Question of the Day - 15 July 2018

To answer your first question, yes, returning your bet on a pair of face cards on a Jacks or Better video poker machine is definitely part of the built-in house advantage, as is the rest of the payout schedule, of course. It would drastically alter the casino edge if, for example, a Jacks or Better game returned two units for a one-unit bet on a pair of jacks or better (like it does for two pair).

Secondly, it’s not “almost” misleading. It's totally misleading to say that "You Win” something on a push. That’s the nature of machine gambling, where your bet is subtracted from your total credits when you hit the deal or spin button, then added back when your result is a tie.

It’s even more pronounced when, for example, you make a max bet of $3 on a Megabucks machine and the reels line up in such a way that pays you back $1. “Congratulations! You Win $1!” is a lot more exciting than if the machine came out with, “You’re a sucker. It looks like you ‘won’ $1, but in reality, you lost $2.”

Contrast that with blackjack where, when you and the dealer have the same card total, your bet just sits there in the circle, waiting for the next hand. There’s no illusion that you won something.

All that said, we’d be remiss if we didn’t repeat one of Jean Scott’s favorite lines: “Breaking even at gambling is a wonderful thing.”

Back to your push on a pair of face cards at Jacks or Better. Imagine that you play a $100 machine with a $500 max bet for a couple hours and push on every single hand. At the end of the session, you’d have the exact same amount of money you started with. But your comps would be through the roof.

So although you didn’t win any money on your pair of face cards at JoB, you didn’t lose any either. And you added a bit of weight on the comp scale.