Slot Speculation: Theories and Questions Answered
Slot players like to think about the games they play as much as those who play any other games. A key difference is that you can’t see the inner workings of a slot machine. You can’t watch the process by which results are determined and calculate your chances, like craps, roulette or blackjack players can.That has long led slot players to speculate and form their own theories. Are results really random? (Short answer: yes.) Does it make a difference to your payback percentage if you push buttons, pull handles or touch the screen? (No.) Can the casino choose who wins and who loses? (No.)Modern video slots have brought new questions including both the mechanics of how games work and downright philosophical debates.On the game mechanics side, one question that’s been prominent in reader email is, “How can players who bet different amounts be allowed to play for the same jackpot?
Win the Ultimate Casino Getaway! Vote for your Favorite Casinos Today!
We are excited to officially kick-off the Voting of our annual Readers’ Choice Awards that runs through the end of February.
CLICK HERE to vote!
We are giving away the Ultimate Gambling Getaway to one lucky voter. The winner will receive an overnight stay at the casino of their choice, dinner on us, gambling money to play with and a gas card to get there. Best of luck in the 2019 Reader’s Choice Awards!
Pai Gow Poker: Learning the Game
If you are looking for a new game to play in the casino that is easy to learn and can be very profitable, you should consider Pai Gow Poker. It is a combination of American poker and the Chinese domino game that shares its name. Similar to blackjack, it is a slow-paced table game with plenty of player interaction and dealer assistance. With a 5% house vig on your winnings, this game provides the player with a huge advantage which is why the house has to take a cut. The actual house advantage is 2.3 percent.
CRAPS: Deconstructing Marty and Marvin
Last issue I offered to our readers a few players who articulated their craps strategies – some of these strategies were good, some were mediocre and some were awful. I didn’t comment on these strategies because I wanted our readers to savor them without my own strategic articulation – meaning “Hey, I’m right but I’ll let most of these poor souls have their moments in the sun.”
The next two issues will have me offer my opinions about these various strategies. My first player is Marty, our model of a smart player.
Video Poker: Lemonade
I can remember my mom saying that when life deals you lemons you should make lemonade. Beyonce even had a blockbuster album called “Lemonade”, so I guess moms everywhere (and grandmothers in Bey’s case, since she passed the adage and recipe on to the star’s mom) have some of the same feel-good maxims. It’s not just true about life in general, but also applies to the world of gambling. You might logically assume that with all the competition for players, casinos would be offering better odds than before, but that’s not the case at all. Instead, there are more greedy hands stuck out for pieces of the pie than ever before and our legislative regulators are merrily lowering the minimum ER (expected return) on a state-by-state basis. You may have sworn that if house odds were increased at your expense, then you’d never again enter a casino, but that’s like an ultimatum when angry with your partner; it may not happen. In the mercurial case of casinos your best bet may be to make lemonade.
Casino Strategy: Short-Run Decisions
When you read gambling books and articles, you sometimes see a distinction made between the “short run” (tonight, this weekend, this week, this month) of a few hundred or a few thousand decisions, and the “long run” (a few years or more) of millions of decisions. In the short run, anything can (and does) happen. Players can go on incredible streaks of improbable wins or equally improbable losses.
The long run is a very long time. Usually, it can be stated as the amount of time, or number of decisions, necessary for the probabilities to be within a given range of results. A coin flip will be, in the long run, faster than a roulette wheel because a coin flip has only two possible decisions and a roulette wheel has 37 or 38, depending on the type of wheel. As I stated, in the long run, the math of a game will win out over any aberrations that take place tonight.
Poker: Trapping & playing low pairs and A-Q
Let’s examine three ways these eight hands (8-8, 7-7, 6-6, 5-5, 4-4, 3-3, 2-2 and A-Q ) might be played in No Limit Hold ‘em (NLH). These are the kinds of hands you want to take a flop with and are hands worth one raise before the flop, or even making the first raise yourself. If you are going to raise with one of these hands, raise about the size of the pot and hopefully win when everyone folds. Ideally, you want to call a small raise (or the initial blind bet) or make the pot size raise before the flop, and then hit the set on the flop to win a huge pot.
Again, my theory is that you want to call a small raise or make a pot-size raise before the flop to try to win the pot before the flop.
Casino Knowledge: 12 Gambling Secrets
This column is an excerpt from Bill Burton’s book, “1,000 Best Casino Gambling Secrets.” Bill is a regular contributing tip columnist for Southern Gaming and the Internet portal About.com found at casinogambling.com. He is also an instructor for Golden Touch Craps seminars. For information on the seminars, visit www.TheCrapsClub.com
General: True Odds are determined by the probability of an event occurring. The casinos pay you less than true odds when you win. The house edge is the difference between the true odds and the odds that the casino pays you when you win.
General: Many players win when they are playing and then give it all back. They rationalize that they were playing with the casino’s money. Once you win a bet, it is your money, not the casino’s money. You should treat it accordingly.
Travel Aficionado – Planning Your Trip
In some ways, taking a vacation today is more troublesome than ever. Long security lines at airports, the prevalence of airline delays (customer satisfaction with America’s airlines continues to nose dive), the rising cost of fuel, a weakened dollar and the need for passports even to fly from the U.S. to Canada have all conspired to make travelers grumble. According to the Bureau
of Transportation Statistics, 24.3 percent of flights in the United States arrive late; 21.3 percent register a late departure.
Finding the Edge: Three Card Poker VS. Mississippi Stud Poker
Three Card Poker and Mississippi Stud Poker are two of the hottest table games around. Their popularity doesn’t challenge long time player favorites blackjack and craps, but in some states they draw more players than baccarat or even roulette.
HOW GOOD IS YOUR SHOT TO WIN AT THOSE GAMES? WHAT IS THE HOUSE EDGE?
Those are questions that need to be answered in multiple steps, because both are games with more than one round of betting.The house edge can be expressed as a percentage of the ante that starts either game, or it can be expressed as a percentage of the average total wager, once subsequent bets are considered.Some people refer to these as “house edge vs. the ante” and “house edge vs. total action.”
