Mohegan Sun in PA

My mom passed away last week, and we took her back to PA to be buried. She had Alzheimer's so her passing was more blessing than sadness. That is one nasty, mean, and cruel disease. For the trip home, we decided to spend Saturday night with friends at MS, since I had an offer for a free room any night.

I call to reserve the room,
ME: I'd like to reserve a room for Saturday. I have an offer for a free room.
RSV: WE don't have any more free rooms, but I can give you a deep discount of $119.
ME: EXCUSE ME? My offer says FREE.
RSV: "Yes sir, and if you had called when we had the free room available, you could have had it. But that room is gone, all we have left are rooms for $119."
ME: Sorry but I have not paid for a casino room in 10 years, and I am certainly not going to pay $119 for a FREE room. I guess I need to reevaluate which casinos in PA should be getting my action.
RSV: I understand sir, but these rooms are $599 a night, so you are getting a really good deal at $119.
ME: From your point of view that would seem to be true. But from my view point, I am out $119 for something that should cost 0. Not to mention whatever other fees and taxes that will be added.

I decline to reserve the room, and call to tell my wife we need a new plan. She goads me into calling back and trying to talk to someone. So I call the casino, and ask to speak to a Casino Host.
ME: I just spoke with reservations, and my free room offer will cost me $119. I've not paid for a casino room in 10 years.
HOST: $119 is a very good rate. Those rooms go for $599 and now that the horses are running, we will be sold out.
We discuss how they manage to sell out 240 rooms in that area.....
HOST: I am looking at your play. Problem is you only have one visit.
ME: Actually I have 6, but I didn't bother to get a card for the first 5, since you had no hotel. That is on me. But what do you have for my AVG BET, HOURS, and win/lost for that trip?
HOST: For that one trip the numbers are good. 6.5 hours of play (avg bet and LOST was spot on as well)
ME: If I played at that level again, would you comp me the room?
HOST: Yes, if you played at that level I could comp you the room after your play.
ME: Problem with that is, I am staying in the room Saturday, but will be hitting the nightlife. I won't be playing until after I have checked out of the room on Sunday. I am bringing the same amount of money, and I will be playing at the same level. If the money holds out, I will be playing for 6 hours.

Host and I go back and forth a bit more and I finally agree I will get the room at the $119 price, and he will credit my card after I have played, if I warrant the room. I say I will break my principle of never paying for a casino room, by pretending my $140 in match play is covering the room instead.
Host makes the reservation for me, and then says, "You obviously understand the comp game, and you sound honest. I will take a chance that you will play like you have said. Therefore I have comped the room. There will be no charges."

First time I have ever managed to get a host to change their decision about a comp level. :-) I have won the free room, but now I am sort of obligated to play at a higher/longer level of play, although it is the same level I was going to play anyway.

Saturday night the place was a MOB SCENE. I have never seen so many people there. We tried to go to the buffet at 7:15, but the line was really, really long. One guy walked by saying, "C'mon folks. The food is really not that good, for this kind of line."
We ended up going to Bar Louie. We tried to find room at the bar, but there was none. Lots of empty tables, but we were told they were not available. They took our name, and told us to come back at 7:40. We come back at 7:35 and get seated back in the same section that was not available 20 minutes before. We get service within a few minutes, and order a round of drinks. It took about 5 minutes before the drinks came back, so we immediately ordered a second round of drinks. I'm not sure if that pissed her off or not, but the rest of the story is a disaster.
The tables on either side of us were seated after we arrived. Both tables ordered, ate, and left, and we still did not have our food. We were getting good service for our drink orders, just no food was arriving. 9:00 PM we got our food (1:25 from the time we sat). I was very nice and told the waitress I was not upset, not looking to get anyone in trouble, but I felt the Bar needed to offer us something. She sent the manager over. He then proceeded to tell me that the food tickets were only running at 30 to 35 minutes, so my timeline must be off. I said my timeline was accurate. Our name was on the list, I know the time we were seated, and more importantly, I know the 2 tables that are no longer here, came in AFTER us, and we just now got our food. He said he was going to check our ticket time, and get back to me.
He never came back to tell us what happened. They did bring another round of drinks that were on the house, so a $30 value, on a bill of $184. By the time we got done eating, we got to the track in time to see the last 3 horse races of the evening. Since none of us bet the ponies, it wasn't that big of a deal that we missed the races.
The two wives then spent an hour wandering the slots and playing through about $100 each. A few more drinks and off to bed.

I am down to the craps tables at 7:00 AM. Only 3 of us on the table, and 1 is a Don't and he doesn't shoot. I have been in a shooting funk for a year now. I'll generally make a point, but am not having any long rolls, nor am I hitting many box numbers. I am certainly shooting under expectation. Soon it was only me on the table. I would win small bets, but as soon as I would put any real money on the table, SEVEN OUT. I gave up after 2 hours, down $600, and went back to the room, to get ready for breakfast. We ate at the buffet. It was okay. We checked out of the room and our friends headed home.

Wife and I settled in for some black jack. Black Jack went well. As I noted in the other thread when we sat down, I was able to shuffle track 1/2 the aces in the six deck shoe, but it did me no good, since the guy who cut the deck, sent all those aces to the back of the shoe where they never got dealt. :-( But the cards were falling my way, and soon my $300 buy in was up to $600. My wife was also ahead $100. After I gave some of mine back, we quit. She gave me back her buy-in and took the winnings to play slots. With my extra money, I headed back to get revenge on the craps tables.

Waited at the table until the current 10 point was made, and then bought in. Since the shooter had made the point, I decided I was on a good table, and so went with $50 odds on the new 8 point, and $80 inside. SEVEN OUT, Down $140. That was when I also noticed he was shooting from the DON'T. He had LOST his bet when he made the 10!
The next 4 shooters all went PSO. Here comes my turn in the barrel, but I am not kidding, and I am not exaggerating. Four shooters in a row, set the point and threw a 7 on their second toss of the dice. I had lost another $140 on the second shooter, but by the 3rd, 4th, and 5th shooter I had no money inside, and only had a small amount of odds.
Eventually I put a $50 NO TEN bet out there, and got paid $25 on the next 4 shooters, although that just covered what I lost on my PL bets. I did manage to take down the NO TEN before I lost the bet, so came out ahead $96 on that one bet. Have to find happiness somewhere. Rest of the session can be summed up like this.

%$#@^$%&^%*&*#%# SEVEN OUT*%^#%^#SEVEN OUT $#%^$^*%^*%&^$%^$%^ SEVEN OUT %&%^&*%$^ ^#$% FN SEVEN OUT $%&^%*&^(*^

It felt like a victory to only be down $600. Sorry I don't have much detail on the craps game. There is absolutely nothing worth remembering in these sessions. Nobody makes 4 points. Nobody repeatedly hits one number so my bets get pressed up over $200, etc. I made around 15 Come bets, and only got paid on two of them. Twice I had a Come bet up when a point was made, so I was working on the Come out, and lost to SEVEN WINNER. (0-2 on working Come Bets, not even any no decisions). I got the six up to $90 one time, but never got paid on that bet. Best roll of the session was when there were only 4 of us on the table, and my wife stopped by as I was rolling. I put a bet down in front of her, and then went 7 out shortly after that. My wife rolled next. She gets too nervous when I put much money on the table, so I just did $54 across, and PL with full odds. She rolled quite a few box numbers which I kept as same bet, except for buying the 4 and 10 for $25 when they hit. My wife made 2 points, so after the 3rd point was set, I pressed the inside bets up to make them $25 and $30 as well. SEVEN OUT. Right on schedule. :-( Still I made quite a bit of money on her roll, and later I also had a decent roll. I only made one point, but I hit a lot of box numbers, and hit both the 4 and 10 at $25 a few times. If I had pulled all the bets down at that point, I would have had about $100 profit from that craps session. Instead, I lost all I gained on the next few rolls, since there were no good rolls back to back.

Licked my wounds, and my wife and I headed back to BJ. This was the session where we ran into mister 'I want to play this shoe all by myself'. See the above linked thread. Once again BJ proved profitable, as I got up over $300. Alas, leaving at the right time escaped me this time, and I stuck around to watch the dealer go into never bust mode. Unfortunately, many of those times were with 5 and 6 showing, and I was doubling down, to ensure maximum pain threshold would be reached. Wife was a bit smarter and had left one shoe earlier, having suffered a small lost, after having been up $100. I ended up even, found my wife, and we headed to the buffet for supper. It was good. Not great, but better than okay. Salad was fresh, which was nice.

We had a 1.5 hour drive to get to our next friend stop on our trip home, so after dinner I hit the craps table for one last try. Different time, same story. Started out down, and when I finally got back to even, I bailed. We left at 7:30 PM. So I clocked about 9 hours of play over the 7:00 AM to 7:30PM time frame. Never checked my ratings, but at craps I probably never cracked the $50 AVG. At BJ I played a lot of $20 hands, and some $25 and $50 hands, primarily when I would see the pit getting ready to rate our table. Bottom line was the Host got the play I told him he would get, so he should be happy.

If you are still reading this, Do you not have a life? You must be ill to have stayed with me to the bitter end.

MATCH PLAY. I had $140 in match play. At MS, you go to the kiosk, and you can print out your match play in whatever denomination you would like. So I got $20 match coupons 3x. and $10 match coupons 8x.
I played 3 $10 match plays on the PL at the first craps session. Lost all 3.
I then played the remaining match plays at the first BJ session.
Lost the 5 remaining $10 match plays.
Lost the first $20 Match play, Won the second one, and lost the third one.
So final tally was 11 Match plays, and my record was 1-10. I SUCK AT GAMBLING

The one match play I won was nice though. I had $20 match play, and $20 in chips. It was a double down opportunity, so I got to double for $40, and I won, so that was a nice little pay day.

Quote: RaleighCraps

You must be ill to have stayed with me to the bitter end.

Only mentally.

We were up there Saturday, and I was there by myself Sunday. Saturday was kind of packed, but it's been worse. Not only is it early season horse racing, but it was the drawing/promotion night with the monthly giveaways, they were calling names every 15 minutes for some basketball shot giveaway. Mrs had hit big on the slots early in the week, so I was there on her dime Saturday, she gave me $200 to play so I mostly played slots next to her. I played maybe 30 minutes of 3 Card, got a bunch of crappy hands. I've been playing more blackjack lately, but not that night.

Bar Louie's can be that way. The food is decent, but if you're going to wait, you might as well wait for Rustic Kitchen, just sayin'. We ate at Johnny Rocket's, better than the buffet and the burgers are as good as Bar Louie's. We walked right over and got seated. They must have knowed we were coming (LOL). A minute later the line was 5 deep. Good timing!

If Mrs Raleigh Craps wants to know, the better slots right now are the Pink Diamonds and Baron von Bacon right past the $1 WoF circle that sits at the entrance to the floor by the valet parking, both have consistently offered long play over the past year, and in the back corner of Penny Grove there's a Platinum Quick Hits where the top bonus for 9 quick hits is over $15000 and it has offered long play over the past several years.

I enjoyed your wrangling the rooms. We stayed up there a couple weeks ago on a Monday night, comped, and there was no activity at the desk, but I asked the clerk and he said they were almost full. But there was no lobby activity, no elevator activity, nothing, not that night nor the next morning. My belief is that they are trying to artificially create demand.

I should have pinged you to see if you were going to be around. I remember thinking Saturday night how funny it would be if we ran into you.
There were a lot of green lights on the outside of rooms. I 'think' that means the rooms are empty, but not sure. I know you set the DnD from the in room IPad, but that was about all I played with.

I had voted for Johnny Rockets, but was shot down as we all wanted to drink.

You just reminded me that I found my fav, Texas Tea, in the high limit lounge, but forgot to go back and play it on Sunday. But then again, I will usually only waste a Franklin on that if I am up, and I did not have that this go round.

Quote: RaleighCraps

I should have pinged you to see if you were going to be around. I remember thinking Saturday night how funny it would be if we ran into you.
There were a lot of green lights on the outside of rooms. I 'think' that means the rooms are empty, but not sure. I know you set the DnD from the in room IPad, but that was about all I played with.

I had voted for Johnny Rockets, but was shot down as we all wanted to drink.

You just reminded me that I found my fav, Texas Tea, in the high limit lounge, but forgot to go back and play it on Sunday. But then again, I will usually only waste a Franklin on that if I am up, and I did not have that this go round.

Good report RC. Sorry the variance didn't go your way this time, but I too enjoyed how you gave it straight to the host (that you knew how the game worked, etc). Hopefully he gave you his number to speak with him in the future? I noticed you said you placed a NO 10 a few times. Are you strictly a pass player, or do you ever play the don'ts? I would assume you're pass only as all night was 7-out.

Hope it goes better next time and thanks for the interesting report!

Dang it, RC, one of these days you are going to get out of this take-a-beating mode in Craps!

They added Mississippi Stud in the smoking section, I played about 3 hours on Sunday. I was helped by drawing a full house off of J-10 offsuit, right before announcing that I was only going to play a couple more hands. I played another hand and cashed.

Quote: odiousgambit

Dang it, RC, one of these days you are going to get out of this take-a-beating mode in Craps!

Use your anger... I can feel your hate... Come, come to the dark side.

Quote: Romes

Good report RC. Sorry the variance didn't go your way this time, but I too enjoyed how you gave it straight to the host (that you knew how the game worked, etc). Hopefully he gave you his number to speak with him in the future? I noticed you said you placed a NO 10 a few times. Are you strictly a pass player, or do you ever play the don'ts? I would assume you're pass only as all night was 7-out.

Hope it goes better next time and thanks for the interesting report!

I did not say 'my host', but rather just a host. I am not high enough of a player to get a host. Craps avg bet is around $50 on crappy sessions, but can get into the $220 range if there are a few decent rolls. I will play for 6 to 8 hours if I can last that long on a $1k buy in.
It is high enough that I know the casino should be giving me a room, and perhaps a meal or two if I get into my high range, but low enough to know no host is interested in wooing me. I am content with that status.

I am 99% a right side player. I just don't get any joy out of playing the Don't. Sure, it is better than losing money, but there is no excitement in a game where the Don't wins money. Mostly a bunch of pissed off looking sour pusses cursing their bad luck. But what makes for an even worse feeling, is playing the Don't AND losing money, which seems to happen to me a lot when I do switch sides. Nothing turns a cold table into a hot mess faster than RC going to the dark side. lol

So my compromise has been to LAY a 4,5,9, or 10, depending on my mood, and whatever number has not been showing up much. Yep, has no bearing on what will come out next, but since it makes me feel better, that is how I choose. But generally speaking, I am so afraid of missing a hot roll that I will continue to PL bet, and take odds. Of course, now I am breaking a wizard rule.

Once again though, the DONTs were also getting killed, due to the high frequency of Come Out 7s and 11s. You would have needed a 5 progression Marty to have overcome those. The DONTs who were laying 6x odds every time were okay, because they were losing base bets, but mostly winning the odds bets, so their net was much closer to even.

Quote: odiousgambit

Dang it, RC, one of these days you are going to get out of this take-a-beating mode in Craps!

I keep saying the same thing OG!
For the first 2 years when I started playing bigger, I was on a heater. Lots of long sessions, some big wins, and hardly any bust outs. Then there were 3 years of so so results. Some small wins, some losses, and a few bust outs. But these past 2 years have been brutal. One, maybe two, big wins on a craps table, but too many bust outs to count. And many of those have been with very little play time.

Coincidentally, I have not been to Beau Rivage since this cold streak started, and that has always been a favorite craps casino for me. That is the only place I am up lifetime at craps. Guess I know where my next trip better be........

Quote: Romes

Use your anger... I can feel your hate... Come, come to the dark side.

I don't hate the playa' [Donts], I hate the game. ;-)
I actually admire the Dont's who can stick to their guns and play Dark all the time. I just can't do it.

I am mostly just out of sync with the game right now.
Come betting when place betting would have worked better, Only PL betting when box numbers were rolling like crazy, Don't betting when the points get made, DC betting when the shooter throws nothing but repeats, etc.

It will change, unless I am destined to be one of those outliers on the far far left of the distribution.....

Quote: RaleighCraps

Quote: Romes

Use your anger... I can feel your hate... Come, come to the dark side.

I don't hate the playa' [Donts], I hate the game. ;-)
I actually admire the Dont's who can stick to their guns and play Dark all the time. I just can't do it.

I am mostly just out of sync with the game right now.
Come betting when place betting would have worked better, Only PL betting when box numbers were rolling like crazy, Don't betting when the points get made, DC betting when the shooter throws nothing but repeats, etc.

It will change, unless I am destined to be one of those outliers on the far far left of the distribution.....

I like your take on the game. I feel the same way, while 'majorly' on the don'ts. I think you can be a great craps player from either side, and admire those that are good players regardless of side. I think my favorite craps is when the shooter hits 5 different numbers (hitting pass players place bets), makes 1 point, then come out 7 winner for my other 4 DC bets and the pass line players win as well =)... rinse and repeat. It happens every now and then and suddenly some of the more uneducated superstitious pass players aren't afraid to high five me anymore =p.