Category: Advanced Strategy

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Comparing Bonus Poker with Super Aces Bonus Poker

I recently came across a dollar 8/5 Super Aces Bonus Poker game and it’s been years since I played it. I know 8/5 Bonus Poker cold, and because the full house, flush, and straight are the same between the two games, the strategies must be similar. Still, they differ in the amount of the straight flush, quads, and two pair — all of which affect the strategy as well.

I thought it would be instructive to give you ten hands — three of which are played the same in the two games and the other seven are played differently. Even if you haven’t mastered both games, you might find it an interesting exercise trying to figure out which four are played the same before you look at the answers. 

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This Made Me Uncomfortable

Bonnie and I were at Harrah’s in Cherokee, NC for a Caesars Seven Stars trip. Cherokee is in the Smoky Mountains and a world away from Las Vegas. Plus, they have $5 NSU Deuces Wild.

For a Seven Stars trip, you get up to $1,200 airfare, $500 in resort credit, and transportation to and from the airport. The airport means either Asheville (about 50 miles away, but not a direct flight) or Atlanta, which is 160 miles away (which is much easier to get to). We usually fly into Atlanta.

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Figuring the Return for 8/5 Bonus Poker with Four Progressives

Note to reader: The original version of this contained an arithmetic mistake. It was pointed out to me by a man who posts under the name “New2vp”. The error, which affected one of the tables in the chart, are in the section relating to quad 5s-Ks. The corrected version follows. Thank you New2vp.

I received an email:  Sam’s Town in Las Vegas has three different banks of 8/5 Bonus. Two of those banks have progressives on the royal flush only. The third has that progressive, plus three additional ones for the quads: aces, 2s-4s, and 5s-Ks. Since the game starts out at 99.17%, sometimes these games must be pretty good. How do I figure out how to calculate the return of these games quickly if I don’t bring computer software into the casino?

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It’s Not Like That

In addition to being posted on www.bobdancer.com, these weekly blogs are also posted on www.gamblingwithanedge.com, where there is a forum for reader discussion. Recently, a man who posts as “Boris from Switzerland” wrote (slightly edited): Change of subject: Why has Boyd stopped offering multipliers to everybody, and why did they clean out their casino floors by removing their 99.50% and higher games? This is something I don’t like at all. 

While I’m not a big fan of Boyd and the gambling decisions they have made, Boris has misstated what they are actually doing.

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When Is It Quittin’ Time?

This post is syndicated by the Las Vegas Advisor for the 888 casino group. Anthony Curtis comments on the 888 article introduced and linked to on this page.

A.C. says: When should you quit playing during a gambling session? Most advice revolves around the monetary consideration, focusing on protecting a big win or limiting losses. The advice in this article is related to that, but really boils down to using common sense. It advocates paying attention to what you know is the logical thing to do, whether based on your current results or simply maximizing the experience. It sounds a little bit like a cop-out, but because of several points made in this article, there aren’t any hard-and-fast rules for stopping. That’s okay; relying on common sense is good advice for all levels of player. However, there’s a fairly solid rule of thumb for expert players who know how to play with an advantage, e.g., by counting cards in blackjack or playing a video poker progressive that’s above breakeven. Assuming you’re adequately bankrolled, you should stop when the game conditions deteriorate or when you’re too tired to play accurately. For pros, the paramount consideration for deciding when to stop is almost always whether or not the game continues to be beatable, not how much has been won or lost, especially after a small amount of play.

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It’s Not Good News

Not so long ago, I received an email from Anthony Curtis directing my attention to https://acresmanufacturing.com/optimal-poker-analyzer/ . It’s an advertisement for a product that casinos can use to evaluate the accuracy of the video poker players at their casino.

Generally speaking, casinos want to reward players based on their true worth to the casino — that is, pay losing players a lot to keep losing, pay good players a little but not too much, and find and eliminate winning players. Also generally speaking, strong players want to disguise what they’re doing so they can keep their welcome and continue to gather their profits. 

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“You’ve Already Hit the Royal”

When I wrote recently about hitting a $120,000 royal flush at Dotty’s and explained when I planned to return to playing there (after a four-month hiatus, which I explained in the earlier articles), I received the following comment from a reader who calls himself/herself Hop Hoofer:

You have a very small edge. And playing with an edge is mainly for preparing for the worst. Since the best, the $120K royal, already happened to you, why would you still want to risk your money? Your score will be balanced out eventually and most likely your profit will be evened out if you continue to play. If you are already ahead a lot, I don’t see a point of chasing for the tiny edge and losing your profit back.

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A Not-Too-Disturbing Farewell

In Las Vegas blackjack circles, the El Cortez in downtown Las Vegas is well-known for having a decent single-deck game — aside from the fact that they are extremely quick to pull the trigger on kicking players out. Several blackjack teams send their new players to play there, knowing they’ll be kicked out fairly quickly, just to get the first barring out of the way.

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A Mailer to Appreciate

I recently wrote that I had hit a $120,000 royal flush at Dotty’s in October. I mused that possibly the plug had been pulled on my welcome as I had hit a number of big jackpots there in the past. Several readers responded that surely my time was up there.

In November, I received no mailer at all. I looked at this as a “possible sign” of the end of my welcome, but not definitive. In October, my mailer was for $1 a week for the first three weeks, and a whopping $2 for the fourth week. I left them uncashed, except for cashing one of them on the one day I went in to play.

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Adventure at Railroad Pass – Part 2 of 2

My play at Railroad Pass had largely stopped. While they still had dollar $1 9/5 Triple Bonus Poker Plus with a 0.75% slot club on Wednesdays, I could only play 400-hands-per-hour on those coin-droppers. I had earlier played dollar 8/5 Bonus Poker Wheel Poker (99.59%), which was much more lucrative because it required $30 per hand to fully load. This was worth more, and was a lot more fun to play.

When that game was pulled, I pretty much retired from Railroad Pass, except for playing enough to keep my account active (at least one point every six months) so that my comp dollars didn’t evaporate.

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