Sycuan and Barona are the only 18+ nearby I think, so I'll be going to one of those it seems.

1/2 game w. a max buyin of 100 is ridiculous lol so guess I'll be playing 2/3. How does that play over there? Aggressive? Seems like 2/3 is basically our 1/2 on the East Coast.

Hey Carnivore, where's our TR? I'm snowbirding there next week, gonna play in both SD and LA.

East coast guy here on biz travel to SD. Played at SevenMile last night. This was 2/3 . It basically plays like 1/2 . Pots were a little bigger than your typical 1/2, but that was due mostly to a maniac. Once he lost his $ 1000 (multiple 200-300 dollar buy ins) he left and game returned to your typical 1/2 style game. Only complaint was that they ran out of Stone Ruination ale.

Tx Jello. Did they run 2/5 or was 2/3 the biggest game?

Ocean's 11 is a ways out of town so I'm looking for an in-city option for a couple of the days. (Will prob play at O11 when coming back from LA.)

in city its 7 mile or lucky lady, and i'm not sure lucky lady is even running games any more.

they passed a law a while back which said in-city cardrooms would have to close down when the owner dies. thats how we've gone from lots of cardrooms to 1. palomar was basically the last one standing until it got raided a few years ago.

7mile has 5/10 and 2/3. also sometimes 5/5 and sometimes 5/10plo.

TY Clayton. Google has been surprisingly useless (at least it was when I checked 2 months ago) in terms of figuring out what rooms actually spread the pokers.

My plan is to play 7mile 1-2 nights, then drive to LA for a long weekend. Hit Ocean's 11 on the way back.

Lucky Lady is still open until June at least when they have another review/hearing or whatever with the city.

Played 2/3 and 5/10 at Seven Mile the last Friday. The 5/10 game wasn't bad. A couple tight regs, a couple fun players who love to see flop. Of course there is always a player who is buy in short and always complaining about card dead and how unlucky he is. Also, 5/10 PLO didn't look good and broken around 1am.

Hi all-

I am a young amateur player, looking to find a better low stakes game.

I currently looking for a better venue than my current room- Oceans 11.
This room is really starting to get to me. I am a 1/2 player (my current life doesnt really permit me to increase stakes) and the games here are horrendous at best.
The 1/2 games are 20-60 buy-in, and the players are always calling stations, impersonal, tilted, etc.

Where do you play in San Diego? I am based out of North County, but occasionally make the trip out to Barona with friends- games are usually great there.

Two of these sound like good things, and I don't really understand the third (impersonal) in a poker context.

In retrospect, I realize how this may seem optimal.
I guess to better describe it, it is a combination of the three that makes playing extremely frustrating for me- its not enjoyable. In situations like this, I try to play as tight as possible, but Im always being one-upped, getting gut shotted, or never actually getting a hand to play because Im notoriously unlucky. I will try to find a better way to describe the problem.

Let me translate for Jarin, as he's new.

He's a beginning player who wants to have fun when he plays and eventually get to be good at the game. That is impossible playing a silly short-stacked rake trap. Where can he play 1/2 and buy in deep enough to actually use some of the strategies he's trying to learn?

Once he can, he'll probably get over the ideas about luck and hating people who call, but right now the game he plays is so dumb he's having trouble leaving those ideas behind.

Garick, please let Jarin know that deeper 1/2 games have gone extinct in San Diego. The 50bb max game at Barona does tend to get deeper during the evenings, though, as players stack off and reload.

@Garick thank you so much for the help, I could not have phrased it better. A rake trap is the perfect way to describe it. My main focus is to improve my play, employing the strategies that I have read in books/forums/discussed/etc. but it is impossible when you have no chips, AND people never fold- you cant push people off hands, cant put them on ranges, it feels crippling.

(and for the record, i dont hate people who call- i hate people who call all 3 streets with 72o only to spike the river and take down my AKs)

the same room has a 2/2nl for 60-200 buy in, I am considering just playing that game.

Thank you, that is very good to know.

The Barona games are usually some of the better I play in, but I am in North County and cant always make the 70-80 minute drive down.

Oceans 11 has a 2/2nl game max $200 buy-in that I might check out.

Ocean's rake is more than Barona, but still that 2/2 $200 game is probably worth it. O11 is on Atlas, so you can monitor it to see when this game typically runs. GL.

Drove past what was Palomar last night. The building is completely gone now; demo’d and cleared since the last time I passed it 3 weeks ago.

Still shocked that the weekend 5-5 PLO never found itself a home somewhere else. <sigh>

Pechanga regs are going ape**** over new button straddle rules. It was previously SB acting first (Mississippi straddle?) and now it’s UTG acting first.

Personally, I prefer the new rule, but don’t care either way very much. Anyway, you can imagine how worked up some players are over this. Fun times.

Barona used to have SB acting first, but switched to UTG first.

Having the player in the SB act first makes no sense to me. The blinds are technically a forced bet, so if the players in the blinds act before everyone else, then you've actually made them act twice before anyone else acts.

(I've always understood mississippi version to mean any player can straddle to any amount from any position at any time?)

I just finished a session at seven mile and they have the same button straddling rule for action starting at utg. I really enjoyed it, it didn't seem to be problematic for the games like button straddling is sometimes and actually drove action.

Was thinking about dusting off the hoodie and headphones and play some good old fashioned donkaments this weekend (Saturday) in the SD area. I was looking at the schedules and there is some Helix type game going on at Harrahs. Anyone know wtf this is? They are giving away 2 WSOP GIANT seats to top 2 finishers. Can't find any other info.

Looking for the best tournament for two rec players who haven't touched the felt in a few years. Max buy in $200ish. Not interested in cash games. What casino in the SD area has the best tournies going, this Saturday specifically??

Wednesday Night at Sycuan has been the best tournament I've played in San Diego so far. It's $40 buy-in with unlim re-entry for a few levels. It's a step up from the $20-30 buy-in tourneys with unlimited $10 quadruple rebuys and 8x addons that most casinos offer nightly.

The only catch is that depending on the jackpot, tournaments may be canceled at Sycuan without warning... So keep an eye on the jackpot before expecting to play the tournaments

Is anyone here involved in real estate that has a general idea about the local property market? I am strongly considering moving here to work and then play poker part time online and live so am curious about opinions on local property values, whether there is room for desirable neighborhoods to continue to grow and things along those lines. I'd really appreciate any input by post or PM. Thanks !

LOL where to begin. Cost of living in San Diego is going to be significantly higher than almost any other city than LA, San Fran, NY, Etc..

And that being said, all of the rooms are not in the best places.
O11 is in a pretty shady part of Oceanside (its not ghetto, just run down)
Lucky Lady is pretty much the same
7mile is probably the best as far as location goes, it is tucked away but pretty isolated from near-by neighborhoods
and the Indian Casinos--- they are on Indian reservations as I am sure you couldve guess.

Where are you moving from? If youre from somewhere where you have to drive a lot, you might enjoy San Diego (most of the residential areas are pretty far from poker rooms), and San Diego in general has a big footprint.

Honestly, unless youre making close-to or more-than six-figures a year, San Diego can be tough to live in.

Hi Jarin, yes I visited earlier this year and found the amount of driving acceptable while living a little north of downtown SD. Given 7 mile runs some 1k+ nl & plo I'd primarily play there. My income is appropriate, the other areas i'm considering are the southern part of the bay area and the beach part of LA, so I'm fine with that.
What I'm really trying to find out is whether anyone with their ear to the ground about the property market has an opinion about it so I can make a more informed decision about where I settle down as that involves most likely buying a property. I won't post about it anymore tho as to not spam the thread so still looking for any input from anyone thx