Hot Roll video poker

7 April 2016

By John Grochowski

Ever since I saw Hot Roll video poker at the IGT booth at Global Gaming Expo in 2014, it had been in the back of the mind that I wanted to try to game in a casino for money instead of just in demo mode.

That time came in late March, and it happened by happy accident.

My wife Marcy and I were out for an inexpensive morning excursion, just sampling penny slots at the Potowatomi Bingo Casino in Milwaukee. We’d each lost about $20 when she needed a break.
We happened to be standing near the video poker area, and on the aisle was a nickel Hot Roll machine.

Hot Roll is available in Triple Play, Five Play and Ten Play versions. It takes a wager of 10 coins per hand to activate the Hot Roll feature. Instead of the 15-coin max bet on basic Triple Play, I’d be betting 30 coins for Triple Play with Hot Roll.

What you get for your extra wager is a randomly occurring roll of two onscreen dice for a multiplier. After the roll, you complete your hand and any winners are multiplied by the total on the dice.

I chose Triple Play Bonus Poker, and for the first few minutes, my multipliers and winners weren’t in sync – a common experience for those who have played Super Times Pay, Ultimate X or other video poker games with multipliers.

When I had multipliers, I didn’t have winners. When I had winners, I didn’t have multipliers. That’s a losing combination.

My luck with a dice roll of 6 and 3. I was dealt a pair of 3s on my initial hand. On the first draw, two 8s turned my hand into two pair that paid 90 instead of the usual 10. The second draw was the big one – it brought the other two threes for four of a kind. Instead of 200 nickels, the 9x multiplier was worth 1,800 – a $90 hit.

That was plenty to set us up for more penny play.

It turns out Marcy was standing behind me at that point. She saw it all, and asked, “How do you get the dice?”

I explained that they occur randomly. They come up an average of once every six hands, but could come up two hands in a row, or not come up at all for a dozen or more hands.

The odds on the roll are the same as if you were rolling two physical dice. Each die face has an equal chance of occurring on every roll. The average roll is 7, just as they are in any game using two six-side dice.

That means your average payoff is double the base on the pay table. Let’s use a high pair as an example of how that works.

High pairs usually pay 5-for-1. In an average set of six high pairs on Hot Roll, five would pay 5-for-1, but one would pay 35-for-1.

Five returns of five coins is a total of 25, and when you add in one 35-coin return, that’s a total of 60 coins for your six winners. And that’s an average of 10 coins per winner, exactly double the base return of five coins.

Hot Roll adds volatility. Chances at large wins are offset by an increased wager that means some paying hand lose money. But the average return on the Hot Roll bet is the same as on the main game.

Payback percentages for Hot Roll games are the same as on same-pay-table games without Hot Roll. No strategy changes are necessary.

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