What Means NSUD in Video Poker?

I don't understand the term NSUD. All I know it's a video poker deuce machine. Can I get a full explanation?

First, "ducks" is a nickname for 2s or deuces with poker and video poker players.

Second, NSUD stands for "Not So Ugly Ducks." The late video poker expert Skip Hughes labeled a particular Deuces Wild video poker pay schedule with this designation and it stuck.

Now, full-pay Deuces Wild (FPDW), sometimes called "Classic Deuces," has a payback percentage of 100.76%, making it a positive game for the player. The payouts are 250/4K for a natural royal, 200 for four deuces, 25 for a Wild royal, 15 for 5-of-a-kind, 9 for a straight flush, 5 for 4-of-a-kind, 3 for a full house, 2 for a flush, 2 for a straight, and 1 for 3-of-a-kind. These machines are few and far between these days, if you can find them at all.

In their place are far inferior Deuces Wild pay schedules, such as "Really Ugly Ducks," which substitutes a return of 4 betting units, instead of 5, for 4-of-a-kind; this reduction of a single unit in the entire pay schedule drops the return percentage more than 6%, all the way down to 94.34%. Yikes.

"Still Ugly Ducks" returns 4 for 4-of-a-kind, but ups the return on a full house from 3 to 4, for a return percentage of 98.91%. Better, but not good enough.

That brings us to "Not So Ugly Ducks," which returns 16 (instead of 15) for 5-of-a-kind, 10 (instead of 9) for a straight flush, and the dreaded 4 for 4-of-a-kind. The return percentage of NSUD is 99.73%. It's not a positive-expectation game. But it's so close that where you can find it, players club benefits usually push the total return to over 100%.

NSUD is often the best-paying video poker variation in the casino, but usually at the $1-and-higher denominations.

We should note that you won't find the designations Ugly Ducks, Still Ugly Ducks, or Not So Ugly Ducks anywhere on the machines themselves. They're all simply nicknames. You'll need to recognize the various pay schedules in order to identify them by their nicknames.

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Kevin Lewis Oct-16-2021

The home of NSUD

While NSUD games can be found at many places in Vegas, South Point has by far the most machines, at .25, .50., and $1 denominations. I don't know exactly how many but I'd say, easily over 100 of them. Plus, the slot club returns 0.3%, which is triple what everyone else pays. They also run frequent promotions (that last for a month), like double-point redemptions or half-price Chevron or Wal Mart gift cards, which effectively raise the slot club return to .06%. Definitely not so ugly compared to the rest of Vegas.

I remember my high school prom date, Not So Ugly Diana (NSUD). But I digress.

Kevin Lewis Oct-16-2021

Oops

I meant 0.6%. And I think her name was actually Not So Ugly Debbie.

Jerry Patey Oct-16-2021

Not so ulgly

It is a name of a dueled wild game that pays more than most games but less than full pay suedes where you are paid 5 for quads. I believe 50 fo SF and 80 for five of kind. It is still available but slowly removed. I will not mention places that have them. They read this and may not know they have them. The crowds will decrease the winter months. Adm vaccine mandates are here and you will see major repercussions coming. When cross dwindle it will be interesting to see what casinos do then. Their corporate guys think this will last forever. Worse is Boyd casinos. Their video poker is gutted. This means I will not be back to Vegas. I can play at tunica that has similar tables and 30 minutes away. Vpfree has description of games and pay tables. They also stay up to date on games. 4?Quuens just hit the vp at dollar and some 25cent games. Hardly reason to come to Vegas to play. No one has reported the slot machine payback. I doubt this is oversight. Vegas is on self dest. Course.

Michael Oct-16-2021

South Point

South Point has more than 10,000 games returning at least 99%. This is more such games than anyone else has.

rokgpsman Oct-17-2021

South Point machines

Gotta say BS to previous comment.
According to the South Point website and casinocity.com the South Point casino has about 2200 total machines, which includes all their slots, which never pay 100%.

Rod McElvain Oct-18-2021

why is this field required?

rokgpsman

Michael said 10,000 GAMES.  Many of the 2200 machines contain multiple games.  So, I'd hazard a guess that it's possible there are more than 10,000 games that pay at least 99%.

Question of the Day - 16 October 2021

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