I've been a lurker here for about a decade. I play only NLH. The trip reports are hands down the favorite part of the forum for me so I'm going to finally write one.

A bit about me:

I used to be an avid recreational player pre Black Friday and made Poker trips out to Atlantic City a couple of times a year. I would only play cash games (mostly 1/2 with a bunch of 2/5 as well) at casinos and would only tournaments online. My weekly tournament staple was one of the Sunday $200 tournaments and about 5-6 smaller tournaments over the course of the week. I went to Vegas just one time during this period.

While I was a losing player, I played well when I was serious and playing a bit higher than I normally would. I also had a bunch of cashes and even a couple
of wins (albeit, in small tournaments). I had a good command of the basic math concepts (EV, odds, implied odds, pot odds etc) and basic strategy (position, ranges, blockers, etc). Despite wanting very much to get better, I just didn't have the discipline to study the game beyond this basic foundation. Every time I would try to read through a hand on this forum, I would just tune out half way through the description. Plus, I always enjoyed a bit of a gamble.

I pretty much stopped playing after Black Friday. The vast majority of my play was online and when that went away, my interest in general in poker tapered off. Aided also in part by the fact that I quit my job around then to take some extended time off. I went to Vegas a couple of times after Black Friday but these were mostly non-poker trips (bachelor parties) with maybe a couple of hours of poker when we were drunk.

For some reason, after not really thinking about poker for the past many years, I started spending more and more time on this forum and started getting excited about making a trip out to Vegas. Excited to the point of deciding that this was the perfect time to make a trip out there since the WSOP would be starting soon. I'll be out there the first week of June. The plan is:

1) Play the WSOP NLH $1500 6-max. I would like to play possibly one other $1k tournament. Doesn't have to be WSOP. And probably I will mess around and play some WSOP satellites.

2) Play some 5/10 NLH cash games. My budget is about $4.5K for this so I'm thinking of 3 $1.5k buy-ins.

3) Play some craps! Budget for this is about $3k

4) Smoke and drink at random bars while watching the NBA playoffs.

5) Eat at all the nice places. The only place I know I'm going for sure is Wicked Spoon. My favorite buffet at Vegas (granted I haven't tried too many). Rest will be decided when I get there. There is no food/drink budget.

I did want to solicit some advice from the community:

First the objective questions:

1) Can I cash-out satellite wins for WSOP events or am I required to play the tournament if I win a satellite for it?

2) Best place to play 5/10 NLH?

3) Recommendations for craps? Do people have a favorite place to play craps? Looking for $25 min bet tables.

4) Recommendations for places to just smoke and drink play some video dueces wild while watching the NBA playoffs? Any places that are known for a great moscow mule? Or perhaps there is a sportsbook you recommend? I've only been to the one at Caesars and it was an amazing experience.


And finally the subjective question:

As I read through some of the discussions on this forum, it appears that NLH has evolved quite dramatically since I last played (circa ~2014). To the point where I barely understand any of the terminology that is used in the strategy discussions. I have no interest in catching up to this theory. I want to take my solid game of from back then and run with it. My question is whether this is a terrible idea? Has the game of NLH really evolved so much that my solid game of 2014 will just be completely dismantled and embarrassed? I'm a fairly smart guy and can make adjustments and am not scared money.

Thanks!

If you havent played since 2014, why not take that $1500 and play in the daily 1pm $250 tournaments at the RIO? They are relatively soft, and probably even more soft since they'll be plenty of people here who busted out of the Big50 tournament (day 1's end on Sunday June 2nd). So I'd expect the prize pools to be on the higher side than normal. Then again, you'll continually have a ton of people busting out of the Big50 who will jump into the Wednesday 6max tourny you mentioned. Guess it's your call with how comfortable you feel.

As far as cash games go, I've never sat at a 5/10 game, so I really can't answer that. But if I were playing a game for money and hadn't played for 5 years, I'd probably step down a notch maybe get in a session or two of 2/5 first.

Keep it coming

GL, i'll be there too and contemplate on doing a trip report too since i like them so much. On lower stakes a solid 2014 style should still be a winner, dont know about 5-10 since ive never played that.

[QUOTE=chrismrjen;55140041]

3) Recommendations for craps? Do people have a favorite place to play craps? Looking for $25 min bet tables.

Wherever the dice are hot... which for me involves moving to different places. If you play the small-tall-all bonus bet, I think Hard Rock has the best payout 176x for the all, versus 150x at most other casinos. Cosmo probably has the best scenery walking by, but I've also seen them raise the table mins to $50 during prime times. $25 tables are pretty standard at most casinos. If you want to bet 100x odds, Cromwell has that. Good luck.

If you reallly wanna try 5/10, might want to try Bellagio - min buy in only 1500 so you won't feel like a shortstack.

5/10 will have some good tables, but higher percentage of good players vs 2/5 games.

If you *really* wanna try 5/10, maybe roll the dice one session but if you bust go down to 2/5 so you don't feel like your trip poker roll is on the line in every hand.

Or whatever, sounds like you have a bunch of bankroll for various activities, so can always adjust on the fly.

Have fun

I will be there 2nd trill early in the 6th so hit me up. I will be doing a live trip report so u should be able to find me. I also say drop to 2/5, the B is $500 cap but most others rooms are $1k cap. GLGL

Thanks for the feedback re:5/10. I think what i'll probably end up doing is keep take 2 shots at 5/10. And if I bust, switch to 2/5.

Thanks for the advice! I'll give this a shot if I bust out of the $1500. I've always wanted to play higher buy-in tournaments. Couldn't afford to when I played back in the day, but can now so would love to experience it. And plus, I really enjoy 6-max tournaments versus full ring.

Thanks for the tip! I was leaning towards Bellagio as well. And yah, I can always move my budgets around as needed.

I'm a bit of an early riser. Do you know if Bellagio would have these kinds of games running earlier than you would normally expect due to the WSOP. Like say 10:00 AM ?

Thanks Sprintrex! Good luck to you too. Dutch trip reports are the best!

Download the Bravo app.

2 weeks from now won't be exactly like this week, but open it up at 10am Friday and see what Bellagio has running and how many on which wait lists and that at least gives you a frame of reference.

And you can check it other days/times to get a sense of what each room has going well before you go there yourself.

For the satty question, you get $500 lamers and can sell them pretty easily at face value to people in the registration line.

Thanks that_pope!

After a bit of reflection, I've decided that 2/5 is probably a better idea especially since (I didn't know this) they had 1k buy-in games. I assumed for some reason that it would be a 500 buy-in in all places.

Sadly, seems like my favorite casino, Bellagio, is one of the ones that caps it 500 so I'll need an alternative. Is there anything at all to chose from between Aria & Caesars for 2/5? I don't want to play at Venetian.

Encore or WSOP @ Rio

There will be other 2/5 games that pop up randomly, but Bellagio, Aria, Wynn, Venetian, and WSOP will be the most regular.

Sadly Bravo App doesn't have encore or rio.

Sure it does.

Encore is listed under "Wynn Las Vegas" even though it is technically in Encore.

Rio is listed twice. "Rio Las Vegas", which is their real poker room and "World Series of Poker" which is the cash game room in the convention area with the tournaments.

It's hard to keep up the poker study of you're not doing it full time.
It's a lot of work. I admire people who are able to do it. I try, but it takes up so much of your free time if you are serious about just keeping up, let alone improving.

I'll be there in June myself for 5 days, but won't be playing much, if at all.
Have company.

Have fun and good luck!

PH will have 2/5 most of the time starting early afternoon and they end up being real good games. It is a 1k max there also

Alrightie here goes! On the flight over now. Should land somewhere around 2:30. Plan is to hit up the dispensary on my way to check in at Aria. Then heading to PH to play in the quarter million gtd since I haven’t played a tournament in forever.









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GLGL. PM if at PH and you want to meet up with another solo guy. I am there also. Lots of people there for the tourneys

Good luck and keep the updates coming. I'm headed there in a week myself so I am stoked as you can imagine, and our agendas are very very similar (dispensary, craps, poker tournaments at $1500 or less, cash games, etc). Will be living vicariously through you, the more updates the better.

Press the place bets and hardways! Take the Raptors! Haha glgl

Well what a start.


Landed a few hours ago. Checked in and went to check out the 4:00 PM 250k gtd at planet Hollywood. Line was insane so decided to get something to eat. Walked across the street to check out the B buffet. Very underwhelming. The wait lists for the poker room were insane (100+) so I went back to PH . The line was just as long since there is a single line for the 7 PM and the 4 PM. Went downstairs to see if the cash situation was any different. Nope.

At this point I walked over to the bar and started playing some deuces wild. Aaaaand hit a jackpot .



In for 100. Out for 2165.

But I am curious: how am I suppose to get into any poker games? Should I just put my name on and wait forever?




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Damn, nice hit!

For poker tourneys, it's worth heading to the casino of interest at off-peak hours (late at night or early in the morning) and registering for tourneys at that point.

For cash games, download the Bravo app, it'll show you what games are running at all casinos and what the lists are. Maybe you'll find something decent running with no list at a place you wouldn't otherwise consider.