I've played many, many years of video poker. As much as I'd like to believe to the contrary at those maddening times when "things just go wrong," my experience is that VP machines in major casinos are indeed "random." At least as random as a computer can be.
I've worked with computers since the days of punch cards. Although the "randomness" of computers IS extremely close to random and astronomically better than thirty years ago, no computer can be completely random. They are amazingly close, however.
That being said, I generally don't think casinos would find it a reasonable risk of their gaming licence by breaking the law when there are so many other options. Another contributer to this site pointed out by far the simplest; change the pay table. In one fell swoop, you tend to get rid of good players--and bad players just don't seem to care.
Another thing I've observed over the years is techs when they open up a machine. They take down the percentage of return on each game. I particularly like to "shoulder snoop" when they do this on the full pay games I like to play. For all its worth--and this is purely anecdotal--I've noticed that the games with the higher percentage of actual return for that individual machine (not the mathematically theoretical one we advantage players know by rote) are far more likely to have their pay tables reduced to "airport deuces," or some other lower schedule. Ones with the lower levels of actual return seem to stay at full pay. If this is true (again, I'm just speculating a hypothesis, not claiming a law or theory), this would not be illegal, but just plain smart on the part of casinos. This is because no two computer chips that pass QC are exactly identical. One might use the analogy of several different brand new color TV's. They all pass QC, but a good eye can see
that the colors set to the same levels are not exacly the same. As a consumer, we would buy the TV that has colors that please our eye.
Even if this hypothsis were true, it would not guarantee that the machines would continue to perform at the rate of the actual returns like clockwork. In fact, my shoulder snooping has shown me over the years that the longer the individual machine stays in circulation, the closer it gets to the theoretical return. IE, if machine "xyz" was returning 103% and machine "pqr" was at 96%, the next time, far more often than not, "xyz" and "pqr" would tend to get closer together in overall percentage of return, not further apart or the same.
In short, despite the aggravating times we probably all experiece as players when the wheels AND valve stems fall off, I have little reason to question the fairness of NV video poker machines. Although not completely random, they are close enough that I never really worry about it. I've had mostly positive years, primarily at the quarter level. I choose only full pay games, primarily FPDW and KBJP. In fact, I play millions of hands a year, although I haven't kept exact numbers year to year. All I track is money. Most years, I've won somewhere between $5,000 to $8,000. Last year (2006), however, I lost a little over $2,000 overall for the year. This year has been outstanding, and I'm near $10,000. If you were to add the last two years and divide by two, it would be within the range of the previous decades.
I'm sorry to hear some players going over 200 RF4's without hitting. Myself, I've gone over this number three times in my career--once way over. There is one casino I have played for 7 years and never gotten a royal. I have also had times when I've hit more that one royal in the same day. Once I had three. There were weeks where I couldn't seem to do anything wrong, despite not getting any royals. Overall, I think the machines are as fair as possible.
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
Are you being cheated on Full Pay Video Poker?
So, there is a natural selection process on the part of the casino.
Tight machines tend to get ignored, because they're making money for
the casino. Loose machines on the other hand are identifed by the
casino as money leaks and are "worked on" to solve that problem,
generally by downgrading paytables or just removing that particular
machine. So, if there were some "manufacturer's defects", either on
purpose or unintentionally, the ones in favor of the casino would tend
to stay on the floor. There is no way for regulation to determine if
these possible tight machines are defective or if they are merely
being played by less competant players or perhaps there is some
ergonomic factor like a sticky key or bad lighting, other than a
complete machine analysis, which isn't going to happen, and even if it
did it would be extremely difficult to explain the process to a jury
or judge.
Another thing I've observed over the years is techs when they open
up a machine. They take down the percentage of return on each game.
I particularly like to "shoulder snoop" when they do this on the full
pay games I like to play. For all its worth--and this is purely
anecdotal--I've noticed that the games with the higher percentage of
actual return for that individual machine (not the mathematically
theoretical one we advantage players know by rote) are far more likely
to have their pay tables reduced to "airport deuces," or some other
lower schedule. Ones with the lower levels of actual return seem to
stay at full pay. If this is true (again, I'm just speculating a
hypothesis, not claiming a law or theory), this would not be illegal,
but just plain smart on the part of casinos. This is because no two
computer chips that pass QC are exactly identical.
···
--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, Thomas Barefoot <thomasbarefoot@...> wrote:
Hi Thomas,
Of all the intelligent and thoughtful messages posted on this
subject, I do believe that you've written the one that comes closest
to my own feelings on this interesting and sensitive thread.
I too have played VP for many, many years....starting in the early
80's with the very first JOB coin-droppers, in the old Riviera.
We have a lot in common. I was basically a .25c player for a lot of
years, but now also play lots of .25c multi-line, as well .50c and
$1.00 single-line games. I have also had mostly positive results at
years end, with the exception of a couple of stinkers. Even then,
my losses were less $5K for the year. Overall, for all those years
of fun, I am ahead of the game. Not by much, but still ahead. When
all the free rooms/meals/FP etc. is factored in, I think that my
won/lost record is just fine.
So, I'm totally in agreement with what you've posted.
This is the first post that I recall seeing from your address. I do
hope that you will continue to post regularly.
Regards,
~Babe~
···
==================================================
In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, Thomas Barefoot <thomasbarefoot@...>wrote:
I've played many, many years of video poker. As much as I'd like to
believe to the contrary at those maddening times when "things just
go wrong," my experience is that VP machines in major casinos are
indeed "random." At least as random as a computer can be.......
And just a few thoughts that was given to be by a slot tech from a
small off strip casino that shall remain anonymous (it's gone anyway).
1) Most VP machines give back 3% or more less then what perfect play
would generate because MOST people don't know how to play. It's the
people who drop in a $20 on a $1 machine loose all 4 pulls and walk
that generate the most money.
2) Over a week the management changed (legally under NGC supervision
with all the paperwork filled out, etc.) 75% of the slot machine
payout percentages down about 1/2% to 3/4% from where they were. 0
people complained about the machines being tighter then they were before.
3) [Not proven just discussed and assumed true] They went from $2/min
roulette to $5/min and the drop went up over 3x instead of 2.5 as
would be expected.
So from that point of view why bother risking anything to muck with a
VP machine.
Now from my OWN VIEW SEEN WITH MY OWN 2 EYES. A certain well know pro
playing FPDW missing a duce on the draw and not holding it. They were
playing fast and furious and I was amazed at their speed. I can barely
do 600 HPH on JoB they were way above that on a harder game. But they
did make a big mistake. Overall cost, most likely nada. But still
people are people NOT machines even the best trained, most rock steady
pro will screw up now and again. Even a .0001% error rate will tilt in
the casinos favor in the long run.
-Dave
-Dave
don't think that is true...i probably make errors that cost me 10 coins
per session on average...that wouldn't tilt it in their favor...
Even a .0001% error rate will tilt in
···
the casinos favor in the long run.
-Dave
Yes and no.
The problem is you don't know what it truly cost you. Using the pro
who discarded the wild in the dealt hand. What would it have cost them
if they got 4RF on the deal, or a pair of x's, or 3 more 2's. Odds are
what happened is what should have happened (a loosing hand) but you
never know. What I have been wanting to do, is get a newer IGT machine
and see what the true payback is when letting my friends play. I have
a strange feeling it's going to be WAY under 99%
-Dave
···
--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "lv_nv_realtor" <irdd@...> wrote:
don't think that is true...i probably make errors that cost me 10 coins
per session on average...that wouldn't tilt it in their favor...
Thomas
Without speculating on randomness of todays machines, (we will agree
todays games are random) I have a question.
I have been playing video poker since Si Redd made a black & white
poker game called Draw 80. His company was Sircoma and IGT wasn't
named yet. The first games only paid on 2pr then it was changed to
JOB. When Vegas started with vp I seem to remember 10s or better and
they didn't play so good. I played a lot of progressives and cb was
good. The players clubs were just starting to show up at Dust,
Frontier and a few others. In fact I think Stardust was one of the
first places to get a players club. The card was a plastic card with
key punch holes in it. Hell, Frontier used that system till a few
yrs ago. Point is I've played a lot of vp over the yrs.
So here's my question. I know many of the folks will stand in line
to criticize my thought or explain to me that I just don't know how
games work. (That's if they know my answer) Taking into account the
processors are much faster today, do you believe the FPDW or JOB
play different today than in the 80s or early 90s? Do you have any
observations or just never thought about it? Again, I'm not
speculating if games are random.
Just a question I thought I'd ask an oldtimer. Most folks didn't
discover vp till the internet was invented. Any answer will not
change how I play today anyway. Just curious.
Cheers Jeep
-- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, Thomas Barefoot <thomasbarefoot@...>
wrote:
I've played many, many years of video poker. As much as I'd like
to believe to the contrary at those maddening times when "things
just go wrong," my experience is that VP machines in major casinos
are indeed "random." At least as random as a computer can be.
I've worked with computers since the days of punch cards.
Although the "randomness" of computers IS extremely close to random
and astronomically better than thirty years ago, no computer can be
completely random. They are amazingly close, however.
That being said, I generally don't think casinos would find it a
reasonable risk of their gaming licence by breaking the law when
there are so many other options. Another contributer to this site
pointed out by far the simplest; change the pay table. In one fell
swoop, you tend to get rid of good players--and bad players just
don't seem to care.
Another thing I've observed over the years is techs when they
open up a machine. They take down the percentage of return on each
game. I particularly like to "shoulder snoop" when they do this on
the full pay games I like to play. For all its worth--and this is
purely anecdotal--I've noticed that the games with the higher
percentage of actual return for that individual machine (not the
mathematically theoretical one we advantage players know by rote)
are far more likely to have their pay tables reduced to "airport
deuces," or some other lower schedule. Ones with the lower levels
of actual return seem to stay at full pay. If this is true (again,
I'm just speculating a hypothesis, not claiming a law or theory),
this would not be illegal, but just plain smart on the part of
casinos. This is because no two computer chips that pass QC are
exactly identical. One might use the analogy of several different
brand new color TV's. They all pass QC, but a good eye can see
that the colors set to the same levels are not exacly the same.
As a consumer, we would buy the TV that has colors that please our
eye.
Even if this hypothsis were true, it would not guarantee that
the machines would continue to perform at the rate of the actual
returns like clockwork. In fact, my shoulder snooping has shown me
over the years that the longer the individual machine stays in
circulation, the closer it gets to the theoretical return. IE, if
machine "xyz" was returning 103% and machine "pqr" was at 96%, the
next time, far more often than not, "xyz" and "pqr" would tend to
get closer together in overall percentage of return, not further
apart or the same.
In short, despite the aggravating times we probably all
experiece as players when the wheels AND valve stems fall off, I
have little reason to question the fairness of NV video poker
machines. Although not completely random, they are close enough
that I never really worry about it. I've had mostly positive years,
primarily at the quarter level. I choose only full pay games,
primarily FPDW and KBJP. In fact, I play millions of hands a year,
although I haven't kept exact numbers year to year. All I track is
money. Most years, I've won somewhere between $5,000 to $8,000.
Last year (2006), however, I lost a little over $2,000 overall for
the year. This year has been outstanding, and I'm near $10,000. If
you were to add the last two years and divide by two, it would be
within the range of the previous decades.
I'm sorry to hear some players going over 200 RF4's without
hitting. Myself, I've gone over this number three times in my
career--once way over. There is one casino I have played for 7
years and never gotten a royal. I have also had times when I've hit
more that one royal in the same day. Once I had three. There were
weeks where I couldn't seem to do anything wrong, despite not
getting any royals. Overall, I think the machines are as fair as
possible.
···
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
I have been playing VP for a lot of years myself. The only real difference is that I can play a
lot more hands per hour now than in the old days. Lets here it for credits, bill acceptors and
TITO.
Regards
A.P.
···
--- whitejeeps <whitejeeps@yahoo.com> wrote:
So here's my question. I know many of the folks will stand in line
to criticize my thought or explain to me that I just don't know how
games work. (That's if they know my answer) Taking into account the
processors are much faster today, do you believe the FPDW or JOB
play different today than in the 80s or early 90s? Do you have any
observations or just never thought about it? Again, I'm not
speculating if games are random.Just a question I thought I'd ask an oldtimer. Most folks didn't
discover vp till the internet was invented. Any answer will not
change how I play today anyway. Just curious.Cheers Jeep
Regarding how VP is played differently now, the only thing
that I can think of is that the cards drawn after the initial deal
are dealt differently now than they were in the beginning.
It used to be that ten cards were randomly selected at the start
of each hand: five up and five 'below' the up cards. When a
card was discarded, the card 'below' it would come up after
the draw.
Although some of these machines still exist in casinos, they
don't make them that way anymore. Now, the drawn cards
are not randomly chosen until the draw button is pressed.
And, the drawn cards are selected in sequential order, just
like they would be if they were real cards coming off a deck.
The VP experts have told us that, mathematically, it makes no
difference to the payout percentage which method is used for
selecting the drawn cards. But, personally, I don't like the
idea of the possibility of having the one card that I need for
my Royal not available to me because it's sitting in the
position of one of my 'held' cards.
···
On 8/14/07, whitejeeps <whitejeeps@yahoo.com> wrote:
<SNIP>
So here's my question. I know many of the folks will stand in line
to criticize my thought or explain to me that I just don't know how
games work. (That's if they know my answer) Taking into account the
processors are much faster today, do you believe the FPDW or JOB
play different today than in the 80s or early 90s? Do you have any
observations or just never thought about it? Again, I'm not
speculating if games are random.Just a question I thought I'd ask an oldtimer. Most folks didn't
discover vp till the internet was invented. Any answer will not
change how I play today anyway. Just curious.Cheers Jeep
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
I have been playing VP since the mid 70's, mostly 9/6 JOB. It seems
that over the years the game has become more volatile. It seems
lately that I can play 10-20 hands in a row without even receiving as
much as a low pair. It seems that in the 70's and 80's the game
played a lot smoother. You could get a lot of time in on a $20.---
I have been playing VP for a lot of years myself. The only real
difference is that I can play a
lot more hands per hour now than in the old days. Lets here it for
credits, bill acceptors and
TITO.
Regards
A.P.
--- whitejeeps <whitejeeps@...> wrote:> So here's my question. I know many of the folks will stand in
line
> to criticize my thought or explain to me that I just don't know
how
> games work. (That's if they know my answer) Taking into account
the
> processors are much faster today, do you believe the FPDW or JOB
> play different today than in the 80s or early 90s? Do you have
any
···
In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, Albert Pearson <ehpee@...> wrote:
> observations or just never thought about it? Again, I'm not
> speculating if games are random.
>
> Just a question I thought I'd ask an oldtimer. Most folks didn't
> discover vp till the internet was invented. Any answer will not
> change how I play today anyway. Just curious.
>
> Cheers Jeep
No, I believe they play the same.
vpFae
···
On 15 Aug 2007 at 2:23, whitejeeps wrote:
Taking into account the processors are much faster today, do you
believe the FPDW or JOB play different today than in the 80s or
early 90s?
Highly inaccurate. Today they play faster.
···
-----Original Message-----
From: vpFREE@yahoogroups.com [mailto:vpF…@…com] On Behalf Of
vpFae
Sent: Thursday, August 16, 2007 8:39 PM
To: vpFREE@Yahoogroups.com
Subject: [vpFREE] Re: Are you being cheated on Full Pay Video Poker?
On 15 Aug 2007 at 2:23, whitejeeps wrote:
Taking into account the processors are much faster today, do you
believe the FPDW or JOB play different today than in the 80s or
early 90s?
No, I believe they play the same.
vpFae
vpFREE Links: http://members.cox.net/vpfree/Links.htm
Yahoo! Groups Links
> Taking into account the processors are much faster today, do you
> believe the FPDW or JOB play different today than in the 80s or
> early 90s?
vpFae replied:
No, I believe they play the same.
Cogno Scienti replied:
Highly inaccurate.
Well, "Highly inaccurate" is better than
"Highly inaccurate. Highly". 
Today they play faster.
Have you checked the FPDW at Sam's Town lately?
vpFae
Finally one person who thinks he sees the same thing I "think or
imagine" I see. In the 70s I home based at Frontier . If FPDW was
busy or progressives were not playable I played JOB. I would play
down a line of $1 JOB dropping $20 in coins in one machine. If I got
through 10 plays without adding coins I would play on for a while.
Another 10 plays without adding coins and I would play more. I
remember getting $1 machines that seemed to pay all day. I could
spend 8 - 10 hours on a machine and it was common at least once in a
week stay. We would stack racks of dollars up 7-8 high stacked 2
deep. A rack of dollars was a hundred bucks. I know play was slow
then because of fill ups. Also, we tend to remember the good times
and shut out the bad. But, I played a lot of vp. I don't question
todays randomness. I do think there are too many 10 -15 hand losing
and winning streaks. You say it best; "It seems in the "70s and 80s
the game played a lot smoother." By the way, as I remember, Lenny
Frome mentions in one of his first vp books when machine takes a
losing streak cash out and move to another machine. I not quoting
I'm just remembering and that sometime ain't so good. Maybe Lenny
thought, back then, the machines did bunch up in longer losing and
winning streaks. Maybe he was talking about money management. Maybe
he had a page to fill up with another paragraph; Who knows? I just
wonder if the machines today are too random. I guess, even if
true, it will not effect how we play today anyway.
My favorite play at Frontier was 2 FPDW $1 of which I spent most of
my time. I seem to remember the play was worth $35 an hour. Also I
played the 6 coin quarter prog when it was playable. When not
getting your share of hits, these machines were brutal. Most 7 day
trips I would get at least one shot at the quarter progressive.
Royal prog would get to $5000 or over often. But, the good play was
when the SF prog. got to 12 hundred and got better with every coin.
As heard more around here lately.... Ahhh The good old days.
Cheers...Jeep
.
.
I have been playing VP since the mid 70's, mostly 9/6 JOB. It
seems
that over the years the game has become more volatile. It seems
lately that I can play 10-20 hands in a row without even receiving
as
much as a low pair. It seems that in the 70's and 80's the game
played a lot smoother. You could get a lot of time in on a $20.---
>
> I have been playing VP for a lot of years myself. The only real
difference is that I can play a
> lot more hands per hour now than in the old days. Lets here it
for
credits, bill acceptors and
> TITO.
>
> Regards
> A.P.
> --- whitejeeps <whitejeeps@> wrote:
>
>
> > So here's my question. I know many of the folks will stand in
line
> > to criticize my thought or explain to me that I just don't
know
how
> > games work. (That's if they know my answer) Taking into
account
the
> > processors are much faster today, do you believe the FPDW or
JOB
> > play different today than in the 80s or early 90s? Do you
have
any
> > observations or just never thought about it? Again, I'm not
> > speculating if games are random.
> >
> > Just a question I thought I'd ask an oldtimer. Most folks
didn't
> > discover vp till the internet was invented. Any answer will
not
···
.-- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "bobtry2000" <bobtry2000@...> wrote:
In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, Albert Pearson <ehpee@> wrote:
> > change how I play today anyway. Just curious.
> >
> > Cheers Jeep
>