I'm taking a four day trip to Tahoe from Vegas, and I was curious if any of the members here could help me with what level of play is generally required to earn future room offers. I generally play 25c vp, although I'm considering playing higher this trip to earn Diamond status in a day or two.
Also, does Harrah's Tahoe have bonus point days?
Thanks,
John
Wednesdays are the bonus point days, IIRC. Also, I'd say $10k in a day will earn midweek...$25k per day ought to earn weekend.
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Earning diamond status is certainly worthwhile if you use the comped rooms. Otherwise you are subject ot the resort fees of $30+ per night. Earned diamond in two days by playing 2500 tier credits. With the bonus of 5000 per day ... instant diamond.
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LoL, I'm sure we can all guess who sent that email...and as far as I remember, "Bob Dancer" is retired...
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LoL, I'm sure we can all guess who sent that email...and as far as I remember, "Bob Dancer" is retired..
My guess would have initials RS. I periodically get these "love notes" from him, although the ones to me are much worse than the one posted here.
I had no idea I was retired. I thought I taught classes, hosted a radio show, wrote articles, and averaged about 20 hours a week playing video poker. If you find out more details about my retirement, please let me know!
Bob
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Bob, your guess as to the initials of the sender would be correct! 
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Bob wrote: "I had no idea I was retired. I thought I taught classes, hosted a radio show, wrote articles, and averaged about 20 hours a week playing video poker. If you find out more details about my retirement, please let me know!"
I guess the argument is that you have to work all these other side gigs to pay for your gambling habit. But I imagine that $100,000 royal on Dotty's NSU Dollar Deuces covered you for a couple of months at least.
On a side note, maybe I can ask you some questions: What's the longest you've gone without a royal? 5 cycles? More? And what's the most money you've burned chasing a royal?
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nightoftheiguana2000: I know you are asking Bob Dancer the royal drought question, but I wanted to interject and say I once went through an amazingly bad streak of over 500,000 hands without a royal. (12+ cycles) I figured the odds of this occurrence at approximately 65,000-1 against.
Yes, I've also experienced the opposite extreme of multiple royals within 30 minutes of each other as well.
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noti wrote:I guess the argument is that you have to work all these other side gigs to pay for your gambling habit. But I imagine that $100,000 royal on Dotty's NSU Dollar Deuces covered you for a couple of months at least.
On a side note, maybe I can ask you some questions: What's the longest you've gone without a royal? 5 cycles? More? And what's the most money you've burned chasing a royal?
________________________________
People who believe my "gambling habit" is net negative are mistaken. Believe that or not, as you wish. But it's true.
People who believe that writing articles and teaching and preparing for and hosting radio shows increase my knowledge and I'm a more successful gambler because I do those things are absolutely correct. That's the real benefit to me from doing those things. The actual money I get from doing those things is a small part of my income. This income IS always positive so it provides a useful cushion, but on average my gambling income is quite a bit more than my non-gambling income.
I don't keep track of cycles. I don't know how long my biggest streak has been in terms of cycles. And I switch stakes a lot, so the number of royals is not particularly important. Today I hit 2 royals --- and lost. I was playing 10 cent Hundred Play.
Years ago, when $10 single line was as big as I played, I lost about $80,000 over eight months (I think --- not positive on either the amount or the length of time. It was in the late 90s.). There were probably some $4,000 royals along the way, and maybe even one or two for $20,000 in there, but those are just bumps in the road when you're usually playing higher stakes.
Your comment about one $100,000 jackpot is strange. Do you think I hit that royal in a vacuum and it was cost free to play before and after I hit that royal? Playing NSU for $125 a hand when you don't hit royals or deuces can be quite expensive. Even though $100,000 sounds like a lot to you, it's just a once-in-43,461-hands royal. Every experienced player knows that each royal is not "pure profit." You have no idea of my coin-in at Dotty's --- or how many other $25,000 or larger jackpots I've hit there this year --- if any.
If you think I write about all of my "sizeable" jackpots, you're mistaken. There has to be some sort of "teaching moment" involved for me to want to write about a particular jackpot. Having column after column saying "I hit another one --- aren't I clever?" isn't my style. My style is more to explain WHY I was playing that particular machine at that particular time. People can learn from that. They can also learn from that kind of information even if I lose $20,000 or more in a day. The swings go up and down --- but if you're always playing with an edge and within your bankroll, you're going to end up okay.
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0/12 cycles for royals is a lot worse than 65,000-1 against. Assuming 41,667 cycle length, then 0 royals in 500,000 hands is over 162,700-1 against. Congratulations, you beat the odds!
TomSki
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TomSki: Thanks for the correction. The drought was a long time ago (2007-2009) and I don't even remember if I used binomial distribution or Poisson formula; I was just reaching for a quick and lazy calculation at the time. I do remember using a round number of 40,000 hands per royal cycle since I played several different games at the time, so that explains at least some of the discrepancy in any case.
By the way, I still have an old copy of your VPSM. It's still my "go to" hobbyist's utilitarian toolbox sometimes. You made it very simple and quick for me to set new paytable values and to print up a customized strategy chart on the fly when I play different games at various casinos (not to mention the occasional progressive, etc.).
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