Thank you so much for taking the time to write such an insightful, concise and intelligent piece on what I too have instinctively suspected to be true for all the years I've been playing VP. I find that the only place on earth that I can win at playing VP is in Nevada. I have won on rare occasion in the past in Ontario before they changed the pay schedules on Pick'em at the casinos I frequented and now do not play VP here at all. Once a rare while if the mood takes me, I might go for an afternoon and try my (heavily underlined) "luck" at the slots and have come home once in a rare while with more than I left with.
Last trip to last Vegas I played and won at two .25c multistrike DDB VP machines in seperate casinos hitting the Royal on the top line on one for $8000.00 and the four 2's with a 3 kicker on the top line for $3200.00 on the other, thus providing me with more 1042-S forms to add to this year's collection.(not meant as a boast but I have done well).
I have also been the recipient of "hot streaks" on VP machines where every dream hand one wanted suddenly appeared in quick succession in a short amount of time
The only reason I mention these wins is that I change machines frequently contrary to the rubbish the "fundamentalists" advise. You can only flog a dead horse for so long and the trick I found, is to try and figure out how little to flog it for, before you know it's dead for sure.
MO
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--- In vpFREE_Canada@yahoogroups.com, "Marc Landry" <landry@...> wrote:
Here's a topic that will either really open your eyes...or close that
one-track mind even further because of how close it hits to home. And
because of the bold approach it takes regarding all aspects of the machines
that those addicted to the game rarely if ever want to talk about, blood
pressures will rise, hate levels will skyrocket, yet those who think they
already know it all will be humbled. Let's just call it "The Undeniable
Truth About Video Poker MACHINES" for purposes of clarity.First, we're only going to talk about what I see going on with the machines
in Nevada, because that is where I play for profit and it's really the
industry leader as it has always been. I'm ignoring Indian casinos because
of the disturbing pattern of nebulous responses I've always received both
from the tribes themselves as well as from the supposed state "regulatory"
agencies where the casinos are located. My conclusion is that their machines
are not to be trusted, and anyone who plays at them regularly and who will
not even question why there is such a cloud of smoke screens surrounding
machine regulation (obviously, because they are compelled to get their vp
fix and therefore HAVE TO play at them) either resides in that
comfort-giving place called Fantasyland, or they have an uncontrollable
pathological gambling problem - or both.Cruise ships are another totally off-limits place to play, and anyone who
tries to make you think there are no on-ship machine biases is quite simply
seriously misinformed and/or purposely misleading you because they are being
paid to. If you're the sort of person who books a cruise and for months
prior to cruise day looks forward to playing video poker while aboard,
you're most probably a helpless addict. I've been to too many casinos all
over the world to count, and I assure you, in nearly every one of them it
was not difficult to determine something was up with the machines. And if
you believe ANY cruise ship casinos are regulated or sanctioned by the US
Government, try making believe again.Of course, those who regularly play at Indian casinos, aboard cruise ships,
or on-line will forever be in denial of the facts. And what causes this to
occur? Yup, we're back to the same old problem which affects most gamblers
who always likes to think it's "the other guy" - machine addiction. These
people are such an easy tell simply because I've been there, I admit it time
and time again, and I was lucky enough to recover from that curse before it
took complete hold of my soul. Others....have been less fortunate.As far as the machines in state-operated/regulated locations around the
country, all I'm going to say is I believe they follow Nevada's lead, which
fortunately, while not nearly perfect, is still the best thing going. I had
always believed the machines operated in 100% random fashion - at least up
until about 4 years ago. Then, I started to gather somewhat disturbing
information that apparently, even to this day, only I have tried to do. I
have the time, I have the interest, and unlike those who couldn't live with
themselves if anything turned out to be different because they'd have a
conflict with that which helps them justify playing far more than they
should - I am far more interested in the truth about the game than I am
about pretending everything is math-pure and theory-indelible.My initial introduction to machines not being totally random came from a
machine manufacturer employee telling me how the vp machines were and always
have been programmed to run in mostly cold and some hot cycles, which was
absolutely in-line with Nevada Gaming Commission regulations. The whiners
who proclaim how the regulations just don't say that will never understand
how Governmental Agencies work. If anyone thinks the public gets to see
every pertinent document relating to any of their largest business deals,
then they are just out of the womb. Besides normal hot/cold cycles being
inherent in all human-oriented programming, these cycles were needed to keep
them in compliance with the min/max payout requirements that every machine
has because the regulations require it. When I released this information in
a Gaming Today column, it completely ruffled the feathers on every advantage
player and video poker famous name around.Hmmm...isn't that the same thing
the Undeniable Truth about ANYTHING in video poker does?It stands to reason that anyone who's playing a machine which just isn't
paying should move. Duh! It can't hurt. Yet there are still a faction of
advantage-play fundamentalists who want to go on thinking that changing
machines means absolutely nothing, because all of them are random and you're
just on one long continuum anyway. They claim a string of many hands can be
"read" as we enter the supposed "long-term". But that's a little strange -
and surprisingly contradictive - given that we all understand (and THEY all
agree) that any hand dealt is totally unrelated to any that have come before
or are yet to come. But these people want to continue believing they are
right whenever they choose to talk out of either side of their mouths. Never
underestimate the conviction of a neurotic.Another signal the machines - as well as my gaming manufacturer employee
friend - gave me 2 years ago was about machine patterns. While I am not at
this time sure if these hurt or help, what I am sure about is that they
exist. I profited nearly $26,000 overall last year by taking the time
searching for, detecting, and trying to plot what they're all about - and I
explained it all in detail in several columns - but I lost $9000 on my last
testing effort which says to me that it's too early to determine what they
really mean. As far as the critics, well, let's just say they can't handle
this one either. I think it's more like they don't WANT to handle the issue
because it would just be something else that would put their world on tilt.Finally, there's the most telling of all phenomena - the 5th card flip-over
statistics. Over the years I've received a great many passing e-mail &
in-person comments from players who've been telling me how weird they think
it is that whenever they hold four to a straight, a flush, or hold two pair,
it seems far too often they've been getting a flip-over. Not everyone has
the aptitude to detect such things when they're gambling, so receiving input
from about a hundred different players developed real meaning when I started
to pay attention to the occurrence. I began to see what they were talking
about, only what good would it be without doing a true test? Naturally, if I
wrote about it the critics would simply do what they always do when
something "peculiar" pops up in front of their eyes associated with the vp
machines: They'd claim it was selective memory - first to make it appear
they had superior thinking ability; and second, because it's always easier
to brush something under the rug than to have to deal with it.So I decided to do a serious test on the subject, which I'm 2/3's the way
through with right now. What I've found has surprised me but not
overwhelmingly so, because I already accept that there's no such thing as a
randomly programmed machine - at least in the context that the gurus and
other math people want us to believe there is. (BTW-can you just IMAGINE
what acknowledging that fact AND TELLING THE TRUTH ABOUT IT would do to all
that income they receive from a marketing philosophy based on totally random
machines?)At this point in time I've played and documented the testing results from
30,000 hands which have yielded about 3500 opportunities, where I play one
credit of the smallest denomination I can find in multiple casinos around
Nevada. While the math says that the 5th card should flip over just a little
over 6% of the time, the actual result is running nearly EIGHT TIMES that!
When I first brought this up, the math people were claiming I was just using
my own "selective memory" which proved nothing. Then I went out and took the
time to document results, so what do they do? They claim I'm, what else,
"making it up" of course! Have you ever seen a group of people get more
agitated from issues that rattle their little worlds, instead of using all
that intellect they claim they have by taking the time to follow up my
testing with testing of THEIR OWN?They never will of course, because they just want it all to go away so they
can continue on selling what they sell in order to keep them rich with
gambling money. Others will pretend it just isn't happening so they can have
nothing stand in the way of their pathological gambling problems they
themselves created by chasing the misrepresentation of long-term strategy.
But their is one very interesting point to make here. Although I am certain
the machines are not programmed in totally random fashion, based on the way
most people play it is very difficult to determine if this hurts the players
- and if so, to what extent. Strangely enough, I had the best year of my
playing life in 2008, winning slightly over $192,000 in just 25 hours of
play. And this year playing just once for 4 hours, I've won $8000. Still, I
feel compelled to alert video poker players everywhere on the truth about
the machines. Most probably, the majority of players will take the time to
comprehend just what is going on, and while I'm still trying to determine if
these uncoverings are doing any harm or not, all players everywhere really
should be paying attention to this.From: vpFREE_Canada@yahoogroups.com [mailto:vpFREE_Can…@…com]
On Behalf Of Neil
Sent: Wednesday, December 01, 2010 11:30 AM
To: vpFREE_Canada@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [vpFREE_Canada] Re: Full Pay $1 Pick'Em @ Rideau Carlton--- In vpFREE_Canada@yahoogroups.com
<mailto:vpFREE_Canada%40yahoogroups.com> , "Marc Landry" <landry@> wrote:
>
> As I said before, the paytables on two machines may be identical but the
> RNGs have been set at different payouts percentages.And, as everyone else contributing to this topic has said before, what you
are describing is, for video poker, totally illegal in Ontario.[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]