Thanks. Is there any action at any other clubs for cash games? Or is Prime the main spot?

It depends on what part of Houston you live in and what you play.

For central Houston Prime has the largest number of games and game selection.

If you live down South, Mint Poker has multiple tables running (at lower stakes).

Post Oak will typically have 2-3 1/3 games going daily if that is what you are looking for.

Others such as Steelhouse, Babaloo, etc. have trouble(it seems) even getting 1 table going.

Also on that app that was posted note a lot of that information isn't accurate re: the game buy in levels.

Examples:

The Prime 5/5 PLO buy ins are $300 to $2000, not what is listed on that app.

It also shows a 5/10 PLO and 10/25 PLO on that app. Neither of those games are even spread. However, they have a 5/10/25 PLO that spreads every day and it's buy in levels are $1,000-no max buy in.

They show a 20/40 Omaha 8 or better game on the app but they have actually only been spreading a 15/30 O8 or better game a couple times a week. It isn't listed on the app at all.

Those were set up on Poker Atlas when each place first opened and I don't think they have ever been updated so it is better to call and clarify if you are looking for a specific buy in game.

if you are playing the PLO games they are insane - the 5/10/25 game has many stacks in the 10-20k level...

By the looks of their pics they are going all out. Looks like at least a $100k investment in the room itself. Now advertising livestream cash games during the WPT tourney - Sept 26-30. $5/$10 ($5k buy-in) on Wed and Thurs and $10/$25 ($10k buy-in) on Friday and Saturday.

http://freerollspokerclubs.com/

definitely looks like a whole new place - at first i thought it was the old location but it is not

wait a min....yes it is the old location - i confused the soda machine with an exit

I don't think so Clive, the address they are giving is on I-10 just outside the Grand Parkway on the South side. Brand new commercial space.

yes..but the photo is the old locations....im pretty sure

I am sure it will be beautiful

I think that pic is the old location. No doubt those guys will have a nice place though. The way they improved that room from VIP was a lot.

yes.they do have a good operation and wish them the best

While not an explicit denial, this does throw some water on the MagicIsland as venue rumors.

https://www.chron.com/news/houston-t...-85307-tbla-29

Also, 15/30 O8 seems to now be a regular game at Prime.

Didn’t think that rumor was true but would’ve been interesting. Still think a room near downtown/Montrose would do well.

Yeah I really preferred the 20/40 game but most of those players have gravitated to the 15/30 08 game

Anyone played at Shuffle512 in Austin? How does it compare to TCH? https://shuffle512.com/

$20 / month or $250/yr..wonder what the 5 yrs plan is $2,000?

I've played there a couple of times as it is closer to my house than TCH North. Right now, only open at 5pm during the week (and not open on Tuesdays). For cash games, it's almost strictly 1-2NL. I think this is due to it being new and still needs to get more players in the room before some higher stakes games get going. A PLO game did get going on Friday night late when I was there.

It looks like they are trying to get some momentum by running free-roll tournaments and low buy in tournaments.

Overall, a decent but smaller room. About 10 tables. Tables are OK and the chairs are comfortable. Lots of TV's. Clean. Lots of space between tables, so maybe room to expand to more tables. Most dealers are good, but did have 1 inexperienced dealer who made some mistakes. Host/floor were nice and made a point of thanking me for playing and encouraging me to come back again.

The action was surprisingly good. Not as much as TCH, but still worth playing here. I expected it to be a passive game. There were some newish players, but you'll see some faces from TCH or elsewhere as well. pretty much a typical 1-2 game.

They use time-chips as opposed to paying for all your time on the way out (like TCH). I personally like this better.

Nice review, thanks for posting.

I like the idea of time-chips, seems like I would be a bit less tilted walking out after getting felted rather than waiting for the cashier

I also noticed their tournaments have a one-time "fee" rather than an hourly cost. This is way more appealing to me, and I still don't quite understand TCH's logic for this rule. TCH claimed it was a legality issue where they need to keep fees consistent. However, I don't really buy that since they randomly instituted a $2 "seat fee" for everyone.

PLO sounds great, I'll try to make it there on a Friday night soon.

Yes, nothing more tilting than playing well for hours, then taking a bad beat to go broke, AND then having to money for your time on the way out.

On the tournaments, they do charge time on the free-rolls, but not on the buy-in tournaments, at least currently. Just an FYI.

The TCH does not use time tokens because they are typically used as a payment method to charge players only when they are playing poker. This is a time rake on the game. The TCH charges members as soon as they go in the club regardless of what activity they are participating in. There is no seat fee at TCH, the rate is simply $2 + $10 per hour to be in the club.

New room just opened in League City:

https://www.facebook.com/theroomleaguecity

SA Card House's $100k guarantee ended up SMASHING the guarantee and hit $329,000. Is that the largest poker tournament in Texas so far?

Not even close - 1M and close to 2M were run back in the days of the underground...there were even some home games that ran well over 250k with 100 players - in Houston there was a 10 location tournament that produced 50k each - so we are well into the 500K level - this was in about 07

Was just on Poker Atlas and a reviewer gave Post Oak 1 Star. His big complaint was that a lady at the table had a dog with her and was feeding it food off her plate and sharing water with it. Floor person said she had proof it is a therapy dog.

Wow, that is totally insane, if true

Anyone played at The Vault Club in Galveston?
How was it? Action?

I ended up playing the Saturday night $60 rebuy/add-on $1500 guarantee last weekend. We chopped it 6 ways as the blinds were so high the big stack has 9bbs.

I'm not sure if the owner of Shuffle512 reads these forums, but there were a lot of improvements that could be made with regards to their MTTs that would help both players and Shuffle512.

The good: I loved how there was a simple $20 fee for the tourney. This is way better than an hourly rate. Please keep this policy as it's the most fair to players. Hopefully this is profitable for the establishment.

Improvements:

15 minute levels are fine for the rebuy period, but 20-min levels would be much better for the late stages, especially if you are going to skip blind levels - i.e. going from 3k/6k to 5k/10k, then 10k/20k. If the levels are going to remain 15 minutes, at least implement a 30-second "shot clock" for each decision to prevent long tanking.

Chopping - Please allow for the pausing of the tourney clock to see chop numbers or discuss chop numbers. One player at the table was deaf. It was extremely frustrating to not make any sort of accommodations for the difficulty in communicating a chop and specific payouts, all while the 15 min blind level is counting down. Pausing for 5 minutes would have actually saved time in the end and allowed for a cash game table to start up more quickly, earning more $ for the house.

Website - the website shows 2k bonus chips if you are seated at the start of the tourney - every dealer said this was only for the freeroll tournaments: https://shuffle512.com/events/event/...hold-em-rebuy/ - Please put the actual blind level structure on the site and update it and include the MTT fee.

Overall the tournament was good, but it felt a bit amateurish compared to other card house's in Austin that are run more professionally.