Crazier still that they opened at all in the first place. Houston is oversaturated with cardrooms as it was when they launched. And the location they chose - 10 minutes away from multiple eatablished rooms. Very ambitious of them all around.

I mean, I understand their approach, they're trying to do something "different" in building an upscale destination location with a hotel attached for traveling players to stay on property for their series.

The problem is, this is similar to what The Lodge is doing wrong (i.e. going after the traveling pros). That's terrible for the economy, because traveling grinders don't make your games better, they come into town, chew up the local money and take off after the series ends.

They really need to focus on the local market and build a core of local regulars to fill the room, rather than trying to attract traveling players.

In addition, it looks like The Champions Club is doing $50 high hands every 15 minutes. And while the ever 15 minutes thing is nice in a sense, the $50 isn't really going to get anyone all that excited.

They'd be better served doing a $200 per hour highest hand bonus I think to have a better appeal to the promo.

Champions finally announced a tourney series for September, schedule not out yet but supposed to have over $1M of guarantees. That is the best way to get people in your room to check things out.

https://www.click2houston.com/news/l...mpted-robbery/

TCH Spring robbery attempt last night. Security guard was shot at least once.

TCH spring had a list to play 1/3 PLO8 on Tuesdays.

Glad I didn't go yesterday because apparently a guy tried to rob the place, ended up shooting the security guard, whom I hear is now in stable condition. The security guard also shot the robber. I don't know condition of robber.

Sucks that this keeps happening down there... glad the guard made it out alive, if only the robbers hadn't had the same fate it would be a happy ending.

Gonna say it now..........overlay alert!

story says he was shot SEVEN times but managed to scare off the FOUR assailants and keep customers from getting injured.

Hiring police or sheriffs is likely a lot more costly, but may serve as a better deterrent for these robbery attempts

Yep, updated since my 2p2 post

I'm praying this doesn't make HPD crack down on the rooms.

Play at Champions Texas if:

1. you want floors who are the left-over crumbs from the Amazon Room and the circuit events, ie. they are incompetent. Good floors don't have to live out of hotel rooms their entire lives. Who else could they possibly convince to move to Houston for a $12-15/hr job?
2. you want to play with the riff-raff from the sketchy, smoke-filled underground games up and down Bellaire Blvd., where Champions is located. If you want to play with business owners, lawyers and other River Oaks residents, play at the established clubs inside the Loop. Even Spades has a regular who is a Harris County Judge. At Champions you get petty criminals in the game
3. you are into woke culture, players at Champions are on a "social credit" system
4. you want incompetent dealers, Champions is the only place besides the Amazon Room I've seen a dealer put in the box to deal Omaha who had no idea how to deal the game
5. you want cage cashiers and servers who have been let go by the other clubs in town
6. you want to play at a table with 4 house props (empty chairs in the game who play poorly but still never put a chip in the pot)
7. you want to welcome Corporate America and the Poker Industrial Complex to Houston (where it does not belong)
8. you want to play at a club destined to be out of business soon, is having a hard time even getting 1 table going despite the nice amenities
9. you want badly prepared food
10. you have no self-respect – you won't be treated like a paying customer – remember: this is Corporate America trying to ruin poker

I don't think $7 rake is too much, I payed $32 max rake in Macau back in 2016. it was $250 HKD. And at other rooms it used to be $200 HKD max. I think people like to make this an issue for just so they have something to say. From my experience with a rake this high, it does have an affect of "taking $ off the table" but if the action is good, then it doesnt matter. All these videos I see on youtube about texas, it shows alot of action. and 7$, thats a deal. You also gotta take into account that if you go card dead, or if youre nittier, then you get involved in less pots, and thats cheaper than paying the time structure.

What room policy is this referring to? Can you elaborate or does anyone know about what this means?

Lol harsh on Champions, havent been so cant speak to it... I do know a massive building with hotel rooms, kitchen, poker staff, etc that struggles to get a single table going most days has to be sweating... thats a serious monthly nut to cover and they arent even coming close... ol Hellmuth and company will probably fold it up before the end of the year if things don't pick up.

I think their problem is similar to how the Lodge in Austin is missing out on tons of revenue. They focus too much on the high stakes market. A 100/200 NLH player is paying you the same seat fee as a 1/2 NLH player, but the bigger player wants a host, free food and special treatment. They're an absolute pain in the ass and not worth the effort.

A poker room with a hotel that they pumped $12 million into means they thought they were going to be a "destination" poker room, hosting big series and having people travel to attend.

The problem is that this is difficult to pull off because there's so much competition for series of events all over the country, and they're essentially relying too much on players coming to stay there.

You really need to focus on building a core local group of regulars that will come and fill those seats and pay you time everyday, you can't just rely on traveling players.

So you need to market to locals, and you need to create promotions that will get butts in seats and keep them there (hint: $50 high hands every 15 minutes ain't gonna do it). And you need to setup your games to protect people from going busto, cause broke players ain't paying you time fees. All this unlimited restraddles and uncapped buyins or match the stake just favor the people with the deepest pockets who don't think long-term, they will absolutely slaughter the sheep rather than shear them, and **** up your local poker economy.

You have to not cater to the very vocal professionals and the deep-pocketed players, and instead cater to the recreational lower stakes locals if you want to really make money. You should do everything to structure your room to repulse the grinders. Flatten payouts in tournaments, pay a larger percentage of the field than 10%, get rid of the unlimited rebuys for 9 ****ing levels, etc.

Or they could just let Texas be Texas and allow people to conceal carry into the rooms.

You never hear about home games being robbed and I bet they have some big ones.

Anyways not trying to spam but how are the games at TCH Spring? Looking to play 1/2 or 1/3. What's a standard buy in? 600?

When a player is denounced for non-PC micro-aggressions he/she is referred to Champions' DEI department (Diversity, Equity and Inclusion) and is publicly shamed

Btw, the Lone Star State has roundly rejected DEI https://www.dallasnews.com/news/educ...s-at-colleges/

Poker Atlas never seems to show any games running at 4 Suits Social in Humble. I was going to say the same thing about The Hangar, but I see right now there is 1 1/3 NLHE game running. Do these rooms usually have 0 or 1 table going? Or are there cash games running that don't get updated to Poker Atlas? Is there any good PLO in Humble or thereabouts?

That's because the action is terrible at each place and the rake is $11 max. I live in Summerwood near Atascocita and would love it if Four Suits had competent ownership on a membership basis or raked less. That's probably not sustainable for them though, being such a small operation. I find the 20 minute drive to TCH Spring well worth it

Texas Card House, Spring is currently expanding and added ~16 Tables to give them ~30 Tables. They are working to have all the tables ready for the Fall Classic starting Wed, 2-Oct-23.

You better believe if/when someone does decide to rob one they'll just come in guns blazing. Happened in SC a few years ago. Guy tried to stop the robbery and they shot him dead.

For NL players it’s kinda crazy how much Houston and Austin suck compared to Dallas. In Houston there’s so many damn and it’s all 1/3 NL. Almost no 2/5. Oof. And the rake sucks. And it feels so much sketchier and unprofessional. At Legends some guy was getting a massage just completely shirtless at the table lol.

I've seen that twice here in Austin too, gross

The bigger games in zhouston are mostly PLO. But also the 1/3 is misleading. When the 1/3 games might have $10k or even $15k on th3 table why do you need to play 2/5.

I just played 1/3 NL at Legends, Elite, and Champions and they all were boring nitfests with almost nobody with over 1k at the table. Where are you finding these games?