Thanks for everyones input. There were a lot of good ideas here.
I have created a couple of strategy cards for DD with +50%, +100%
and +200% Royal. I'll keep these in the gambling wallet should the
progressive get high again.
Interestingly, I went to the Sheraton Tunica afterwards and the
Royal on the 1c 100-coin was over double, at $1650. The best game
by miles on these machines is 9/6 JOB, so the decision was pretty
easy here. No luck though...
Cheers
Wayne
Several good points made here by several posters. I think the key
determinant is how should you look at royal chasing, and in my
mind
for my objectives the answer is you should look at it as a long
term
affair ignore competitors and time limits and one-night funds-
availability limits, and play the game as if it would always be
there. So whether you plan to sit there until it gets hit or until
$100 is gone or just until your wife gets back, you simply want to
play for the best EV possible.
My rationale for ignoring competitors and the time limit imposed
by
it eventually being hit is as follows there are certain play
opportunities that I'm always going to take advantage of and that
are
going to happen repeatedly in my VP career. Therefore, these plays
should be grouped together as one long session over my career, and
not as individual do-or-die sessions.
Thus, although the poster is correct that Deuces and Joker Poker
put
you at an inherent disadvantage in chasing royals, I wouldn't rule
them out. If they still have a higher EV, then they are the better
game to play. Keep in mind your objective isn't the $2900 jackpot
itself, but rather the higher EV this jackpot causes. (Otherwise,
you'd be willing to play a 90% EV game that had a $2900 jackpot,
and
you can find those all day over in the reel slot section.) To the
extent that royals are less frequent in Deuces, this will be
reflected in the EV (if properly calculated*). If, nonetheless,
Deuces still produce the highest EV, then I say go for that.
*Proper calculation requires a frequency distribution by hand, not
just an overall EV. Sometimes you'll see a "value" calculation by
hand you can convert this to frequencies by dividing by the
paytable. In JOB, the royal frequency is generally around .000025.
This converts to the standard 2%-of-overall-return rule-of thumb
by
being multiplied by 800. In Deuces, the frequency is usually
around .000022, which converts to 1.76% of overall return. (If you
can get more precise numbers for the exact game you're playing,
use
those, as each one/millionth (.000001) change the return about 8-
hundredths of a percent, but if not then use the .000022 number.)
So, while the $2900 royal adds 3.80% to the standard EV on a JB
game,
it adds 3.34% to the deuces return. That 0.46% difference in the
return adjustment takes into account all the disadvantages of
Deuces
mentioned by the poster above. Now, for some reason Double Deuces
seems to the best paying game by far on a lot of machines,
sometimes
by over 1% at its standard rate. If this were the case where you
were
at, DD would still be the better game after adjusting for the
royal.
Just because 2 games are over 100% doesn't make them equally
playable. If one is 100.1% and another is 101.1%, that difference
is
just as large as between 99.5% and 100.5%. True, you might play a
100.1% game if that's the best available, but that's no reason to
say
100.1% is an acceptable return. Your objective in game selection
is
the highest weighted average EV over the course of your career,
not
just to get over 100%. In fact, due to inevitable human error (not
to
mention beer and the pretty legs on those cocktail waitresses),
true
breakeven is probably 100.25% or higher.
To properly evaluate progressives and to determine what strategy
changes are necessary, you need a strategy chart that lists hand
values in addition to ranking the hands. If you have that,
strategy
changes are easy. For two card royals, add 0.005% (80/16215, the
number of 3 card combinations possible from 47 cards) to EV for
each
10% increase in the progressive, and for 3 card royals add 0.074%
(80/1081, 2 card combinations). Nothing else changes. (Forget
strategy changes for one high card the odds of drawing 4 are so
long that progressive values don't matter. Four card royals
already
beat any pat hand other than a 4OAK and those are mutually
exclusive.
Now, it's true that a royal value of 300% of normal would dictate
tossing a 250-coin 9-10-J-Q-K pat SF, but not a lot of people
would
be willing to do that under any odds.)
In my experience, people tend to over-adjust for high royals, and
thus pay a significant cost in EV. For example, a low pair still
beats suited JQ all the way up to $5000 on the royal, and suited
KA
up to almost $6000, but I see these tossed much sooner. Likewise,
4-
card straights and 3 card SFs (like 9-10-J) outperform two card
royals until a fairly high level is reached, but most people take
the
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--- In vpFREE@yahoogroups.com, "blaw57" <blaw57@y...> wrote:
two royal cards.