Trip Report Reno Peppermill Mid November
This report is much delayed as the trip was pretty dull VP. I will
just try to hit the high points as I remember them, such as they
were.
My husband and I arrived in Reno on a Sunday and checked into the
Peppermill around 12:30 and, surprise, our room (suite) was ready. My
husband likes a lot of room so we splurge on the room and usually get
an Imperial Suite, which is a large Jacuzzi suite with a living area
with a sectional couch, dining table and 4 chairs. No desk though.
Until the prior trip and this one, they all had steam showers, which
we really like, not being used to a dry climate, but these last two
rooms did not. We even were assured at the desk that the room had
one. So that might be something to watch for. Thank you whoever told
me that you could get a coffee maker for the room just by asking, it
worked although it took two requests. I noted that you can also
request a microwave and refrigerator.
We had our mailer with some decent coupons, $75 in free play, $50
dining credit, 100 coin bonus on a face card 4 o k, and a $50 match
play on table games or sports book bet. My swipe for a bonus coupon
yielded a free $2.00 parley bet so I headed over to the sports book.
I was hoping to win in order for my assumption about the match play
coupon to be verified. Normally when you get a match play coupon and
you win, your match bet and winnings are returned to you, so that you
win twice your bet. However, what happened to me in the Sports Book,
maybe because they don't get very many of these coupons, is that they
took my $50 match coupon, my $50 bet and issued me a bet ticket
showing that I had bet $100 and that if I won I could cash the ticket
in for approximately $190. I took the over on Dallas at 40 on Monday
night football and added a couple of other prop bets for my free
parlay. It was very exciting on Monday night when Dallas intercepted
and scored a touchdown in the last minute to bring the total score to
41. I won both the match and the parlay and got the $190 with no
problem. So definitely use the match play at the sports book even if
you know nothing about sports, the bets are basically neutral.
On a down note, what are the odds of getting 4 coupons for a free ace
in blackjack and not only not getting a blackjack, but losing every
time?
My husband had a total of $100 in free play and just like his last
trip was going to attempt to play on that the entire 7 day trip. We
headed over to the 100 play machines by the Qube bar and settled in.
We fed our money in and began play at the penny level at JOB. To sum
up for the trip he steadily won and I steadily lost. A few dealt 4 of
a kinds but nothing special for either of us. However, he met his
goal of never using any of his money and finishing comfortably ahead.
I hopped around and played other stuff like craps, BJ, and some
quarters VP, didn't win at those either. We both loved the multiplay
multistrike, my husband won and I lost. I did play video blackjack a
lot whenever my luck at VP was really bad. I like the fast action and
low volatility. It's my bar top game of choice, really works well for
getting a quick drink and covering my tips.
I played some progressives, convinced that the big win was around the
corner, it wasn't. Played a little FPDW, thank you to every one who
helped me find the machines. They were usually empty at the times
that I wanted to play. Did my $20 on Wheel of Fortune to see if I was
meant to be rich. Apparently not.
We also try to take advantage of all the free drawings, so one
evening we were waiting for results and went into the high limit. I
played BJ on the bar top and my husband decided to be wild and play a
few hands of $ VP, he only plays 9/6 JOB. I walked away for 30
seconds and when I came back he proudly showed me his 4 Queens. Good
thing he waited for me because I then pulled out the 100 coin bonus
coupon and all of a sudden he was up $225. That's pretty typical of
his luck. That was the only time on the trip that he played dollars.
I played the stage bar JOB progressive for a little while on our last
morning, about 5:00 am, I was convinced that I was going to hit, I
missed 4 of a kinds, had 4 to the Royal, 4 to a straight flush and
never drew a thing. Another thank you to whoever coined the
term "weirdo magnet" for that area, as that is how we referred to it
our entire stay. A great place for people watching and listening at
odd hours.
Regarding food, we had another disappointing meal at the steak house,
everyone else raves about it but I have never had much luck with the
entrees. I was all pumped up to try the spring rolls and jambayla
that Mark had mentioned and of course both had been pulled from the
menu. I had the crab legs and steak, the steak was basically so tough
to be unedible and the crab legs were huge but unwieldy and watery.
We did like all our lunches at Oceana.
Do not read the next section if comp questions bore you.
Now to take advantage of the experts on the site. We have just moved
up to where we are putting more money thru the machines and think we
are nearing the level of something more than hard comps. We kept
track of our points and they seemed to accumulate at the rate of $40
equaling 1 point. So we figured Sunday thru Saturday we ran thru
around $90,000. This was hurt by the fact that we put in almost no
play in the day we arrived. We finally, after several attempts on
prior trips, were able to meet face to face with our assigned host,
Paul Wong. We wanted to be shown how we are being tracked and rated
and ask what level of play would get our entire bill comped or what
percent we could expect at our current level. We had seen from some
posts that some hosts will show you your play in the computer. We
didn't get any firm information, maybe because we were not forceful
enough in our questions, but he did say looking at our play, that we
seemed to be around 1300 points a day and that on one day we were
almost at 1500, that sounded to me like for their tracking purposes
they were doing 1 point equals $10. We asked what we had to do to get
the room comped and all we could get out of him was that he would do
something for us. We saw him make some entries in his computer. We
asked for at least a couple of nights. A note about our hard comp
level, we had cleaned out the account in April and put some in in
July, about $300 that we had not used. So that should have been our
beginning balance, (Paul had given us the number at the end of the
August trip). That seemed to grow at about the .1/2 percent level I
had read in the database. .Anyway, when we checked out nothing had
been taken off our bill and in the VIP lounge the young lady adjusted
our bill and took off all our room charges, about $750. She said Paul
had given us a really good rate on the room for our six nights (no
Sat), (I think the off the street rate would be around $179 a night,
plus plus) and that she had cleaned out our hard comp balance and
given us a extra $100 or so credit. We had another $500 in food and
miscellaneous charges that we paid. Paul also gave us a $50 food comp
when we showed him that the $25 Birthday gift had expired shortly
before our visit. So my question is were we under comped? When do you
get discretionary comps. Do we need a couple of more trips at this
level to prove ourselves? Should we be more forceful in asking for
comps or were we treated at an appropriate level?. This is the first
trip we played over $12,000 a day. Anyone who made reading this this
far and wants to give us the benefit of their experience would have
my thanks.
Thanks to all the posters on this site. I really love reading about
your trips and casino visits, experiences and perspectives.
Trish