A List of the Best Overall Hold 'em Tournaments in Las Vegas

[bav]

The $62 sammiches at Sahara are completely edible. It's just your basic large sub sandwich cut into 2" hunks. If you're willing to eat a ham+cheese+tomato+mayo sandwich anywhere else, you can eat the Sahara offering at 8pm.

I rarely go downtown or to Orleans. Yes, I think the Orleans and Binions and maybe even the Nugget tournaments are playable. I just don't think they are best of breed.

Looking at Nugget specifically since it is referenced above, they're $105 total, give ya T5000 in chips, 20 minute rounds, $19(*) vig. Sahara is $62, gives ya T5000 in chips, 20 minute rounds, $14 vig. Basically if I'm gonna pay $105 at Nugget, I'd rather pay $130 and do Caesars. If I want to pay less, I'll do Sahara.

Binion's weekend 8pm is playable, but it's $200 with a $50(*) vig, vs say Venetian's normal 8pm which is $180 with a $25(*) vig. And V's is 6 days a week vs 3 days at Binion's. I'll normally aim for Venetian.

Orleans I mostly can't remember their tourney schedule. I'm usually not in the mood for one of their unlimited $20 rebuy donkfests where tables compete with each other to try to break the most-rebuys-at-a-table record. But the normal $75 or $60+$40 are ok.

Sahara $62, Caesars noon $130, Venetian 8pm $180, Wynn $330, and Venetian Saturday $550 are just my own personal preferences for those size buyins based on the structure of the event and including some consideration for vigorish. I declare my gambling winnings exactly legally (I think) so Caesars W2G's don't enter into my decision process. But sure, there are other perfectly playable tourneys that aren't total pushfests after 60 minutes.

(*) Note that I'm not positive of the vig's. AVP is my source but I had some trouble figuring out if the optional dealer add-on is included in AVP's figures so my number may be off by $5.

[CaptHomer]

This is a good list as well.

Vegas Tournaments Rated

[grdred944]

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Some casinos want to issue the form for the amount 1st place was posted as not the amount first place was actually paid when they are different (when a deal is made).

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Caesars did this to a table I was at in 2005. I ate the form. I wasn't happy about it but everyone else involved were freaking out and I wanted to get out of there.

I agree that wholesale boycotting is not the answer. Harrah's is such a machine that no one on the poker room management level is going to question a decision that obviously came down from corporate counsel. The noon tournament is great for locals and tourists so the W2 issue should be secondary.

[deepdowntruth]

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The $62 sammiches at Sahara are completely edible. It's just your basic large sub sandwich cut into 2" hunks. If you're willing to eat a ham+cheese+tomato+mayo sandwich anywhere else, you can eat the Sahara offering at 8pm.

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I dunno dude, when I see that horde of questionable-looking people talking and breathing over it with their dirty grubby fingers frantically rooting around, my stomach says no.

[grdred944]

In my humble unsolicited opinion....

I agree with most of the weighting on skill level. But I think the Wynn noon $330 tourneys are way too high at 6. I have played that tournament roughly 20 times and I would put it at a 4 (4.5 if that were possible). Certainly when you compare it to the other 6's on the list it does not come close. Unless I just picked 20 good days to play it.

[bav]

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I agree with most of the weighting on skill level. But I think the Wynn noon $330 tourneys are way too high at 6.

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The web page that describes skill level seems to just relate it directly to patience factor. I don't quite understand the need for both figures. His table just maps Patience <1.49 to skill 0, patience of 1.5 to 2.99 is skill level 2, etc.

So don't read too much into the skill level column. I don't think it actually includes any subjective estimate of the quality of the players.

[LasVegasMichael]

One annoying aspect of Sahara is that if they tournament is player heavy, they will cram 11 people onto the tables. But, more players means more dead money, so I guess you take the good with the bad in this situation.

Bav: The vig % on AVP is calculated from the buy in only, excluding AO and RB, IIRC.

[bav]

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Bav: The vig % on AVP is calculated from the buy in only, excluding AO and RB, IIRC.

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Except when it isn't.

Like the Orleans Friday night tourney is $60 plus one $40 rebuy plus $5 dealer toke with $10 of the $60 to the house. This is on AVP as $65 with $15 admin. So the optional dealer toke is included, but not the optional rebuy.

But Venetian's 8pm buyin is $125 with an option $50 rebuy and an optional $5 dealer toke where $15 of the $125 goes to the house. That's on AVP as a $125 buyin with $20 overhead. I dug out a printed Venetian tourney structure page to verify this, so my stated $25 vig for V is wrong, it's $20...a minor oops on AVP's tourney page; I think to be consistent it should claim V's buyin is $130 with $20 admin fee to include the dealer toke as it does on Orleans, Caesars and Sahara.

So that's why I included the (*) above... I was noticing some oddities on AVP but couldn't quite put a finger on what was wrong. Looks like the dealer toke is intended to be included in the computations while the rebuys are not and Venetian is the only one I see offhand that is off.

[AllVegasPoker]

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Looks like the dealer toke is intended to be included in the computations while the rebuys are not and Venetian is the only one I see offhand that is off.

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Bav, thanks for pointing this out. You're right. When we revised the tournament database over the summer, the policy we came up with is to make the 'optional' dealer tokes part of the house rake for the purpose of computing the total buy-in.

Unfortunately, as you probably know, many Las Vegas poker rooms call their dealer tokes "optional add-ons". Personally, I think this is deceptive. I don't think an inexperienced tournament player from Middletown, USA should visit Vegas and be surprised when he has to pull out an extra $5 after he sits down at the poker table.

By contrast, REAL re-buys and add-ons are not included in the buy-in.

I'll see to it the Venetian entry is fixed. Good detective work [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[jeffnc]

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The web page that describes skill level seems to just relate it directly to patience factor. I don't quite understand the need for both figures. His table just maps Patience <1.49 to skill 0, patience of 1.5 to 2.99 is skill level 2, etc.

So don't read too much into the skill level column. I don't think it actually includes any subjective estimate of the quality of the players.

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It's like Harrington's M. Why have M plus the Zones? Just 2 ways of looking at the same thing - use the value that makes it easier in context.

As far as subjective estimate of the players, I think it's implied that the best players will avoid the crapshoots and gravitate toward the tournies with the longer patience factor. Also, it simply takes more skill in the long run to win high patience factor tournaments.