Ask the Slot Expert: Stealth-mode video poker

Question: I always turn the sound down (if possible) to its lowest setting on VP machines. If I have a substantial hit like a Royal, I don't want to advertise it to anyone nearby. You never know who it is that may be lurking around you.

Answer: I've never turned down the sound on a video poker machine in the past, but I may in the future. It's not because I don't know who might be around. It's because I do know who is nearby.

I usually want the sound on. I like having the ding letting me know that I was dealt a paying hand on the machines that I play. I also like it when a machine displays the name of a paying hand just below the paytable. The ideal situation is having both player aids turned on -- I get an audible indication that I have a paying hand and the display tells me what the hand is -- but I can live with having just one or the other. One casino seems to not want to do anything to assist the players on its highest-paying vp machines and it disabled both sound and paying hand on-screen display on those machines.

I went to Red Rock on Sunday because it was a point-multiplier day and because I had a free pretzel offer at Auntie Anne's that was going to expire in a few days. After playing NSU for a while, I went to drop a few dollars into a slot because of the extra points.

Red Rock has a pod of four IGT Egyptian-themed slots: two Ramosis' Treasures and two Nefturi's Treasures. Get it? Ramosis not Rameses and Nefturi not Nefertiti.

I don't know why IGT changed the names. The names in the movie Casino are fake but the names in the book Casino are real. The movie used fake names because they wanted to release the movie around the same time as the book and they had to start shooting the movie before the legal clearances were ready. I doubt there's anyone who would (or could) sue over the use of the real Egyptian names. Besides, Ramosis sounds like a liver disease.

These machines have three progressives. One big progressive that they all participate in and two smaller ones that are machine specific. I usually pick the machine that has the highest value for the second-biggest progressive. (You never know.)

I quickly discovered and then remembered that the machine I picked is the one machine in the pod that has no sound. Broken or turned off, I don't know. It's silent running when playing this machine.

My goal was to play 200 spins at $1.50 per spin. I hoped to get at least two bonus rounds based on my guesstimate that a bonus hits once per 100 spins. One hundred spins came and went without a bonus and I reminded myself that my guesstimate is an average. I finally got a bonus on spin 186. I had to wait a long time for a not particularly generous bonus.

Turning down the sound is a stealthy maneuver for hiding royals hit on a quarter machine, but it's only partially successful on higher denominations because the flashing candle alerts passersby to a big hit.

One way around this problem is enrolling in a program that lets you add jackpots that would otherwise require a handpay to your credit meter. Some casinos offer this ability to high-end players only, others to anyone who wants to sign up for it.

A technique you can use to make big hits that don't trigger a handpay a little more discrete is to hit a button while the machine is awarding the credits. That should cause the machine to award them all at once.

That's what I've done when I've been playing near one of my vp acquaintances. The machines we play make a slightly different sound when they award the larger hits than when they award a run-of-the-mill hit. He would always ask what I just hit when he heard the large-hit sound coming from my machine. I would hit another button as quickly as I could when I hit a straight flush or better.

I wasn't always successful in hiding the hit. My reaction time was slow enough that he was able to recognize the large-hit sound.

Next time I'm playing near my acquaintance I'll turn down the volume. Maybe I'll be able to avoid being questioned about my larger hits.

If you would like to see more non-smoking areas on slot floors in Las Vegas, please sign my petition on change.org.

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