If anyone has played at the Houston locations please do a report.

^^^
interested as well.

The club does have an Austin address, and while it doesn't lie inside the city limits, it is within the Austin City ETJ.

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Manchaca is located in Austin’s extraterritorial jurisdiction, or ETJ—any area within 5 miles of Austin’s boundary that is not part of the city limits or ETJ of another city. Only Austin can annex land in its ETJ, which extends to Buda’s city limits in Hays County.

Austin ETJ residents officially live in unincorporated Travis County or Hays County. They do not pay city taxes and only vote on city referendums that affect them, Austin City Planner Virginia Collier said.

One advantage of an ETJ is that it allows Austin to regulate some aspects of development outside its city limits. If Austin later decides to annex area in its ETJ, any development or subdivision there would meet minimum standards for road access or lot size, according to the city’s website.

That was my mistake, just going by the website and not looking up the jurisdiction.

While APD has no jurisdiction until the place is annexed, there is still concern about the Sheriff's Office and DPS.

I hope they're left alone, and one day we get a court to rule these places are legal.

I played at Club 333. It's in strip center off Beltway and Cullen. Felt safe. It's run by Clive who's had a long running home game near there. You pay a $25 fee per night. But if you're in a pot over $50 you get a red chip and for every 10 of these you get $5 -off that fee. It was a fun game. Lot of people seemed to know one another. Nice mix of players. When I left there was about $3k on the table.
I'll definitely go back. Set up for 4 tables since they run tourneys. Their website is very helpful.
Price includes dinner, which was good, and water/soda.

Was tipping the dealer allowed?

Yes but you buy "tokens" to tip dealer and game girl. Cannot tip out of your stack. I'm not going to tell you this is on the up and up but it's a nice place to play cards with no rake.

Alamo Card House opened at a new location a couple weeks ago on Perrin Beitel in San antonio. They have eight tables and are located in a strip mall with a decent amount of space. Another table would definitely fit. It's clean, they have armed security, there are multiple TV's and there's a cashier cage.

I played 1/2NLHE for the first time Thursday late evening for a couple of hours. When I arrived at 11pm, the nightly tournament was on the final table and two 1/2 tables were full. It costs $5 to enter for the night and $8 per hour of play. More specifics on other membership costs, rules and hours of operation can be found on their web site: alamocardhouse.net

With word of mouth, this place could explode with activity. I hope all of the I's are dotted and T's are crossed with the laws, because this is what we need. It's very similar to what Texas Card House in Manchaca(Austin) offers.

The Alamo Card House is excellent. I played there almost every day before they moved from their old location, and it's one of the best 1/2's I've played at anywhere. The biggest issue compared to Austin is that certain game runners in San Antonio are a lot more territorial than the game runners in Austin, and so the ACH has to be much more careful.

Not sure what you mean by the game runners comment?

There are people who run other home games in San Antonio who are trying very hard to get the Alamo Card House shut down because they run over-raked, dirty ****holes and are worried they will lose business.

ahhh gotcha

$8/hour to play 1/2?

That's cheap. If they rake $5/hand, that will work out to about twice as much taken off the table each hour.

Cheers, Greg Raymer (FossilMan)

Twice as much, Greg? Add again.

Meh, his math is right at high level. Don't hate on the fossil man

He just used $5 / hand as rake

But average rake per hand in a typical, casino dealt $1/$2 NL game (10% capped at $5) is more like $3.16, not $5

So at 28 HPH x $3.16 avg per hand, hourly rake for typical 1/2 game in casino = $88.48.

Club example above charges straight $72/hour (assuming 9 handed ), plus any membership fees

So compared to professionally run homes games who typically charge lots more, club example above not that bad a deal.

Compared to casino dealt game... bout the same.

Casino game has advantage though over Texas club. Casino dealt games are legal

These games take zero off the table every hour, and that is a huge advantage for players. Thats why the comparison between what the expected rake/hour is at a 10%/$5 casino is and what these club games take per hour isn't really a viable discussion.

I didnt know that, but yea thats +EV for the game.

TX Clubs still not legal though, thats -EV for the game .

Played Club 333 last night...concur with the other comments that location inside felt safe and even the parking lot itself seemed OK walking out after 2am (and I say that as a SWF that would NOT feel safe in some parking lots in that part of the Houston area).

Dealers were competent. Food was decent (last night was brought in from Cracker Barrel as it sounds is the norm).

Tourney had a lot of no-shows, so two of us basically just played heads up through the first break and then chopped the entry fees.

They had two full tables going at one point once the 8pm cash games started up. Lots of new people besides myself...levels of playing competence were all over the place and you really want to be careful about tapping the glass...you want #Shrek the human donkey boy to keep coming back (seriously, he made it $52 to go with a whole three dollars in the pot in one hand and called for his stack PF with pocket 3's later in the session- and won).

As noted, the location is in a strip center and has frosted windows. No signage that would indicate what it was, so you need to know the suite number you are looking for.

Optional high hand jackpots run depending on whether the table wants to kick in. They have a jackpot for sets ($15) and there is a daily straight-flush jackpot bonus of $100. Discussion was had that the daily door fee may be going up $5 to $25 to fund a house high hand jackpot.

There are some who have interest in PLO and $2/5 NLH games but not enough to consistent run a table of each. Mississippi straddle allowed in any amount. Deals are allowed on an all-in, although most were just running it once at my table last night.

Blinds are structured such that the small blind is one jackpot chip and the big is one jackpot chip and a $1 chip.

Oh...and they indicated Thursday tends to be their biggest turnout for the cash games.

Game girl can be tipped with any chip or cash. That being said, most were either using the tip chips or dollar bill.

Anyone know if this is still in their plans? I live in North Austin and would love to not have to drive an hour to play in a legal game.

I would only play there if there was no tipping tbh

Sucks to hear there's tipping. I heard they just paid their dealers good and you didn't need to tip at all.

Which place are you referring too?

There's no tipping allowed at Texas Card House in Austin. Not sure about the Houston room.

I'm planning on heading to the Texas Card Room tomorrow night, I'll
get a status on the North Austin location and report back.