the best promotions here in AZ were splash pots during sporting events. Huge crowds (and fish), lots of action and big pots. Buffet finger food made it even better though I would like to have some tables set up on the side for eating, sit out a round to scarf down a sandwich!

Loyalty promotions IMO only attract the OMC types that sit there, miserable to all those around them, just to get the hours in. Soft play is rampant among the regulars who always have the nuts if they put a dollar in the pot.

Points and hours based tournaments kill the tourist/visitor live game action and the same people are always there playing for small payouts.

^^^^^^^^ THIS ^^^^^^^^^...........is the answer for Las Vegas.

Other very-well run rooms:
Peppermill Reno
Seminole HR Hollywood

Big rooms that have management that listens to you:
MGM National Harbor
Thunder Valley, Sacramento area

BY no means an exclusive list. I include the two rooms for many of the same reasons that Gzesh cites.

+ 1 on South Point in Vegas. I am not a vegas local but I am there frequently. I think the Sahara is a pretty decent room that doesn't get any love. PokerAtlas rooms are >>> than Bravo rooms. I haven't had any issues at Sahara but your experience may vary.

I haven't played at MGM National Harbor but I can vouch for the other rooms listed.

Here is a random list of features/observations/ramblings that I can think of off the top of my head in no particular order:

Quiet & Clean Poker Room: I have played in poker rooms where tables were right next to slot machines... very annoying.

Restrooms: I have played in poker rooms that have 40-50 tables and the closest restroom had 2 stalls and 4 urinals and wasn't cleaned regularly.

Promotions That Make Sense: There is not a one size fits all promo that works for all areas. Take time to get to know your clientele and try to figure out a balance that brings new players in, keeps regs happy and keeps dealers dealing cards.

8 Handed Max: A personal request but it employs more dealers & players get more hands per hour and provides more leg room.

Free Self-Serve Soft Drinks & Coffee: Sometimes the wait staff is very busy or is servicing the entire gaming floor and it makes more sense to get your own drinks.

Consistent Enforcement of Rules: 90% of card rooms do not have this problem but I could tell you some stories....

Tournament Chips: I've played in some casinos where two different chip denominations were nearly indistinguishable. Light lavender 500 chips vs. larger denomination gray chips.

Dedicated Poker Cage: I've had to wait 20 minutes plus to cash in my chips in a casino with one cage w/ one cashier.

Cheap/Affordable/Fast Food: I'm not talking McDonalds, but I've had to wait 20-30 minutes for deli/cafe food that cost $15+. Concession stand quality is fine and stuff like nachos, hot dogs, etc gets customers in and out.

Poker Room w/ Nearby Exit/Entrance: I personally do not like walking through clouds of 2nd hand smoke to get to a poker room.

Poker Room Hotel Rates: These seem to be a thing of the past. I would be more willing to put in an all night session if poker room rates or comped rooms were available to those who have logged X amount of time in the room a month.

Tournament Pre-Reg Promos: A random example off the top of my head... if a property is running a series of poker tourneys, they could bundle hotel rooms with the cost of admission for the tourney and the guarantee a special poker room rate when players pre-register. This might help the room predict a tournament's festivals turnout and prevent hour+ long waits related to alternates. Online pre-reg's could possibly qualify for lower rake.

Comfy Chairs: Seems like a no-brainer... but you'd be surprised.

Some of this stuff above is a pipedream because at the end of the day, a casino marketing executive would much rather have someone sitting in a chair, feeding $100 bills in a machine and pressing a button vs. playing poker.

Hi Mason,

I’m really looking forward to this book coming out. I think this has the potential to positively benefit the industry. Here are some observations of mine from playing for two decades.

Rake Reductions: The rooms where I now play in northern New England are very stingy with rake reductions. No reduction until the game is 4 handed, at which point the rake drops from a $5 cap to a $3 cap, and the $2 jackpot drop is not reduced at all.

As a player I have always loved/thrived in shorthanded games, but I realized my winrate shrank to breakeven when playing shorthanded with this rake structure, and it seemed like most everyone else lost (this is at 1/2NL). Eventually I and the other regs stopped playing shothanded and the rooms had a much harder time getting games going. Post re-opening after the covid lockdown all the games are shorthanded, and that is a part of the reason why I haven’t been back. It’s just too hard for anybody to win with this rake structure.

Rooms that have a more generous rake reduction strategy may make less in the very near term, but in the long run they’ll have a much easier time getting and keeping games going. I would love to see this point emphasized in your book.

Jackpots: There are two ways I’ve seen high hand promotions administered. One good and one bad. The good way is progressive or fixed jackpots for certain hands. For example, Bally’s in Vegas used to have progressive jackpots for royals of each suit. Bad players would play any suited face cards, and traffic would increase when one of the jackpots got big.

The bad way is high hand windows, meaning the highest hand within a set period of time gets a jackpot. This is the standard in New England and some parts of Florida, and it has a negative effect on the games. When there’s no high hand going, games die because the players are paying a jackpot vig that they have no chance of recouping. In New England each room has “high hands” on different days, and there’s a crew of tight promo-chasers who (pre covid) would drive to whatever room was/is having the promo. So each room would take turns being “dead” and when traffic increased for the promo the games would have less action. Even during the window traffic would die if someone hit a big straight flush early in the promo period.

The response from the poker rooms was to raise the jackpot drop to $2 and have larger high hands. Not good policy imo.

Another good jackpot promo that was offered at Harrah’s many years ago was to give low buy-in tournament players a $10 voucher redeemable after playing 2 hours in a cash game. This had the effect of peppering the cash games with people who had no idea how to play them. The regulars appreciated this more than if that $10 had been split between ourselves.

Best of luck with the book.

Hi Ol'Gil:

I never heard of a hand count before. And while I believe a good dealer will put out a lot of hands, they also need to be (relatively) error free. Policies that cause dealers to increase their error rate are not good policies.

Best wishes,
Mason

Hi Corto:

Yours is an interesting post and my comments are below.

Best wishes,
Mason

Is this good? I doubt it. Promotions that will cause the bad players to lose their money at a faster rate may be negative towards the proper balance of luck and skill.

I am aware that bad beat jackpots will frequently make some players play worse.

I agree. But there's also another point. If the balance of luck and skill is upset as you're describing, the bad players amy not now have enough winning sessions to keep playing. Thus in the long run many of them will lose less money.

I think the important question is who is getting the majority of the bomb pot promotional money. I suspect this is a neutral promotion since the bomb pots will make the expert players now play like the bad players.

This is might be correct. The bad players will play more hands than the good players which implies they'll win more hands and thus pay more rake. But good players will correctly use strategies that may allow them to win the pot a higher percentage of the time relative to a bad player. Thus it may not be so bad.

Best wishes,
Mason

Hi ballin:

The floor should privately talk to players who do this all the time. And if necessary, they should be given a short vacation.

Best wishes,
Mason

Hi easyfnmoney:

Some poker rooms will have events for their regular high players. Again, I think this money would be better spent on promotions where most of the money ends up in the hands of the recreational players.

I think there might be a flaw in your thinking. That's because poker rooms need two types of player who are very different. They need the regular players who help to start games and keep the games going. And they also need the recreational players who lose money at the proper rate.

This is an important point. Poker is the only game in a casino where winning players are welcome. Some casino executives don't fully grasp their value.

Given the high rake that we see today, I don't think that poker is a loss leader.

Best wishes,
Mason

Hi likes:

All of this is on the money. Poker rooms often don't understand the damage that some players can do to the room and this can contribute to the adversarial relationship between the players and management.

Best wishes,
Mason

I think the idea that expert players 'play bad' or can't adjust to bomb pots is absurd.

I still think bomb pots can be very appealing to recs, but often they will be even more appealing to pros.

Hi Gzesh:

I agree on the South Point and will mention it positively in the book.

Best wishes,
Mason

Hi jcorb:

I agree with most of this although I think there are better promotions than splash pots. Also, if poker room management is aware of soft play issues, it should not be tolerated, the same goes for angle shots.

Best wishes,
Mason

Hi easyfnmoney:

My comments are embedded below.

Best wishes,
Mason

I don't agree. While clean is nice, I don't think that quiet and good games go together.

Obviously this is a problem. But it may not be the poker room's fault.

Good games will keep the regs happy and the promotions should be targeted towards creating good games.

The less starting players you have the more likely the game will go short meaning the more likely the game will break. I also don't think leg room is important.

I like this but not for the reason you think. When you get a free drink from a machine, you have to tip, so that money will stay in the poker economy, and yes it does add up.

Okay.

There will be a chapter on this subject. However, even when there is a dedicated cage, it's often run by the casino cashier and this can cause problems.

Okay,

Okay.

Comfortable chairs are nice but I think most players would prefer good games.

Best wishes,
Mason

A couple years ago, the WSOP was nailed to the cross both here on 2+2 and on Twitter for their inaugural running of the Colossus. The main complaint was that a 20,000+ person $565 tourney only paid out $600,000 for first.

Those who took top 1,000 were all making at least 5x their buyin. The WSOP initially defended the payout structure then caved to the feedback and changed the payout structure of the event in following years flattening out their payout table.

I thought the original structure was fantastic. The low stakes cash games in Las Vegas thrived. For a solid week, you had cash game lists in Las Vegas on multiple hour long waits because you had thousands of poker players with excess cash in their pockets. It didn't matter which poker room you visited.

My opinion isn't popular but the WSOP made a mistake. We need more events like the Colossus 1 that puts cash back into the pockets of recreational players at a higher rate of return.

I didn't want to turn my post into a novel but let me expand just a bit. The analogy of Florida vs. the Bay Area was intended to paint two distinct pictures.

Demographically speaking, Florida has a lot of retirees. These folks often have excess cash and time on their hands. If you're trying to fill your poker room up in Florida on a Tuesday night, that might be your key demographic for that specific area. Knowing that, you would want to create a promotion or an incentive to bring those folks in. Maybe it's play X hours and get a fine dining voucher? Free round of golf? I don't know?

Contrast that with the bay area, where the demographics are different. Perhaps the average age of the player is younger, perhaps they're more likely to be single, etc. The promotion or incentive you'd offer this crowd most likely wouldn't be the same as the one you'd offer the players in Florida.

There seems to be a "Throw it against the wall and let's see what sticks" mentality to creating promotions that keep poker rooms bustling. I just think poker room managers need to put on their marketing hats and do a bit of research. Unfortunately, casino execs may not think the juice is worth the squeeze.

I think it boils down to knowing your player and knowing your pool. In terms of people trying to make live poker like it was 10-15 years ago, another important thing to note is that there are vastly more poker rooms today than there was 15 years ago.

I remember a time when I was in the midwest and Horseshoe Hammond didn't exist and the best games were private. It wasn't uncommon to have to drive or fly hours to go to a public casino. Today, there's a casino that deals live poker virtually within 90 minutes of any major metro in America. That's not a bad thing, but it certainly makes it more important for a book like this to be authored.

I don't think you will write a NYT best seller but I do think this is a book that needs to be authored and 2+2 is the entity that is best suited for the job.

Hi Money:

[QUOTE] Years ago we put out The Professional Poker Dealer's Handbook by Dan Paymar, Donna Harris, and myself and I believe it had a positive impsct on the industry. So, I hope this book will do something similar.

This is a no brainer, and I strongly suspect that the room rakes more (ignoring the jackpot drop) when the game is 4 handed than when the game is full. That's because a lot more hands are dealt in a short handed game.

This sounds like you'll agree with my point above.

I'll include something on it.

Jackpot chasers have always existed and I'm not sure they're as bad a problem as you indicate. That's because these people will often play a lot of hands in their desire to win the jackpot.

Somehow this doesn't surprise me.

This is good and I'll probably mention it in the book. This promotion could also be used by the cardroom to target games they're not currently spreading.

Thanks and Best wishes,
Mason

Hi monki:

Bomb pots are similar to hands with huge antes, and huge antes hurt the expert player.

Best wishes,
Mason

This is just not true, expert players will be able to capture a larger % of the pot regardless of how the money gets there. If you can't figure out how to play a bomb pot or with huge antes, or at least comparatively play less bad than the recs you're not an expert player. It increases the expert player's risk of ruin but for a properly rolled pro you want as many people to put in dead money as possible because it increases the effective stake and even if your win rate is lower because effective stack is smaller, your hourly will be higher. Huge antes and bomb pots just ramps up the variance for everyone, which is not a bad thing because variance is good for recs since their lose rate is less in those formats. They might lose more money on a per hour basis but the likelihood they win in any given session is higher.

Perhaps I don't understand what a bomb pot is. But let's look at a specific example.

Suppose everyone in a game buys-in for the same amount. Then before the first hand is dealt everyone puts all their chips in the pot. Isn't this a bomb pot and do the experts have an advantage?

Best wishes,
Mason

The first thing that pops in my head when reading "Cardrooms: Everything Bad" is having to play a game with scum bags. I'm talking smelly players, stains on their clothing, clipping their nails at the table (i've seen this), flossing then touching the cards, etc.

It's the biggest thing I can't stand about card rooms, people with poor hygiene. I'll table change whenever possible.

I was one of those filthy animals and you're right. It's gross.

That is just everyone going all in blind flipping for stacks. There are several ways of doing a bomb pot I've been part of. The most common happened in time raked games where every time they take rake, everyone puts in $X, and winner of the pot pays time for everyone at the table. Saves time from the dealer having to make change for everyone. At a 5/10 NL game, the amount is usually $50 per person (it could be whatever the table agrees to). It juices the pot but it is not blindly flipping for your buy-in.

The second way to play a bomb pot is thru a poker room promotion. For example, I've played at a room where between the hours of 4-6am, every hour on the hour they would draw a card to see how much money they would add to the pot for one particular hand. Say they draw a card that says $50, the floor would add $50 to the pot into the $1/2 table and they play the pot as normal.

This is such a good point. Most of your recreational players see this and think "This is what poker is all about? No thanks, I'll pass" and it's entirely possible that you lose those players to the pits, or to other recreational hobbies outside the casino, forever. It's the poker room managers job to ensure this never happens, even if its inevitable.

I agree with about 95% of everything Mason has said in his posts but his perspective seems to be from the "I'm a pro/advantage player, how can card rooms better cater to players like me?"

In my experience, regs are gonna reg. You can have uncomfy seats, loud casinos and provide a subpar overall experience because if the games are good, regs will be there. But how do you KEEP the games good? How do you keep dealers employed? How do you keep profit minded casino executives from replacing poker tables with Triple Diamond Slot Machines?

Regarding promotions that cater to regs.... I remember a few years ago when a reg shat himself trying to win a promotion....

https://www.casino.org/news/cincinna...ooped-himself/

Because he didn't want to give up his seat. This is the wrong way to run a promotion. I am not trying to throw stones... but the folks who ran this poker room were not the type of people who would receive a 5 star review on Yelp. Just my opinion. Yours may vary.

I think regs and recs must exist in a yin and yang fashion and poker room managers must figure out creative ways to create promotions that keep both parties happy.

A reg loses a thousand dollars in a poker game and that's a bad night... A rec loses a stack in a poker game and he's driving home wondering how he's going to explain this to his wife.

It's tricky, and I don't have the answers, but I can make the observations based on what I've seen playing all across the country for the past few decades.

Hi Jim:

The Bellagio has a $5-$10 game with a 1,500 max buy-in. Suppose everyone has $1,500 in front of them but instead of $50, just to make the point, everyone puts in $500, which leaves each player with $1,000 and the pot will be $4,500. So, the most you could bet would be $1,000 into a $4,500 pot, which given the size of the pot would be a very small bet. This has to reduce most of the skill advantage of the expert over the live one.

Now suppose instead of betting putting $500 each player must put in $50 producing a $450 pot and leaving stacks of $1,450. This will still reduce the skill advantage of the expert, but not as much as before. Part of thereason for this is that you'll frequently be all-in before the river and won't be able to trap your opponent when you make the nuts or have a very strong hand.

I think it's straight forward.

Best wishes,
Mason

Hi Mr.Jones:

I can mention this in the "Obnoxious Players" chapter.

Best wishes,
Mason

Hi easy:

My comments are below.

Best wishes,
Mason

I think if you were to read again you would see this is not my perspective which is to have good games that feature a proper balance of luck and skill. Now when you have this, everyone, including the cardroom itself does benefit.

It has taken time, but most casino executives now realize that when you replace poker rooms with slot machines it doesn't mean that mot people will be playing the slots.

Over the years I've seen some stupid things too, Hopefully the book will correct some of this in the future.

You may also want to read my book Poker Essays: Volume Two. In that book the paper, which I wrote with Donna Harris, "Cardroom Theory -- A Two-Way Street" appears and this is the subject of much of the paper.

Hopefully, this book, assuming I can do a good job, will answer many of these questions.

Best wishes,
Mason