Yesterday, the prog. RF at the SunCoast for this 25c game was $3375.
The return at reset is 98.8% (variance 32), but at $3375 the return
is a remarkable 103.8%. According to WinPoker the variance is 214.
Evidently there are a lot of strategy changes required at $3375 ...
long shot RF attempts. I mention this because I was surprised at how
high the variance is at $3375.
Bonus Deuces Wild
Yesterday, the prog. RF at the SunCoast for this 25c game was
$3375.
The return at reset is 98.8% (variance 32), but at $3375 the return
is a remarkable 103.8%. According to WinPoker the variance is
214.
Evidently there are a lot of strategy changes required at $3375 ...
long shot RF attempts. I mention this because I was surprised at
how
high the variance is at $3375.
Variance is not really a very good number to use in VP. While it can
be useful, a high RF value will almost always send it sky high. For
example, take a .25 game that pays even money on any hand and $2000
on a RF. It will have a high variance even though you could never
lose a dime.
Dick
···
--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "brumar_lv" <brumar_lv@y...> wrote:
rgmustain wrote:
Variance is not really a very good number to use in VP. While it can
be useful, a high RF value will almost always send it sky high. For
example, take a .25 game that pays even money on any hand and $2000
on a RF. It will have a high variance even though you could never
lose a dime.
Excellent observation, Dick. I'll add that it's important to keep in
mind that variance is a single-point descriptor of a game and can
reflect it's behavior in the short-run, longer-run, or both.
What it does identify is the relative degree of confidence that you
have that play over a given length of time will achieve a return
that's closely in the ballpark of the game's ER.
In the case of a high progressive RF meter it's common sense that
variance would be very high. If your RF hits don't closely match the
expected occurance it's strongly probable that your return will fall
sharply short of the games ER.
- Harry
--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "Harry Porter" <harry.porter@v...>
wrote:
What it does identify is the relative degree of confidence that you
have that play over a given length of time will achieve a return
that's closely in the ballpark of the game's ER.
- Harry
The variance increased by a factor of 7. I've computed other
progressives with a similar % increase where it only doubled. But my
question is ... are there a lot of strategy changes that account for
the increase, or does it have more to do with the increase in the RF
irrespective of the strategy changes, or both?
brumar_lv wrote:
The variance increased by a factor of 7. I've computed other
progressives with a similar % increase where it only doubled. But
my question is ... are there a lot of strategy changes that account
for the increase, or does it have more to do with the increase in
the RF irrespective of the strategy changes, or both?
The answer is both -- directly due to the increase in the RF meter and
indirectly due to strategy changes that best take advantage of the
higher RF payout.
Keep in mind that as game return becomes concentrated in lesser
occurring hands, variance goes up. Risk is increased that play
results will vary from the game ER.
A higher RF meter pushes up the game return concentrated in the
jackpot, even if you don't change strategy to take optimal advantage
of the higher RF value.
Adjust your strategy to favor RF opportunities more and you
additionally increase the return concentrated in the RF, notching game
variance up further.
- Harry
--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "Harry Porter" <harry.porter@v...>
wrote:
brumar_lv wrote:
> The variance increased by a factor of 7. I've computed other
> progressives with a similar % increase where it only doubled.
But my question is ... are there a lot of strategy changes that
account for the increase, or does it have more to do with the
increase in the RF irrespective of the strategy changes, or both?
The answer is both -- directly due to the increase in the RF meter and
indirectly due to strategy changes that best take advantage of the
higher RF payout.
Keep in mind that as game return becomes concentrated in lesser
occurring hands, variance goes up. Risk is increased that play
results will vary from the game ER.
A higher RF meter pushes up the game return concentrated in the
jackpot, even if you don't change strategy to take optimal advantage
of the higher RF value.Adjust your strategy to favor RF opportunities more and you
additionally increase the return concentrated in the RF, notching
game variance up further.
- Harry
I found this discussion useful, particularly when dealing with
progressives. For newbies, or those who want to try progressives, it
is probably less risky on one's bankroll to play games that are known
to be fairly low in 'variance' (i.e. 9/6 JB, 8/5 Bonus Pkr, etc.) vs.
a more volatile game with higher variance (9/6 ddb, or worse; 8/5 JB;
etc.). I hope that makes sense.
I know that this is generally true, ESPECIALLY as you change
strategies to go for more 'RF' draws (breaking high pairs to draw to
3 cd RFs, holding A-10 suited, in some situations, etc.).
Also, I have some experience from playing 8/5 Bonus poker w/ prog. on
quads and higher) vs. playing a standard 7/5 JB game. There are
WORSE out there........so tread carefully when playing progressives!
Remember - even a 110% opportunity probably has most of that extra 12
$+ locked up in the big RF hit.
A good rule of thumb - evaluate the game based on the return MINUS
the RF - Can you withstand the short-term loss?
I.E., my Indian casinos have 7/5 ddb w/ prog. that has sometimes
reached the $3-$4K range, but I refuse to play it. Too volatile and
short-term loss can be huge (you may not even hit those bonus quads).
Even 7/5 JB is quite marginal (although for $1/hand, I'll sometimes
try for the $3K+++ progressive). I set a loss limit here.
Another ugly game w/ prog. is 10-8-5-3-1-1 regular bonus poker.
That game will drain your bankroll, even with 4-Aces jackpots of only
$100 apiece.
Hope that advice is helpful to future progressive chasers,
Martin.
PS - If you are the unfortunate person (like me) who never hits the
big RF when someone else does, then I also ask myself - is it a game
I would still play WITHOUT the prog. RF? IF not, then it is probably
a game I should stay away from.....
Progressives are great (usually for casinos) bec. they attract more
players. But only ONE lucky person will win it.
Therefore - my advice is to at least play progressives ONLY when they
are on playable vp games. Yes - casinos may cut paytables to offer
those progressives.....just be careful on how much of a shortterm
loss you will accept.
Hope that advice is helpful to future progressive chasers,
Martin.PS - If you are the unfortunate person (like me) who never hits
the
big RF when someone else does, then I also ask myself - is it a
game
I would still play WITHOUT the prog. RF? IF not, then it is
probably
a game I should stay away from.....
Progressives are great (usually for casinos) bec. they attract
more
players. But only ONE lucky person will win it.
Therefore - my advice is to at least play progressives ONLY when
they
are on playable vp games. Yes - casinos may cut paytables to
offer
those progressives.....just be careful on how much of a shortterm
loss you will accept.
I totally agree with you. I recently chased a progressive that
seemed like a great opportunity, but after 5 days of chasing I was
invested almost the amount of the RF, and I nearly went busted, then
hit a few quads and by pure luck, the RF. After all was said and
done I was barely ahead for the total chase.... if someone else hit
the RF, I would have had a serious loss.
Assume that you play on a bank of 10 machines. If you do this often
enough, you will eventually win one out of ten times that you play.
With infrequent play, anything can and does happen, but if you play
often, you should eventially hit your share.
···
On Fri, 12 Mar 2004 00:18:55 -0000, you wrote:
Hope that advice is helpful to future progressive chasers,
Martin.PS - If you are the unfortunate person (like me) who never hits
the
big RF when someone else does, then I also ask myself - is it a
game
I would still play WITHOUT the prog. RF? IF not, then it is
probably
a game I should stay away from.....
Progressives are great (usually for casinos) bec. they attractmore
players. But only ONE lucky person will win it.
Therefore - my advice is to at least play progressives ONLY whenthey
are on playable vp games. Yes - casinos may cut paytables to
offer
those progressives.....just be careful on how much of a shortterm
loss you will accept.I totally agree with you. I recently chased a progressive that
seemed like a great opportunity, but after 5 days of chasing I was
invested almost the amount of the RF, and I nearly went busted, then
hit a few quads and by pure luck, the RF. After all was said and
done I was barely ahead for the total chase.... if someone else hit
the RF, I would have had a serious loss.vpFREE Links:
http://www.west-point.org/users/usma1955/20228/VP/Links.htm
Yahoo! Groups Links
jimnkelli wrote:
snip
... I recently chased a progressive that
seemed like a great opportunity, but after 5 days of chasing I was
invested almost the amount of the RF, and I nearly went busted, then
hit a few quads and by pure luck, the RF. After all was said and
done I was barely ahead for the total chase.... if someone else hit
the RF, I would have had a serious loss.
The only time that there is an advantage in playing a progressive is when the value of the _entire_ paytable -- including the elevated value of the progressive JackPot -- is positive, or at least becomes positive when bounceback, cashback, and other value is added. And that statement is true whether the basic game itself is _normally_ positive or not.
However, a negative game which is turned positive by an elevated progressive can just as easily be changed by the _player_ back into a negative game again through the use of improper strategy. You said that you recently "chased" a progressive, and if that means that you used an altered strategy to increase your chances of hitting the Royal above and beyond what the math would normally dictate for the value of the Royal at that moment, then in doing so it was a mathematical certainty that you were sacrificing some of your ER from other hands (I am speaking now in terms of max-ER strategy). Depending upon how much your strategy deviated from perfect/optimum play, the decrease in overall ER will range from a small amount which will still allow the game to remain positive, all the way down to the point that you can fully wipe out the gained ER from the progressive and actually start dipping into the basis ER that is normally associated with that game.
The best approach, in my opinion, is to play perfect or optimum strategy for the current value of the progressive, which means a frequent adjustment of strategy as the progressive increases. By doing so, and by playing at every opportunity when the progressive makes the game positive -- and playing _only_ when it is positive -- then in the long term you will have a positive expectation. Now, except for those of us who live in a gambling town where we might have plenty of opportunities to find positive progressives, most of us probably will not be able to get enough play on such opportune machines to ever personally play anything that approaches the number of games that would begin to resemble long-term play; however, that does not make it a bad investment -- within limits. I think that all of us except for maybe newbies will understand that if we think about it, so I'll skip any math or example to demonstrate my point. If someone can't understand that, just ask and perhaps someone else will pick up where I'm leaving off.
Cheers.
Bill Velek
then in
The only time that there is an advantage in playing a progressive
is
when the value of the _entire_ paytable -- including the elevated
value
of the progressive JackPot -- is positive, or at least becomes
positive
when bounceback, cashback, and other value is added. And that
statement
is true whether the basic game itself is _normally_ positive or
not.
However, a negative game which is turned positive by an elevated
progressive can just as easily be changed by the _player_ back
into a
negative game again through the use of improper strategy. You
said that
you recently "chased" a progressive, and if that means that you
used an
altered strategy to increase your chances of hitting the Royal
above and
beyond what the math would normally dictate for the value of the
Royal
at that moment, then in doing so it was a mathematical certainty
that
you were sacrificing some of your ER from other hands (I am
speaking now
in terms of max-ER strategy). Depending upon how much your
strategy
deviated from perfect/optimum play, the decrease in overall ER
will
range from a small amount which will still allow the game to
remain
positive, all the way down to the point that you can fully wipe
out the
gained ER from the progressive and actually start dipping into the
basis
ER that is normally associated with that game.
The best approach, in my opinion, is to play perfect or optimum
strategy
for the current value of the progressive, which means a frequent
adjustment of strategy as the progressive increases. By doing so,
and
by playing at every opportunity when the progressive makes the
game
positive -- and playing _only_ when it is positive -- then in the
long
term you will have a positive expectation. Now, except for those
of us
who live in a gambling town where we might have plenty of
opportunities
to find positive progressives, most of us probably will not be
able to
get enough play on such opportune machines to ever personally play
anything that approaches the number of games that would begin to
resemble long-term play; however, that does not make it a bad
investment
-- within limits. I think that all of us except for maybe newbies
will
understand that if we think about it, so I'll skip any math or
example
to demonstrate my point. If someone can't understand that, just
ask and
perhaps someone else will pick up where I'm leaving off.
Cheers.
Bill Velek
Thanks for the analisys Bill:
the game was positive including the progressive even without the
cashback and comps (which werent much), and I did make daily
adjustments to strategy to follow the RF payout. I ended up playing
about 18-19 thousand hands before I hit the Royal, but anyone could
have and I would not have come out ahead. That is the risk of
chasing a royal, only one person gets it and usually many are
chasing. for clarification, when I say chasing I only mean playing
a game that has a elevated royal value. Hopefully anyone doing so
will adjust the strategy accordingly to the value of the royal, but
my guess is not many do.
Jim
···
--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, Bill Velek <billvelek@a...> wrote:
jimnkelli wrote:
snip
the game was positive including the progressive even without the
cashback and comps (which werent much), and I did make daily
adjustments to strategy to follow the RF payout. I ended up playing
about 18-19 thousand hands before I hit the Royal, but anyone could
have and I would not have come out ahead.
snip
But let's pretend that the _only_ game you play are progressives with a positive ER. Using proper strategy, you _should_ -- statistically speaking -- hit your fair share when playing long term; I've already discussed long term and the difficulties of doing so with games of limited opportunities like attractive progressives. I think what complicates that even more is the fact that you can pump a lot of money into the game while pursuing some very fat progressives -- which costs you proportionately more than the not-so-fat ones by leaning even _more_ heavily toward the Royal for the fatter ones -- and then possibly hit only the not-so-fat ones, so that even though you might still be hitting your fair share of Royals insofar as raw numbers of Royals goes, you are still coming up somewhat short. That is going to decrease the return that you personally experience in what seems like the long-term to you, but whether it decreases the game to the point of making it negative depends upon the disparities between the bigger sacrifices made pursuing FAT jackpots versus the smaller gains in ER for the 'skinny' jackpots. However, one should realize that in the _real_ long-term -- which might exceed our lives -- players using proper strategy should each receive a fair-share of both the fat and the skinny jackpots. I have no idea what the variance would be with that additional consideration, or even what the average ER would be -- and there are way too many variables to be able to figure it out, including the fact that you will undoubtedly have both skilled and unskilled players contributing to the jackpot, the various possible sizes of the jackpot when you would typically decide to start playing, how fanatically you make strategy changes to maintain accurate play as the jackpot increases, and the fact that other players might be using different strategy -- including actually "chasing" the Royal, etc.
Cheers.
Bill Velek
I suggest that you could use a progressive strategy equal to the ER of
whatever game you would be able to play when the RF hits assuming you have
other positive ER games available to you. That's because of the opportunity
cost of hitting the RF.
So if you know you will be able to play fpdw with cashback of .25 you may
want to limit your changes to strategy for the progressive to a point where
you set the RF amount equal to a 101 pct ER including cashback. (Assuming
the actual ER of the progressive + CB > 1 pct.)
···
-----Original Message-----
From: Bill Velek [mailto:billve…@…net]
Sent: Friday, March 12, 2004 7:12 AM
To: vpFREE@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [vpFREE] Re: Bonus Deuces Wild Prog RFs/variance
jimnkelli wrote:
snip
the game was positive including the progressive even without the
cashback and comps (which werent much), and I did make daily
adjustments to strategy to follow the RF payout. I ended up playing
about 18-19 thousand hands before I hit the Royal, but anyone could
have and I would not have come out ahead.
snip
But let's pretend that the _only_ game you play are progressives with a
positive ER. Using proper strategy, you _should_ -- statistically
speaking -- hit your fair share when playing long term; I've already
discussed long term and the difficulties of doing so with games of
limited opportunities like attractive progressives. I think what
complicates that even more is the fact that you can pump a lot of money
into the game while pursuing some very fat progressives -- which costs
you proportionately more than the not-so-fat ones by leaning even _more_
heavily toward the Royal for the fatter ones -- and then possibly hit
only the not-so-fat ones, so that even though you might still be hitting
your fair share of Royals insofar as raw numbers of Royals goes, you are
still coming up somewhat short. That is going to decrease the return
that you personally experience in what seems like the long-term to you,
but whether it decreases the game to the point of making it negative
depends upon the disparities between the bigger sacrifices made pursuing
FAT jackpots versus the smaller gains in ER for the 'skinny' jackpots.
However, one should realize that in the _real_ long-term -- which might
exceed our lives -- players using proper strategy should each receive a
fair-share of both the fat and the skinny jackpots. I have no idea what
the variance would be with that additional consideration, or even what
the average ER would be -- and there are way too many variables to be
able to figure it out, including the fact that you will undoubtedly have
both skilled and unskilled players contributing to the jackpot, the
various possible sizes of the jackpot when you would typically decide to
start playing, how fanatically you make strategy changes to maintain
accurate play as the jackpot increases, and the fact that other players
might be using different strategy -- including actually "chasing" the
Royal, etc.
Cheers.
Bill Velek
vpFREE Links:
http://www.west-point.org/users/usma1955/20228/VP/Links.htm
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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
Randy C wrote:
I suggest that you could use a progressive strategy equal to the ER of
whatever game you would be able to play when the RF hits assuming you have
other positive ER games available to you. That's because of the opportunity
cost of hitting the RF.So if you know you will be able to play fpdw with cashback of .25 you may
want to limit your changes to strategy for the progressive to a point where
you set the RF amount equal to a 101 pct ER including cashback. (Assuming
the actual ER of the progressive + CB > 1 pct.)
snip
That sounds like a static strategy (one that doesn't change to adapt to the ever increasing jackpot value). While you will certainly end with a constant long term ER -- assuming the game is positive -- you will not be realizing the full potential of the progressive because you will hit fewer Royals than you competition; what the strategy changes are doing is weighing the value of the jackpot -- the higher the jackpot, then the more frequently are close decisions made in favor of trying for the Royal. One good thing about your approach is that you would need to know only a single strategy and not have to worry about changing holds based on shifting strategy; this means that you could become much more proficient, in my opinion, and learn to play much faster so that perhaps the extra play due to speed, and perhaps fewer errors, will completely offset the disadvantage of using less than optimum strategy. That might actually be the best approach. Thanks.
Bill Velek
Randy C wrote:
I suggest that you could use a progressive strategy equal to the ER
of whatever game you would be able to play when the RF hits assuming
you have other positive ER games available to you. That's because of
the opportunity cost of hitting the RF.
That starts converging upon Steve's min-cost strategy for
progressives. While I'm hesitant to speak for his thoughts given that
I'm usually off the mark, the logic behind your suggestion has a rough
common root with min-cost.
Mind you, min-cost seeks to minimize total expected losses between RF
hits and isn't really an "opportunity cost" oriented approach.
Min-cost - which targets the strategy that would be optimal for a
progressive meter yielding a B/E play - doesn't max EV (or ER) ... as
is also the case with this suggested strategy (as noted by B.Velek).
But that tradeoff is reasonably modest relative to the reduced loss risk.
I think min-cost becomes a very prudent strategy when you start
talking a meter that's at 2-3+ times it's commonly observed levels.
Plus, it fixes strategy to a constant one which for most players will
yield greater accuracy and smaller error cost than a shifting strategy
which maximizes EV for each sizable increment in the meter.
- Harry
Randy C wrote:
> I suggest that you could use a progressive strategy equal to the ER of
> whatever game you would be able to play when the RF hits assuming you
> have other positive ER games available to you. That's because of the
> opportunity
> cost of hitting the RF.
>
> So if you know you will be able to play fpdw with cashback of .25 you may
> want to limit your changes to strategy for the progressive to a point
> where
> you set the RF amount equal to a 101 pct ER including cashback. (Assuming
> the actual ER of the progressive + CB > 1 pct.)snip
That sounds like a static strategy (one that doesn't change to adapt to
the ever increasing jackpot value). While you will certainly end with a
constant long term ER -- assuming the game is positive -- you will not
be realizing the full potential of the progressive
That depends on how one defines "full potential". The min_cost_royal
strategy, which minimizes the average loss between royals, is a static
strategy. The strategy maximizes EV for the royal payoff that gives
a breakeven game.
One good thing about your approach is that you would need to
know only a single strategy and not have to worry about changing holds
based on shifting strategy; this means that you could become much more
proficient, in my opinion, and learn to play much faster so that perhaps
the extra play due to speed, and perhaps fewer errors, will completely
offset the disadvantage of using less than optimum strategy. That might
actually be the best approach. Thanks.
The min_cost_royal has these features and also wins the most money
per royal jackpot. In contrast, the max-EV strategy wins most quickly
rather than extracting the most dollars from the jackpot.
···
On Friday 12 March 2004 09:01 am, Bill Velek wrote: