Trip Report: Great Blue Heron Casino

[DavidC]

Ambiance: Darkly lit, pretty strict atmosphere, smoking is allowed at the tables, bottles of water cost money (their policy), as do alcoholic drinks (this is the law in Ontario), pop or tap water is free, as is coffee, etc. Sandwiches cost money

Dealers split tips (This is consistent with Rama and Niagara Falls).

House rules:

-if you're standing, you're not dealt into a hand

-if you're not at the table, you're not dealt into the hand

-if you act out of turn, you can only call.

-if you put money into the pot out of turn, it's stuck there (unless you raised out of turn and the person before you chooses to just call, in which case I think it's just considered a call and you pull back one of your bets)... this leads to some neat situations where you can get correct odds to chase gutshots vs a raise and stuff like that, if you've already called out of turn. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

-If, when showing your hand, any card at any time turns face down, your hand is dead (I guess if you're still holding it that doesn't count)

-If you muck vs a player who's all in and hasn't mucked, you lose the main pot... ditto if you muck and someone else still has cards

Rake: 10% max $5 at the 5/10 game, $5/half hour at the $10/$20. At $20/$40 I think it's $7/half.

They spread 5-10, 10-20, 20-40 (most often), 30-60 (sometimes), NLHE SNG (wednesdays? for $50/$100 buy in, winner take all, blinds accellerate VERY quickly and stacks are short), I think once a month they spread a $50/$100, $100/$200, or $75/$150...

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Trip Report, Heron $10-20
I went to Heron last night, and, though i couldn't afford it, I put my name on the lists for $10-$20, as well as $5-10 (which I could afford).

We started observing a 5-10 game, and there were 5-8 players per flop, every flop, mostly unraised. There were people exhibiting standard tells (freezing when bluffing). They were getting paid on their big hands, etc. Some bad hands were getting turned over and there were people playing every hand.

We then shifted our attention to one of the 10-20's, and I saw a hand where There was a preflop raise (button) with two callers (bb/mp). Flop comes up j-hi rags two-tone. It's checked to button who bets, bb raises, and mp smooth calls. Button smooth calls. On the turn the flush card comes, bb checks, mp bets, button instafolds, bb thinks and folds, mp shows the flush. However, when continuing to watch the table, I saw that there were 5+ players to the flop quite often. There didn't appear to be much talking at any of the tables, and the players at 10-20 appeared quite a bit more skilled than those at the 5-10.

The 10-20 looked beatable, but I still got a little nervous about playing it.

At the 5-10 game, I saw a hand where a guy raised the field with JJ from the SB (5 players limped), then bet a low ragged flop, called a raise with one caller still in the hand, then bet out the turn on a blank. This seems really weird to me, as the flop is ragged enough that you're not trying to read someone for a draw and therefore charge them for it / get more info on the turn. Really really strange behavior.

I ended up sitting at a 10-20 between 10:30 and 2:30.

I noticed that if there's a bunch of limpers and you raise, it's generally followed by people three-betting and capping afterwards (even people who have already acted). Sometimes they're doing this with good hands and sometimes with weaker hands. It sometimes manages to kick out a few players also.

There's several players who freeze when they're bluffing. Another tell that I've noticed is that people tend to think for a moment and "casually" check, as though they're preparing to checkraise, when they really don't want to call a turn bet on a scary board, or they have a super-weak draw on a scary board. They pretend to be going for the raise in order to get a free card. I think I noticed this tell 2-3 times in 4 hours. I once bet (3-way) KQo unimproved into someone who did that on the turn (3str/3fl board) and he thought for a moment, said it wasn't worth it, and folded.

When I sat at my 10-20, there appeared to be two huge loose fish (first time I sat down, one of these two guys appeared a little bewildered by the game), as well as a guy who was semi-loose who bluffed a bit and was fairly aggressive (but slowplayed a lot) postflop, and a lady who played some pretty nasty hands (QJo, 63s) and played them fairly passively. I think she did bluff once or twice in 2 hours though.

These fish made the game quite lucrative, probably the best 10-20 of the night. When the fish dropped out of the game and were replaced by a good player and a decent player, I left the table, only to find that I'd moved to a worse table. Play was a little tighter, much more aggressive, and table-coaching (telling players to raise pf with aa, etc.) was rampant. I jokingly asked if these guys made videos. One of the guys had a great line, "What do you think we come here for, to hate aces?"

I got to see a guy muck his hand after thinking that everyone had folded, only to lose to a lady who was all-in and had her hands over her cards. Lesson: DO NOT muck your hand until the dealer sends you the chips. This cost the guy $80 (it probably should have been more).

I once mucked Q6o and exposed the 6 as I did (it stuck to my finger). The card lifted a bit, and as far as I could tell, only one player saw it. The guy that saw it kinda looked up at me and smiled. It wasn't a significant card in the hand, but i still felt bad about exposing it. I would have said something, but the dealer put it into the muck so fast that I wouldn't have been able to find it to show the table. I ended up just not saying anything but made it clear that I would have if I couldhave shown it (this was the good player that replaced a fish at my first table).

When I moved tables, the guy sitting to my left was exposing his hole cards by looking at them too far from himself and with one hand. I had thought that he was a good player, because he knew that aces won about 40% of the time, however, I saw him play 94s in the BB for two bets... this could have actually been okay but I saw him play a few more offsuit kinda junky hands too. The dealer caught me looking once and didn't say anything, but he made eye-contact with me. I'm not sure who else saw me looking.

I think my first hand at the table was AKs spades on an AQJ board. A passive lady check-called me on the flop, then a ten of spades came on the turn (2 spades). She check-called again, another spade hit the river (9s) and she check-called again. My heart was pounding pretty fiercely at that point.

In the four hours that I'd been sitting, I guess I played something like 100-120 hands, and the deck was just hitting me in the face. However, I was playing very aggressively (including some large pf investments) and I was bouncing around like crazy. At the end of the night I won a $300 pot to put me +$60 for the night (there were two side pots in this one too). [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

I made a raise with ATo to isolate some loose players, and got a cold-caller on the button. The board came up AA5. It was checked to me and I bet out, button raised, one of the checkers folded and the other cold-called. I called. I check-called the turn and checked the river and it was checked through by the button having 99, the caller having a8 and myself having AT for hte win. I thougth for quite some time before calling the turn. I thought I was beat (by someone floating a better kicker) and was trying to find a lay-down.

An interesting hand. There were 4 limpers or so, and the button raised. Button has been folding a lot of hands and appears to be pretty aggressive. I re-raised in the BB after the SB folded, there was one fold and the rest called. The button seemed adamant about not capping it (I guess someone had pestered him about it or asked him about it quickly and he refused quickly). Flop comes 876 rainbow. I bet out, get one caller and hte button. Turn is a blank. I bet out, one guy folds and the button raises. I think, and reraise to 60, the caller (fishy guy) calls, and the button caps. We call. I check-call the river. The caller shows A6 for trip sixes (he'd rivered them), button shows T9o for the straight. This seems to be one of my problems. I was a little wrong in my read here and it ended up costing me like $40 more than it should have in this hand. I figured that a TAA wouldn't have 88-66 for the set, and wouldn't have T9s for the straight. Now in HPFAP it mentions raising this kind of hand on the button to tie people in when you hit something massive, so it's possible that his play would have been okay with better players and with a better hand for himself, but as it turns out, I was just wrong about his hand selection and quality of play.

[DavidC]

You have to ask the Floor for a meal button, not the dealer.

The floor can't give you a meal button if you've already got a "missed blind" button. So DO NOT wait until your BB to ask for the meal button. Basically, if you did this, you have to wait until the button passes you, post your BB, plus your SB (surrender), and then get your meal button. Supreme B.S. here.

--Dave.