My venture to the casino..

Well! I went to the Niagra Casino yesterday with some buddies of mine to play some cards.. Was pretty nervous, never played in any serious live games before.. (When I asked for $300 in chips, the guy asked if i wanted it in 1's.. So I was like sure)... He hands me 3 racks of 1's... I'm like "Yep, so this is 3 stacks of high society right ? " He laughed and said yea for sure.. So anyways I get out 2 the table and the guy there says that I need at least $80 in red's so I head back and get $80 in 5's and $20 in 1's...

ANYWAYS I sit down at the table, and just play my normal game... Was folding, watching how others were playing... Didn't catch any cards for a good hour or two, and I was aware which players were mentally taking notes on my play... So I had decided to make a move, get my money back that was spent on blinds... I was in a pot heads up with K10 suited.. Flop came A,10,5... The guy lead out for $20, I decided to raise him to $50... He stared at me for a while, I was pumpin inside but remained calm outside, he folded and said "Ace with a queen kicker, you hit two pair ?" I just smiled and took the pot.

Alright, I'd been feeling more comfortable after that and stole a few other pots, was up to $150.. ($100 was the max for the table) When some guy that looked like a tourist sat down, fumbled all his chips onto the table and put in the BB bet. Guy A who is super aggressive Bet's out $7.. I'm looking at AK of hearts, I reraise to $18... And guy that just sat down says "Ok well, I'm all in"...

Wtf is he doing, is he just gambling ? Does he actually have a hand ? Guy A then calls his all in and the action is on me.. AK suited, Now the Guy A had gone all in with crap before, he was really really aggressive. The guy that just sat down, something about him made me think he didnt have a great hand, the way he just fumbled all his chips on the table like he didn't care at all.

Since the table limit was $100 that was the allin bet.. So I called leaving me with $50. Flop comes 3h Ks 7h, I'm thinkin Jackpot! As long as they don't have Aces, and even so I have my flush draw.. I push my $50 in and guy A calls..

Guy A has JJ, Random dude that just sat down had AQ.. Ace freaken queen.. of spades... I'm pretty sure you know what the next two cards that fell were... Spade spade.. He took down the $300 main pot, and I took the side pot for about $100.. (The worst part was, when a few of the other guys at the table said "wow you got lucky there" he just said "It wasn't luck, I've been playing for years" This guy then donked away $100 with pocket Queens by not raising preflop, and walked into a straight.. which is expected when you don't raise preflop with queens and have 7 others in the same pot)

I was going to rebuild my stack but I realized 3~4 hours had passed and my buddies were out at the bar getting a head start,so I packed it in and went over and they bought me a few beers after I told them about the hand. All in all a great experience for my first time playing live, and coming out even is definitly not a bad thing for me. (Oh and yes my sentence structure is horrible, give me a break I was out all night)

Wow, nice write up Xife. Sounds like you had a good time overall. And did pretty well, being your first live experience and all. Very cool.

So what's your opinion then... I know this varies by cardroom, but did you notice that, for the most part, live play really is much different than online? I mean in terms of fewer players per pot, less donkishness, less chasing, etc...that sort of thing. I know that I tend to find live play to be more of what I expect poker should be compared to what we deal with online.

I'd played home games with some buddies before, but it wasn't as fun as this.... (Of course my home games never got a $400 pot before )

From what I saw there was a lot of preflop raises, to $7~14... and a lot of people would stay in the pot..A few of us were playing tight poker but most were just trying to see as many flops as possible with anything.. Guy A (dude from my example) called a $10 raise preflop with 8,3 and hit two pair taking down a decent pot... I'll have to go a few more times before I see what it is like normally...

I also havn't played stakes as high as $1/$2 so I'm not really sure how the play is like online.. But at least to me, it seemed more donkish irl.

Cool. Fair enough, I was just curious.

I have played casino poker ,I liked it but what I hated was the people who ride out all the way threw on limit tables ,even when you raise it to a big pot have nothing & then get it at the end .It reminds me of freerolls on line.

see, alot of live and online is the same, just in the casino, they tend to have more play money is all

My experience has been that broadly at a £22 ($40) live SnG the standard of play is comparable to the $5 or $10 online.

At a table of 10 live I tend to find there are 2 or 3 very solid players, 4 or 5 who have some knowledge though are either weak or have big holes in their game and like to chase and a couple of shockingly bad players.

Online there is usually a more even skill distribution at a given level, live it pays to work out who the few sharks are and also those who are either semi-drunk or just there to gamble as a break from the roulette or blackjack. Play against the latter, avoid the former

(Great post btw )

Nice story, Xife.

Guys who play for years but don't raise JJ probably have lost a lot over those years. Thanks for posting, 'specially for those of us who have yet to venture out live.

Sounds like a lot of fun. I've walked through casinos a few times, but havent sat down at a live table yet. Hoping to do it this summer..

Amen!!!!!!!!

The lowest stakes in a casino is 2/4 limit that I have seen. I would equate that to a .10c/.20c limit game on-line. I have seen tables where all 9-10 people are calling and reraising preflop.

It sounds like you are playing a 5-100 spread game. Those can have some serious pots going.

I did my first live casino a couple of months ago and had a lot of fun. I am planning on my first casino tournament in the next couple of weeks so I am looking forward to see how people play there.

I was playing $1/$2 no limit.. and it felt like the .25/.50 at the B2B network (Full of fishies)