I walked from Bally's to Aria and back today and didn't see too many weird people.

Yeah, those are also "locals joints" where the games are supposedly nitty.

I walked by a drug dealer around 25 minutes ago when I was walking on the bridge between Cosmo and Crystals lol. But I wouldn’t worry about it; just keep walking and nothing tends to happen.

Unless he was aggressive like the CD guys.

lol check the crime map

Have you? There were zero homicides or robberies on Harmon between Koval and Paradise over the last 180 days. The only incidents are basically in front of (or inside) Hard Rock and Holiday Royale which has nothing to do with the walk there.

Tourists are the only valuable asset Vegas has and the city does a tremendous job of protecting them on and close to the Strip.

Does that mean it's saver than in your small hometown? Probably not, but it's way saver than almost anywhere else in the LV metro or other large metro areas in the country.

Hmm, I just looked at the crime map and it is surprising what you are saying. It must be because there is a huge criminal element living at Harbor Island Apartments (Police on the news have said this) and they rob near the strip and can retreat quickly home.

So they don't rob where they sleep is what's going on.

So according to you, Harbor Island is the safest place to live then, right?

Criminals in Vegas aren't that stupid to strong arm rob tourists on or near the strip unless it's a rare purse snatching. There's more money in trick rolling older men looking for escorts and selling fake drugs to the thousands of idiot tourists asking locals on the strip where they can buy coke and molly. There's nearly zero chance of getting reported and the victims of those crimes aren't likely to retaliate with violence. That's been the Vegas hustle forever.

That’s the thing. Even really stupid criminals understand that they should leave tourists on and around the Strip alone because that causes trouble while nobody cares if they rob other people (preferably same ethnicity) a couple miles away or hustle tourists that want to do illegal stuff.

The metro I live in has an absurdly high murder rate with the vast majority happening in poor areas. A significant percentage stay unsolved because the police is busy protecting rich people. Last week a criminal made the mistake of robbing and killing an Indian grad student in a diner in a not so nice area of town. Two days later after an extensive undercover operation, they used a SWAT team to neutralize him. His main mistake? Not knowing that important people would really care about the person he killed.

I like your style madlex. You're 100% correct.

I played NL there quite recently (the Orleans) and, yes, there are locals, but IF you are a good player, the games are actually quite good. Many times there was $5,000+ on the table and it was in play. Of course, most of the locals who play there are not suckers . . . so if a table full of suckers it what it takes for you to win . . . well you get the point.

As for the rake: it is $3 +$2. However, the promotions that are used to distribute the $2 are very good. Some of the "promotions" at the strip casinos are something like: Must flop quad nines Ace kicker or higher between 8:30 and 8:35 on the third Tuesday of the month, both of the nines in your hand must be black. Max payout $599.

Some of the Orleans promotions are good but they often have too many “play more hours to win cash” type of promotions which are useless unless you’re the one grinding out the hours. And that appeals to local nits.

Yeah, that is true. So I figure I'm never going get one of the dollars and consider it the same as 4+1. But that's still better than 5+0. And at least in the limit games, many of the people who put in tons of hours are not very good.

Yeah that’s the way I look at it too. 4+1 is still the best deal in town.

ChillRob and Steve made very good observations. For example, during my recent trip I won:
Two high-hand bonuses - one for $100 and one for $400.
Two room share bad-beat jackpots (yes, this was unusual).

Last year was similar (except only one room share for a bad-beat jackpot). I didn't play enough hours for any of hours-played bonuses.