I'm thinking about a last minute trip to play the ANZPT ME. Hotels seem to be really pricey though, what's a reasonable amount to expect to pay for a 3-4* place decently close to the casino?

I used to play occasionally at star city, but since one of my friends has become a dealer there and told me they rake 180 - 200 dollars off the 1-2 tables hourly and about 250 off the 2-5 tables per hour, i dont think its good to play a game that basically rakes a buy in off the table every hour

The rake is stupidly high for 1/2 there, if you can find good homegames at the 1-2 stakes you should be playing those imo.

That is the current rake at the moment and table wait times during the day are fine for the most part but they get lol bad on friday nights and weekends, I expect them to get worse since anzpt is running at the moment.

The poker room will also be moved downstairs , should make the games abit better hopefully more pit players will be keen to give poker a go.

Poker room now downstairs on main gaming floor.

From the place that brought you the "magic muck" (a card touching the muck is ruled a dead hand regardless of the spirit of the game) and "bet out of turn means you are forced to check if it is checked to you, even if dealer had mistakenly told you action was on you" comes a new, greater highlight: if you grossly misunderstand the bet you are facing and call what you thought was a far smaller amount, you are now forced to call the full bet size. "to make people pay attention" apparently. Mind you the dealers will let a person out of the hand give instructions to someone in the hand without batting an eyelid, apparently that is quite OK.

lolstarcitypokerments

STAR CITY IS AWESOME!!! LOLJKS

And another starcitylolpokerments gem has just been introduced...

No mobile phone use. Not at the table (fine with me). Not away from the table (?). Not anywhere in the poker area at all (!!!).

Along with no food anywhere in the poker area.

I'm moving back to Pyrmont soon and thought I'd drop by every so often and make a donation to the grinders.

Do they ever run any PLO8 games there?

Seems like a few Australian casinos have stupid rules about phone use and having anything on the table (drink, keys, etc). At least that's one positive about Crown in Melbourne, eat, drink, text, phone, music, whatever, do whatever you want.

No, PLO and the occassional Manilla are the only non-NLHE games ever spread.

PLO is 1/2 and 5/5 with uncapped buy-ins.

Bummer, what's the PLO standard like?

Thanks

Haven't played it but from what I can see it's like any other game, a split between some solid players and some whales who are playing to gamble it up. It is not uncommon to see players buying into the 5/5 game for $5k+.

Wow, a new lolstarcityaments low. Players are now allowed to high-5 the dealer after winning a pot! (new rule and yes, I'm serious)

If any star poker room management is reading this, please please PLEASE do something about this nonsense. Someone high up is trying to run the poker room as if it were pit games. The room is very strict on nonsense like that "you grossly misunderstood the bet, tough you have to call everything" carp (flies in the face of RRoP) or "no phones anywhere inside the poker area" (I understand at the table but nowhere in the poker area?) but game integrity issues like one player to a hand are ignored by not only dealers but also supervisors. The other day at a table the dealer was talking with one end of the table for several minutes before a player on the other end asked him to please deal - the player got admonished severely by the dealer for this ("no offence dude but you are paid to deal, not have a conversation with the table" - I was watching the clock and he was right, it was several minutes of conversation. "you have no idea what I'm paid for so keep your comments to yourself")! I have asked dealers to get high denomination chips put on top and was laughed at by the dealer who then proceeded to ignore the request. A reg I talk to told me of a hand he was in, raised all-in pre and had the 2 opponents with large stacks on the other end of the table agree with each other to check the hand down if they both called - not only in front of the dealer but also a supervisor! The 5/5 game is just infested with angleshooters.

Seriously, this nonsense has to stop. it is really getting beyond a joke and is being noticed by more and more of the regs

Now, I will have to say that many of the dealers and supervisors are good. There are enough good dealers, supervisors and managers to run a very solid poker room yet it just seems that somewhere up the chain someone just doesn't "get it". The only thing keeping the room alive is the terribad standard of play however slowly the numbers are dropping. Many of the quieter regs are starting to play more and more online. When the only tables running at midday on a Friday are 2x 1/2 tables then you can see something is very very wrong. A few years ago Fridays with 10 tables+ of 1/2 used to have waiting lists of several hours plus 2x 5/10 and 1x 10/20 LHE games (now LHE not spread), one or two Manilla games (now 1 if lucky) and up to 25/25 PLO!.

What's doing?
/rant

Edit:
Actually re-open rant: I'll throw it out there - does anyone who works for Star poker even read the largest poker forum (one of the largest forums overall) on the net?

Lol good points. In summary. Is crap.

LOL Sydney. Should be the place to go for poker, but will never compete with Melbourne.

There needs to be competition.

@denks, I enjoy your reading your posts mate, keep them coming whenever something interesting happens.

You could raise your issues at the Australian Poker site http://www.pokernetwork.com/forums/main-noticeboard/, although the place is rather dead compared to a few years ago.

there is competition ask around

Not legally

Star city dosent care about poker im not holding my breath on them changing anything soon

On a lighter note, the Star thick serviettes are the best things I have ever come across for blowing your nose when you have a cold. Recommend anyone with a cold / flu to head over to the food court and grab / ask for a few. I'm sure you all needed to know that

Thanks mate. Will keep the lolstarcityments coming

I have come to the conclusion nobody in star management reads these forums anyway so I'm just using them as a place to vent rather than expect any real change which won't come until we get some competition in NSW.

I hope you're not holding your breath waiting for competition.

I look forward to joining you in rants here in the near future.

Should be a few stories from the Sydney Champs donkaments over the coming weeks. Was thinking of coming up (from Melbourne) but have competing priorities right now.

I don't play tourneys so I'll probably be avoiding the place.

There was a 10k-50k 25/50 NLHE game running for a bit last night, heads up as far as I can tell. Even a long waiting list for 25/25 PLO (PLO at star plays very deep, the average buy in at even 1/2 is 200 - 500 bb). Busiest I have seen the place in quite a while. Whale in a 5/5 game had the table playing 2k-5k deep on average.

Place was run quite decently last night, then again looking at the floors on shift I can see why. Amazing how different floor supervisors can add or detract from a place - last night was most of the better ones and few of the bad ones.