Randomness, Intuition, and MS poker machines.
You have witnessed the scene a million times
A little kid puts his quarter into that silly little machine, the one with the large crane that
drops down to grab that toy smiling at him through the glass, in the hopes that the teeth
at the end of the descending chain will have just enough a grip to grasp the prize that will
send him home with a trophy to show mom. After all, the player (sometimes even an
adult) knows that he has just as much of a chance to win as that last kid that walked away
with the stuffed bear he always wanted.
The problem is, he doesn't.
What you probably didn't know, and what your intuition fooled you into assuming, is that
the crane doesn't grip equally on each drop. That is, it isn't a matter of how you line up
your crane above its target, or how well the teeth fall over the toy you are aiming for.
Instead, the machine is programmed to grip differently every 16th play or so, so that the
vast majority of attempts go empty handed, no matter the "skill" you so effectively
demonstrated as you lined the crane up for the kill.
I have always felt that this was a particularly insidious game, since it tends to prey on the
hopes (and allowances) of children. (Yes, I know that there are indeed more pressing
issues plaguing the real world). Then again, one might argue that it is true that you do
have just as much chance of your play resulting in a prize
as long as you play through at
least one cycle of drops to "equalize" your chances. It all depends on your definition of
"fair", doesn't it? Regardless, what is for sure is that the reality of playing such a game
does not jibe with your human intuition that all attempts are created equal.
I experienced this intuition vs. reality clash during one of my first gambling experiences,
and on a much more adult game
one of Nevadas progressive slot machines. It was a
nickel progressive called "Nickelodeon". The idea was to line up the 4 rainbows on the
centerline in order to win the large jackpot. (something like 25 grand on a 5 nickel bet) I
was in Reno, and it was late the night before I had to leave. I had done well with some
blackjack, and I didn't want lose a decent win. Since I wasn't sleepy, I thought I would play
this slot. Even if I didn't win, I would kill time, lose slowly, and maybe have fun doing it.
Suddenly, I lined up the 4 rainbows. It is just that I lined them up on the wrong line, the
top line.
Rats!
However, I figured "Hey!
if I can line them up on the top line, I can do it on the middle
one, too!") Wrong. The problem was that I hadn't yet connected the dots as to how these
machines work.
In the good ole days of mechanical machines (I always loved Binions for being one of the
last to abandon these), my intuition would have been correct that I indeed had just as
good of a shot at lining up those 4 rainbows one any given line as any other. But with 25
symbols per reel (estimate) and three reels, the odds of winning a jackpot payout would
have been around 15625 to 1
hardly far enough out to support jackpots of the hundreds
of thousands (or even millions) that we are used to today.
What I hadn't realized yet (that was explained to me later by a girlfriend that had worked
for IGT) was that each reel on the newer machines has a random number generator, a chip
that constantly blasts out numbers for each individual reel. The machine thinks something
like this: For reel one, X equals a number from 1 to 100. If X is 1 to 10, stop on a cherry.
If X is 11 to 50, stop on a bar. If X is from 51 to 99, stop on a blank spot. If X is 100,
stop on the Jackpot symbol. For reel two
.the same
and so on for each of the other
reels.
Suddenly, the possibilities for a 4 reel center line jackpot are much larger. In this case,
one hundred million to one, and with no more symbols per reel than in the good ole days
of mechanical slots. Not only is there not an equal chance of any given symbol stopping
on the center line, there is a greater chance that the jackpot symbols will line up on either
the top or bottom line than on the center one. In fact, the odds of one lining up the
jackpot symbols on the line above or below the center line are MUCH larger. Significantly,
if you follow your intuition that all lines are created equal, you would be just as misguided
as I was.
Which brings me to a new version of video poker I have seen a few posters complain
about
MultiStrike, or MultiStrike Super Pay Poker.
The complaint: "it seems like I never get a hand when I get a good multiplier." Etc.
True or not, it brings a question to my mind. Does a machine "know" when I will be dealt
trash and throw in a multiplier to give me the "intuition" that I could just as easily get one
with, say, 4 deuces on the deal? And, would it "knowing" violate the meaning of "random"
at all? Remember, it could still be called "random" under a certain rational. One could say
that we all have "equal" chances for high multipliers, just not as often as our intuition
might lead us to believe. It would be a situation, or some variation of it, not unlike those
described above.
For the record, I am not a fan of the rational that lends itself to these kinds of scenarios. I
feel that violating the intuition of the player is, to some extent at least, dishonest. But in
the end I understand that it may just have to do with what we are willing to accept the
definition of "random" to be. It may be true after all that it ultimately depends on what
our definition of "is" is.
B
