This page is simply a collection of my own experiences at every poker room I have visited. I cannot guarantee my experience is typical, but hope this information will be helpful to you in choosing where to spend your gambling dollars.
B&M rooms are listed in alphabetical order.
Last visit: 24 Febuary 2005
Three cramped tables squeezed onto the floor of the casino. Very smoky, poor ventilation. (Maybe it's OK as a nonsmoking room, I don't know.) They were spreading 3/6 kill and 4/8 kill when I visited. I didn't stay to play, and went across the street to the Last Frontier instead.
About ten tables, spreading $4/8, $6/12, $12/24 and $20/40 most nights, and occasionally an Omaha game. Like everywhere else near Seattle their jackpot drop has just gone up to $2. On the up side this is the closest of the 'big' rooms to Sea-Tac, and playing there until 2 in the morning if you have to be at the airport at 4 for a 6AM flight is a nice alternative to an overpriced hotel room. On the down side, there isn't much of a discount on the food (and very small portions!), and the dealers let people get away with badgering their opponents and exposing hole cards to their friends in the next seat way too much. Parking is very limited. Probably a very comfortable room before the poker boom hit, but now very cramped.
Last visit: 24 February 2005
Seven tables. When I was there, three tables each of 3/6 kill and 4/8 kill, and one table of 10/20. Rake is the usual 10%, $3 max, $1 jackpot drop.
The jackpot drop is actually given back and then some. They give away $250 to the high hand every hour on the hour, along with a fixed $10,000 bad beat.
Table games are in the same room, but no slot machines so the noise is not intolerable. Smoky but a high ceiling. On-site restaurant but I don't know what the comp arrangements might be.
Many regular players, and my session here was one of the tighter tables I've seen in a low-limit B&M game. On the plus side, nice views of Mt. St. Helens on the drive to the casino.
Last visit: 26 February 2005
About four tables. When I visited the only game going was a 4/8 kill game but the signage indicated they also spread 2/4 and no-limit. The tables are in one corner of the casino area but not separated from the floor by a wall, so a little bit noisy.
They get credit for having been a non-smoking cardroom before state law required it. Recent Internet reports are that they spread a no-limit game Thursday to Sunday nights.
Last visit:22 August 2005
One of the two big Seattle-area card rooms, eighteen poker tables. They spread Holdem in limits from 3/6 up to 50/100. Most evenings there are two or three 3/6 games, five or more of 4/8, one or two of 10/20, one table of 20/40 or 30/60. Also usually two tables of seven-card stud.
Rake is 10%, $3 max, $1 jackpot drop. (Update, May 2007: most Seattle area rooms now take $2 jackpot drop.) All the dealers I had were competent, some were excellent. Bad beat jackpot requires losing with quads; variable size, ranging from $30,000 up to $55,000 when I have been there. Every full house or better entitles you to a ticket to enter a drawing for a money giveaway but the value of the tickets is negligible. The bonuses seem small compared to the amount they collect in the jackpot drop.
Well ventilated enough that it was bearable for a non-smoker when they still allowed smoking. Orders from the on-site restaurant are half price if served to you at the table. All the usual table games and slots available elsewhere in the casino (but no bargains - unfavorable blackjack rules, and the video poker machines are all "8 and 5" for instance.) I avoid the Muckleshoot for reasons unrelated to poker, but the poker room is well managed. Word on the web is that the room is expanding from 18 to 31 tables in spring 2007.
Several local hotels will offer you a special rate if you tell them you are in town to play at the casino. See the Muckleshoot's website for details.
Small three-table room, tacked into the far back corner of an Indian casino. Lots of slot machine noise spills into the cardroom. Only game going when I was there was $4/8. One tournament a day, and, so I am told, an Omaha 8 game one night a week (I think they said Thursdays). You can phone ahead to put your name on the list. $1 jackpot drop.
Daily no-limit tournament at 10AM. Two or three tables on the casino floor. They were spreading one 3/6 kill game the morning I visited.
Location at International Boulevard just south of 192nd street is in walking distance of Sea-Tac airport hotels. Handy if you have an overnight stay without a rental car or even a long layover at this airport (the hotels all offer free airport shuttles.)
A small friendly room. A few tables of blackjack, pai gow, etc in one corner, four poker tables in the other. Only game running most days is $4/8 with a half kill. Sundays are $5-25 spread limit. (In other words, if you're a low limit player, don't plan to play on Sunday morning or early afternoon.) One daily tournament, which ends after 3 hours and top three places are paid - does NOT run until one player is left. $1 jackpot drop. You can phone ahead to have your name put on the list for a seat.
The other really big room, about twenty tables. Games spread theoretically include stud, holdem from $2/4 up to $50/100, no-limit, Omaha, and pineapple. In practice, there was usually only 4/8, 10/20, and NL going. I did eventually get a seat at 3/6 but only after being pressured heavily to play 4/8 first. 2007 update: emphasis continues to shift toward NL. As of May 07, Tulalip was one of the few Seattle rooms still taking $1 instead of $2 for the jackpot.
The good news: it's a non-smoking room, clean and well-maintained. In addition to being able to order food at half price while playing, they provide a complimentary buffet at mealtimes in the poker room. The bad beat jackpot is aces full of tens or better, and a small additional bonus for every royal flush dealt.
The bad news: game selection is a bit limited. The NL game is $3 and $5 blinds, $200 buyin, so very action-oriented. The NL game always has a couple tables going and tends to draw in the "saw it on TV and want to try it" crowd - which means that the 3/6 and 4/8 games are tougher than you'd expect for a room this size.
No hotels in walking distance, and no discounts at the hotels in driving distance, but there is a free shuttle every hour to five hotels in the surrounding area if you don't have a car.
All online poker rooms have suffered reduced table selection and become much tighter in 2007 as a result of the new US banking rules that make it harder to deposit money.
My first choice for online poker. Clean no-frills interface, and the "mini view" is ideal if you multi-table or just like to watch two or three tables while you wait to see where a seat will open up.
Hand records can be displayed in a separate window at the conclusion of each hand (and show mucked hands at the showdown.) A hand-grabber program, UltimateHistory, is available to automatically download all your hand histories.
Bonus dollars never expire, and you can withdraw money immediately after you deposit it and still qualify for a deposit bonus. The bonus is released pennies at a time after every raked hand you play. Spring 2007 update: the bonus clearance rate is now very, very slow, the worst in the industry.
Formerly the most generous site on the internet for giving reload bonuses, and still offers frequent reloads but at a very slow clearance rate. If you like full tables, game selection is limited especially late at night. Always lots of 6-seated tables going.
Recent improvements to the software made it easier to review your previously played hands. Using the waiting lists is a nightmare especially if you'd like to try playing more than one table at once. Your first indication a seat is open is often a popup saying "you have been removed from the waiting list"!
A small friendly site. The games are loose -- I often see as half the table taking the flop even at $2/4 and $3/6 tables -- and the players seem chattier than elsewhere. Playing interface is uncluttered and functional (but no miniview.)
The site doesn't advertise heavily, doesn't feature big-name pros, and doesn't do a lot of big flashy promotions or frequent reload bonuses. Still, I find I have no trouble making enough extra money at the tables to make up for the lack of free gifts.
One other minus is that the hand histories are available only on the web, not as downloadable text files you can study at your convenience.
You'll either love or hate the interface. It has some novel features, like automatically rotating the tables so you always sit South, and allowing you to play 3 tables at once, one full-size in the middle of the screen and the others as insets on the left edge. (This means you can't resize or reposition the tables.) Sometimes hard to find a game as the player base is small, especially if you want to play anything besides hold'em.
Their main claim to fame is having produced two World Series of Poker winners in the last 3 years. The site itself is clean and functional. On the downside, the games are pretty tough, and there is very little in the way of bonuses / promotions / signup incentives. Not a site I choose to spend much time at. On the plus side, they have added a wide variety of games recently - you can now play razz, triple draw, and HORSE, among others.
As of May 2007, one of the largest rooms, and the only one to regularly offer Razz, HORSE, and triple draw tournaments.
A good selection of games at all limits, and also offers a few of the less common games including 5-card draw. Interface is eyepleasing (you can even choose what drink you want to appear beside your chair!) and functional. Very few incentives to play here aside from that - no frequent players club, and very few bonuses. Quit accepting business from US players in fall 2006.
Part of the OnGame network. I find the interface a bit more temperamental than most (can't see the discards in 5-card draw unless you watch carefully; there are nice shortcut keys for bets and calls and folds, but not for posting blinds... little things like that) and the hold'em games are tight. They quit accepting business from US players in the fall of 2006.
Part of the CryptoLogic network. Holdem ring games are VERY tight, often fewer than 30% seeing the flop except at the very lowest limits. The 7-card stud games, on the other hand, still have quite a number of loose players. $50 per month bonus to every active player, if you can bear to play long enough to meet the requirements for it.