players isn't completely stupid.
I do vary my style when short-stacked (e.g. I will shove over any decent dead money with marginal hands), although perhaps by short-stacked you mean my typical 75 BB buy-in, let alone when I am down to less than $100. I will eventually move on to buying in 100 BB (currently do about $150 at $1/$2 and $200 at $1/$3). I think one of the problems if I double up then I feel "OK" at 150 BB but literally out of my depth at 200+ BB. The other problem is I don't like losing $200+