I met Sean at the Pinky Ring when he asked if I wanted a drink from the $300 bottle of wine he wasn’t going to finish and wasn’t even close to hitting his minimum tab. I politely declined the wine, sat down, and ordered two Perriers.
Sean works in tech, lives in San Jose, and is a Vegas regular. At 45, he’s ready to retire.
Hopping on SW flights, he frequents Strip casinos, is often comped, likes slots and roulette, cigars, good food, and high-end fashion. He always brings a low-four-figure bankroll. High-limit $25-$50 slots and roulette or other high edge games are just fine with him.
Sean is, of course, the casino’s sweet spot.
Being an Advantage Evangelist, I fervently believed I could change that. “Have you ever played video poker?:
“No. I never bothered to learn.”
I liked Sean. And I knew advantage player revelations would turn him.
We started out with roulette. “I like playing my numbers.”
Okay. I wasn’t going to discuss the 18-month study and 45-page paper I’d written on non-linear recurrence theory in roulette or the work I’d done with the wheel-bias king Laurence Scott.
I started by steering him away from triple zero’s almost 8% house edge. “On that $50 game you were playing at Wynn, Sean? That’s almost $4 per spin you’re handing the house.”
“Really? Wow. But I got this really cute girl’s number while playing.”
Sigh. Cost of dating, I guess.
Later, we started searching out single zero. Yes, it’s still roulette, but at least the edge is 2.6% not 5+% or 8%.
I also discussed the concept of advantage play slots, but it was clear he didn’t want to work that hard to learn. So we went back to near positive-expectation video poker and strategy cards. Sean wasn’t intimidated and was willing to learn, even if his first reviews of strategy cards left him feeling like a fish out of water.
I kept it simple, 9/6 Jacks or Better hold-the-pairs simple. I also steered him away from Deuces Wild as I figured the high volatility would scare him off. And I felt like the lone monk in the jungles of Vegas, bringing just one soul out of the slot darkness — and into the fold of the Church of the Lower Edge of Advantage Play.
Revelations: “Prosperity is yours, my son! Read your strategy card! Learn what VPFree2 and the LVA gods have given you!”
And he started winning. Hitting his first $450 full house changed everything.
“So Sean, what about slots?”
“Slots?! Are you kidding? I’m never going back to slots!”
Praise Jean Scott and cash those TITO tickets, baby. I’ve found my mission.
My opinion – anyone playing slots just hates money. The casinos market playing slots as “Entertainment” – that is just another word for “don’t expect to win”. If you don’t actually “get lucky” you will lose again and again. Remember this – slot machines and the revenue they generated built Vegas. Never forget that, no matter how fancy the slot machines are and how “entertaining” they are.