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KANSAS CITY, MO TRIP REPORT

by JPB

JPB has been playing blackjack and counting cards part-time since 1996. He plays throughout the country but primarily in Missouri. He has been a Green Chip member of BJ21.com for four years and one-time winner of the Post-of-the-Month. JPB is a professional engineer with three engineering degrees and works as a consulting engineer.

This trip occurred in July 2014. Casinos visited include:

Argosy (Riverside)

Ameristar

Hollywood

Harrah’s

Kansas City, MO is the largest, or second largest market (depending on how you determine "largest," St. Louis may be larger), where a card counter cannot be banned for card counting. With such a restriction on the casinos, it is probably safe to assume the blackjack conditions in Kansas City are horrible, right? After all, if the casinos cannot ban card counters, then they must make the games bad enough that no card counter would play.

If you are making this assumption, you are very wrong. In this trip report, I cover three of the four casinos located in Kansas City: Ameristar, Isle of Capri,

and Harrah’s (and the Argosy located in nearby Riverside).

Kansas City Logistics

There are actually six casinos in Kansas City: two are located in Kansas: Hollywood and 7th Street. I do not believe 7th street casino offers blackjack. Hollywood is on the far western part of the metro adjacent to the Kansas Speedway. I will only be covering the Missouri casinos in this report. Three of the four casinos are fairly close on the northeast side of the metro area: Isle of Capri, Harrah’s, and Ameristar. They are not within walking distance but less than five minutes apart by car. Argosy is located in Riverside, about 10 miles west of the main cluster.

Argosy (777 N.W. Argosy Pkwy., Riverside)

This casino is part of the same chain as Hollywood. The casino has never been particularly good for the card counter, but at least they offered great comps before being purchased. The rules are the standard Midwest rules for two-deck games (H17, DAS, no RSA, and no surrender). RSA is allowed on the six-deck game but there are no other differences. Penetration is not good: 50% penetration on the two-deck games is typical. Penetration on the six-deck games is not very good either at about 4.2 out of 6.0 decks. The house advantage is 0.56% for the six-deck and 0.40% for the two-deck games. Argosy is the only casino where you will find $10 or $15 minimum double-deck games. The tables are typically less crowded than the other big casinos. The buffet is very good as well as the sports bar (Crazy Olives) and the steakhouse.

Overall, you can skip Argosy and head to Ameristar or Harrahs if you are a card counter.

Ameristar (3200 N. American Dr.)

This is the largest of the Kansas City casinos. On the main floor, you can find a small number of six-deck games with the standard rules: H17, DAS, RSA, and no surrender for a house advantage of 0.56%. Penetration is good at around 4.8 out of 6.0 decks. However, the six-deck games on the main floor seem to be usually crowded and table hopping is not that easy. In the high-limit area, there are usually at least two or three double-deck tables with the following rules: H17, DAS, no RSA, and no surrender for a house advantage of about 0.40%. Penetration is good and varies by dealer but is typically about 1.3 or better out of 2.0 decks. Table minimums are $25 or $50 and the maximum is higher than I ever bet (at least $2000). There are also a few six-deck tables in the high-limit area with the same conditions as in the main pit. The restaurants are good and reasonably priced; the highlight is Arthur Bryant’s barbeque. The buffet is very good also. I have not received any comps from Ameristar in many years, so I cannot comment on the current conditions, but the room and food comps used to be decent.

As I mentioned, a card counter cannot...

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