Bob Dancer

Posted on March 23, 2021August 24, 2023 by Bob Dancer — 19 Comments

Looking at a 50-coin Penalty for the Straight Flush in 10-6 Double Double Bonus

There is a version of 10-6 DDB that pays 200 for the straight flush rather than 250 and that change drops the return from 100.06% to 99.96%. Casinos which have a firm policy of never offering a game returning more than 100% sometimes have this game. I refer to the games as 10-6-50 and 10-6-40, where the 50 and 40 represent the one-coin return for the straight flush.

The strategy for the two games is very similar, of course, but not identical. If I had places where I could play both games, I’d likely use one strategy for both. But I don’t know of any casino with the 10-6-50 game where I want to and am welcome to play, so I concentrate on the 10-6-40 strategy. The Dancer/Daily Winner’s Guide for Double Double Bonus covers the 10-6-50 game completely. Today I’ll just discuss the differences between the two games. All money amounts assume you are playing for dollars, betting five coins at a time.

Posted on March 16, 2021September 18, 2023 by Bob Dancer — 11 Comments

Waiting to Get Ripped Off

Author’s note: This week’s blog has nothing to do with gambling. I’m hoping you find it interesting anyway. Next week I’ll return with something about video poker.

Bonnie and I live in a quiet neighborhood in Las Vegas. The homes are 30-35 years old and many of the original owners (including Bonnie) still live there. Everybody looks after each other and crime is low.

Posted on March 9, 2021August 24, 2023 by Bob Dancer — 18 Comments

A Birthday Present That Keeps on Giving

I turned 74 years old in mid-February. Not a big deal. I have a birthday every year. But this time it turned out to be special in an unusual way.

My Nevada Driver License expired on my birthday. Again, not a big deal. It always expires on a birthday, every three or four years. But this time it turned out to be special in an unusual way.

Posted on March 2, 2021August 24, 2023 by Bob Dancer — 16 Comments

A Lesson Relearned

Today we’ll have a personal anecdote about what happened to me recently. I’m not sure how widespread my situation is, but perhaps some of my readers will relate to it.

I’ve been gambling at video poker since 1994. For the right promotion, I’ll go any time of the day or night. To make this work, I also need to be able to sleep any time of the day or night so I can be at my best when I play. Sometimes I’ll play daytime for one promotion, sleep four to six hours, and then go play graveyard at some other promotion. At age 74, it’s more difficult to do this than it was when I was younger.

Posted on February 23, 2021August 24, 2023 by Bob Dancer — 14 Comments

Quitting While You are Ahead — Does it Work?

Recently, a poster on the videopoker.com forum wrote words to the following effect: “I have no doubt that if I could ever learn to quit while I was ahead, I’d be far ahead at video poker, even though I play games returning only about 99%.”

Let’s look more closely at that statement.

Posted on February 16, 2021August 24, 2023 by Bob Dancer — 37 Comments

Who Are the Patrons?

On our February 4 Gambling with an Edge podcast, Anthony Curtis brought up something that I had experienced, but not understood why it was happening. With some notable exceptions, numerous Las Vegas casinos have really tightened up. Slot clubs are less generous. Promotions are smaller. Games aren’t as loose as they were.

In my opinion, this is not the smart way for these casinos to be acting. Their customers are hurting. Their customers have less money. At least some of the customers are wary about venturing into casinos at all until the percentage of our population vaccinated is much higher than it is now.

Posted on February 9, 2021August 24, 2023 by Bob Dancer — 17 Comments

Two Stories

I have two brief things that came up recently and are worthy of writing about, but neither is sufficient to fill up an entire blog. So, I stacked them together. Hope you don’t mind.

New Rules

Posted on February 2, 2021August 24, 2023 by Bob Dancer — 8 Comments

Using One Strategy for Two Games

The mathematical analysis in this blog was done by Rick Percy. I do not have the tools to do that analysis myself. Thank you, Rick!

My personal goal is to learn the best strategy for every game I play. Not everybody shares that goal. Some people want to minimize their work, or don’t have the time, or have trouble keeping the differences between strategies straight.

Posted on January 26, 2021August 24, 2023 by Bob Dancer — 15 Comments

Killing the Golden Goose

There are some excellent video poker opportunities to be found from time to time in Las Vegas. When these are found, good players rush in to take advantage of them. After a few days or weeks of getting pounded, casino slot directors decide that they are tired of this, so they remove the promotions, the machines, or sometimes, the offending players.

For a promotion to work, good and bad players need to play. If the casinos do not make money, the promotion will not last. When good players hog all of the machines, the casino cannot make money, and so the casino makes adjustments.

Posted on January 19, 2021August 24, 2023 by Bob Dancer — 15 Comments

Is It Worth the Risk?

I was playing a $1 9/6 Double Double Bonus game with multiple progressives. The royal was at $5,400 and aces with a kicker (AWAK) was slightly above $2,300. The other two active progressives, which reset at $800, had been hit in the previous half hour and had not yet risen much.

The numbers made the game about 100.1% which I would usually consider a waste of time, but it was by far the best game in the house. The slot club added 0.2%, the meter was rising at 1%, and I needed to play some to keep my mailers coming. Plus, sadly, at the moment I didn’t know of any better game around, so I played.

Author: Bob Dancer