I do remember the 6:5 blackjack swoop of the strip and remember walking into Wynn and double odds craps!

I mean, all I kept thinking was that this is Las Vegas... WHY on earth would u offer double odds? What math are you bean counters doing in the back that they don’t realize house always wins. I wondered. Couldn’t be good for the casino

Day 2

I'm awoken at 6am by the alarm WHICH SOMEONE LEFT SET in my room! Argh, I was sleeping very soundly which of course is super unusual for me in Vegas. Great, now I'm awake, still tired, and this really doesn't fit with my "gamble less" plan.

I've got a breakfast reservation at Tableau at 8:30am, then the first 2 rounds of the tournament at 2pm, and literally have nothing else on the agenda until then. I head downstairs, grab my coffee and head over to hi limit for some full pay TDB.

So my options are basically spin poker, or UX 5 line and don't bet the extra 5 credits per hand. I settle on spin, knowing cold spin is a very dangerous game to play. I'm already stuck and this is a recipe for disaster. Of course the machine decides to kick me in the nuts, and I dump 2k really fast and hit absolutely nothing. I get so frustrated I head back to 9/6 10 lines, and it's less swingy than spin was, but ultimately just as worthless. I'm now stuck 5k for the day!



My now-standard corned beef hash at Tableau. 8/10.

After breakfast, I head upstairs! Don't think I've done this before. I start up a movie, start feeling a little tired, try to sleep, can't quite sleep bc of the caffeine, then decide to get up. It's close to 10:30am now. Take that, Wynn!

Head back downstairs. Hi limit is full now. Dump another 1k then switch to 5 lines.



Wherein the first hand of the day finally comes in.

Play off 1k of that hit, head back upstairs. Still stuck 5k for the day. Finish the first movie, start the second. FU Wynn, not playing until I see how I'm doing in this tourney.



Part of the LONG walk to the ballroom where the tourney is. It's about 1/2 way between the Wynn and Encore, wrapping around the "other" side. These buildings are huge.

The tourney, part 1

The format is pretty standard- 3 3 min rounds, top two scores used to make your combined score. Optional 500$ rebuy round with its own separate prize pool, winner take all. Rebuy round can be one of the two overall rounds as well, so it's basically mandatory IMO. As with all of these things, total luck.

Prize pool (exact numbers may be off but close enough)-
- 1st- 225k
- 2nd- 75k, 3rd- 50k, 4th 25k, 5th 15k. Down to 30th you at least get your money back- 3k cash. They're expecting about 200 runners.





Food was pretty decent, the whole thing had a New Orleans theme to it. I got some pork loin, dirty rice, escarole with bacon and a slice of the cake- everything 5/10.

As I'm eating, I look around and note the top scores for each round seem to be 30-35k. In addition, one lady seems to have found a way to come up with 48k!!!! in 3 min. I've played 10 min of these things before and not made 48k, how pure do you run lady. Jesus. I haven't even played yet and it looks like 1st probably ain't happening.



Not a bad first round, but nothing great either.



Worthless second round.

It appears that this tournament is headed just like all the rest- nada. I head back over to the Wynn and mentally plan my approach for the remainder of the trip-
- I've got 10k left which needs to last until Sunday lunch. It's Friday afternoon right now
- before, I would have said I would have been "quite" upset to lose all 20k I brought but I could live with it. Now, with the 9/6 paytables, I know I will be mega-tilt-never-come-back to Wynn mad if that happens. So, I know even though I've got 10k on me, I'm probably not going to let myself lose all of it
- figure that leaves me 8-9k total. I need at least 6k for Sat. I can deal with zero for Sunday if it's that bad. So I've got 3k left I can play today.

With that done, I hit the machines. 3k now or 3k later, what difference does it make. But if I bink something now, maybe I've got more to play with.

I pick up a few draws but don't hit a big one. Still haven't made 4 aces at all this trip.



Finally, my first 4000 hit!

OK, that helps. The machine hits me with a brief flurry of heat.





Almost the exact same hand, 2 min apart.

That was a nice sequence. I give back 1k to this machine, 2k to spin and another 1k to another machine before I come to my senses and take a break. Up 3k for the post tourney session, down 2k for the day. I go upstairs, finish off movie # 2 and take a nap.

I wake up in time to get cleaned up and give myself a short session before dinner at SW steakhouse at 7p. As soon as I get downstairs, I think to check my reservation and sure enough, it's actually 7:30p, not 7p. So I've got more time to win/lose more.

I start off picking up trip aces three times, and of course whiff them all. Jesus I'm running bad. Then-



Second royal of the trip, again from 3 cards. STILL haven't made 4 aces!

I think the above caption is noteworthy. On the one hand, I know I got lucky to catch those two royals, but on the other hand I know it's an indication of how poorly my aces have run to get 2 royals so far and zero quad aces. Anyways, I forge ahead and get my first dealt quads of the trip-



Just not enough. Whatever, maybe this will open the flood gates.

I keep playing, give some back, then head to dinner. +2k for that pre-dinner session and even for the day!







Bread basket, didn't touch it.

I go with 4 oz of Kobe rib cap, and two half orders of sides- creamed corn and broccolini. Gotta give it to the server, who alerted me to the possibility of 1/2 sides. Given my overall lack of hunger and how wasteful it would be, this is definitely a good call.



Amuse bouche- artichoke and butternut squash soup. 7/10 for flavor, but served SCALDING hot- I burned the roof of my mouth. Knocked back to 2/10 since I couldn't taste anything after this.



Rib cap, 8/10.



Broccolini and truffle creamed corn, both 9/10. They really hit the mark with the sides this time.

Other than burning my mouth, this was actually a really good SW experience. Service was impeccable and as mentioned the 1/2 sides were a perfect suggestion. I ate just the right amount of food and am satisfied but not stuffed. I elect to not get dessert, and the waitress brings me a small treat anyways-



Damage-



After dinner, it's back to battle.



I'll take the randomness! Hold an ace, pick up all 4 4s.

I go through a massive downswing and give all of that back plus more. Pick up three aces several times, STILL can't convert. Finally, I get the draw one more time, and on hand 10 of 10...



It is about FRICKIN' TIME!

Hopefully that will unlock the quad aces. Keep playing, go on another downswing. At some point I head back to hi limit, and play UX, full pay, no multipliers. I think I hit quad aces, no kicker- just enough extra coin to give me motivation to go for it and play WITH the UX feature.

AND I MAKE A HAND!



Third royal of the trip. But, as can be seen, no multiplier.

I downswong myself yet again before I finally pack it in and head to bed. After all those hits, my post dinner session is ridiculously, inevitably even. I can't believe I got lucky enough to be even for the day. And, I can't believe how badly I ran to be even for the day...

Day 2 result- even
Overall- -5k

Day 3 coming soon...

It's the same mindset that decided it was a good idea to charge for parking.

Long ago in a previous life I was in the gaming business, about the time the huge corporations moved in. The best explanation I ever heard about the change in theory was "They'd rather hold 20% of a thousand dollars than 5% of a million." Which seems pretty accurate.

MM MD

Speaking of half orders of sides at SW, I think they let me order a half of some of the entrees as well. Good tip for the solo traveler.

what happened here, I may be blind but I don't remember seeing the outcome of this draw:



thx for the great reports, run good!

I didn't bother taking the after pic bc the draw was irrelevant and I figured most regular readers would know the amount. 250$ x 10 lines = 2500.

guess I'm getting old & lazy, I cant understand half the payouts I see you post, especially the ones with the colored lines you have to trace, and just look to see the amount it says you won

thanks for indulging this geezer starter kit

Quad fives is not "premium" so it doesn't matter what the kicker is. Payout is the same regardless.

On Spin, just follow the lines. Each one passes through five cards, and that makes up each hand you're playing.

$240 for 4oz of meat????

I've had Kobe before and it's delicious but holy crap

Day 3, part 1

No alarm set, which of course means I wake up at 5:45am. Yesterday's result (even) means I'm almost certainly going to survive this trip- sometimes survive is the best you can hope for, but 15k left for just over 24hrs oughta be plenty for anyone. If I can't make that last I deserve to lose it all.

With that thought, time for battle once again.



Time stamp says 0618 on this one- right out of the gate!

I remember switching to spin after this, and donking back most of the money. I'm planning on room service for breakfast and I've still got over an hour to kill. At some point I must have moved to hi limit for some full pay action- I honestly have never felt as comfortable in hi limit as I do out on the floor. It's likely due to 4 attendants basically hovering at all times, coupled with the typical Wynn hi roller who will come in like they own the place, bring their little yappy dog in the Gucci carrier in (not making this up), talk really loudly on their cell phones about their latest business deal, etc etc etc. It's not that I feel out of place so much as it's just not that pleasant of an environment.

Anyways, I suck it up bc full pay, and if I don't get it in in the AM it probably won't be available for the rest of the day.



Clearly I make 4AWAK when playing on full pay UX, no multipliers selected! Whatever, keep 'em coming! Aces are finally starting to drop.

I can't remember exactly but I believe I finished that pre-breakfast session up 2k for the day. Big swings, but good start.

Breakfast was forgettable- I forgot to take pics, but it wasn't worth it. I went with a pretty standard scrambled eggs/cheese/bacon, but the plate was just TOO hot. As in, it continued cooking the eggs the whole time so by the time it got to me, half the order was bonded to the plate, rubbery and inedible. If I was paying for it I send it back, no question. I feel bad for the guy who has to scrub that crap off- that's going to take some serious elbow grease to get off. Maybe they just chuck the plate entirely.

I teed up the third movie of the trip and basically finished it. I'm supposed to play my third and final round at 12:20, right around lunch. 4th/rebuy round after that. I've killed enough time- time to head downstairs again.



I remember this one vividly- LITERALLY first hand out of the gate. KEEP THOSE ACES COMING!

That machine cools off a lot, and I switch to the usual.



DAMN! Twice but no kicker either time!

I again go through some massive swings, and finish that session up 2k again. Up 4k for the day, within touching distance of even!!! I head over to the slot tournament for a quick bite before my rounds.



Dessert display, thought this was pretty cool.

It's brunch right now, so I get an omelette and some andouille sausage. It's pretty good- I gotta say, the Wynn's free food at the tournament this time around is getting it done. With that, I play my 3rd round.

Result-


So again, this is a decent but not great score. Several scores in the 30k range above me.

While I'm playing, I hear the MC mentioning rebuy people are supposed to come back starting at 1:30 for their rebuy round, depending on when that is. Hmm. I don't recall seeing when my rebuy round is, I assumed it was bundled into the third round. So I check, and yep, supposed to come back at 2:30! Annoying- no one wrote it down on my credentials (but all other rounds where written down), and now I've got to make the long trek back to the casino YET AGAIN, and then come back here YET AGAIN for the rebuy round, and THEN do it all over again for the awards presentation! Sigh.

I belly up to the machine which has been pretty hot, and am immediately rewarded-



SWEET.



SWEET!



SWEEEEET!!!!!! One ace into 4AWAK!

To be sure, that was a great session, but I didn't take as much from it as you might think. I know at some point I was up for the trip. I also switched to spin poker and it was as cold as ever. Spin is so bad this trip... I think I only took 2k from this session as well. Still up 6k for the day, up 1k overall.

Back to the tournament room.



So, the rebuy round. I feel like I should explain this again in a lot of detail. We've got a separate prize pool, 48k winner take all. Obv a long shot. Of course, the rebuy round also can be used as one of your top two scores. So to me, the rebuy round is so heavily weighted- have a monster rebuy round and you're winning money way out of proportion to the overall prize pool. It's possible, in fact likely to me, that the rebuy winner is going to place highly in the overall standings in addition to winning the 48k. If I ever needed a monster round, it's now...

I'm in the last round, which is cool bc at least the MC is announcing the top rebuy score he's seen. 39k and change. YEEESH. At least we know what to aim for.

We start. I'm getting absolute crap. This sucks. First 1 min 30 sec of 3 min, my score is abysmal. Then, the symbols start coming. You want 3x4x5x (top prize), but I'll take anything.

2x3x5x. 3x4x5x. 2x4x5x. 3x4x... blank. DAMN! Another 3x4x5x. My score is growing fast. I'm gaining some hope I can at least take top 30 and get my money back.

Honestly that last 30 sec was a blur. I hit so many symbols and had quite a few near misses too. When all is said and done-

Result-


AGGH!

Great round, to be sure. I won my session, but as the MC points out "it's not quite 39k". Man- I think about all those missed symbols, the multiple 3x4x BLANKS that I had. If I had even one more of those come in, I WIN THE REBUY ROUND!!!

Oh well. I figure with my 28k and this 36k, and top people from every round were posting 30-35k scores, I've gotta be at least in the top 30. Looks like I'm headed back for the award ceremony at 6pm...

I've got dinner at Sinatra at 7:30p. Award ceremony is at 6p. Got a lot of time to kill!

As I'm now minimally up for the trip, and likely at least going to get my buy in back, I decide it's time to change it up a bit! I resolve to play every gimmicky version of VP on offer here. The rules are pretty simple- I'm going to coin in 200$ then move on. As the paytables are atrocious, I wasn't planning on doing this at the beginning of trip since I was stuck and facing 9/6 TDB all weekend, but now that I'm doing ok I figure why the hell not?

Unfortunately, most of the games at the 25c/50c level have paytables that even now I would hate myself if I played. Most of them scaled up to "less bad" at 1$ credits, so that's what it'll be. I figure less iterations on each game the better, anyways.

(Note: the pics and sequence here are mostly accurate, but I missed a few machines)



Other versions on offer at hi limit. Starting with 8k credits. I'm going to hit DSTP, spin, Triple spin, UX, EDF and Deal Draw (played all the others and STP ~ same as DSTP)

DSTP result-



Spin result-



Triple spin result-



(Holy crap this game is swingy. I didn't even play all 3 games at once, but 2 (90 credits/push). 135 per, I don't even get two pushes!)

UX result-



(About this time I started thinking this is really dumb. Just lost 500$)

Extra Draw Frenzy result-



(Never saw 3 OAK, obv)

Deal Draw result-



(This one was good)

That's all on offer at hi limit. I head out to the floor.



Result-



(This was also good, made some money and got trip 4s with nice multipliers! Blanked, of course)

UX "bonus streak"- Mega swingy from experience, I'm ok with 25c credits on this one.



Result- bad. Forgot to take a pic.



Result-



Terribad, plus one of the buttons was stuck, resulting in a mishold.

Also played wheel poker and another version with LOL bad results, then to the big daddy of them all-



I'd be better with the 5$ credit version, but the progressive was near the baseline. Whatever, I won't be here long regardless.

Result- royal flush?



Overall-
- coined in 200$ on every gimmick VP game in house, probably 10 games total.
- lost ~ 1k, about 50% payback overall
- wasn't worth it. Meh. I'll do something different to change it up next time. You're welcome, 2+2.

With that, back to something more sane.



THANK you, erase that stupid gimmicky challenge in one swoop!

I play on and give all of that back. I head back upstairs up 5k for the day, even for the trip. Take a nap, finish off that third movie. Then, back to the tournament awards presentation.



To be continued...

Amazing, you finally get money out of a slot tournament, but now the Wynn F's you over on pays.

Lots of pics aren't there for me in this update, not sure if you can still edit, but I'm not seeing about 5-10+ pics of the first wins of the day and some of the stupid games you played.

Weird- they're all there for me. Your browser/software maybe?

The rib cap at Ramsey's steak house at Paris is great. Not like the SW Kobe, but still a good choice.

The Rib cap at Ramsey Paris is good, but I wouldn't go out of my way there for it. Stick with SW, only the best there. But the stickey toffee pudding is a good dessert.

I’m waiting to read that he finished top 3 because they also reduced the payouts in the tourney slots

I have read most or all of this thread and maybe I am off here but it seems Leon is up 50-100k over the years while also getting 10s of thousands of dollars worth of comps. Originally partially because of his dad who lost a fortune there. Now his dad has moved out of the country and all of Leon's favorite machines have the payouts changed.

Is that a coincidence or not? Also typically full pay VP players don't get the royal treatment with full RFB at least from my limited understanding so I have always wondered a bit about this. Even if you are running $500k a trip through the machines that is still only $2500 in theo. Which should get you about $800-1k max in comps not full rfb, suites, multiple rooms, $1000 FP etc.

Would love to know where I have this wrong as this thread has fascinated me for years. I appreicate all the TRs Leon and the effort they take to write.

Leon isn't always playing full pay machines and he degens with his wife/mom/friends at times playing table games and regular slots so I believe that might factor into it.
Also his father had much higher coin in and wasn't playing full pay exclusively either, I'm sure that influenced his host which I'm assuming they share to some extent.

From his TRs it sounds like 99% of his play prior to this trip was on full pay machines. I agree they were factoring in his fathers play for his level of comps. With his father having moved abroad I would imagine the other way they can justify the level of comps he gets is by increasing the house edge on the games he plays. Leon said it himself that going from 99.5 to 98% payback increases their hold by about $7,500. That means Wynn stands to make about $2500 from him each trip by his own admission on prior trips. Do you know anyone else who gets Leon's level of comps with that theo? I don't.

In fact I would go so far as to say Leon's prior trips were probably +EV once you factor in 1-2k/trip in freeplay and the comps he has been getting. A good deal if you can swing it.

not the hold, $7,500 in increased theo ($500K x 1.5%)

My dad has been abroad for the last 25 years. His MO hasn't changed, which is come to LV 3-4x a year and play for a month solid. I'm sure the change has zero to do with him living abroad.

I always figure my theo at 99%, assuming I make mistakes/gamble gamble sometimes (eg, hold 3 to a royal vs a 4 flush), etc. As mentioned I'll play penny slots and table games too.

Everything else, I'll take what I can get. My FB is capped, changes each trip (1-1.5k) but almost always more than enough. My parents always get "full comp" but I'm sure they've got a limit too, they've just never hit it. The free credit was negotiated- I guess they're willing to give more if you ask? Remember I initially tried for 2k and was shot down to 1k coming in, 1k on hitting 50k points.

Yeah and dad plays like a donk too. Almost pains me to admit it. If I'm a 99% theo player he's gotta be 95-96% at best. Makes SO many mistakes and doesn't learn when I correct him. Sigh.

Lol, reminds me of the very first I went to Vegas with my gf. We weren't in gamble mode at the moment, but after stepping away for a couple minutes to piss, I come back to find her at a VP machine, holding a mid pair and an ace kicker. At ddb. I forbid her from any VP henceforth.


But many people are like that. I used to frequently observe consistent terrible play by randoms playing bar progrossives. So while the game is probably 7/5 Bonus at 98%, the average of the bar has to be in the low 90s, and still they don't offer reasonable games.

I have a habit of watching how people play VP next to me. It is remarkable just how bad some plays are. Low inside straight draw and holding an A kicker with a pair are just the tip of the iceberg. I am no longer surprised at just how bad people play.

I would say low 90%s is a generous estimate