Your Favorites – Bryan

Monte Carlo. Love the location, the pool area is great and they’ve done a really good job of having a nice variety of good dining options. Also, I’ve usually found that the value of what you are getting for the room is good as well. I am concerned (at least on the value side) how the property will change if the rumored re-brand takes place. If talking about the nicest standard room, I’d have to say Mandalay Bay.

On Strip, Luxor. I can’t remember the first time I gambled anywhere, or the first casino I set foot in (though I spend a fair amount of time in LV pre-21, so entering a casino wasn’t a novelty) though I can remember that the Luxor is the first place I was ever brave enough to try craps. The limits are usually right for me on the table games and the dealers are friendly enough. Plus, had my best single night of gambling there on my last trip.

Off Strip, Sunset Station. Usually stop there on our way out of town for one last hour of gambling. Since I’ve been tracking (8+ years), this is the place where I’ve had my biggest cumulative win. Plus, extremely friendly dealers, good rules and low limits. Plus tons of VP that is full pay (or near).

We really try our best to try not to do repeats, so a majority of my dining experiences are one-time visits. That said, I love the Noodle Shop at Mandalay Bay. It pains me that for all the years I have been going there, my first visit to the Noodle Shop was only 3 or 4 trips ago. Great shrimp fried rice. We have also had very good meals at Holstein’s and always entertain that as a place to return to.

The game I like most is craps, however due to limits / bankroll / risk aversion*, the table game I’m most likely to be playing these days is 21. Sometimes roulette. If not, I enjoy Video Poker very much. *The risk aversion is once the limits go above a certain number, I just can’t handle the swings since it not just one bet that is increased it is a minimum of 3!

I cycle between three: Crown and Ginger, Tom Collins and Seven & Seven (not while playing Craps for obvious reasons)

Hard to say favorite, but I have very good memories of a trip early in my Vegas gambling career. Five or six guys crashing in the same room (Monte Carlo of course), the group getting separated at one point (before the ubiquity of cell phones) and having a smaller group of myself plus two other end up throwing the bones at Excalibur for several hours, feeling like we had made tons of money. Walking back to the Monte Carlo and stopping at the America Cafe at NYNY, having a great meal and finally getting back to MC just as the sun was coming up. There are two notorious inside jokes that came from that evening that still live on to this day, Super Nachos and why you never give money to panhandlers on the pedestrian bridges.

When I hit my first royal flush.

MJ One at Mandalay Bay was fantastic.  It was still in previews when we saw it, so it is probably a little ‘smoother’, but it was really good.  Probably some recency bias, since that was the last show I saw, but I can’t remember other shows that I’ve seen where I’ve wanted to see again.

My biggest tip is probably ‘It’s Your Money’. Meaning, don’t let someone at the blackjack table (or wherever) tell you that you didn’t play a hand ‘the correct way’. You are playing with your own money, not their’s. If they don’t like it, they can leave the table. On the flip side of that, “It’s Their Money”. Don’t tell people (at least strangers) how to play their money. If you don’t like what someone at your table is doing (whether how they play, how obnoxious they are, etc.), you always have the power of being able to move. Also, don’t complain about timeshare salespeople or slappers. It’s as simple as saying no thank you, and continuing to walk. Also, don’t bring your baby to Vegas, seriously.

Current Podcasts (in no particular order) — You Can Bet On That, Five Hundy, Behind the Bets, Gambling with An Edge, Comped Vegas, Steve Stevens – VIP Sports (For entertainment purposes only). Old Podcasts — Vegas Thirty (pretty sure they are defunct)

Websites — Vegasmessageboard.com (I’ll post there on occasion, usually trip reports under the name ‘bsbaz’); Hurricane Mikey (Currently semi-inactive, but I probably started reading his stuff over a decade ago. A stretch of his blog covers the time period when he moved out to Vegas to become a dealer (maybe 2006 – 2011 or so?). I still go back and read some of his memorable posts.

Twitter – @lvcabchronicles. He’s a good follow, he used to have a blog that has some great stories, plus he was recently on Doug Elfman’s podcast, which is a great listen. @Meltzvegas always has good links to articles, as does @sportsbooktom.

YouTube – I watch the vlog of TheTrooper97. Used to follow his blog, until he went exculsively to YouTube. He’s a guy who moved out to VEgas to try to make it as a poker player. Also, on occasion, I have been know to watch random YouTube videos of people playing VP, walking through casinos, etc.

Personal website or social media you’d like to promote: @ismebsb on Twitter