Thanks again to everyone who emailed me with info on using a host at
the Reno Hilton.
I arrived on Friday by 8pm or so. Was with 3 friends, & had called up
our host "June" a few weeks back, who set me up with 2 rooms for 2
nights at casino rate ($60/room/night). It was my first time working
through a Reno Hilton host.
The quarter FPDW machines are still in a bank of 10 near Johnny
Rockets. There were always seats available; usually even when all 4
of us were playing at once. Nice comfortable machines, reasonably
fast. No TITO though.
The rest of my play was on the quarter 50-play JOB in the High Limit
room. Both of these machines were working & usually open, though the
one on the right made it a little difficult to pick the exact number
of games to play (the touch-screen didn't always respond so well).
Your comp account balance is shown on the machine when you put your
card in. But you can't really keep track as you play, since it seems
to take some time after you quit each session before your point &
comp are registered.
Playing through Sunday morning, & ended up with $130+ in comps. (You
can now get a PIN for your slot club card, & then use a machine to
get comp slips printed out.) I believe I started with around $50.
Since the comp rate is reported at .33%, this suggests a total coin-
in of about $24K. This is in line with the fact that I ended up with
$60 in cashback (=$24K * .25% cashback rate). Most of this was my own
play, but two of my friends played a bunch of Deuces Wild on my
account.
On Saturday evening, I went to the VIP room to meet June. One of my
friends works for Clif Bar, so we gave June a box of their products.
I talked to June before checking out on Sunday. As she looked at my
play, I asked about coin-in a couple of times, & she kept saying no
no, coin in determined cash back & the comps I got through the
machine, but what she could give me was different, it depended on
losses. She tried explaining how "losses" were calculated, but it
didn't make sense to me.
Anyway, I had indeed lost around $400, & I think the friends playing
on my card had lost an additional $100 or so. June comped one of the
rooms completely, & the other remained at casino rate. I'd thought
maybe I'd get more... I did a bunch of my play shortly before seeing
June, so it's possible that not all my play was visible on her system.
So there was $120 for the uncomped room, plus a little over $100 for
food, a movie, & tax. I had my $130+ comp from the machine; the
friend who played on his own card had built up $30+ in machine comps
through craps play, so between that & the $60 cashback everything was
just about covered.
The play was fun. No royals for any of us, though one friend did hit
quad deuces. I was down over $800, but on the final morning, I was
playing 5-play on the quarter JOB & slowly won back around $100
through getting my share of quads & dealt straights & flushes. 5-play
quarters is pushing the limits of my usual level of play, but when it
got very close to check-out time, I switched to 10-play just to "take
a shot," & quickly got dealt quads for $312.50.
On the way out of town, we stopped at Silver Legacy so I could use
my "$125 for 300 points ($6000 coin-in)" mailed offer. Played the
100-play nickel JOB near High Limit room. The machines are now TITO,
which is a big improvement. Lost $175 over the course of the session
(no Royals, but dealt quads once), for -$50 net. At the Club desk
they comped all 4 of us to the buffet, in line with SL's reported
generosity with food comps, though I may have already had money in
the SL comp account from a previous trip.
Stuart (RandomStu)
sresnick2@comcast.net
http://home.comcast.net/~sresnick2/mypage.htm