I have a four day trip scheduled for November. Right now I’m double booked for that trip at both Palazzo and Mandalay Bay, with great offers from both. I fully expect to low play during my four days as I have a lot of non-gaming activities scheduled and I’m kind of tight on time. Regarding future offers, not necessarily fully comped nights, who would be more forgiving in re low play, Palazzo or MLife? I normally don’t get comped nights but I do get pretty attractive discounted nights at both and don’t want to screw that up too much for future stays. Just interested in your opinions on who it would be better to low play this trip. I realize that neither property will be happy about low playing, not no playing, but is one of these operators going to be more forgiving than the other or will I be on a permanent shit list at both or neither? FWIW, my next several trips after this will be at Cosmo so it will definitely be well into 2023 before I’ll even be thinking about Palazzo or MLife. Also, is this something one or two solid days of play can rectify during my future trips when I’m staying at Cosmo by playing at Palazzo or MLife joints? Thanks VMB….
I continue to receive my 3 free nights, no resort fees from Palazzo even though I have been low-playing them the last 11 months. A previous host has told me that I need to average 4 hours a day in order to continue to receive those offers, but I would guesstimate I played half that on most of my trips and still receive the same offers. YMMV. Hope that helps!
Excellent. That is great to know!! I imagine I’ll be able to low roll my way through a couple of hours a day. Thanks for the post.
I think a lot will depend on your history with the property (for MB your history with all MGM properties). Longer history the more forgiving they will be. I believe MGM averages your past x number of trips/months, so a low play won't wipe you off the radar, but it might ding your offers depending on how it affects the averages. And from my own personal experience, and the experience of others it seems MLife is willing to still throw stuff at you even when it's been 2 or more years between visits, so you would likely still get offers just probably not as big.
I think I would take more of a chance on short playing MGM because they have more properties at lower price points. So even if you ding your rating pretty good, you'll still probably be able to sneak into the Luxor/Excal/NYNY triad at a reasonable discount. I'm not sure how long it will take either to cut you off. My longest gap in stays with MGM was 19 months, and I only booked the reservation that closed the gap a month before the trip. The last time I stayed at V/P was January 2018 and I have a comp offer that's good until the end of this year, but I have to call to get it and I suspect there would be a bunch of blackout dates. I think I checked them earlier this year and I don't recall having any comp offers, so it may come and go with them depending on market conditions. I think what I would do is set something up to ping yourself in May of 2023, and if you have dates in mind at that point, and offers, book something. Or before that if you have already dates set. I've usually found that if I short play for some reason, one subsequent stay of a normal length and play level basically cures things as far as room availability. Throw-ins can take longer to recover. But I also never do walk-ins, so I don't know how well a one-day walk-in will fix things. It should help, but it might not get you all the way back.
Yeah, I was thinking the same thing about MLife. Curiously enough, I haven't even stayed at an MLife property in over 20 years. I have their MLife credit card, play minimally once or twice each time I'm in Vegas, and still find that I get pretty decent, and sometimes incredible, discounts on their rooms. That's all that I'm trying to preserve. Even though I haven't stayed with them in ages I like the fact that I can always have them as a quality backup if I can't get a decent deal at Cosmo or V/P.
Well then, unless they have a 21.5 year cutoff, you should be good. Maybe the activity from the credit card is what's keeping your big discounts alive. Don't mean to pry but I'm curious why you'd book hotels at opposite ends of the strip for the same dates? Or is it 2 and 2?
In my experience. MLife is very forgiving when it comes to low play. I double booked MBay and Cosmo one trip. Did about a quarter of my normal play at MBay. The needle hasn’t moved in over two years. YMMV because of this pesky virus….
Not 2 and 2; I prefer not to do split trips. I originally booked the Palazzo; three nights comped and the last night at casino rate. Then I got to thinking that if I low play, which I will be doing this trip, I might burn future offers from them. I really like Palazzo and don't want to jeopardize my future comps with them. So, I checked out my MLife calendar and was astonished to see that I could get three nights at MB in an Elite King Suite for $12 per night and the fourth at around $50. I jumped on that right away. That was this past Sunday and interestingly enough those rates have gone way up since. Lucky timing for me. My dilemma isn't as much about where I would enjoy staying this trip, I'd be perfectly content at either property, but, rather, which reservation to cancel with future comps/offers in mind. I like to think three or four trips down the road when I budget my trips, usually a good year or two ahead of time.
@MikeOPensacola I would keep Mlife as well. Especially since they do a trip average for rating. Even if you happen to be able to find a single day where you play more than you planned for whatever reason it may be beneficial for your offers.
FYI - I hadn't stayed at MLife in a good 4 years since I went last month, and I always had offers. I show no play whatsoever in 2020 or 2019 on my win/loss statement
