Best low NL stakes in Bay Area?
 

So my live bankroll is only about $2k, but I have other sources of income, so I want to take a shot beyond my usual home games. I've done NL in cardrooms a few times here and there, but I'm not really familiar with the different games.

What game's good for a beginner with that bankroll? I know it's not deep enough were I living off of it, but I'm hoping it's good to ride out at least a bit of variance. San Pablo and LC have such steep blinds and opening. I liked Garden City's $3 bring-in, as that's a significant difference with a $100 buyin, but that's somewhat far for me. How's the Grand? Or Hayward? Isn't there a place up in Napa, too?

Where's the best action? Time of day/week?

Thanks for any tips... (and anyone looking to mentor...? [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img])

Re: Best low NL stakes in Bay Area?
 

San Pablo:

Good: 1-1-2 is one of the softest games around.
Bad: They rake $4 even if it's folded around pre.

Lucky Chances:

Haven't played 1-1-2 in years. But really soft from when I remember it. It was $100 min, but I believe they changed it to $100 min to $200 max.

Hayward Palace:

Good: 1-2-2 blinds offer good play. $100 is the min buy-in.

Bad: Kill and double kill makes the bring in $10 or $20 instead of $5 and then the game becomes much bigger--probably bigger than your bankroll will allow. Sketchy neighborhood.

Grand:

Haven't played their game in a year and half. $200 buy-in $2/$2/$3 blind structure. Pretty good game when I played. Not bad to take a shot or two if you're willing.

Garden City or Bay 101:

Never played their spread limit games, so no comment.

$2000 is kind of short, so you're probably restricted to the $100 or $200 buy-ins for now. Hope this helps.

Garland

Re: Best low NL stakes in Bay Area?
 

I've played the spread at Bay 101 and Garden City and the NL in Napa.

NL in Napa plays too big for a $2000 roll.

The spread games at Garden and Bay are quite good if you know how to play a 40 BB stack. You can't play the same game you would with a 200-300 BB stack obviously.

Can your roll be replenished if you bust (of course you don't want to but can it?) If so I would recommend the 5-200 game at Bay of the games I have played. (5 buy in downswings are certainly possible in this game but 10 should be somewhat rare.)

-Mike

Re: Best low NL stakes in Bay Area?
 

Interestingly enough, I PM'ed pfap earlier about playing out there.

I played at Bay101 once last year and found it a very nice facility. It's very wide open, and getting around the tables was pretty easy. Spread Limit was not available at the time and NL is still, from what I understand, illegal in San Jose County.

For Limit, I played 3/6 and found it to be a pretty solid game. There were the usual donks, but there were quite a few regulars as well.

If you're into tourneys, they have a daily one each morning.

The one drawback I find, given your bankroll, is that the smallest SL game is 5-200 (2/3/5 blinds). Since they don't have a 2/3-100/200 game, you might want to try somewhere else.

Re: Best low NL stakes in Bay Area?
 

San Pablo is 2-2-2 blinds and $4 to open. Most days $100 max buyin and limited to 2 tables. This is a VERY high variance game, probably not the sort of thing you want to play short rolled.

Palace in Hayward is 1-2-2 $5 to open and as Garland said is often killed and double killed making it $10 or $20 to open. With an uncapped buyin and frequent kills this game plays much bigger than typical 1-2 NL. You should probably be rolled for 2-5 before playing this game. Plus, its not a good game to shortstack because it has a $7 per down time charge, so you're paying $14 an hour to fold.

$3-$100 at Garden Gity is defo a good game. If you can stand the drive this might be your best bet.

LCs 1-1-2 is full of grinders. I'm not saying its tough, but its a little stiffer than your typical 1-2 game. Good game though and plenty of tables always going. I'd be comfortable playing there in a $2k roll if it could be replenished.

I haven't played SL at bay.

Re: Best low NL stakes in Bay Area?
 

Yes I can replenish, and in fact I don't even have a roll. I just track how I do, and that's where I'm at, so I'm going to take that much and dedicate it. I'm comfortable playing a shorthanded game. In fact, it's only recently that my deep stack game has had chance for improvement, but that's at microstakes home games.

Thanks for responses so far, keep 'em coming.

I've played San Pablo a few times at various times in my evolution, and also felt it was a good but high variance game. I also can't stand the smoke, I seem to get sick every time I go there. Love the food, tho'.

Lucky Chances I tried a couple of times after a weekday tournament, and yeah, oof, I ran into some folks. But that was long ago and I really sucked then.

Garden City I've played once and I really like the structure as it's an additional 33% to your $100 stack. But damn, it's so far!

The Grand I only did 3/6 once years ago before I had any clue. I'd be willing to take a shot up there, and it's easy for me to get to it, but probably after I get used to a slightly smaller game.

Re: Best low NL stakes in Bay Area?
 

The few times I've played the LC 1-1-2, it had a weird dynamic of Regulars vs Visitors. And the Regulars outnumbered the Visitors by about 7 to 2.

Since Bay 101 got the 10-200 game going, most of the hyper aggro guys left the 5-200 game. You still encounter the live-to-gambool types when they're killing time waiting for a 10-200 seat, but in general the game has slowed down and tightened up quite a bit.

Even though the Garden City 3-100 is farther away, it may be the most "normal" and lowest stakes of the games mentioned here. It doesn't always run though, so if it's not a Friday or Saturday evening, I would call first to see if it's going.

Re: Best low NL stakes in Bay Area?
 

If you want to play 5-200, I prefer the Garden City game over Bay 101.

Bay's game has 3 blinds: 2/3/5 on Button/SB/BB, while GC only has 2 blinds of 3/5 on SB/BB. ($10/orbit vs $8/orbit).

At Bay, any preflop action, even uncalled, incurs a full $5.00 drop. AT GC, if there are limpers and you raise your button and get no callers, they only drop $1.00.

You can buy-in at the 5-200 short if you wish, ($100-200 buy-in).

Only GC is spreading a 3-100 but it is soft. Blinds are 1/3 with $4.00 drop. Min/Max buy-in is $100.00. Wait for strong hands and you will get paid (or cracked) quickly.

My personal favorite is still Bay's 10-200 spread. Blinds are 5/5/10 with a $5.00 drop. Always a lot of action, so don't bluff (too much) and play TAG. After the flop, because of the spread, this plays a lot like 100/200 limit. Buy-in is $400min/$1000max and if the game has been going awhile, there can be $30k+ sitting on the table ("Jackson...Color change!"). [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

FWIW, I bought in short ($400.00) yesterday, played maybe a dozen hands over 4 hours, and cashed out nearly $2500.00. This includes getting AA cracked by pocket fives (Villain flopped a set) and KK cracked on the river when another Villain thought his ATo was the best hand on a T high flop (rivered an Ace). Those hands cost me about $700 combined.


HTH, Rod

Re: Best low NL stakes in Bay Area?
 

Um, yeah, perhaps you missed pretty much everything I asked, but thanks anyway. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

Thanks all for the more reasonable responses and suggestions... any more would be great. Seems like my best bet right now is to plan ahead and see when GC is running. At least get used to it, know if I'm ready. Or have a good run and fool myself. Either way, fun times.

Re: Best low NL stakes in Bay Area?
 

[ QUOTE ]
Um, yeah, perhaps you missed pretty much everything I asked, but thanks anyway. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[/ QUOTE ]

Well, I certainly appreciated the info on the GC 3-100 game. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Rod, great comparison of the games at Bay and GC.

Pfap, if you head out to GC during the day week after next, look for a skinny, bald guy with a slight southern accent. I won't be there every day, but I foresee at least two visits.