Learning a Second Game — Part I of II  

A few weeks ago, I wrote some articles about making adjustments to a strategy based on the pay schedule. The purpose of those articles was for the situation when you were attempting to “fake it” reasonably well. You already knew the strategy for one game and were attempting to play another similar game.

Today’s article, which will continue next week, is somewhat related, but with a different emphasis. Today’s article assumes you already know one game and are trying to learn an unrelated game — and you don’t want to keep getting the two games mixed up.

The first thing to know is that some of my readers will not be able to do this very well. It takes a certain amount of the right kind of intelligence to do this. Many people are plenty smart enough in other areas, not nearly smart enough in this one.

That’s not necessarily a showstopper to playing video poker successfully, because we are starting with the assumption that you play one game well. So long as you can find that game for the stakes with which you are comfortable, everything is all right in your world.

Today’s article, however, is for players who are capable of learning at least two games well. Perhaps they play at two different casinos and the casinos differ on their best games. Perhaps they are ready to move up in denomination and the casino doesn’t offer the same games in both denominations.

Hopefully, it’s not because they are bored playing the game they already know how to play. Video poker is basically a boring game. There are occasional exciting hands (like drawing to three aces or perhaps four to the royal), but most are rather mundane. Unless you can concentrate on playing these mundane hands correctly, you will probably end up earning much less than the expected value. Unless you can deal with this boredom (or, perhaps, even not be bored!), you will never be successful at this game.

So, to flesh out the example, let’s assume you already play 9/6 JoB and are trying to learn NSU Deuces Wild — which is the version where the pay schedule at the lower end is 16-10-4-4-3-2-1. The methodology I’m going to explain works on all games, but I’m just mentioning these for convenience.

The first step is to have good strategies for both. I recommend the Dancer/Daily strategies, but there are several other sources as well. Some are free (such as the ones on wizardofodds.com) and some are “free” if you already own software that computes it for you (e.g. Video Poker for Winners).

The next step is to learn how to read the strategies. In NSU, for example, you’ll see WW45, which you’ll never find on a JoB strategy. Looking at the notes that come with the strategy, you’ll see that the W refers to a deuce of any suit and the 45 refers to a 4 and 5 that are suited with each other. You’ll also see that hand referred to as a 4-card straight flush, with certain attributes.

You’ll see that WW45 is less valuable than WW57 and more valuable than WW46. The reasons behind this are all explained in the Dancer/Daily Winner’s Guide or in my classes, but if this is the first time you’ve tried to play NSU competently, the first sentence of this paragraph just might contain rather surprising information.

The next thing to notice about an NSU strategy is that it’s divided by the number of deuces dealt. That is, the rules for the 3-deuce section are different than the rules for the 1-deuce section. I think of these five sections as making the strategy easier — because you can instantly find the right section of the strategy simply by looking at the number of deuces. And each section is relatively small.

Probably the part of the strategy that will be the most difficult for you is the no-deuce section — because this is the part that compares directly to JoB and the basic concepts of the games are different. In JoB, K♠ K♥ 9♥ 7♥ 3♥ is played differently than T♠ T♥ 9♥ 7♥ 3♥. In Deuces Wild, they are always played the same, depending on how much you get for the flush. In NSU, you hold the hearts both times, but in certain other versions of Deuces Wild you hold the pair each time. It’s going to take a while before you get the concept that there are no high cards in Deuces Wild because you don’t get your money back unless you get 3-of-a-kind.

A related place where the games have different concepts has to do with the value of Q♣ J♣ versus Q♦ T♦.  In JoB, the clubs are more valuable because both the Q and the J are high cards, meaning you get your money back if you get of pair of either of them. In NSU, the two hands have identical values.

You’ll also need to learn the difference between the way straight flush draws are evaluated. In JoB, 4♥ 5♥ 6♥ is equivalent in value to 5♣ 6♣ 7♣ and A♦ 3♦ 4♦ is worth about the same as 5♣ 6♣ 8♣ and more than 3♠ 4♠ 7♠. In NSU, none of these relationships are the same as they are in JoB. You need to be able to change the way you evaluate combinations of cards while still retaining the old evaluation methodology for when you are playing the original game! It’s not a trivial task!

I’ve gone over a few of the things you need to know. There are many more — but this is not supposed to be a “how to play NSU” article. It supposed to be a “how do you learn to keep both games in your head at the same time” article.

We’ll continue this discussion next week.