Frankie? or anyone else...

any promos coming up for fall? comped rooms etc etc?

It's not an East coast thing. Just an AC thing. There's a bit of a learning curve I guess. If you wanna mess with the dealer's mind, try straddling when someone buys the button

According to The Press of Atlantic City, this is the second time someone has been injured from the escalator.

Went I played at Dover Downs poker room I could buy that button if i was a new player.

I think this is an overdone issue. If you join a new table, you shouldnt be allowed in until you are the button (unless you post and are not between button and BB). If there is a skipped blind before you and the button isnt supposed to move when you sit, then you wait a hand till it gets to you, or passes you. IMO

That is not true that casino that Frankie used to run before that Revel, if you were a new played and you are between that button and that big blind you could buy that blind and not skipped that blind.

That what been happening lately at Revel.

if someone wants to enter between the BB and the button, they should be able to if they put in the SB, and also post the BB.

Its only 1 stinkin' hand, if the dealer says "no", then the player should just chill.

I see people sit out 5 hands cause they dont wanna post $2 when they sit. That's just as weird.

anyobdy want to post a game report or something? maybe even a sample GR of a typical Saturday afternoon/night? i'll be down there this weekend and want to know what to expect. is it basically a 2-4 LHE and 1-2 NLHE room with nothing else?

Has this major tournament news been released yet? May have missed something...

bravopokerlive.com is where to go to see up to the minute information. On saturday's from what I have seen they have several games going all day, with as many as 15 going at it's peak late night. There is usually at least a 2/5 game or two as well as a 2/4lhe in addition to several 1/2's. There has been a push itt to get a mixed game going.

REVEL TRIP REPORT
aka “The Most Expensive Free Hotel Room Ever”

I arrived at Revel at around 1:30 in the afternoon on Sunday, 9/9. I received a postcard in the mail a couple weeks before which promised a free room and $100 in free slot play. No idea why I got the postcard since I don’t think I ever signed up for anything at Revel – it might have been direct marketing because of my gambling past and/or my geographical location – but regardless, I used the comp this day.

I was checking in early, which I do a lot in AC. I didn’t need my card to check in which saved me from one line. The line was long and took about 15 minutes to navigate. When I got to the counter, the gal was really friendly and polite. She also liked my Slayer shirt, which is always nice… Until she said her dad loved stuff like that. I am old.

Anyway, we ask for the tallest room and the best we can do at that time was the 17th floor. Since I had the wife and kid in tow, we chose to get that room rather than wait for a better view.

The room was really nice. Lots of high tech gadgets that I appreciated (the remote control controlled the lights in the room) and the phone was a little tablet you could remove and use around the room. The price list for things you could take from the room was funny… $40 for a towel meant my wife’s traditional use of towels to take to the beach with us was a lot more strict!

The family and I went down to the beach and had a nice time watching the waves and many crust punk surfers (we settled near Resorts for our beachcombing) and then ate at the Rainforest Café for the first time ever. Not great but kid friendly.

Headed back to the hotel room and was gonna make it to the poker room at 7ish but wound up dozing off while watching football. Got up at around 8:30 and headed down to go to work… But first I called up and asked that they put a 5/10 HORSE game on the list with me starting it. The person on the phone seemed enthusiastic. More to follow on this…

I had to get my Revel Card so I headed to Card Services. There was a relatively long line but it also went relatively quickly. I made sure I had the correct information on the deal for folks with new player cards and jumped on a slot machine to use some of the free money.

In order to use free money, I had to put in real money… This was confusing to me. I thought I was jump-starting the money with my own money and then using comp dollars that I could cash out if I wanted but that wasn’t the case. I wound up making $2, yay me! I left $87 or so in comp dollars on my card. We will see if I can use that next time, but since I hate slot machines, might not even try.

Then to the poker room… Wow, the people who have complained that the room is off the beaten trail are not kidding. There are signs at the elevators and escalators which do point out that you have to go to the Mezzanine level for the poker room but once you get there, the signs stop and you go down a winding corridor of desolate conference rooms. You keep thinking “it has to be around this bend” and then it’s not.

At the worst, I suggest more signs in that long, winding corridor to at least help people realize they didn’t hallucinate and that there is, in fact, a poker room destination. I would also suggest the poker room be moved to a better location but failing that, Revel can employ Poker Guides whose job it is to escort prospective players from more high-traffic areas to the poker room. Maybe even have the Poker Escort give out something small to anyone who makes the trek with them – say a white chip or a card good for 10% off at a restaurant. Something small might do what this room will never do: get walk-up traffic from novice players.

So I finally make it to the poker room. It is really dark, but the tables are well-lit which creates an interesting sense of vertigo, at least in me. Not bad, just different from rooms that are well-lit throughout.

I didn’t even see the HORSE list though I found out later that the game was listed as Omaha… Huh? I didn’t say that! The game probably wouldn’t have run anyway but it would have been nice to have it put on the list correctly…

I got right into a $1/2 game that was running. Lots of grey haired people at the table. Not the best possible set-up but since I am a nit, I figured that playing with rocks could be profitable, plus everyone was friendly. I bought in for $300 at 9:17 PM.

A couple hours in and cockpit introduced himself to me. We were playing together for a while but didn’t know each other from the forums. I pointed out that I looked exactly like my avatar which is a good thing for future reference to all, haha! I did have him pegged as a solid player and even before I met him, I stayed out of his pots and he mine. I thought the game was fairly soft and the players fairly predictable – the kind of game you just KNOW that people are gonna pay too much for their flush draws or that you can bluff them when the flush draw that you didn’t actually have hits.

I played fairly well –folding Queens face-up after an old guy went over the top of my three-bet all-in only cost me the minimum and got him to show his Aces that I knew he had. Got my stack up to $425 or so and then lost it all when I overplayed a hand: Completed the small blind with 45 of clubs, flop comes 44T with two hearts. I wind up getting it all in on a non-heart King on the turn and the guy tabled his K4 of spades that he limped in with UTG.

I buy back in for $200 and wind up stacking off again when my AT loses to A9 thanks to her getting two pairs. I buy back in for another $200 which I fortunately double up thanks in large part to the very last hand I played. I announced it would be my last hand since I was UTG and I looked at the first card that came in – an ace – and then the second – also an ace. I said “well, since this is my last hand, may as well raise” and made it $20. Got two callers, one of whom went all-in on the turn on a Queen-high, uncoordinated board. Never saw what he had by my Aces held.

I played from a quarter after 9 until about 2:30. The players and play was mostly predictable. Later in the night some wilder and younger players came by making the game more volatile (and probably better). I would have liked to play more but I was tired and when I left they broke the table anyway.

I found the staff pretty good for the most part. Dealers weren’t as friendly as I am used to seeing (only one introduced himself using his name) but they were competent. The floor was good enough to give us reduced rake ($3 instead of $4) when tables went down to six players. There wasn’t a ton of game selection but as you get late on a Sunday, that’s pretty common all over AC.

Right as I was about to leave cockpit came back to the table after leaving and informed me that someone just fell off the escalator. This was a bit of a shock! I went by the elevator from the casino floor and looked down and saw them cleaning up blood. I was gonna try and take a photo but a security guy unsurprisingly put the kibosh on that immediately.

I also saw the burlesque dancers though at 2 AM it was more depressing than titillating.

So I lost $300 but played long enough to qualify for another free room. I had to go downstairs to activate the offer, which I did right before I checked out. Prior to this, the wife and son had breakfast at the O Bistro while I slept. They said the service was bad and the bill was bloated but not atypically for casino fare and the food was fine.

There was a longish line at Card Services but it went fast for me since I could jump into a shorter one to activate my promo. I did so and had it explained to me politely and with a smile.

I’ll stay and play there again because I always reward those who give me free rooms. Don’t know how many I will get after this promotion but we will see.

If I was going to AC without a free room, there are better destinations for poker. The biggest drawback is the lack of casual players. They are the people who you want to play against. When someone came by and said “Is this real poker,” like a rube, I laughed my ass off because he wasn’t a rube at all. He tried to get people at the table to think he was. But even if his knowledge of the game didn’t give him away, the fact that nobody can stumble upon this poker room does.

Possibly Revel doesn’t care about poker. Many casinos in AC get by without poker rooms or with small ones where they make no bones about how unimportant poker is to the property. Revel will either find a way to get casual players inside their poker room (aside from my aforementioned Poker Escort idea, you have to imagine a big tournament series with good structures and solid guarantees might help and should be on the landscape – it did get bodies into the Golden Nugget which also had notable logistical problems when they first opened.

Maybe unlike Golden Nugget they can get those people to stay… I think they may have a better shot. But it all depends on how much of a priority poker is to the powers that be way above Frankie’s head. We will see…

Agree the poker room needs to be moved. Where its located right now there's no incentive to leave your name on the list. You have to wait nearby in the most quiet and depressing part of the casino with nothing else to do, and then there's no guaranty that a critical mass of players will show up.

Would be curious if people could give a casino report whether there are dead parts on the floor where poker could potentially be moved. Everytime I walk the floor the electronic blackjack tables are empty, but admittedly I'm usually there during weekdays, not sure if they actually get use on the weekends.

If they moved the poker room to the floor I'd at least be willing to throw my name on the list and hover near the poker room while playing other table games or just people watching.

I'm sure they could text your phone if u wanted to go into the casino.

They should put a craps table upstairs near the poker room

Frankie - What is the policy on Buying the Button? Open to a new-to-room player joining a table in between button and blinds? Open to new-from-broken-table player? Open to existing player who missed his BB?


I walked the long walk to the poker room the first time. Then when heading there from the hotel/casino, I headed to the box office (on casino level) and took the nearby escalators up to the room.

There are elevators near the escalators. Wondering why they weren't run up to the hotel lobby level? Hotel guests seeing a show (or hitting the poker room) wouldn't be forced to trek across the property twice, but would also miss having to walk through the casino. Guess that answers that...

OK, another weekend coming and you guys will have yet another donkey trying out the Revel for the first time Sat-Mon. I'm a sucker for mixing it up, so if y'all want to try to get a late night mix going Sat or Sun I'll be game. Heck, even if we can just get LHE/LO8 I'd play all night. 2-4 thru pink. Build the list and they will come. I need something to earn my first $10 comp on. (the wife would even do the simple mix as well; trust me you want her at your O8 table)

Hey
I was in A.C this weekend and I was dissapointed with the poker room of Rebel. The place is like a maze, the poker room was far, lonely and dark .Looks like the owners forgot the poker room and they decided to put it in the most remote place of the whole casino.

Every poker room in ac other than borgata is hidden. How do those make it work?

And for the love of god just take the box office escalators

I'm going to have to at least stop in at Revel on my next AC trip to see if the signage is really as bad as everyone says it is.

You haven't been to Caesar's, the Taj, or the Showboat?

oh it's bad rapini... it's bad... and so far out of the way.

at least in the other AC casinos that don't have their rooms on the main floor have signs and are easy to get to. bally's is probably the hardest.. and you just take the elevator or the escalator and you're there.

but once you get there.. the revel room is run very well.

The worst thing is you can be on the second level and just down a short set of stairs from the poker room, and still not know you are almost there.

I seriously think the powers that be might have deliberately made it hard to find so the whales don't spend much time there.

The taj's poker room is hidden at the front door? It's the most prominent poker room in any casino I can think of.

Shotboat is pretty easy to find these days, although that one was revel esk back when it opened. There was a time when the borgata's room was hidden in the basement, in the corner.

I forgot that the taj exists. Miserable place.

Caesars is hidden in the way back of a sea of slots.

Once you know where you are going the poker room isn't that bad to get to - you can go via the escalator near the box office or if coming from your room you can make a right at the bottom of the first escalator down (before going down to casino level) and walk around.

I think the room has a lot of potential. They clearly aren't really marketing yet but I am sure that is coming. Opening a casino is a tough thing to do and frankly poker doesn't make a lot of money so they need to make sure their casino floor is working well first.

The issue with Revel's poker room has little to do with location and more to the fact that poker players are creatures of habit and don't move. Case in point the Taj - why players continue to play in that dump baffles me.