The Golden Goose

12 February 2019

By Frank Scoblete

If you take a look at the three basic machine games in today’s casinos, you will note a small number of electronic table games, a large number of video poker games and a huge number of slot machines.

I know that the electronic table games and the video poker games require knowledge of proper strategies to keep the house edge as low as possible. Blackjack games and video poker games demand decision by decision proper playing of one’s hands or the expectation of the player is to lose more than he must. These games are skill games; the more your skill, the better it is for you.

In skill games each decision is unique to that moment; it is the best decision or it isn’t. For example, in blackjack if you double down on a 20, you are very, very likely to lose that hand. If you drop the four cards to a royal flush, well, there is probably only an itsy-bitsy-teeny-tiny chance of getting a royal as the replacement cards are dealt to you. Step outside in a thunder storm and you’d have a better chance of getting struck by lightning using the strategies mentioned above.

Now, what of slot machines? It is rare that you play slot machines that require skill (there may be some here and there now) so why do slot players flock to these “skill-less” machines? There is no doubt that slots are the cash cows of the casinos, making more money for them than any other games, and that the only choices a player makes are what machine to sit in front of and whether to play multiple credits or one credit. Most slot players play multiple credits.

And that is that. So why bother?

I think that while I spoke of the casino’s cash cow above, we might not realize that the players have an animal they are trying to corral, and that is the Golden Goose. Some players are satisfied with a rather small Golden Goose experience, the kind that wins them a few thousand dollars. Other players are going for the ultimate Golden Goose reward by hitting one of the BIG jackpots on machines such as Megabucks and Wheel of Fortune, among others.

I think the pursuit of the ultimate Golden Goose inflames the average slot players. I don’t really see this in other machine players, at least not to such a great degree.

A player can hit a royal flush at video poker but you never really hear video poker players waxing poetic about getting such a hand. It just seems to be a part of the video poker landscape as in “I’d like to hit a royal today.” These players seem more down to earth than the Golden Goosers.

Electronic table game players rarely think in terms of retiring from work tomorrow as do the ultimate slot players. Dreaming the big dreams are the reserve of slot machine players.

Table game players? It would be rare indeed if a table-game player thinks in terms of a life changing craps game or blackjack game or roulette game. Any win at these games will be okay with the players. You will not see huge highway billboards lauding Jimmy Twoummy having won $475 at blackjack. “I only played $5 a hand!” Fun? Yes. The dream? No.

Look at the billboards on the highways, who is being lauded? Why the mega-winning slot players. Just look at the amounts they won!

If the casino has a television advertisement the people (generally good looking, booze sipping middle class folks) are usually shown having amazing fun as they hit huge jackpots. You rarely see some old bat in a tattered house dress pouring in nickels.

There is one television advertisement in the New York area praising a man who won over a million dollars because he knew deep in his heart that he was going to hit the BIG one today and he even shaved and dressed accordingly. Even his wife was amazed at the man’s prescience. Now that is an inspirational advertisement. (Of course, of course, there were tens of thousands of slot players across the country who thought it was going to be their day – and it wasn’t.)

I think it is fine to dream the dream of hitting the big one as long as the dreamer doesn’t confuse his or her dreams with reality. Certainly there are some big winners out there in the world of slot machines, but of the 54 million people who go to American casinos each year, most of them slot players, you aren’t going to find a high percentage of players who can tell their bosses tomorrow to take a hike or jump in the lake.

I am guessing you know what type of machine player you are and that’s fine. You earn your money and you can play with somewhat low expectations or those ultimate ones. But remember this, most people trying to pluck the Golden Goose’s feathers wound up in deep you-know-what. One man won that Goose but the others? No. That is a lesson to be learned.

Visit Frank’s website at www.frankscoblete.com. Frank’s latest books are I Am a Dice Controller: Inside the World of Advantage-Play Craps, Confessions of a Wayward Catholic and I Am a Card Counter: Inside the World of Advantage-Play Blackjack. Available from Amazon.com, Kindle, Barnes and Noble, and at bookstores.