Comps and More Comps

14 November 2023

By Frank Scoblete

Players get comps with even marginal low-roller play. Just hand in your player’s card and the casino will figure out what you deserve and what you will get – “free.” (Not really “free” as I will explain in a short while without putting the word “free” always in quotes.)

Comps are given to players to reward their past play and to keep them coming back to the property. In fact, the reward is based on what the casino figures the player will lose playing the games they play and at what stakes. It’s a reward for future expected losses.

Hey, wait a minute, aren’t comps just free stuff? Not really. In the casinos there really isn’t much you get for free.

You earn your comps with your expected losses – not your real losses, as those will be in and out as you win some/lose some on this or that period of time’s play; but comps are what the math says you will lose over some period of time.

Given enough players and enough hours those expected losses become just about what all those people will lose in the aggregate over a somewhat extended time period. The casinos have their comp formulas and they sure work to keep many players playing and happy to get what they might consider all that free stuff.

The casino makes its money from all those players losing this or that much over time and the players truly enjoy getting those comps for their play. That’s the magic the casinos have over the players – the mathematics, the probabilities in each game, coming in from all their games for all their players makes a casino a profitable business.

Okay, what can you get for your low-roller play? Plenty! Free or discounted rooms, especially during the week but rarely the weekend, food usually in the buffet and/or cafe, some gifts such a knife set or some bottles of wine, maybe a show or two. Medium rollers will get the above and maybe more and then you have the high rollers.

Sure, sure but what about those high-rollers? What has the casino world have for them?

Just about everything!

Free rooms and/or suites, food in even the best restaurants, limo service, maybe butler service, parties – some of which will have celebrity celebrants – free shows and sporting events, shopping trips, maybe even airfare. How about some gold silverware for the biggest of the high rollers? Oh, yeah!

The more those high rollers play, the more they will lose and the more they will get for those losses. Well, that’s the formula anyway. And that formula certainly works.

So, what is the difference between the players and the casinos? Just a little one really. The players are relying on luck when they play to give them the victory. They want Lady Luck to be their benefactor.

The casinos don’t care much for luck. They care about the math of it all and the math of it all dictates the games for them and that fact means a simple thing – the casino beats the players over time.

Those are the facts of it all. There are no frees for players, no matter if the players think this or that is a free gift from the “house.” Players pay for everything.