Bellagio (Las Vegas, NV)

I will add that I liked the 2-5 game with the $500 max (despite the earlier comment I made about the max buy-in being tiny). So I’m not sure what to think of these changes. It might make the 2-5 game tougher.

It was also a good game for players that want to move up in stakes but may not feel comfortable playing 2-5 somewhere else with a $1500 max.

Thanks for the info. From my point of view their reasoning looks silly. Players had options to choose that are bigger than the previous Bellagio 2-5 game and smaller than the current Bellagio 5-10 game.

The most obvious example is at Aria. The Aria runs 2-5 with a $1500 max. I guess the dealers don’t know or don’t care.

I played at Bellagio a few days ago and several dealers were pushing the table to play bomb pots for a hand each time there was a dealer change.

I’ve seen the bomb pots in a few sessions this year but this time the dealers were trying much harder to get the table to play them. I’ll be back there soon but I was wondering if this is more common there now.

The dealers make extra tips when a bomb pot is played. That answera that question.

Also, my estimate is that a bomb pot takes three to four time as long to play as a regular no-limit hand. So, the Bellagio is costing themselves rake.

I generally agree that lower buy ins protect recreational players and keep the games better over time. However I think given the higher rake and inflation, 500 max works well at 1/3 and makes the game better. This is particularly important in room like where I ply where there is up to 3 each hand coming out for high hand jackpots. I know that’s not the case at bell but given their six dollar rake, the current value of money in the world and my experience play 1/3 500 max I think 500 works for 1/3 and doesn’t put recs at an enormous disadvantage.

However for 2/5 where I play it is also 300-1000 max and this game is much tougher and attracts many more pros and serious players and the stacks often get very deep (which of course means recs are frequently killed). There is sometimes a four or 5-1 ratio of 1/3 to 2/5 games and while you can find good 2/5 there is a huge game quality difference. In an ideal world 200-800 would be a good buy in for 2-5 but 300-1000 has become too entrenched. That is why in my room I see many people not move up from 1/3 where if you had it structured like I’m saying I think it would make a big difference in terms of creating the beneficial pyramid Mason always talks about.

You can play Bellagio still with $500 cap, it’s just 1-3 instead of 2-5. I’d say lateral move with the 500 cap(same stakes) while potential to grab the less skilled 1-3 players in the game.

I’ve adjusted at my local casino to often play 1-3 since caps were raised. Bankroll is fine for 2-5 at higher cap, but I’m a rec who wants better chance to win and as long as stacks aren’t all $100 shorties, 1-3 is fine with $500 cap.

I’ll be likely to check out Bellagio again with this move.

This is an interesting point. I think a lot depends on the poker room. To be specific, I play a lot at The Bellagio and recently, since it's close to where I live, I've been playing a fair amount at Green Valley Ranch Station Casino. Here's what I've noticed concerning the $1-$3 games (and GVR has the $200-$500 buy-in).

1. The best players at The Bellagio are much better than the best players at GVR.

2. The worst players at The Bellagio (the tourists) are much worst than the worst players at GVR.

3. Overall, the players at GVR are weaker than the players at The Bellagio.

This says to me that the balance of luck and skill that a game needs to perpetuate is probably okay at GVR with the $500 max buy-in. But I suspect, because of the fact that the stronger players are much better at The Bellagio, this won't be the case (at The Bellagio).

Also, I suspect, as you point out in your post, that The Bellagio will, over time, lose some of their $2-$5 games as the better players will realize that they'll be able to now make a similar amount at the $1-$3 as they use to make at the $2-$5 (with a $500 buy-in) but their fluctuations will be less.

And another point. The Bellagio is encouraging a bomb pot for the first hand that a new dealer deals. Thai increases the luck factor (for the good players) in the game. Yet, at the same time, by having the larger buy-in they are now decreasing the luck factor for the good players. And when I say luck factor, I'm thinking in terms of the ratio of the win rate to the standard deviation in the short run.

And while you may be more likely to play at The Bellagio because of this change, I suspect that many tourists will get wiped out too quickly and be less likely to come back and play again.

If I'm correct, I question whether this is a trade off that The Bellagio wants to make.

This is going to sound bad, but what do dealers know about the "proper balance of luck and skill?" I hope that The Bellagio Poker Room Management, or any poker room management for that matter, is not listening to their dealers on how to run their poker room.

Agree with almost all of this except the bomb pots. While they are probably bad for the game overall, I don’t think they increase the luck factor for skilled players (I.e. those who understand the strategic concepts governing how to play them since they have a huge advantage over those who overvalue a good hand on one board etc.). So assuming there are bad players in the game it further increases the edge for skilled players (in addition to what they gain from the larger buy in). Maybe we are saying something similar in that it does increase variance but honestly you can play them in such a way that you virtually always have a freeroll or giant equity edge when you put money in the pot so the only variance is having to ante something; that’s a slight exaggeration but you can see what I am saying). So basically all the changes they are making will have more money going to better players and fewer winnging sessions for bad players, if there is a room on the strip that can sustain it though it is probably Bellagio as they have much more random walk in traffic than virtually anywhere else.

Okay. While bomb pots may increase the EV for excellent players, they also increase, in the short run, the standard deviation for these same players, and I think the standard deviation goes up more. again in the short run than the EV. Thus, that should increase the luck factor. Remember, in the long run, the effect of variance dissipates.

Also, at The Bellagio, almost all the bomb pots are PLO, and this is the case in the no-limit games. I think this reduces the effect on bad players who are too often playing just one way.

Whether I'm correct or not on the specifics above, the bottom line for me is that I think that poker rooms that spread bomb pots are foolish to do so.

I will be there for a couple of weeks during the WSOP and Bellagio is my home for cash games while in Las Vegas. It was time for the Buy-in increase. I think the changes are good No need to go any higher. I do not play bomb pots, so I appreciate the heads up on that.

I played a few sessions at the Bell 2/5 game a couple months ago, and the dealers basically have a good hustle going where they do a bomb pot of $11 per player at dealer change, except only $10 per player goes into the pot, while the last $1 per player gets automatically tipped to the dealer. So at a full table, the dealer gets an $8 tip at the start of their down essentially. That's the reason the dealers push the table to do bomb pots. I'm not against tipping dealers when I win a pot, but it seems silly to me to pre-tip the dealers 10ish% of the starting pot, while also having to pay full rake on that pot. That kind of thing doesn't fly at the bigger games (never seen that at 5/10 during the bomb pots), but lower stakes players are generally either clueless or just don't care that that 15% of the starting pot is getting raked/tipped out.

At 1/3 games people are tipping $1 out of $6. But I think players view it as tipping an extra $2 an hour out of their stack.

I didn’t know until very recently that MGM is also doing the PLO bomb pots. A dealer told me they started doing it about a year ago, stopped doing it, and players complained so they brought it back.

I think this may have changed. The last couple of times I played at The Bellagio, several dealers explained that if three (or more) players didn't want to play the bomb pot, the bomb pot wouldn't happen.

By the way, one of the dealers told me she didn't like dealing them, and I suspect that more dealers feel this way.

Also, do the dealers really make extra tips with bomb pots? They're now almost always PLO bomb pots, even though the game is no-limit hold 'em, and they take, in my judgement at least three times as long to play as a regular no-limit hand. And if some players don't participate in them, the extra tip money that the dealer gets may not be as much as it appears.

Things must have changed recently then, because when I played those 2/5 sessions, the bomb pots were always NLHE.

I played there two days ago and the bomb pots were PLO.

Bellagio used to have a 5/T/1000 game that I thought was cool and good action, and a stake low enough I could occasionally play that had time rake.

I feel like with rake reaching $6/hand, $300 max games oughta die, but bellagio had interesting/unique/old school structures which had intermediate step between the more common structures othee casinos offered, so its still a bummer.

*shudder*

I did see NLHE bomb pots in the 2/5 game around 2-3 months ago, but that was before the change to PLO.

They have changed their buy-ins. The $1-$3 is now $500 and the $2-$5 is now $1,000.

Is Bellagio doing tables in the sportsbook again this year or did the World Cup nuke that this year?

A dealer told me the sportsbook tables will be added in the coming week.

Was in Vegas for a conference and to play some poker last week and stayed at the Bellagio.
Hotel: 10/10
2 5 NL was a bit lower on action and played smaller than 2 5 games in Philly (where I am from and usually play) despite the newly increased limits. In fact I have not seen too many players buying in for the full $1K. All the players, floor and dealers were super friendly though and the drink service was great (both Fiji water and mid-range liquors were available).