I played at Harrah's East Chicago this weekend. I played the same vp machine 3 different times over the weekend. On Sunday morning, I played and earned 604 base credits and 1207 bonus credits, right about 2 to 1. This has always been my experience on the $0.25 vp at Harrah's EC. I then played some more Sunday evening and when I was done, my base credits were 1155 but my reward credits were 2024. No longer 2 to 1.
I played on Monday morning and my base credits earned were 530 and my bonus credits were 1060.
I went to the slot booth and the lady told me that bonus credits ( which she called Lucky Rewards) are different on different machines, denoms, etc. I told her it was the same machine. She then said that different amounts get different lucky rewards. I told her that it was 2 to 1 for the first 604 base rewards. Why did it decrease later that same day on the same machine. She said that's the way it works and I could talk to her supervisor. I talked to the supervisor and she echoed what the booth worker told me. Then she hit me with the rationale. She told me that I would get different lucky reward credits at different times on the same machine because the machine is more lucky sometimes than others. I was momentarily speechless ( I know, that doesn't happen too often). After a couple of seconds, I said 'you mean to tell me that the same machine can give different bonus credits ( rewards credits, lucky rewards, luky charms, whatever the heck they call them) at different times of the day? And with a very straight face, she said yes.
I understand different Harrah's casinos having different RC values. I understand different denom machines or slots vs vp having different levels. I don't understand the same machine having different levels. I don't believe it's based on win/loss either. My wife hit a royal on the same machine and her RC were exactly two times her base credits.
I think that Harrah's has created a black hole for any RC discrepencies. They can explain away any lack of RC as being just the way the system works. The end user has no way to know if their tracking system is working properly or not. It's also a great way to give different RC numbers to different guests. They could target 'good' vp players and give them less RC for the same play. Definitely not good news for VP players.
And now a couple of multi play results. On 50 play, I had a 4 flush dealt and filled it on 2 lines, a 0.1665% event. I also had a four flush dealt on 25 play and filled it 0 times, a 0.49% event.