Link is broken. Are all games still at the old casino?

Yes

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https://www.prnewswire.com/news-rele...300709513.html

Poker is coming back to great blue heron casino in december!!!!!!

So...when do you guys think poker is coming back to southern Ontario? Or Canada in general?

I guess once they have some kind of vaccine im guessing. Isnt Brantford Elements open?

I heard a full time, and well known member of the Poker staff at an Ontario casino is looking for new work. I doubt before a vaccine is available. Also who would open up even a single table of poker if there was maximum capacity of 50 customers?

I'd be shocked if even 40% of the poker room staff are the same when the rooms reopen. People gotta eat ya know...

And yes, I don't see anything happening before we get a vaccine and it gets distributed. So maybe they'll reopen Augustish.

In better news, Great Canadian is being sold to a finance company. Unlikely it'll change anything, but it sure can't get any worse.

The purchasing by an investment company is GUARANTEED to make things worse.

They should have sold it to a funeral home.

They don't currently offer poker. How could it get worse lol? They take the crappy high rake game out of Port Perry lol?

Actually, the Port Perry game rake wasn't too bad by Canadian standards, 10% up to 6.

The big problem here is the excessive long waiting times to play.

Many, many things wrong with Port Perry.

1. little bit high rake
2. slow dealers
3. long wait times
4. Not enough tables running, lack of willingness to open new tables.
5. Not Toronto
6. Many, many, many silly rules. Like how they'd pick you up if you missed your second blind, even if you show up 2 seconds after the dealer threw the button. Nothing worse than them kicking an action guy off the table cause he was 2 seconds late. Or once I called them, told them I was going to be 2 minutes past my call in time, they refused to do anything and I fell off the list. They're like the poker room run by Hitler.

I'd also point out that this investment company owned Harrah's/Caesar's for a good number of years recently, and Caesar's poker improved under their watch.

The rake was the lowest (real casino, maybe even in Ontario?) anywhere in driving distance from Toronto.

Most dealers are faster than other legal poker games, even though they're on average pretty slow.

They do have a limited number of tables which increases wait times. Tables are opened when they don't risk breaking another table and the list supports it. Not the most convenient bit how do you propose to improve it?

Make your time. It sucks to get a fish kicked out because of the rules, but you'd be perfectly happy when a rock gets kicked out. They have to avoid the appearance of impropriety. And if that fish won the first pot when he came back late I can guarantee you there will be complaints.

Have you ever been to Niagara lol? Rake in Niagara lower than GBH, even after it was raised recently. The rake at Woodbine was also MUCH lower before Great Canadian removed the tables. There was a $2+$1 ($3 total) difference in rake at 2/5 between GBH & Woodbine.

Dealers in Niagara much, much better than GBH. Especially if you're talking about 2/5 & up. I mean I know it's not a fair comparison, some of those Niagara dealers have been at it for 10+ years. But it's night & day between them. The average 2/5 dealer at Niagara is better than your average Vegas dealer.

I completely disagree with this. They very often simply do not open tables because they simply don't want to bother, or they say they don't have dealers available. It's usually nothing to do with the risk of another table breaking. This may be the case late at night, but is not at all during the day, around noon-7pm when they have massive lists.

You know this is all jibber jabber right? Show me another poker room anywhere that'll kick a guy out for double blinding when the dealer just threw the button & the guy is standing right there. Show me another poker room that won't say "ok bud, what's your name" when you tell them you're going to be 2 minutes late.

At this point I'm really sort of thinking you must work there or something.

And all of this misses the key point -- this stupid casino is 50 minutes - 1 hour 30 minutes away from the GTA, depending on where you live. It's a tent beside a field on a native reservation on a peninsula. The only amenities anywhere nearby are the gas station & donut shop across the street (and the donut shop closes at 6pm or something silly like that). This location gets zero of those 20 year olds who come out to party, then stop by the poker room at 3 am to show their gf's how manly they are by dropping a couple buy ins, or the ones who strike out at the club & do the same thing with their buddies to avoid admitting to themselves the night was a total bust.

Great Canadian has two other, much larger and nicer, properties in the GTA, neither of which host poker. They also have a third smaller property in Ajax. So 3 locations, craploads of square footage, yet no poker anywhere. We're relegated to the tent beside the damned cow paddy. It's crap company, non-responsive to their customers desires, only looking to hose people down cause they're protected by politicians & their politically appointed lackeys at the OLG.

You're comparing the rake on a virtual poker game to a live table? Really?

I see you addressed all the points I raised. Well done.

And it wasn't virtual, it was electronic. Everyone was there, so not virtual.

And yes, I am comparing it, as it was in Toronto, and it was poker. That's a far cry from the shiit show in Port Perry. It worked till Great Canadian removed it.

These are good points. The issue lies in the lack of competition in the Canadian market overall. If this was in Florida for example, where competition exists, some of these problems would go away. It has to do with Canadian regulation and a broader view Canadian society in general.

Ignore the posts by Nutella Virus, what he or she is unclear but ignore them.

If you want to play live poker go to the US, they are a business run in a competitive environment. When the Covid 19 situation improves, I suggest going to Florida, if you want to grind live poker. It's a little costly as far living costs are concerned in South Florida but Seminole Tampa is pretty good and cheaper than Miami area.

Of course, I think all Toronto poker players have been there before.

Rake in Niagara works differently, it's a session fee. 7 dollars every half hour not cheap. Especially if you are a tight player. Session fee generally favours the tight aggressive player. That's one reason why Niagara generally has better players than elsewhere in Ontario.

It depends. I'd say on average you are right but GBH has some really good dealers. A lot of them got transferred to the other casino. But I've played with the lady who was of Native origin and the Asian guy and they are both excellent. They have some new dealers, but over time, it wouldn't have been a problem. You learn quick dealing 8 hours a day 5 days a week.

yeah the lists are a big problem at GBH. The only solution which sucks but is to call in the morning and get there early. Then you are probably waiting an hour or two. It sucks, but I don't think it would have lasted. This casino needs it's poker. I talked to the supervisors and there all kinds of plans to expand poker and really make it a big deal. Of course that sounds like baloney..but look at the quality of the few tables that were there. Of course Covid came along and ruined everything. This is the casino that needs its poker more than anywhere else.


I've had bad experiences at Niagara before too. I once had a dealer tell me I should "stick to online poker" because they needed space. I once said "raise" and the lady said I was string betting and tried to hold it to a "call". I told her verbal is binding and she said that wasn't the rules. I generally hate the vibe at Niagara but that's a personal thing.

Port Perry is closer to most people living in Toronto. Not West enders but central Toronto (like me). A simple google map would confirm. The traffic corridor on the QEW is a lot worse than driving up north and crossing through Uxbridge. The travel time to Niagara will usually be longer.
Getting back to the other issue, I find the quality of play is much greater in Niagara. Anyways this is going to be subjective. The "isolation" is a bit overrated, driving 20 minutes from Port Perry is Oshawa and in Oshawa you have bars, clubs, shopping. It's not a bad little town. It doesn't have a wonder of the world nearby but it's not a bad place. Anyways nobody serious about poker plays because they can go walk to a dairy queen on a break.
This is true. But I don't think the lack of poker is anything more than economics. Poker doesn't generate a lot of money for a casino. Poker players, well objectively, we are bad for business. We go out and try to take the money from newer players. That's money that could have later gone into slot machines, blackjack, craps, etc. Perhaps players lose their money on video poker or poker house games. That's why there's no poker. Don't get me wrong, I'm on your side. I'd love to see poker in Toronto. But I don't think it's coming because of dollars and sense.

Here's the thing -- imo the comparison to Niagara isn't even the main point. I'm 1 hour 20 minutes from Niagara, 50 minutes from PP. Yes, it's better for me in terms of travel, but it's far from what it should be.

And I reject the economic argument completely. The rights to run poker are 100% owned by the government, who then license those rights to various companies in various territories. It is the responsibility of the province and the OLG, to ensure their rights are being properly exploited, to the benefit of the taxpayers of Ontario. If they grant the rights to a company that will not take full advantage of them, then the OLG is negligent. I don't give a damn if GCG makes money on poker or not. Their mandate under their license is to provide tax dollars and jobs for the province. If there's parts of that mandate that involve them taking less margin, they get to deal with that in exchange for the larger margin they make on other parts of the contract.

Not for one second do I believe that if there was a will between the OLG & GCG to figure out a solution for poker somewhere in the GTA, it would be figured out, and that revenue would start flowing. But no... because they're lazy bureaucrats who have been taken out to dinner a few too many times, they're not doing their jobs. Casino Ajax was supposed to close, and was only kept open because it became a political issue during an election (can't lose those jobs in Ajax!). How profitable will a tiny room with only slots be when it's 7 minutes away from a large new full service casino complex? Why could this place not have been converted to poker? Or even Woodbine -- put a heated tent offering poker in the parking lot for all I care. But no... we get relegated to be the justification for keeping open the casino in the middle of nowhere that no-one cares about, except the government, cause I guess there's an MPP from PP as well...

This whole thing should be thrown open to competition & let the private sector sort it out. It's like our high cell phone bills... anything the gov't tries to regulate for the 'public good' just means they f it up.

Anyhow, for those who haven't yet done so, I'd encourage you to Google ratings shame Pickering Casino for their lack of poker. I really think public pressure is our best chance of getting poker in the GTA. GCG will notice if the company showpiece gets horrible ratings on Google, and poker players have already dropped their rating below 3*.

Link here, takes 2 seconds --
https://www.google.com/search?q=pick...e7e7837af51c,1,,,

Yeah, this is absolutely the case for young single males without families. US casinos in many places are awesome.

But for people with many other things holding them to the GTA, our best solution is a casino that can be accessed locally, without spending 3 hours a day driving.

You're really saying electronic, sorry not virtual, poker was better than the games in Port Perry!

Define better. I mean it was in Toronto, and it had much lower rake. In both those respects it was much better than PP. Regarding quality of play, I'd say Woodbine was tougher. That's not what I'm talking about though.