Question of the Day - 27 November 2005

Slot tournaments are the fairest of all tournament games, because they place the smallest premium on skill. Tournaments that give players a set amount of credits and unlimited time to play them incorporate no skill factor whatsoever. If everyone contesting a tournament gets to pull a slot handle the same number of times, the winner will be determined purely by luck.

Some tournaments, though, limit the rounds to a set amount of time, often 30 minutes. This format allows fast players to gain a small advantage by getting in more pulls. The following strategy enhancements will help you in these "timed" tournaments. Though the suggestions may seem obvious, they're routinely ignored by slot tournament players.

• Play Fast. Stay focused and concentrate on your own play. Some slot-tournament participants, especially those with friends playing nearby, stop in the middle of a round to cheer for someone else who's hit a jackpot, which reduces their own spin total. Anthony Curtis tells the story of playing in a slot tournament with 20-minute rounds at the Tropicana. After 15 minutes, he was in third place. During the final five minutes the two players who were ahead became distracted. One began tapping the machine's spin button with her elbow. Anthony managed several extra spins in the last five minutes and pulled away to win.

• Conserve Energy. Many players frantically pound the spin button, even when the credits are tallying. This causes them to tire and lose spins. Tapping the button lightly is more energy efficient.

• Prepare. Before playing, familiarize yourself with the combinations that produce large payoffs and rest when you hit one. Take care, however, to resume play as soon as the meter stops registering credits. It’s not uncommon to see players sit for close to a minute without realizing that their machine was ready to be played.

We've seen formats (especially in Atlantic City) that use a single meter that increases with winning combinations and decreases with losers (acting much like a meter in actual play). This complicates things somewhat, since you risk lowering your tally every time you take another spin. If you're lucky enough to play in the last round, you might be able to determine a good stopping point by monitoring the best scores from the early rounds. If you have to play early, you'll have no choice but to set a lofty goal (a score that you think has a good chance of winning) and just play away until you reach it. As in most tournament play, as a rule, aggressive is better than cautious.

Finally, the best thing you can do to enhance your prospects for winning at slot tournaments is to devote your time to identifying tournaments that return the highest percentage of the entry fees ("equity") and those that offer the best perks for playing ("vacation value"). These are different considerations than just wailing away at a spin button; analyzing equity and vacation value is discussed in many Huntington Press publications.