Category: Advanced Strategy

I regularly participate in Thursday night workshops for an improvisation group in Las Vegas. Improv is a form of on-stage comedic acting where the scenes are made up on the spot in response to a suggestion from the audience. Although the group I go to is “clean burning,” meaning the language is suitable for all ages, it’s optional with each group whether to follow those rules or not.

Improv requires quick thinking and a sense of humor. On average, the people who come to these workshops tend to be both smart and a smart aleck.  These are my kind of people! I enjoy the group.

I first became fascinated with improv while seeing some “Second City” performances on cruise ships. Second City is a group that started almost 60 years ago and is probably the best-known improv troupe in the world. On cruise ships, most of their shows are family-friendly, but sometimes they’ll have a late-night “adults only” show where the language and gestures are raunchier.

In addition to the Thursday-night workshops, once a month we have a showcase where the better performers in the workshop get invited to perform for audiences who pay $10 to watch. I like the idea of being onstage and so am trying to get invited to perform. There are more wannabe performers than open positions and selecting the actors to perform is a subjective enterprise. Sometimes I get invited and sometimes I don’t. I expect to be invited for the February 16th showcase, but we’ll see.

There are a variety of games that are played during these workshops and showcases. I am best at the ones that involve rhyming. As a writer, I’m sort of a “word nerd” and rhyming comes easier to me than it does to others.

Plus, I study.

In addition to a few games where you have to compose songs on the spot, there are two different games require using words that rhyme with one-syllable first names, so I have prepared a list of words that rhyme with John, Stan, Kate, Pete, and about 30 other relatively common first names.

For a name like Jack the others in the group can “spur of the moment” come up with rhymes like back, black, crack, hack, rack, sack, stack, track, and whack. My list includes such words as amnesiac, Adirondack, Antonin Dvorak, Honoré de Balzac, cognac, almanac, Amtrak, insomniac, anorak and a bunch of others that are a bit outside of the mainstream. I have such lists for 35 names that I review periodically, “in case.” If one of these names is suggested by the audience, I tend to shine, which I am hoping increases my chances of being invited to perform in the monthly showcase. It’s an unpaid gig but being onstage is a type of high for certain of us.

Almost six months ago, on August 21, 2018, I wrote in this column about a buddy and his two kids. One of them, “Jack,” a twelve-year-old boy, also participates in the improv workshop along with his father. The vocabulary of a twelve-year-old is quite a bit less than that of most adults — and especially smart adults of the type who show up in the workshop.

To help compensate for this, I’ve sent Jack a few lists of rhymes and other material.  When Bonnie and I join their family for dinner once a week or so, we frequently play one of the improv rhyming games. As a result, Jack continues to improve and is now a better rhymer than some of the adults in the group who don’t practice. I have enjoyed watching his improvement over the past few months.

I’ve attempted to enlist Jack as an ally in my goal of being called to participate in the monthly showcases. I’ve provided him with a short list of rhyming names where I think I’m better than average. If I’m onstage and we’re going to be playing one of these games, I want him to call out one of these names from the audience that the group onstage will attempt to rhyme. Since I’ll be prepared, I’ll tend to do better than average.

Somehow, either I haven’t explained this well enough to Jack or he is unclear on what it means to be an ally. The last time the opportunity to call out a rhyming name came up when I was onstage, he came up with “Cole,” which is a name for which I was not prepared.

Spur of the moment, I came up with mole, foal, goal, and dole — but since I hadn’t studied this word, words like patrol, parole, rock-and-roll, español, shoal, skoal, and Superbowl, among many others, were not at the tip of my tongue. (They are now. After a name is used in the group, they tend to be re-used.) I had an opportunity to shine, with my helper in the right place at the right time, and he threw me a curve ball.

When I asked him why afterwards, he said he didn’t remember the words on the list I gave him plus he figured I was smart enough to figure it out on the fly. I’m not sure whether his “smart enough” comment was meant as a compliment or a dig. I’m betting on the latter.

While it is true that I could do better at that word than Jack could (assuming he had not extensively prepared for it), or better than many others in the group could do on the fly, I want to shine. I want to be a LOT better at these games than the others. I have only limited opportunities to impress the decision-makers with the fact that I deserve to be in the showcase. I want to be successful when these opportunities come.

So, I’m now asking Jack to review out loud the words I’ve sent him while he and his father drive in to the workshop every week. If Jack and his father, who’s also in the workshop, are both reminded of what’s on my list just before the workshop, perhaps one of them will “come through” for me. I’ve told them both that if they provide me with a list of the words they think are best for them, I’ll try to call one of them out at the appropriate time. I’m willing to be their ally whether or not they return the favor, but I strongly prefer that it be a two-way street. (Jack’s father is definitely an ally of mine — in many ways. Jack is so far a bit unclear on the concept. But he’ll learn!)

So, finally, what does this have to do with video poker? I am a very strong player and so some people conclude that I can play any video poker game in the world competently. Those people are incorrect – big time. There are a number of games I play at the professional level, but there are several dozens of games a casino could offer, along with a good promotion and slot club, at which I’m not currently competent. I can get good fairly quickly, of course, but it’s a process I must go through each time.

Right now, for example, I don’t play 9-5 Super Double Bonus competently. I used to know it well, but it’s not offered at casinos I frequent, for stakes I’m interested in playing, during the right promotions. So, the exact rules for the correct play when you have an ace along with a suited jack-ten are not front and center in my mind. I know sometimes you hold the ace by itself, sometimes you hold AJ, and sometimes you hold JT. Just knowing those things puts me ahead of most other players, but I want to be perfect at these decisions.

When I started playing Jacks or Better Multi Strike recently after a hiatus of a few years, I spent several hours getting up to speed and learning all the fine points. Now, I’m competent at this game, and so now is when I’ll go into the casino to play it during the right promotion. If I take another break from the game, I’ll need to relearn it one more time. Each time I relearn it takes a little bit less time than previously, as I certainly remember much of the strategy even after not playing for a while. But the fine points don’t stick with me as well as they did when I was younger.

The secret to my success, such as it is, is preparing extensively before I compete. This is true in video poker, improv, and many other things.  I like to “stack the deck,” as it were, so that I’m only competing when I’m prepared. Competing in things where I’m not prepared to succeed is not as attractive to me.

Obviously, none of us can be good at everything, and sometimes you must participate in things where your skills are less than average. I’m less than average at far more things than those things at which I’m better than average. But if I’m required to participate in something over and over again, I usually find it is worth the effort to get good at it. If I can’t get good at it, I’ll usually stop doing it if possible.

Author’s note: If you live in Las Vegas or are in the Vegas area on a Thursday night and are interested in checking out improv, look at //www.lvimprov.com. It will also provide you with information on our monthly showcases, where you are likely to find me, either onstage or in the audience.

For the first six months of the Gambling with an Edge podcast, my co-host was Frank Kneeland. One of Frank’s claims to fame, video-poker-wise, was that he managed a large team of video poker players for two years in the early 1990s. On one of the shows, about six years ago, Frank told a story about a player on his team way back then.

Video poker teams at the time primarily chased progressives. If a game was breakeven at $8,000, his team might start playing at $11,000 or so (every team had its own strike numbers.) The team members would get a $10/hour “salary” and some percent of the royal if they hit it. The royal money would go to the team owner, who would pay all the taxes — minus the expenses of paying his team members. The tax laws have changed since then, and video poker teams are far less common than they were then.

I may have a few of the details incorrect in the story, but I’m sure I have the gist correct. I’m sharing it because it provides a lesson today

The player involved, “Joe,” had played on Frank’s team for several months. As far as Frank was concerned, Joe was the perfect employee. Joe would show up when called and stay as long as needed. Some players are “high maintenance.” Not Joe. He quietly played and rarely had any special requests.

One day Joe asked Frank if he was about to be fired.

“Fired?” Frank asked. “You’re one of my best employees! Why would I fire you?”

“Because I’ve never hit a royal flush, and obviously the success of your business depends on hitting royal flushes. Since I can’t seem to do that, you must think of me as an undesirable employee.”

“Hardly!” Frank replied. “I really don’t care who hits the royal. That’s all pretty random. But if I have enough competent players playing when the progressive is high enough, I’ll end up ahead. So just keep doing what you’re doing and don’t worry about it.”

Why do I bring this up today? After all, I hardly ever play progressives.

Because there are a lot of players really concerned about their score. If they are ahead, they figure they are pretty good. If they are behind, they figure the opposite. (Of course, players who don’t keep track of how much they are ahead or behind don’t need to worry about this. They have other problems we’ll address another time.)

The key to success, as Frank realized, is playing when you have the advantage. That edge can come from the game itself (as it did back then) or from the slot club, mailers, promotions, or sometimes other things. If you’re playing when you have the advantage, and not playing when you don’t, on average, good things will happen.

You just don’t know when those good things will happen. Every player who plays long enough will go through the type of dry spell Joe was experiencing. I have. Several times. And I’m confident that with my skills and game selection, if it happens to me it will happen to you too. It’s just part of the game. Not a fun part, to be sure. But a part that will surely show up from time to time.

Joe’s “problem,” if you want to call it that, is not that he was running bad. Since he only played when and where Frank told him to, the team as a whole was playing with an edge. Since he was getting $10 per hour, plus a bonus that he hadn’t collected yet but would when he finally hit a royal, Joe was personally playing with an edge.

Joe had one advantage over the rest of us. His salary guaranteed he couldn’t go broke while gambling. (He could certainly go broke if he overspent his income, but gambling losses would never cause him to go broke.) The rest of us don’t have that safety net. At the same time, I wouldn’t want to play for $10 an hour.

Joe was giving up expected value for the sake of a guaranteed salary. That fits well with some people. Especially people without the skill and bankroll to successfully play the games profitably. But also people who are risk adverse — who just can’t stand to lose.

I don’t like to lose. But it doesn’t bother me very much. I’m confident that things are going to turn out pretty well over all and today’s score doesn’t matter too much.

Except for the last few weeks, I haven’t recently played any version of Multi Strike. In the past, I played 9/6 Jacks or Better, 8/5 Bonus Poker, and 9-4-4 Deuces Wild Bonus in the Multi Strike variation, but it’s been so long that I felt I needed a tune-up. Now in my seventies, my memory isn’t what it used to be.

I’ll be teaching the 9/6 Jacks or Better Multi Strike class on January 29 at the South Point. Although my notes for the class are prepared, I teach better when I have recent experience. This gives me “depth” and a better ability to deal with some questions that I would have otherwise forgotten. Teaching classes well is one of my goals.

Plus, since the game returns 99.79% and the South Point’s everyday slot club is 0.30%, it’s not as though it’s a financial burden to play. The only version offered at the South Point is the 25¢ Five Play variation, which requires a bet of $25 per play. Even though the player has a slight edge, Multi Strike has a higher variance than many other video poker games. I did lose $1,500 on my first foray back into the game. But that loss was recovered in later sessions.

As most of you know, Multi Strike is a four-line game where you pay for all four lines up front — namely 20 coins. (I’m referring to the game in most of this article as a single-hand game, rather than the Five Play version you find at the South Point. This is done to make the explanations easier.) If you earn nothing on the bottom line, your 20 coins are gone. And this can sometimes happen several hands in a row.

If you at least get your money back on the first line, you get to play the second line (called the Level 2x line) “for free” and at double the payoffs. Earn something there, and you play the third line (called the Level 4x line), again for free, at quadruple the stakes. The same pattern holds for the fourth line (called the Level 8x line). Periodically you get a “Free Ride” after the draw but before you decide on which cards to hold; this moves you up to the next higher line whether you score anything on the current line or not.

What isn’t so obvious to all players is that you use four different strategies for the four different lines. The logic behind this is that in regular video poker the pay schedule falls into the “what you see is what you get” category. When the hand is over, it is completely over.

That’s not the case in Multi Strike. If you score on the bottom line, you now get to play the second line for free, and sometimes the third line, and sometimes the fourth line. Those are very valuable “plusses.”

The second line can give you two extra plusses. The third line can give you one extra plus. The top line, and any Free Ride you get, gives you nothing extra. The strategies depend on how many additional plusses you stand to get when you succeed.

If you know regular 9/6 JoB (which may well be the easiest video poker game to learn), you’re well on your way to learning the Multi Strike version of the same game because the strategies you use for most of the hands are considerably easier than the regular strategy. Why? Because for the bottom two lines you avoid ALL 3-card straight flush draws, which are the most complicated hands to play for most players.

This is not to say you can forget part of the 9/6 JoB strategy when you play Multi Strike. You still need the entire strategy because whenever you either reach the top line or receive a Free Ride, the regular strategy is appropriate.

For me, there were two different times where I found I could be making a mistake. First was remembering where I was in the game. Did I need the Level 1x strategy or the Level 2x strategy? From K♥ Q♠ 9♥ 7♥ 3♥, on Level 1x, I should hold the KQ and on Level 2x I should hold the hearts. For A♥ Q♠ 9♥ 7♥ 3♥, I hold the hearts on both of these levels. It’s easy to get these confused. Each of the strategies by themselves aren’t so difficult, but holding them all in my mind at once and using the right one each time is not trivial.

I made another mistake, which may well be the biggest mistake I’ve ever made in video poker. Perhaps you’ll make it someday too.

This mistake came from the different way Multi Strike deals cards. When Multi Strike finishes a level where the player advances, it deals the next level immediately. That is, let’s say you’re dealt A♣ J♦ T♦ 9♣ 8♥ on Level 1x and correctly hold AJ. (You only hold JT98 on Level 8x or with a Free Ride.) If you are playing the Five Play version, let’s say you end up with a pair of aces on one of the hands and two pair on another. The 15 credits will add up, and immediately the Level 2x hand will be dealt.

The problem came when I had three hands live on Level 4x and held trip 5s. On two of the three hands, the trips converted into quads. This is an unusually good result. Each of the quads paid 500 coins ($125), which is four times the normal $31.25 you regularly get for these hands in quarter 9/6 JoB, and the trips registered $15 instead of the usual $3.75.

Certainly, I’ve had many thousands of jackpots higher than $265 in my life, but I took a few seconds to admire my good fortune. When I was finished “admiring,” I hit the button to play the next hand — which is my normal practice in every other video poker game I play.

Except in Multi Strike, the next hand was already dealt. When I hit the button intending to play the next hand, what I actually did was throw away all the cards on the hand that had already been dealt! With three live hands on Level 8x, this was equivalent to throwing all the cards away sight unseen on $2 Triple Play!

What were the cards I threw away? I have no idea! By the time I realized what I had done, the original cards were long gone. I know I wasn’t dealt a royal flush or that would have locked up, but other than that, I just don’t know. Very likely throwing all the cards away was the wrong play — potentially a very big error.

Oh well. Spilt milk. The reason I bring it up is that it strikes me as a relatively common mistake others might make as well, at least on occasion. So, I tell you in the spirit of “forewarned is forearmed.”