35 Years of Advantage Play – Part 12

I would really like to write an autobiography, just talking about all the fun times and interesting experiences we’ve had in the casinos over the years. I already am writing a blog which covers a lot of that sort of material but it would be nice to bring it all together in a book. But that’s all going to come down to time. Right now, Brad and I are still active players and I’m trying to update all my previous books, so finding time to write a new one is difficult. Although I have threatened to retire for many years, I probably never will, but I figure the book in my head will demand to come out some time!

I wrote that several years ago, answering a question about whether I would ever write a Frugal Gambler autobiography.  How things can change in just a few years!

Now, in 2020, we did retire from casino gambling, moving to Georgia to be near family that would be a safety net as we deal with Brad’s failing health. I thought I would probably wind down my blog writing since not being around casinos anymore I wouldn’t have any current gambling advice to share.  However, that “book in my head” started coming out, albeit in just small pieces, just the right size for a blog “chapter.”

Actually, when I started this series, I really didn’t plan for it to be an ongoing project.  Here was my thinking:  We had taken one last trip back to Vegas in February to attend the Blackjack Ball, staying at the Rio where we had many comps to use up and $600 in airfare reimbursement to collect.  This was given to us as free play so that meant we had to run it through at least once on one or more machines.  Some of my readers had asked what game did we play.

Now I had a problem.  I know many expected us to choose video poker and explain how we hunted for the one with the highest EV; that’s what I had been recommending in my writings for over 25 years.  But that is not what we did.  We played slot machines!!!

How can I explain why we did that and not disappoint the players who had been following us for so many years?  Or, worse yet, would this influence both novice and experienced players to throw aside all the wise gambling precepts I had preached all these years?

Here’s what I needed to do:  I must explain why we played slots – a very negative situation – for a very brief time.  There were many reasons.  The Rio had no positive VP machines and we had no extra benefits or there were no promotions to push it over 100%.  Furthermore, we were sure we wouldn’t be doing any casino gambling in the future – at least not for a long long time and perhaps never – so we weren’t concerned with future benefits. In fact, if we had been looking for future mailings, playing slots would probably generate more of them than would VP.  This was going to be very short-term play where luck is the overwhelming factor, so we decided to go for…. wait for it… the fun factor.  And it was fun, taking that free play and jumping from machine to machine, choosing those that looked like fun, ones that we had seen others having fun playing.  We’d play a bonus round and move on.  Hit a little jackpot and move on.  We played about an hour and ended up with about $400 profit from the $600 free play.  We called that good luck.

However, if I was going to write about this brief step off the path of advantage play, I needed to tell you about staying on the path for 35 years and how that was the reason we had such great financial success.  I needed to explain that this was fun too; combining profit and entertainment makes for a very exciting life!

So, in early May I got out all my records and I figured I would write one blog giving a financial summary of 35 years of advantage casino play.  Well, here is how I ended that blog:

I can see now that this “financial report” I promised may take more background explanation than I planned.  So, I just added Part 1 to the title and I will continue this saga in my next blog.

Blame it on pandemic boredom – but I still have a lot more I want to talk about.  So tune in next week for Chapter 13.  In the meantime, here is an old Rio photo memory.  And yes, Jean Scott had to enter this invitational  BJ tournament using her real name, which is on all my players cards!