Category: Video Poker

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Would This Be a Better Strategy?

Assume you’re playing 9/6 Jacks or Better and you’re still at the stage in your playing career where you need to regularly consult a strategy card. You’re dealt 2♠ 3♥ 4♣ 6♦ 9♠.

Experienced players know you throw all five cards away. But this is not an experienced player we’re talking about. This is a beginner — at least to this game. At least to the ranks of players who play using a computer-generated rule. The unsuited 2346, a 4-card inside straight with no high cards, is held in some games. Such a player might well ask: “Is this particular 4-card inside straight held in this game?”

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An Opportunity or a Predicament?

It’s been a long time since I addressed this subject. The opportunity to actually do it hasn’t happened recently, so you should know that the situation I’m about to describe is fictitious, not factual. Still, the situation does happen periodically and knowing how to handle it when it does happen is worthwhile.

I’m playing $2 NSU at the South Point and a lady next to me is playing $1 9/6 Double Double Bonus. She’s dealt A♦ J♦ 3♦ Q♦ K♦. She doesn’t know me, but since I’m playing my game rapidly (by her standards) she assumes I’m knowledgeable and she asks me whether she should hold four or five cards?

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Why is There a Difference?

You’re playing dollar Double Double Bonus with progressives on both the royal and aces with a kicker (AWAK). On the hands we’re going to talk about today, the only thing that matters are quads and full houses, so assume AWAK pays $2,200 and a full house pays $45. If you’re not familiar with the game, trips pay $15 and aces with the fifth card not being a 2, 3, or 4 pay $800.

I’ll start with the three hands in question, where suits don’t matter:

  1. AAA45
  2. AAA44
  3. AAA43
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Video Poker and The Golden Rule

According to Wikipedia, “The Golden Rule is the principle of treating others as one wants to be treated. It is a maxim that is found in most religions and cultures. It can be considered an ethic of reciprocity in some religions, although different religions treat it differently.”

I’m not here to debate religion. Consider, however, the following:

  1. A juicy promotion begins at midnight. There are only a few machines that pay well during that promotion. This means only a very few players will get to play the good machines during the promotion, and most will be shut out. You get to one of those machines at 6 p.m. and play the machine slowly. This guarantees you will get to play the desirable machine and others won’t. After midnight you play much faster.
  1. Perhaps the same situation as above, perhaps a different one. You make a deal with another player to “take over” your machine while you sleep, and then give it back to you. Eight to ten hours later, you return the favor. This keeps the machine “in the family,” and others who want to play it, can’t.
  1. It’s a drawing with physical tickets. You’re a proponent of the theory that folding the tickets before putting them into the barrel gives you a better-than-strictly-random chance to win. But anything that increases the odds in your favor, decreases the odds of other players.
  1. A restaurant where you get comped meals has the policy that on your birthday, you get a free piece of Death by Chocolate cake, with forks for everybody else in your party so you can share. You claim about four birthdays a year at each restaurant that has a policy like this. This dishonesty reduces the profits of the restaurant owner for your benefit.
  1. At one casino, playing $20,000 coin-in a month maximizes the benefits you receive. You obtain ten multiple IDs and have a player’s card in each of them. This way, you can get far more benefits from this casino than the casino had designed.
  1. A casino ends a multiple point promotion at midnight, but so long as your card is inserted prior to midnight and remains inserted, you continue to get multiple points long after the promotion is intended to conclude. 
  1. You believe that casinos are sleazy organizations and don’t deserve to be treated honestly. So, you look for ways to cheat them.
  1. Someone has left $20 worth of credits on a machine. You insert a $100 bill into the machine, play a few hands, and cash out for $115. 
  1. There are only a few “good” machines available on a progressive bank. You want them for your friends. So you bring out foul smelling cigars and begin to smoke them in the vicinity. When other players leave in disgust, your friends sit down, and nobody smokes anymore.
  1. A floor supervisor taps you on the shoulder and asks if the $100 bill on the floor behind you belongs to you. In truth, you have no way of knowing. But your answer is, of course, “It must be. I pulled money out of my pocket and must have dropped that one. Thank you!”
  1. You’re too sick to go to work and expose people you know to your illness, but not too sick to go to a casino and expose strangers.
  1. You are dealt three aces and hold them, except you know you didn’t hold the third ace firmly. You draw the fourth ace, but the third ace “unholds.” Even though you know it’s your own fault, you call the slot supervisor over anyway and complain about stick buttons.
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Has This Happened to You?

Bonnie and I recently checked into a local casino comped room. We don’t really “need” a room — we’re locals living about 15 miles away — but Bonnie doesn’t drive anymore, I was planning on playing four hours or so in a particular promotion, and we wanted to eat dinner together at the casino.

Bonnie is a non-player (well, she allows herself $5 sometimes at nickels, until it goes). Video poker is basically my avocation/vocation. She’ll take along some books on tape. Often, she’ll get her exercise by walking through the air-conditioned casinos, which are much cooler than Vegas in the summertime. She knows how to use Zoom, and sometimes she’ll have a nice chat with one of her friends or relatives while she’s waiting.

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A New Game for Me

I was looking at dollar progressives and found a 9/6 Triple Double Bonus Poker game where the royal was at $5,300, aces without a kicker were at $1,400, and the two kicker jackpots were just slightly higher than reset. It was a bartop game, the meters rose by 1% with each dollar played, and nobody was playing it.

I have not played a lot of progressives, but I was pretty sure this was positive. I went to my hotel room, checked my computer, and found out it was right at about 101%, including the slot club. I created a strategy using the Wizard of Odds Video Poker Strategy Calculator, studied that, practiced the game on WinPoker for about twenty minutes, and headed down to play.

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End of An Era?

In late May of this year, I sent an email to the powers that be at the South Point letting them know that I wished to resume teaching free video poker classes on Tuesdays in September. I was told that they would discuss it at the staff meeting and get back to me.

This is the way it’s been at the South Point for almost ten years. Twice a year, we’ve had this exchange of emails. The classes were postponed during the pandemic, of course. For the fall semester of 2020 and winter semester of 2021, my emails to them stated my belief that it was too early to resume classes again, and naturally they agreed with me.

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A Look at Malcolm Gladwell’s The Bomber Mafia

I am a big fan of Malcolm Gladwell. Most of his books deal with research into the social sciences, particularly sociology and psychology and have been best sellers. His latest book, The Bomber Mafia, deals primarily with the philosophies of bombing during World War II, and has not become a best seller —  at least not yet.

The words “Bomber Mafia” refer to a group of American pilots in the 1930s stationed at what was then called Maxwell Field in Montgomery, Alabama. These pilots dreamed of more humane ways to conduct wars. They believed that bombing strategic targets made sense, and bombing population centers didn’t.

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My Explanation

In the comments on gamblingwithanedge.com relating to a recent blog post of mine, a man named Tim wrote: 

Perhaps this has been discussed multiple times, but why don’t the Strip casinos offer full pay video poker? For example, I would sit and play 10 play 9/6 Jacks or better quarters for hours (like I do at South Point). If there is only 6/5 bonus, I may sit at a bar and just play $20. 

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Doing a Favor for Billy Walters

I don’t play golf at all, and the only miniature golf experience I’ve had in the past ten years was playing a few 9-hole rounds on a cruise ship with Bonnie. The putters had steel blades covered in brightly colored plastic. I used a blue one because those were the longest and I’m pretty tall. Bonnie used an orange one. I did okay. I did better than Bonnie did, but this was hardly a real test. 

For some reason, though, I recently had a dream about playing miniature golf for high stakes with some guy. I never learned his name. But I was making fancy shots right and left and ended up with a check from him for about $10,000. Pretty sweet.

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