I saw DK doing their generic "up to $,1000 deposit bonus" promo earlier this week. Believe the fine print said you have to earn your full bonus w/in 45 days of initial deposit & the playthrough criteria is ridiculous, so you better like betting on UFC & Korean baseball A LOT.

Seeing FD & BetMGM both offering a risk-free bet of up to $500. "Refund" your bet in site credit if you lose. If you're patient enough to fish around Google, you can probably find some decent referral codes from sites like Action Network, etc.

All that said... who's ready for some 4-max poker at Ameristar?!?!?

Information on casinos re-opening:

https://www.coloradosharp.com/casinos/

Saw a few posts on Reddit showing casinos in Deadwood, SD started opening back up this week, including poker. Tough to gauge since their rooms are smaller, but sounds like the places that re-opened their poker rooms were opening about half(?) their tables. 4-max, 50% rake and decent sized waiting lists apparently. Looks like they had players sitting in spots 2, 4, 6 & 8. Tables were "normal" and didn't have the crazy plexiglass barrier thing they're testing in FL.

where do i find this reddit thread? i spoke to the manager of cadillac jacks which is the poker room that reopened, not all did. he had 3 tables of 4 each last sunday, but only 1 on monday. im glad my state still has 7 to a table. im not sure what reddit is is it a forum for casinos or for a different subject?

Room that opened was Cadillac Jack's. Post is in r/poker on Reddit. Don't wanna get mod-slapped for linking to another forum but the post is easy to find in that sub.

Black Hawk, Central City casinos allowed to reopen

Proposed reopening 6/17. Machines-only at first. Says they will re-evaluate opening table games after 3 weeks.

My guess is mid-July then, as initially expected. July 4th was my guess 3 months ago. I don't see any reason a re-evaluation won't produce the results we're all looking for, which is a full re-opening. Cases are way down, moving 3 day averages for deaths is almost 0 now. June 4th and 5th recorded 0 deaths in Colorado.

By the way, the reason the seasonal flu and other Coronaviruses are more prevalent in Winter time is due to humidity, not temperature. These viruses thrive and persist during times of lower humidity, which for us, is Winter time. Also, higher temperatures do have an affect on the life span of Coronaviruses on hard and soft services, as UV light is capable of killing virus particles after a certain amount of exposure.

Agree... don't see any reason why they won't re-open tables after 3 weeks. Given all the restrictions for the 6/17 opening (compared to other areas in the country), it wouldn't totally shock me if they didn't open poker specifically until a later date and just have craps/BJ/etc. when they open "table" games. With as slow/cautious as we've been here in CO as a whole, guessing they start poker at 4-max and go from there after a few weeks.

I had some Ameristar chips that I had from before the lockdown, so drove up yesterday to cash them in. It took appx 20 minutes to get through the line for temperature check. Masks required. It looked like they moved a few poker tables on the higher limit side of the room to make room for slots, but tables were mostly still there.

Assuming single point of entry through the valet entrance?

Correct, valet is closed but you get directed to from the parking garage elevators to the line in the picture.

Wednesday, July 15th 10:00am opening. 5 handed max at all poker rooms. Masks will be required at all times. Tournaments will not run until a date TBD. Max rake will be $4 + $1. Temperatures will be taken at entrance to casino.

What/where is this from? Thanks

That is my exact prediction for the opening date and restrictions/requirements. If I turn out to be right, it just reaffirms my ability to see the future. I've called so many turns and rivers (including suits) that it has made me question if I might have extra-sensory powers!

Just injecting some humor into this whole Covin shutdown

A variance request has been announced today by Gilpin County for table games. The Division of Gaming will be holding their monthly meeting tomorrow (3rd Thursday of every month) to consider the issue. I believe because Colorado is in phase 3 of the Covid response - Protect Our Neighbors, which allows local communities to take more control over their decisions if they have low levels of cases, Gilpin County will be able to resume table games if the Division of Gaming agrees. This is the moment we have all been waiting for.

The variance includes language on poker, which states up to 6 players will be allowed if the variance is approved. New players to a table will have to sanitize hands, masks will be required by all customers and employees, and when 6 feet of social distance is not allowed, dividers will be in place.

http://www.gilpincounty.org/news/wha...w/Annoucements

Ride -- I quietly took the over on 10:00am 7/15 and won a million 2+2 bucks. Gonna split my winnings with you.

Just read an article saying it's looking like Teller County may have to shut everything back down due to an upswing in outbreaks but Gilpin sounds like it'll be okay.

I definitely have the itch but seems like the experience might not be super fun on the table games side. Reserve the right to change my mind when one of you guys drops the "I won $3,000 in 2.5 hours at 1/3 in my first session back!" post.

Nice, I'll take half!

On a more serious note, I've never seen the amount of apathy as I've encountered during this Covid-19 pandemic. I didn't realize just how disinterested people have become in fighting compliance with government orders. A lot of people feel squeezed in between government mandates and a rather large cadre of citizens who vilify you if you dare go against the norm.

I think this situation has shed a light on the overall apathy of the poker playing community as well. I don't see much activism on behalf of poker players, or from players themselves, in changing the legal landscape of online poker. It shouldn't have taken this long to lobby Congress to enact legalized online poker at the federal level, and from it looks like, it could be another 10 to 20 years before there is even the possibility of legalized online poker across all 50 states with a common pool of players from all 50 states.

any updates on poker at Gates/DeathStar?

Vegas is moving towards 8 handed but it appears we will be waiting for a while in Colorado. Of course we have lots of private games running in Denver.

Anyone aware of an update on the table game variance request?

I was in the process of relocating to Colorado in March but put it on hold until now. I am officially moving in a month but I can’t find any new info on the status of new casino variance requests.

I am aware the governor but a pause on new variance requests in mid July so I presume no news is bad, but perhaps someone local has some insight in how things are looking in terms of managing Covid cases and whether things are heading in the right direction?

I haven't seen or heard anything pointing to table games or poker opening back up anytime soon.

On a side-note... was I completely living under a rock not hearing about Initiative 257 until yesterday?

It's going on the ballot for voters of the 3 gaming jurisdictions

https://www.sos.state.co.us/pubs/ele...57Results.html

https://www.westword.com/news/colora...imits-11644452

Thx Ride... figured it was probably limited to those 3 cities the more I thought about it, otherwise I'd have seen it spammed all over local stuff here. Thinking the limited scope on this will probably work in its favor of passing.

Now that I think about it, I'm not positive if the initiative is voted on by the general pool of voters across Colorado in the 2020 election, or if it's only voted on by residents of Blackhawk, CC, and Cripple Creek. Amendment 50 back in 2008 was a statewide ballot measure, and once it passed, the voters of each city were then able to decide if they wanted to accept the new limits and 24 gaming hours.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorado_Amendment_50