Monte Carlo LV -- An endless list of annoyances

[bav]

While I'm a bit of a poker room gadfly, flitting from room to room, I hadn't been to Monte Carlo but one time like two or three years ago. But they enticed me to return. Well...I must say, I don't think I've been missing much.

The guy at the podium is very very nice, and gets me to a table and clocks me in. Good start. 'Cept they don't have a computer for this so comps are done by scribbling on note cards--a bit backwards but it works.

We start a new NL1/2 table and a kid asks the waitress for RedBull and vodka. She says "we don't have RedBull". Guy says "yes you do, I've been ordering them all day out there at the bar". Waitress says "yes, but you can't get it in the poker room...no energy drinks at all." No impact on me since RB sucks, but really now. Oh, and the cup holders built into the table do NOT fit the glasses they serve beverages in. Try to use the cup holder for the glass and you'll end up with wet wood and felt. (And yes, the tables have that stupid wooden ledge around instead of being felt all the way.)

Someone pulls out a cell phone. HOLY cow you'd think he'd pulled out a loaded .45 auto. Dealer jumps down his throat and makes it clear that if he opens that phone, his hand is instantly killed. Put it away SLOWLY and keep your hands where I can see them... Lots of rooms have anti cellphone rules, but they don't execute you when you violate it. This was repeated multiple times--they are VERY serious about their cell phone prohibition.

Someone pulls open a Cardplayer magazine and within 3 seconds the dealer says "Sir...put that down, we don't allow reading at the table unless it's a racing form." W T F ??? Did I just hear right? Either you don't allow reading, or you do. Either it's bad, or it's not. The content of what you're reading shouldn't matter. Guy says "I'm just looking at the tourney section, I want to play a tourney tonight" and the dealer repeats he CANNOT have that magazine open. This ends up costing MC two customers since this guy and his friend decide they'll go find somewhere else to play that isn't so uptight.

Someone is laughing about something and utters the F-bomb. Yumpin' Yeeminy, he's lucky security didn't tackle him. Dealer scolded him firmly, told him there is *NO* leniency in the enforcement of Rule 9, and one more utterance and he'd be out on his ass.

A neighboring table is down to 5-handed and asks for a reduced rake. Their rule is the jackpot drop must stop and there will be no high hand awards if they reduce the rake. A couple of the players throw a fit over not getting high hand jackpots so the floor refuses to lower the rake. *BLOOOP* one of the last 5 players says "Forget this! I'll play short handed, but I'm not paying full rake to play 5-handed" and walks.

Guy hits quad 9's at our table. And a little celebration begins when we see on the computer screen 9999 is worth $183. He's high-fiving everybody. They come around with the loot and it's $20. "I'm sorry, 9999 was hit earlier today, we just haven't gotten around to resetting the computer." Talk about a buzzkill.

And speaking of that computer display... Does NOBODY who works there even look at what they're doing? The automated display stuff goes between screens about high hand payouts, and tourneys, and whatnot. But the flippin' thing is apparently set to switch to the next screen the instant the last line of the current screen is written. So it line by line puts up "AAAA $20 $20" "KKKK $42 $55" "QQQQ $42 $20" all nice and slow. Then "JJJJ $20 $20" pops up and instantly is erased and it moves to the next screen--it's literally on the screen for a fraction of a second. Ok...I can read one line that fast, but then they do the same thing for entire screen fulls of tourney rules. It puts up some LONG paragraph of text about a tourney and it's on the screen for <1 second. Two dozen long lines and it just flashes up there and disappears.

And they use must moves. Ick.

And the parking situation sucks...they ain't got no parking garage and the tiny little lots they do have fill up.

And the really annoying killer... UTG is kinda hiding his cards (not intentionally) and UTG+1 doesn't notice he still has 'em and calls $2. Next guy calls $2. Next guy calls $2. Fold. Fold. Suddenly UTG tosses $20 in and says RAISE! UTG+1 starts to pull back his $2 and the dealer says "NO SIR! That $2 stays! You can either call or forfit the $2." He protests and the dealer is adamant claiming this is the rule. I figure this is all some silly misunderstanding and ask for the floor... Obviously UTG cannot let 5 people act behind him, and then get to put in a jumbo raise and force a forfit of all the money already in out-of-turn. Floor comes over and just growls "that's right, those bets stay and you can call the raise or forfit the chips". I reiterate that *5* people have acted behind this guy and he nor the dealer did anything to stop it; surely the floor CANNOT be implying that UTG can now raise knowing all this extra information and steal the three $2 limps already in there. Floor just growls that this is the rule and storms away.

So for all you angle shooters, here's the perfect place. You can turn your early position into a late one at anytime by getting the folks behind you to act out of turn. Sit to the right of the dealer and hide your cards when you are in early position. Let the 1-seat act out of turn and silently watch everybody around the table put in $2 Once you see that the whole table wants to limp, THEN proudly announce you were skipped and you are raising! All those folks are now stuck with their money in the pot, and it's perfectly legal and acceptable at Monte Carlo.

Mind you, it wasn't all bad. Most of the staff were pleasant, the players were fine, and 19 out of 20 hands went off without incident. But I surely do see why they're having to resort to a jumbo freeroll tournament to try to get people to play.

[psandman]

I also have been playing the MC lately, you missed some of the bizarro rules.

My favorite is there rule about racks on the table. The rule is that you can't have a rack on the table, unless the rack is holding chips won from the jackpot (those chips do play). Apparently jackpot chips are somehow magical.

They also play with the rule in NL that a raise of 1/2 the minimum bet reopens the betting, okay I can live iwth that, but then I heard a dealer mention "completing a bet" and my head started hurting.

They drop a rake even if there is no flop. I know the californians here are used to that, but I'm not.

When they start a tournament the TD makes an announcement that a hand exposed while the action is still live is a "dead hand".

And they drive me nuts with there announcement that they are taking registration for there 11AM sit-n-go. They have a couple of these scheduled "Sit-n-gos". Excuse me but sit-n-go means its not scheduled, you go when you have enough players "sitting".

Some but not all dealers won't allow you to keep an ipod on the table.

And i saw a dealer do the thing that drives me most nuts and thats celebrate with a player. Player hits quads for a jackpot taking a large chunk of another players stack. The dealer reaches across the table and shakes the players hand and then claps for the player. So now this player who just lost a chunk of money has to watch this display from the dealer over a $20 jackpot.

Also a bizarro must move rule. They started up another game shirthanded and told us it was a must move game. After we are playing for a while a new player is seated in our game. Just after he is seated they move him to the main game. Me and another player both say something to the floor guy since we expected that one of us would get moved. Apparently the new player asked to sit at the other table so he gets moved first? We didn't bother to ask because we were told it was a must move table.

The TV screen thing was really annoying as I was playing during the Football Conference championship games. The TV in front of me was set on half screen to show the Game on one half and the Jackpot rules on the other half. SOmeone asked the floor to put the game on full screen and we were told that he has to have the Jackpot up on at least one TV and all the other TVs were being watched. But I mostly play on grave, and in the middle of the night they have all the TVs on fullscreen so that I can watch my favorite infomercials on all of them.

And I walked out one night last week when the other 4 players in my game wouldn't agree to give up the jackpot to get a rake reduction (that same night I also walked out of Ballys for the same reason). I have deicded that if this happens again I will make the following offer to the players . . . If the players agree to accept the rake reduction whenever they win a pot they can pay me the difference in the rake (so in a forty dollar pot this would be $4) and if they hit a high hand I will pay them the jackpot out of my pocket. I think I come out ahead in the long run. BTW I don't agrue with anyone about this when it happens just rack up and leave. If 4 players would rather pay $5 a hand to play 4 handed I don't blame the room for taking their money. Its a good policy, it makes the house more money and drives the nits like myself out.

I disagree about the parking, I have never had a problem getting a spot and the lot is right by the poker room.

[Howard Burroughs]

I played there about a week ago in a H*O*R*S*E game (and a little NL), got yelled at for leafing though a mag as well.

Hey, at least you got clocked in :-)
I was not told about the freeroll (or being clocked for time) until I was leaving.


Nice people all in all (one dealer welcomed me back to the room, who I have not seen in 2 years, man he's got a good memory!).



I was lucky to book a nice win there that night and the people are pretty nice there (and I got a lucky parking space in the front, YMMV) but I agree Bav, ....The rules make it "Mandalay Bay Poker North". Well, almost anyway.



Happy Pokering,

Howard