vpFREE2 Forums

AC Trip Report

#1

Hi Gang:
First, I'd like to echo what a number of others have mentioned recently on
these boards .... the Harrah's corporation seems to be at war with video
poker players. Except for the monthly mailers (the value of which have been
cut drastically) Hedy and I have received NO mail from Harrah's AC for
about six weeks now. Even though we are both Seven Stars, and play machines that
DO NOT have 9/6 JOB on them, we haven't received any gift, tournament or
party offers, let alone any extra free-play coupons.
We continue to get some minor mail offers from Bally's (where we've done
very limited play) but nothing from Showboat, Caesars or the other Harrah's
properties in town.
Which brings up the question: Why continue to play at Harrah's when there
may be better play opportunities elsewhere?
A legitimate query, but when you've invested as much time and effort into
a casino as we have at Harrah's and have gotten to know and love its rooms,
restaurants and employees, it's very hard to walk away and start fresh at
another property.
Plus, we've been very lucky at Harrah's (we finished in the black the last
two years playing primarily at the Harrah's AC property) and we love the
privileges and perks that come with being Seven Stars.
This past weekend, we put an end to a four-trip losing streak with a nice
score once again playing mostly 9/6 DDB at the $1 level. Friday turned out
to be a break-even day when Hedy kept our heads above water with 3's and
2's with kickers for $800 (the 3's were dealt) and 3's and 2's without for
$400 each.
Saturday started on the right foot when I was dealt aces with a queen,
then pulled a deuce for a $2,000 hand pay. I also got another set of aces
about an hour later for $800 and Hedy hits 4's with a kicker for $800 more.
That kept us going for most of the day and into the evening.
At about 7:45, we left our machines to go to that evening's show (a group
called the Fab Faux that played Beatle music) but when we got to the
theater we found out that the show didn't start until 9. The tickets, which were
a little confusing, stated that doors opened at 8. So, we returned to the
bank of machines where we had been playing all day. Another list member was
just leaving his machine to go to dinner, so I took it over from him.
"Good luck ... hit a royal on it," he said, but he couldn't have known how
prophetic his words would be.
At approximately 8:10, I was dealt the K-10-Q-A of diamonds and when I
joyously drew the jack of diamonds, I had my first royal of 2010 and a very
nice $4,000 score.
We immediately stopped playing, went into the diamond lounge for a cup of
coffee and went to the show at 9 with wide smiles on our faces, realizing
how much fate plays a part in your success sometimes. If the show had,
indeed, started at 8, or if that list member hadn't decided to get up from that
machine at that precise moment, the royal probably never would have
happened.
The show, by the way, was not very good, in our opinion. The band played
many obscure Beatles tunes we had never heard before and we were sitting
right under a long string of speakers that were so loud we started to get a
headache after about 30 minutes. We left about 45 minutes into the show.
The next morning we tried the Seven Stars brunch at Showboat (from 10-2 in
a private room in the back of the buffet) and enjoyed it, although we
thought the best part of it was that 1) they didn't take any comp points off
our card and 2) we had access to the rest of the buffet as well.
We'll be back at it this weekend at Harrah's hoping that fate can
intervene in our favor again!
Regards,
CoachVee & Hedy

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

#2

playing mostly 9/6 DDB at the $1 level.

Not to be offensive but it makes me wince to think of someone banging away at these machines at 5 dollars a pop.
Why not stick to JOB and learn to accept the lesser offers?

#3

I've been reading these reports with some amusement now over the past couple of years.

Coach and wife are taking 1% the worst of it before the mail, and that's assuming perfect play. So, if he wants to brag about his wins, why would Harrahs not want him to do that? I'm all for bragging about playing junk and getting lucky.

DDB is a game with a lot of variance. My idea of DDB is where the full house pays 10 instead of 9, like it used to in California, like it used to in Mississippi, like it used to in a couple of places in Vegas (one MGM property in particular had full pay 10-6 for $2s and $5s), like it used to in Reno (how could I forget Reno?). I think it still does in IL, but you just get the game and not much else. One of the dollar games, I swung quite a bit of money, like $27K, and I heard one of the locals swung a much bigger number. But I did get it back eventually.

So, if the geniuses in AC can't figure out that their expectancy is positive against you and cut off your mail, well shame on them. But you're right, there's a war against VP players right now, the suits have learned well then when you blame the players for your own screwups (as well as the investors, who took the company public at the absolute top of the market) , not only you keep your job, you get promoted. I mean, their head marketing guy in AC, whom his hosts absolutely hated when he was in player development the first time he worked at Harrahs, has made a career of trying to identify professional video poker players. I use the word "try" with emphasis.

Harrahs uses a bunch of different formulas to determine skill and profitability. They're all junk, but all my saying that will just convince them even more they're on the right track. After all, this is the same company that bought out Jack Binion as a defensive purchase, and then felt it knew the business better than Jack. If that's not hubris, what is? So, let them be, and remember sometimes you have to take the bitter with the sweet in this business, or at least what's left of it.

I've said many a time here and on my website that the stupidity pendulum swings both ways. Well, get used to it seeing it swing the wrong way for a while, perhaps forever.

ยทยทยท

--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, coachvee@... wrote:

Hi Gang:
First, I'd like to echo what a number of others have mentioned recently on
these boards .... the Harrah's corporation seems to be at war with video
poker players. Except for the monthly mailers (the value of which have been
cut drastically) Hedy and I have received NO mail from Harrah's AC for
about six weeks now. Even though we are both Seven Stars, and play machines that
DO NOT have 9/6 JOB on them, we haven't received any gift, tournament or
party offers, let alone any extra free-play coupons.
We continue to get some minor mail offers from Bally's (where we've done
very limited play) but nothing from Showboat, Caesars or the other Harrah's
properties in town.
Which brings up the question: Why continue to play at Harrah's when there
may be better play opportunities elsewhere?
A legitimate query, but when you've invested as much time and effort into
a casino as we have at Harrah's and have gotten to know and love its rooms,
restaurants and employees, it's very hard to walk away and start fresh at
another property.
Plus, we've been very lucky at Harrah's (we finished in the black the last
two years playing primarily at the Harrah's AC property) and we love the
privileges and perks that come with being Seven Stars.
This past weekend, we put an end to a four-trip losing streak with a nice
score once again playing mostly 9/6 DDB at the $1 level. Friday turned out
to be a break-even day when Hedy kept our heads above water with 3's and
2's with kickers for $800 (the 3's were dealt) and 3's and 2's without for
$400 each.
Saturday started on the right foot when I was dealt aces with a queen,
then pulled a deuce for a $2,000 hand pay. I also got another set of aces
about an hour later for $800 and Hedy hits 4's with a kicker for $800 more.
That kept us going for most of the day and into the evening.
At about 7:45, we left our machines to go to that evening's show (a group
called the Fab Faux that played Beatle music) but when we got to the
theater we found out that the show didn't start until 9. The tickets, which were
a little confusing, stated that doors opened at 8. So, we returned to the
bank of machines where we had been playing all day. Another list member was
just leaving his machine to go to dinner, so I took it over from him.
"Good luck ... hit a royal on it," he said, but he couldn't have known how
prophetic his words would be.
At approximately 8:10, I was dealt the K-10-Q-A of diamonds and when I
joyously drew the jack of diamonds, I had my first royal of 2010 and a very
nice $4,000 score.
We immediately stopped playing, went into the diamond lounge for a cup of
coffee and went to the show at 9 with wide smiles on our faces, realizing
how much fate plays a part in your success sometimes. If the show had,
indeed, started at 8, or if that list member hadn't decided to get up from that
machine at that precise moment, the royal probably never would have
happened.
The show, by the way, was not very good, in our opinion. The band played
many obscure Beatles tunes we had never heard before and we were sitting
right under a long string of speakers that were so loud we started to get a
headache after about 30 minutes. We left about 45 minutes into the show.
The next morning we tried the Seven Stars brunch at Showboat (from 10-2 in
a private room in the back of the buffet) and enjoyed it, although we
thought the best part of it was that 1) they didn't take any comp points off
our card and 2) we had access to the rest of the buffet as well.
We'll be back at it this weekend at Harrah's hoping that fate can
intervene in our favor again!
Regards,
CoachVee & Hedy

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]