Gaming Gurus: Strategy Expert Article Archive - Page 68

Caffeine Games or Meditative Games

CINDY: We have divided casino games into two categories, caffeine games and meditative games. Of course, there are games that come between these two major categories and we have some differences of opinions about them. These differences are actually no big deal and don’t fully explain what these games are all about.ABBY: Overall, the caffeine games are those that require intense or somewhat intense attention to the game...read more

Ask the Slot Expert: Can casinos lower the payback on video poker?

Question: I hope I am asking this question the right way, but think it’s a simple and straightforward question that everyone wants to know. If I am playing an 8/5 Double Double Bonus video poker machine anywhere in the United States, is the expected statistical payback the same? In other words, since it is all based on the random number generator, and the expected payback is, say, 90%, can any state or casino lower the expected payback to their favor in any way? Answer: Let's step into the Wayback Machine and go back -- OMG!! -- almost 30 years...read more

Slot Players Are Different

Blackjack players, craps players, roulette players, Pai Gow Poker players and video-poker players (and players amongst most of the other games) all know or should know the established house edges on all of their bets. I do realize that some players do not know any of this information but it is all there to learn.Smart players know what they are getting into when they play those games...read more

What Happened to the Royal Flush?

QUESTION: I was playing 9-5 Triple Double Bonus Poker. Not the top of the line pay table, I know, but not too bad for nickel Five Play game.Four Aces with a low kicker brings 4,000 coins for a five-coin bet. It's as much as you'd get for a royal flush.I was wondering, do you get the Aces and kicker more or less often than royals? It seems like the 4,000-coin jackpots would come a lot more often than in other games...read more

Fixing Something

Recently a reader (Norman) asked about a strange video poker game he had seen in Biloxi. He is a disciplined and skilled player. He generally plays jacks or better if a decent pay table is present. If not, he checks for a decent bonus poker game.As he was scouting the games in this particular casino, he came upon a game that did not make sense to him.The game was labelled “Bonus Poker,” but when he checked the pay table, all four-of-a-kind hands paid the same amount...read more

Video Poker: Tradeoffs

CINDY: I think of video poker as the poor relative of slot machines. I know there are many video-poker players and maybe there are as many video-poker players as craps and roulette players.ABBY: Or maybe as many as blackjack players. But I agree; to me, as I walk around casinos, I find that video poker is the poorer relative to slot machines as you have said...read more

Ask the Slot Expert: Slot payouts in dollars or credits

A few months ago, I received an email asking for my help in a slot payment dispute. Here are some key details from the email: It was a penny slot machine. I was playing $.10 (ten cents) so 10 Xs the denomination. I won $94 in a free games bonus round. The payout should have been $940. I have a photo of the total payout along with my bet. The gaming commission employee took photos and my information and was supposed to investigate...read more

In and Out and In Some More

Slot machines are simple, really; I mean really, really simple. More money goes in them than comes out of them. That’s it, really simple, a very simple game. In and out on occasion for the player, while it is in and in many more times for the casinos.The casino is the really “in” thing when it comes to playing the slot machines.Now, yes, very smart people have developed these machines (which used to be lovingly called “the one-armed bandits” because players had to pull a lever to activate the machine and that lever was considered a type of gun to “kill” the player’s bankroll) and computers now run them and run the RNG (the random-number generator – which is actually a pseudo-random-number generator) that determines which symbols will come up on the screens.In short, a computer program determines when the winning and losing “numbers” will appear...read more

Playing Slots with Mom

QUESTION: My 80-year-old mom loves the slots and she's been giving broad hints that she'd love a mother-daughter day at the casino. I used to go with her on park district bus trips, but our parks don't do that anymore.The result is that I haven't played in a few years, and I'm wondering what kind of budget I need if I'm going...read more

Video Poker Strategy Quiz A-Q Suited or J-Q Unsuited?

This article contains a video poker strategy quiz. The game is full-pay (9/6 – 9-for-1 full house, 6-for-1 flush) jacks or better.The quiz assumes the maximum five credits is played. The maximum bet produces the highest long-term return because the royal flush pays 800-for-1 rather than 250-for-1 when less than the maximum is bet.Look at the dealt hand below and decide which card or cards you would hold...read more