Anybody played in Hong Kong Poker House www.hkph.com.hk ? They claimed that it was founded by Phil Laak and Joe Hachem. Is that place good?

Have not been to HKPH but keep meaning to go. I have met Kelly and Brendan and they are pretty cool guys. I have actually met a lot pf players from the HKPH and everyone seems great (especially "Steph" wink wink)probably a nice place to play.

I am not sure about Phil and Joe, but Kelly and Brendan are great guys, they run that place so well. I went there almost every week, it has to be one of the best place if not the best for fast action live game in HK. I believe they run 10/20 and 25/50 on a regular basis, and higher limit on request. You can check them out on Thursday, when they run tournament, that no membership is required to get it.

btw, I have heard many regulars said, the tables are tougher than Macau at the same limit.

It is definitely too bad to hear about Waldo. I honestly don't understand why more people don't play cash games there; it's not THAT expensive to get there from the city, and the rake is capped at half of what it is at the other casinos. If you win two pots that are over HKD $2000, you've paid for your taxi trip.

Oh well, I suppose most (bad) gamblers don't think rationally :|

When Wynn, Starworld and Grand Lisboa are so close to each other, why would people bother to travel to Grand Waldo?

Um... HALF THE RAKE? That's so huge.

Honestly if a table of 8 people shared two taxis and split the cost, it'd be $20 or so per person to get to the Waldo and back - that's serious savings even at 10/20.

not really half the rake.
they have a 20/40 game which is capped at 100.
but I think bigger games like 25/50 are the same as Wynn or Lisboa.
Starworld actually has the smallest cap for games like 25/50 and 50/100.
Either way, the rake is high as it is in Macau compared to the states.
But since the games are sick here, I wouldn't mind paying the higher rake.

You have a point. But when you have prop players (in Starworld) playing extremely LAG with a huge rake, I think that I also have a point (not that Waldo doesn't / didn't have prop players).

Is there any special poker promotions at Macau during Chinese New Year?

Think all the CNY promotions usually get announced after Christmas by the casinos

Care to elaborate what were the mistakes that costed you chips?

I wanted to shove but didn't announce all in and didn't push all the chips at once. I was treated as limping.

Ok about this week's Saturday tournament. The guaranteed changed to $100K and the buy-in changed to $2000. Blinds begun at 25/50 with 5000 chips to begin and you may rebuy when you have 2500 or less. I was busted out when I raised AQ with about 10000 chips at 300/600 to 1500 and someone cold call, flop come J9x, I bet he raised I shoved and he showed 96o geez this is one big fish. No A. no Q, no to come.

always wonder, are we going to see any omaha or mixed cash game happen in Macau...

Hello,

What type of information would you like? I currently live in Guangzhou, my girlfriend lives in Shenzhen, and we've both traveled extensively in Hong Kong and Macau. The biggest difference is that Guangzhou and Shenzhen are in mainland China, requiring a visa for all visitors, though they've significantly eased the restrictions put on for the Olympics.
-Dan

I am going to Macau in Q1 2009, that is all :-)

TimTam, at the moment only Texas Hold Em is approved by the DICJ (MAcau's regulators). This may change next year with some more games being allowed

Will be heading there again soon. Hopefully the games are still as good as it sounds. Wouldn't mind going for drinks in Macau if any one is up for it. Seems like GL and WYNN are the places to play.

i just got back from playing in macau for two full days at the wynn and i must say i was pretty disappointed. maybe the lower games are good, but the 100/200 was literally the tightest game i've ever played. not sure if it was typical, but it was nothing but regulars who wait for the nuts. almost everyone played tight aggressive/solid and didn't massively over-value hands, unfortunately. if you're lucky you might get to play with a rich fish, but good luck getting a seat if you're not already at the table. it was definitely not what i expected. i think i'll stick to the commerce to get my fix for playing with crazy gamblers. if you do go though, the wynn is where all the games are at now days.

Played at Wynn and GL over the last 4 days. Agree that Wynn is the place to play in Macau. They have at least a few tables in play each time I went there and had no problem finding a seat on the 10/20 or 25/50. Over at GL, the actions usually starts late afternoon onwards and at most 2-3 tables of 10/20 (at least on those occasions I was there). For those visiting for the 1st time, I do think you have to get use to regs talking and showing each other their hands after play but refuse to show the rest. Other than this, the games at these levels are mostly loose/weak.

Looking forward to my next visit in mid-Feb 09 .....

They environment at Wynn is better than anyone by a mile, but they do have one thing that I don't like, they limit the buy-in at 100BB, which is kinda short for my taste, I hope they could up that to 200BB....

I'm guessing your a 10/20 (1/2) player. The max is actually capped at 200BB in all the higher games. Wynn and Starworld at least have it that way.

ya, you are right, but I have heard the 25/50 max at 5k buyin?

Checked out Wynn, Grand Lisboa, and Starworld from Dec.22-24th. Wynn by far has the most traffic. Grand Lisboa seemed dead with only 2 tables going. and Starworld was deader than dead - no tables going at all!

On a side note, I think that a few months later would be the best time to come. Reason being is that there's a lot of regs playing in macau right now and not enough fish. The game is VERY new to the mainlanders (the fish) and they are slowly learning. In fact, I saw over at Grand Lisboa they had a table specially set up with dealer to teach the mainlanders how to play Texas Holdem. I give it half a year when most of the mainlanders will follow the fad of "show hand" poker and flock to the poker tables. Because right now almost everyone was playing tight with the occasional fish mainlander that sits which wasn't that often!

The 25/50 game is 10k max, 50/100 is 25k max, and 100/200 and higher has no cap.

i guess your on shift now bo. lols.