Prinz

I have not personally been on NCL. However, it’s my understanding from others who have sailed NCL with the inclusion of Drink Package as part of their fare, that the gratuities are charged at the time the drink is served and added to your bill.

 

Maybe others that have sailed on NCL recently with the inclusion of Drink Package can comment.

 

It sounds like you are referring to the times they didn’t offer the DP as part of the fare??? Recent cruises and inclusive of DP.

 

 

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When you buy the package you pay the daily charge + 20% gratuity right away.

You don't pay gratuity on individual $0 drinks.

That's the way it's always worked.

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Oh you are so blessed, hard to get a booking lately.

There is so much to enjoy on this ship, the staff was excellent and food! The Maitre’d fixes special pasta dishes in the dining room and shared his recipes. Enjoy it all!

Was Mario the maitre d'?

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I don't recall them being split for the yc inside on the seaside.

Tbh I don't recall them being split on the yc balcony on Divina either.

My wife always asks for an eggcrate topper on any cruise line. Maybe that helps.

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I just want to add, you do you. You know?

For me having a computer capable of playing games is an important part of my regular and vacation life. So I don't rely on the computers on board but instead bring a good laptop.

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That's a bit harsh. We're a healthy couple in our late 50s. I have a tough time believing that no one else would feel the same way.

I think it's obvious that that's way more than most people of any age.

Just seems that if that's what takes up the majority of your day, then you would plan what kind of vacation you take accordingly.

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I do not mean to minimize all of the wonderful benefits of the YC -- we truly thought the service went well beyond NCL's Haven.

 

However, on a holiday the bed is -- frankly put -- used many times a day and I don't mean for sleeping. Navigating the dip in the middle over the frames or perching on one of the smaller-than-twin-sized edges made "non-sleeping" a challenge. Not sure about other people, but it was a BIG deal for us.

How useful is the YC to you anyway if most of your waking hours are spent in the cabin?

I think maybe you should look for cruises or resorts that are geared towards this.

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Used properly it's a more than 10% difference.

You go from like 0.66% house edge to 0.55%.

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It's actually nice to chat with folks who appreciate the difference between dealer hitting soft 17, and the more subtle options!

 

"Best" play I ever saw was some genius splitting 5's!

Another big one is that there's no surrender on ncl lower minimum tables ($25).

You've got to expect people playing terribly on low minimum tables on a cruise ship. You don't have to like it and you can salt away. But you can't play their cards for them.

It is "funny" when they try to justify terrible plays by pretending to know statistics.

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Honestly anyone who wants to make money at BJ should only be playing at the bigger games. Playing at the smaller games for anything but entertainment(which is crazy IMO) is just giving your money to the house.

 

If you want to try and make money at BJ then put in less time and play at the bigger tables. 2 hours at the $50 table will be a better chance at making money than playing 10 hours at a $10 table. Get that house edge down as little as possible.

The only way to make money at BJ is to count cards and then play a lot of games, often. Because even with counting you only get at most a 1% edge.

Then you need to be at a place where counting is going to work.

Cruise ship casinos cut very deep. So that means you really need to hang around and not play until a shoe gets good. That's tricky on a cruise ship.

Even then you need to be on that ship most days out of the year and play, otherwise you're just counting on short term luck.

What you can plan to do is to just play by the book. Get drunk, have fun. Treat it as entertainment for which you pay a small portion of your money to the casino. People go drink at bars to have fun even though it's cheaper to do the same thing at home. That's how I look at it.

( there's a big difference in house edge between people who think they play by the book, appears to be the majority of the people on a cruise, and people who actually play by the book )

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So nothing like the good rules above until you get to $50? Stay on soft 17, split anything, double after splitting, double any two cards including softs?

Hit on soft 17

Split anything

Double after splitting except when splitting access

Double anything

Those are pretty standard rules in most casinos, the main difference being at which minimum does the dealer stay on soft 17.

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The odds and payouts are almost identical to land based casinos. More and more land based casinos have gone to auto shufflers and 6:5 on BJ at the smaller tables.

 

On NCL all $50 and up tables(some $25 and up on smaller ships) will be your best bet. 3:2 on BJ and the dealer stays on a soft 17 which most players do not realize is a player advantage to have the dealer stay. Splitting any 2 cards and doubling on any 2 cards is also a player advantage that most players fail to recognize.

 

All in all $50 and up BJ and craps on NCL is as good as odds as you will get at almost any land casino. Sure there are 100 times craps tables out there but there are tricks to them also.

On Royal you have to put five times the minimum on the pass line to be allowed 345. That's what happens when there's no competition.

I do miss some kind of "fire" bet on NCL. I know it's big house odds, but they're fun for the whole table at a low cost.

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On all of the ships I mentioned they use a multi-deck shoe for all blackjack

The six dollar minimum on all the ships have CSM.

Pretty sure the same goes for most ten dollar minimum.

It's not until the fifteen dollar tables that you'll reliably get a regular shoe that only gets shuffled at the end of the shoe.

You can check lots of CC threads that confirm this.

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What was the problem?

And they don't do anything more than look at your passport and compare to the passenger list.

Oh, and then you still get to go through CBP a second time on land after you embark.

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As a Canadian citizen, this is how I disembark in Boston every time. I do not love it.

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They used a multi-deck shoe on every NCL cruise I have sailed and reshuffle by hand only when the marker is reached. No idea what ship you were on, but Spirit, Jewel, Getaway, Sun, Dawn, Gem, Epic, and Escape use neither auto shufflers nor every deal shuffling.

Those are the 6:5 tables. (Which to me makes it 21 and not real blackjack )

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I searched and could not find the answer. When booking through Casino at Sea, do they have the same available inventory the you see online?

If you're just booking through them for a discount they've got the same inventory.

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If this is the one where they check non us citizens passports it can take hours. This included Canadians as well.

We had this on a Norwegian Dawn disembarkation. Even though to embark in Boston we obviously had to enter the country through customs, so quite a waste of time.

Our concierge said it would take like half an hour.

We showed up a little earlier just in case. It took us two hours to get through it.

And there was several hours worth of line still behind us.

One of the things was that there was one guy checking passports. And if they didn't have the whole cabin checked together instead of putting them to the side they would stop the whole line until they could get the rest of the people in that cabin.

Oh, also you still needed to go through regular cbp on land after disembark.

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We are traveling with our daughter for the first time and would love a few passport stamps...hoping some can help with some information on where to get passport stamps in Bridgetown. Thanks for any help you can give!!

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Those steel cables are useless by the way. You mean those kingston steel cable lock things right? We use them at work and one time we were moving floors and my coworker had lost her key. You know what we did? Just grabbed the laptop then gave it a firm tug and leaned a bit and it busted the plastic tab holding it in near the laptop and it was free. It's useless.

Yeah, I had a similar issue with mine, and broke the lock altogether.

But, it would I think be enough to stop someone who's walking by while the steward is cleaning the balcony type of thing.

I wouldn't be worried about an employee stealing anything in a cruise ship.

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Wow.. that is crystal clear .. too bad that doesn't exist on the US site.. I did a search before this process started and found nothing even close to it.. guess the US affiliate should hire the UK web people to update the site.

Number 5

That's how it's worked on every cruise line, always.

I don't know why anybody would believe that you paid more for a gty. They are always the cheaper option.

Maybe your cabin price went down after you booked a few times so you now think that you paid more for a gty. But you don't, and you didn't.

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For the blackjack discussion, doubles on ANYTHING, including softs (ie double on soft 17?)

Double on anything except split aces.

You can double on a twenty if you like.

On all NCL ships, has been that way for years.

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Hi, going on the Dawn in September. Do they have 3 Card Poker tables? If so, are they $5 or $10 minimums?

They did two years ago.

Don't know the minimums as I play blackjack and craps.

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I don't want more people in the YC but the best thing should be to skip the YC inside "suites", I think.

 

(Just my opinion!)

Nooooo. Not the inside suites.

That's the best part.

First time we sailed MSC it was on the Divina.

We found that the only time outside sleeping we spent in the cabin was to bring alcohol from the mini bar to the casino, it was before YC had free drinks ship wide.

So when I saw the seaside was coming out with inside cabins I was very happy. To me it's got no cons, and it's cheaper.

All the things we want out of the YC is the YC, not the cabin.

I'll agree it's a little strange to have insides in the "elite Yacht Club", but it's great for me.

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Those who are booked in YC rooms wouldn’t notice the difference. You’re talking about 10-15 suites on each ship. Seems like common sense for me. The double deck suite on the Bellissima is probably the nicest cabin yet it won’t have YC access which baffles me.

Might actually create some capacity issues during dinner service.

We also like that the lounge is quiet. It may be selfish but I wouldn't want them to do this.

Also, $100 dollars seems a little low for a week.

Maybe it's a little strange that the nicest suites aren't YC. But we'll always take that tradeoff. I don't want to sail MSC outside the YC.

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You are right. I do use the Butler more when sailing MSC. I use the concierge less on MSC, too. Not sure why that is.

On msc we spent most of our time in the YC. We don't do a lot of specialty restaurants ( although the sushi on the seaside was amazing).

We don't like the shows on msc that much, and your butler can help with that anyway.

The concierge can't help much with the casino.

For disembarking at ports and after the cruise the butler assists you with that.

So I think on MSC the butlers do a bunch of things that the concierge does on NCL.

Which makes the butler just sort of an extra steward.

The concierge on MSC to me is more like an info point/corporate secretary.

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