Split a week long jaunt between Silver Legacy and Peppermill. My girlfriend is along for the Silver segment.
Day 1: tuesday. full flight to Reno from Seattle
on Alaska Air, Silver Legacy limo ok but the CD player didn’t function so I
didn’t get to play the special Reno CD mix that my brother made 6 years
ago. check-IN & I get my usual super corner suite on the 36th
floor. There’s packs of matches with my name embossed on them- always a nice
“high-roller” status bling.
VP includes $1 DDB – a bank of 8
share a prog meter that goes from 4650 to 4850 in the 3 days I’m there. Now you
know I didn’t hit THAT RF.
I also play $1 & $2 ACE$BP,
3-line x $1 BP, 5 line x
50c DDB on the two machines that have it in the no-smoking area of the
mezzanine. Highlight jackpot of the day
is AAAA on $2 ACE$BP for 800.
Swank dinner at Sterling, where the staff pretend to remember
me and I tell them stories about how I remember when they were in
diapers. The cliche’d familiar platitudes.
I get in 5 hrs video poker, score
20 jackpots over $100 and I am UP 500. yay.
Day 2: Same games, plus $1 DDB “Plus” where the kicker is an Ace, added to quad 5-K yields
400 creds instead of 250. All other paylines of DDB+ are basic 9/6 DDB – can be found
on many slant tops throughout the casino main floor and mezzanine. In addition, some $1 JW which is 4700/18/7. First
three hours I get 11 quads, two are bonus for 400, one is dealt and another
quad is all on the draw- holding no cards, down 200. The next 4 hours I get
only six jackpots, with no winning machine-sessions and drop over 2K. Time for dinner at Hussong’s Mexican
cantina. Gaming after dinner for five hours but only two $400 bonus quad
jackpots and a slight profit. I played PAI GOW from midnight
til 2:30AM. I got 4 of a kind twice, AAA+Joker and 8888 which paid me $200 each
for my $6 bonus bets. Net pai gow profit of 100 at session-end. Down 2K on the day.
Day 3: My girlfriend & I agree
we could get used to living in this suite. We go back to Sterling Swank
Steakhouse and have a fine relaxing dinner. My best poker hands are quad AAAA
for 800 and quad wild 2222 for 1000.
Day 4: Room service breakfast eggs,
sausages, hashbrowns, juice & big pot of coffee. I still have over
half my stake in my pocket, which buoys me with optimism. In a one hour session,
I hit two hands on $1 DDB: 4444A and 4444A, 800 each. I hit five other quads for 250 each. Up
2400 on the day at Silver.
We pack & limo to Peppermill.
Check-in to corner suite in the Tower.
I was happy to find the bank of 3 fast multilines with the squashed card display, now near
cube bar and near the main cashier cage.
I piddled away my 750 freeplay in less than an hour. Had a +900 session
on $1 coin DDA&F with KKKK for 400 and KKKKA for 800.
Girlfriend heads to airport about 5:30PM. No big jackpots for her, but she’s
getting into deuces and bonus poker video poker.
There was a drawing promo at 8PM.
minutes before it started, I was playing 5 line 50c DDB and I got that pesky
CALL ATTENDANT message.
Which means my 3 part RF came in on one line for $2000 handpay, tax form.
Royal Boy is back.
Up to here I’m UP for the trip.
But the evening session has me drop
2K with only 3 quads for 125. Mostly 5 x 50c DDB & NSUD, but also $1 DDB,
$1 DDA&F and $2 ACE$BP.
Day 5: Down 3.5K today despite 10 x 125, 2 x 200, 10 x 250, 5 x 400, one
wild 2222 quad for 500 and a bonus AAAA on DDB for 800.
Host sent me up a gift bottle of Duckhorn 2012 Merlot, cheese & fruit tray,
crackers & two big pieces of cake. Might have to check my bag for
$25 to bring home this 'spensive wine. No way can I eat all that cheese &
cake.
I rallied after midnight with a $1
coin quad wild 2’s for $1000 and an $1807 progressive quad 22224 on $2 DDB in
high limit.
Dragged into the room at 4AM with a
nice stake for the next day. But down for the day and the trip overall.
Day 6: First jackpot was quad wild 2’s on 50c NSUD for $500. Then a
lot of 125 regular quads on 5x50c DDB, including one dealt QQQQ for 5 x
125. A nice 33332 for 400 rounded out the session, which was an hour
long, but down 300, somehow.
A good JJJJA on $1 DDAces & Faces was worth 800. $1 DDB session
netted quad 3333 for 400. Dropped 400 at pai gow (!) Just before 6pm
dinner at oceano, that same $1 DDB machine gave me AAAA for 800. Room
break & 90 minute nap got me ready to go out for 4 more hours until I
tapped out of my stake.
Day 7: despite my 156 jackpots in
the first six days, I was tapped out of my stake with ATM reserve withdrawals
and 750 freePlay to last two long days of gaming.
Today started out just fine: I played my 750 freePlay on 50c x
5 NSU deuces and DD Bonus, hit a quad wild 2 for 500 and a bonus quad 3 for 200
and turned the 750 into 1400 cash money in my pocket. Super yay way to
start the day- hey.
I dribbled away that nice bankroll from my right pocket and then chipped away
at my sunday withdrawal ( left pocket ). A nice dealt quad 3 on $1 x 3
line Bonus poker for 200 X 3 made for a plus 500 session. This was on a new
machine - the Williams company first foray into making video poker machines ( I
learned that from a machine mechanic who had to fix my WMS machine 2 days ago).
Squared card format, will expound on my critique of the new machines in a
separate post here & on vpFree - suffice to say the IGT company has nothing
to worry about- too many bugs in the new WMS machines.
Anyhow, a break for food, skipping Bimini’s this trip for a simple big
breakfast at the café at 5PM. I never watch the clock in Reno.
A relaxing hour of Pai gow nets me $100 as the dealer gave herself garbage for
almost the whole hour. No bonus hands bigger than a full house for me,
but fun anyhow.
But crapola- I tapped out of my sunday ATM stash an hour or so after pai gow,
so I took monday’s ATM 1500 and got to work. lost 300 and time for
a long room break.
In the room I reconnoitered my index record cards for the whole week onto
a spreadsheet. Looking for a trend or an inspiration about how to make my
bankroll last.
If I’d called it a night at that point, this report might read like down
everything but having a great time - in which case y’all might question my
sanity.
But, our man in Reno
got back on the horse. I headed to HIGH LIMIT, (dammit!), to play $1 DDB with
seperate progressive meters on each RF suit. Spades was over 6500 and Hearts
was around 5800. I figure I was due RF #2 for the trip, may as well get paid big
for it. But, no RF. Instead I hold one Ace, and three more come in
PLUS a 2 kicker for $2000 jackpot. Hand pay, tax form, happy gambler. Buy
a stogie using my comps (comp balance currently over $1100 !).
I have a lonnnnng session on 50c x 5 line NSUD & DDB. Drop
1000. harrumph.
But stogie is still going when I move to the Oceano door bank of machines where
I play one of my fave games, Dbl Dbl Aces & Faces.
I say $2 coin. I’m down about 350 when I’m dealt AAA and the case Ace
comes in PLUS the Jack (a Face card) kicker, which turns 1600 quad aces alone
into … $4000 Jackpot. Huzzah!
Finally. Hand pay, tax form, $30 tip to attendant.
I snuff my 'gar and spend maybe an hour playing Pai gow. Drop
$500 - SIGH, but still up over 2K on the day. Gotta go count my wad in my
suite.
Day 8: all checked out, etc &
gaming by noon. Today is my last day, day 8 of a nice long jaunt.
Sort of my routine to play 50c x
5-line first thing each day. I have a healthy wad of Benjamins to start the day.
I drop 200 on Deuces and switch to
DDB, first hand the deal is AAA: on one line comes A2 for a cool jump start of $1000. I cash out
& turn my slip into cash in pocket. Lost 200 more on five-line then
went to hiLimit for $1 DDB with suited progs (down 400) and $2 DDB with quad
progs (down 400). Then to oceano doors for $1 DD A&F two quads @ 250 each,
up 200, switch to 10 coin: $2 DD A&F and drop 400. I need to go Pai
gowing, I’m there until 3PM, winning 100.
Back to $1 DDA&F, down 100. Long
session of $2 DDA&F, cycling thru machines, got one quad 3 for 500 but down
600. Back to $1 DDB suiteds -500. $2 DDB quads progs, -600.
$2 X 3 Bonus poker got one quad 7
for 250 then $1 x 3 BP on the new WMS machine I get four quads for 125 each
plus a run on $1 X 3 Deuces. Lost 300 total on this 3-line run.
Now it’s 5:30PM & my limo reso
is 6:45 for a 7:50 flight home.
Time to press the action. The
oceano doors bank of machines are all incredibly FAST. There are only a few
players on the eight machines. I pick $2 coin DblDbl Aces&Faces as my final
push game. I’ll load 200 at a time and keep moving if I don’t hit on a
machine. I KNOW it doesn’t matter which machine you are on, the RNG is
Random. No time for philosophy. I get a DEALT quad 3 for 500 early on.
Nice stake builder. Not winning after that, but not losing fast. I
check the ticket for the time: it’s about 6:15. cripes.
I start playing faster, if that’s
possible. Hold JJ, in comes another JQJ and after a half a second hiccup
CALL ATTENDANT comes on: $1600. Hand pay, tax form. I drop
another 200 and head to the bell desk. The timestamp on the tax form is
6:24PM.
So, down about 1/2 my pocket
stash for the day. Piddle off 200 at the airport 50c 6/5 DDB. A guilty
habit. They are turning off the machines after our flight boards. 5 hours of hasty v-p.
Big loss for the week, but I’ll be back.
about 12 passengers on the plane,
got home to Seattle
20+ min early: easy travel.
Thanks for reading…. Check out my 9 photos of jackpots on
vpFree.
~MarkTime