Day 2, part 1
Wake up around 6am and head down for my morning coffee/pre-breakfast gamble. My parents and I are going to get room service for this breakfast so I've got about 2 hrs.
Tournament-wise, my mom is playing in the 5k buy in and my dad in the 10k. I believe top prize for the 5k is 135k, 30k for second, etc. They're expecting about 60 runners for that one. 10k top prize is 200k, second is 40k. Expecting about 30 runners there. My mom plays at 11am, dad at 1pm. Other than that, there's nothing on the agenda.
I manage to stick to 5-play, but can't buy a winner. Anecdotally, I feel the money is going just as fast at 5 play as it seems to at 10. Logically, that is probably a function of the increased variance with less lines balancing with the increased coin in at 10 play- sure, I may be coining in less, but I've jacked up my relative variance and I'm not making hands.
This AM session was one of the seeds that was planted that has essentially made me abandon 5 play. As you'll see later in the TR I do play more 5 play, and I still plan on doing so whenever I want to try and slow the bleed down, but in the future I think I'm a 10 play player primarily. My previous exposures and wins at 10 play have just ruined 5 play for me.
In any case, I hit nothing and head to breakfast with my parents stuck another 2k, so 8k total.
Forgot to take pics of breakfast food, sorry. I got eggs over easy, bacon and a croissant- all were standardly good.
After breakfast, we head back down to the machines. My dad and I briefly play next to each other, until he gets the hankering for UX. I run badly at 10 play and convince myself to play 5 play again, and things actually start to pick up-
Go to 10 play. Hit nothing, give everything back, go back to 5 play.
Back to 10 play. Same story. Back to 5 play.
You know where this is going...
God come on. Finally make 4 aces but of course no kicker. Turn one ace into 4, can't turn 3 into 4 to save my life. Maybe my whole "there's no difference between 5 and 10 play" is slightly off base...
Many, many 10 play hands later-
AUDHFAHD#@####!!!
But of course, REGULAR TRIPS come in 3 out of 10 times. Sure. Totally standard. WTF-ever.
About the best that can be said about that session is I broke even. Still stuck 8k even after hitting three hand pays. We head to the tournament.
My parents' credentials, and my guest pass.
Swanky set up for this one. By definition every participant here was willing plunk down minimum 5k for a buy in.
Good news- the place appears to be far less crowded than normal. Rumor mill amongst guests and staff is that total numbers really are less than usual. That is just fine with me- I hate crowds, my machines tended to be occupied quite a bit in past (crowded) tournies, and the prize guarantee is still there. By my eye, we had about 50 people total for the 5k buy in.
My mom, about to start her first round.
Mom's first round is... terrible. No other way to describe it. People all around her are hitting good symbols and her machine is just giving her crap. I'm rooting for her harder than I ever have for myself in my life- it's mom, after all. But no amount of rooting seems to have any effect. I think she literally came in LAST for her round. So barring two miracle rounds, it looks like the 5k is a bust.
My mom wants me to play the second round- I do so, and basically only fare slightly better than her. Yay slot tournies! What a bunch of crap. I know SOMEONE wins these things, it's just never us.
Third round is irrelevant, of course. My dad plays it, puts in a decent round but there's not even any hope of getting free credit (consolation prize). We take a lunch break.
Short rib off the bone, stuffed eggplant, heart of romaine. Food was really good all things considered, only complaint is the lack of big plates.
Buttermilk fried chicken, fingerling potatoes. Chicken was the best I've had in quite some time, 9/10. It probably helped that I and a few other guests grabbed the food right as it was served, actually 10 min before they wanted us too LOL.
Now dad is up for the 10k. We NEED a sun run here! The place is even more empty than it was for the 5k, I think there were about 25 runners total. I recognize EVERYONE as having played in the 5k- so it looks like the people who played in 10k basically just entered every tier of tournament offered. I didn't stay to watch the 25k buy in portion, but word is it was all the same people too. So basically there were 20ish guests who bought into the 5, 10 and 25k. Sick life.
Dad's first round is really solid. He ends up with 85k or so which is good for third. There are only enough people for 1 session, so in other words, he's in third overall. Nice. The way it panned out was pretty sweet too- he was trading placing with someone else for the last 3 min and with 30 sec to go this other person hit something to overtake my dad by a couple k. Well, on his last push HE hits something which again puts him on top, then time expired.
Second round... TWO people put in a score of over 100k. So sick. Historically, it seems like you need an aggregate score of ~ 180k to win. Meanwhile my dad has an average round. Ugh, not good. We need a great final round!
Third round- AGAIN, two people with over 100k. My dad has a decent round but only 70k, so he's got 155k in aggregate. Definitely not enough to win, and the realist in me knows he's probably not even going to break even. Sucks.
With that kick in the nuts in the books, we need to decide dinner plans. I convince my parents to give Costa di Mare another chance- they went very soon after it switched from Bartolotta to the current restaurant, had a bad experience and never returned. For my part, I'll be honest and say I never noticed a difference. As mentioned in the August TR, all my meals there have been great. So we've got that booked for 7:30. Time to hit the machines again.
The ice continues. I'm down 10k now.
Take a break and find dad. He's not doing well either. Return to my machines. The ice continues. I'm down 12k now! I haven't even been here 24hrs. I know I've been through downswings like this before but this one hurt worse for some reason. Just totally demoralized and I never had an ounce of hope, I think I knew I wasn't going to hit anything and sure enough it came true.
Head upstairs for a nap and take a break from the bleeding. After the nap, I change for dinner and go downstairs for more play. When I card in, I notice
Huh. 500 more free play.
Never did figure this one out- I'm assuming my host just put it on my card. Perhaps he saw that I was just getting crushed and tried to buy a little goodwill. Maybe it's an error, who knows. Either way, I insta-use it up, knowing it might not be there in a minute if it's a mistake. Result-
That's actually a great rate of exchange. I must have hit a quad or something in there.
Anyways, despite my earlier thoughts that "there's no difference between 10 and 5 play", and my not sticking to only playing 5 play, the fact is I really DID play mostly 5 play. I only went to 10 play to donk the money back in
With that thought in my head, I think to myself, "it's irrelevant anyways, bc it's not like I'm ever going to get a dealt monster anyways". And with THAT thought, out pops-
And we will see what the kicker draw brings in the next installment...
Day 2 so far- -12k
To be continued...