I have to hire a scooter in Vegas, so had the same issue last year, with uber not being an option. First cab I got was a good guy, so I just took his number, and called him whenever I needed a cab.

The new poker room and tournament area at Encore are much better IMO.

Venetian structures can be found at

https://www.venetian.com/casino/poke...-iii-2017.html

Hey Plog, just wanted to say thank you for such a valuable tool and appreciate the time that you put into it for us!

Thanks again for your work. Competition sure seems to effect Vig at The Venetian. Yikes on their structures.

Binions and Venetian have been added to the tournaments section:

http://www.rainbowspuppiessunshine.c...ournaments.php

And I have updated part of my comparison page:

http://www.rainbowspuppiessunshine.c...is.php#compare

It now shows how each tournament is doing compared to itself last year. Planet Hollywoods are to suppose to come out today--I'll work on those this weekend and then update the Best 2017 Tournaments In Vegas section as well. Last year I just categorized them by price range (<$200, $201 - $500, etc.) and showed which casinos offered the most in the top 10 of S-Points and Vig%. If you have a better way to display that data, let me know. Or if you just would like some sort of custom report run let me know.

As always: if you see any errors or just think something doesn't seem right, post back here so I can look into it.

Not sure its fair to compare a tourney from one year to another when it has gone from a multi-day to a single day. Of course the structure will be faster.

The Wynn Main Event has the wrong buy-in in your comparison chart.

Fantastic work once again Plog. Thank you very much!

DSE events 49 & 57 appear to have same structure. I think 49 is rated too low?

Thanks for reviewing the data and pointing out issues:


The Wynn Main Event wasn't in the comparison--it cost $1500 last year and $1600 this year, so my system didn't find it. I manually pulled it and added it--its the very last one--same structure, but the Vig% decreased.


They have the same structure, but 57 was too high. It's fixed now.

I believe the Wynn ME was $1600 last year and had the same Vig as this year.

Anyhow, I think there are still some issues with the screen. I'm just looking at the Wynn for the moment, but you may want to check this for the other tourneys as well.

1) By my info, the $1100 Multi-day event is $1020+80. Wynn charges an additional 3% on tourneys above $600. So the rake should be 80/1100 + .03 = .0727 + .03 = 10.27% (or 10.3%, rounded). Your comparison and s point screen is showing 10.1%. Am I missing something here?

2) Last year, the Wynn only had one $1100 tourney, as far as I recall. It was $1020+80 and was multi-day. This year they have that same tourney, and I believe it is represented by one of the lines in your comparison. However, I'm not sure why you denote the cost mismatch, as I think this is virtually the same tournament as last year.

3) The Wynn does have three new $1100 tourneys this year which are all single-day (as far as I can tell). These are also all $1025+75, so their vig% should be 9.8%.

4) Lastly, and I mentioned this in another post with regard to some Venetian tourneys, I'm not sure its fair to compare these 3 Wynn $1100 from one year to the next, primarily since they did not exist last year, but in particular since you're comparing this year's single day tourneys to a multi-day event last year. These are completely different products being offered, so I don't see the value in comparing their cost and "quality" from one year to the next unless they're supposed to be similar products.

In addition to the $80, 3% of $1020 is withheld ($30.60) for a total of $110.60. This makes the vig 10.1%

In addition to the $75, 3% of $1025 is withheld ($30.75) for a total of $105.75. This makes the vig 9.6%


Your discrepancies are caused by taking 3% of the total buy-in instead of 3% of the portion of the buy-in that goes to the prize pool.

1. I think it has to do with what we are basing that .03 on. You did it against 1100, I did it against 1020 (the structure sheet says 3 percent of prize pool):
Vig% = [Total Fees] / [Total Cost]
[Total Fees] = 80 + 1020*.03 = 111 (Rounded from 110.6)
[Total Cost] = 1100
Vig% = 111/1100 = 10.1 (Rounded from 10.09)

2. There was only 1 $1100 tournament at the Wynn last year, but there are 2 this year: 1020 + 80 and 1025 + 75.

3. Using my formula for #1, I calculate a total of $106 in fees for the $1025 + 75, which becomes 106/1100 which is 9.6%.

4. I agree with you about the value of that comparison all together. I think I'm going to remove that comparison. Instead I think I am going to put every tournament into a cost range (<200, 201-500, 501-1000, etc.), take that range's average SPoints and Average Vig% and then determine what percent of each casinos tournaments in each range are above average SPoints and below average Vig%. Of course I'm open to other ideas and/ or range definitions.

I believe there is a free shuttle bus leaving every hout from Rio to the strip so you can avoid the cabs, if you have the patience to wait.

From their website:

The Rio and our sister properties, Bally's/Paris and Harrah's Las Vegas on the Strip, offer a complimentary shuttle to and from the Rio. Please note: the shuttle only runs from the Rio to Bally's/Paris or Harrah's Las Vegas, not from Bally's/Paris to Harrah's Las Vegas or vice versa. The shuttle runs daily from 10am to 1am. Pick-up times are approximately every 30 minutes from each location (depending on traffic conditions).

Pick-Up Locations:
Rio: Carnival World Buffet entrance
Bally's: Race and Sports Book entrance (side of Flamingo Rd)
Harrah's Las Vegas: Shuttle/Bus/Trolley drop off

https://totalrewards.custhelp.com/ap...e-to-the-strip

ahhh. ok. Thanks.

patstap... the free shuttle is an option if you are going back and forth from the strip (Ballys or Harrahs) to the Rio. It is handicap accessible. However, this obviously doesn't help you if you are going back and forth to downtown.

If you plan on going back and forth from downtown to the strip (ie not the Rio, but to the Wynn or whatever), you might consider taking the express bus (called the Strip-Downtown Express ... SDX). It costs $8 for a 24 hour pass and believe $20 for a 3-day pass. You might look online for discounts. It stops on Freemont Street near Binions and then at various other stops on the strip, including near the Wynn. Don't let the name fool you, this ride still takes at least 15-20 minutes, and is heavily dependent on traffic (so try to avoid between 3pm-8pm, particularly on weekends, and especially if you travel southward, to or beyond the Bellagio stop). As an example, I typically stay on the strip and play one downtown tourney during my stay. On that day, I almost always use the bus. Its actually a kind of relaxing way of traveling to the tourney. Just give yourself plenty of time if you decide to do that for the Wynn.

You're right about the vig. I was using the wrong formula. As for the comparison methodology, here is what i think:

The idea of using buy-in ranges in order to categorize the tourneys makes sense, and I did the same thing last year when I tried to take your s-point work and come up with some methodology for comparing "value". But I can tell you (and I believe you know this), that was really hard to do in any sort of systematic and fair way. There is such a wide variety of "products" offered, even if one limits themselves to just NLH tourneys. There are turbos, survivors, satellites, bountys, MTTs, etc, etc. and even within these there are multi-day tourneys, and single day tourneys. Each of these variants has different characteristics which are attractive to different people. I think any truly rigorous analysis of casino offerings needs to take these things into account.

But perhaps there is a way to do this without introducing too many headaches. In addition to breaking down the buy ins into some number of ranges, break down the events into a "Length" category. I think three options would be sufficient. Something like "Turbo/1Day/Multiday" or however you would like to characterize it.

Turbos and most satellites would fit in the first category. You can even define these as having 20 minute levels or less. These are tourneys that are designed to complete within some number of hours and significantly less than a whole day.

All remaining satellites and single-day tourneys (the WSOP 235 deepstack, for instance) fit in the middle category. In essence, these are all remaining tourneys which do not bag up for the night.

And lastly there’s the rest which are designed to go multiple days.

Once tourneys are defined in this way, in addition to their buy-in range, I think making some sort of statistical analysis about average vig% and s-points would make sense and be useful as a year-to year comparison as well.
So, let’s say for example, you had 6 price ranges…. Something like the following, or whatever.

0-249, 250-499, 500-999, 1000-1999, 2000-4999, 5000-10001

You would end up with a potential of 18 rows of data for each casino. However, in reality, the number should be a fair bit less than this since not all venues offer tournaments across the whole price range spectrum or within all three "length" ranges.

Thank you all for taking the time to get this right. It looks like PLOG's formula is correct, the % only comes off the prizepool number, not the fee.

We take a lot of pride in making the rake and structures as competitive as possible, so I appreciate it when people take the time to get it right and do the comparison's.

It's going to be a great summer!

plog, also, (and just because I suddenly realized I was hungry), there is also one thing regarding tournament vigs and perks which I forgot to bring up... the concept of comps (food or other monetary value). Historically, the Venetian has offered a $10 food comp on all entries into their $600+ tourneys. I believe Binions had a similar comp, though its been a couple years since I played there. There may also be other venues that do the same thing, but I just don't play there. Anyhow, if we are going to be calculating vigs down to the tenth of a percent, I think saving $10 on food is a non-insignificant factor. I don't know how you would factor this in, or if you would choose to. But its something to consider.

And I don't mean to insinuate that those venues which don't have a food comp are somehow neglecting their customers. Frankly, I am surprised the Venetian continues to do this as, to my knowledge, the poker room has to pay the full $10 to the applicable eateries. That being said, its a nice benefit to players and has real financial value.

Thanks for the tips.

If you're going to worry about comps, WSOP also gives tier and reward credits on bracelet events, PHo might as well.

I'm not sure about PH. But indeed the wsop does have reward comps. A chart can be found here...

https://www.totalrewards.com/content...-of-poker.html.

They're a bit stingier than Venetian for most comparable events, but a little credit is always a good thing. Now if we can only get them to stop charging $15 for a burrito in the poker kitchen!

ask for $10 food comp in cash game area.