I feel that the numbers that you saw are the theoretical paybacks
that the manufacturer assigns for each game. It is completely
possible that Pick'em has a long-term payback of 98.48%, and not the
99.95% that Winpoker states. Pick'em is a stud based game and I'm
sure that the programming assumptions are a lot different than a draw
poker based game. I find it strange that the new "poker for winners"
program doesn't even have Pick'em as a game option. Maybe Winpoker
was wrong all along (or Bally's for that matter). Of course this is
just my opinion (paranoia) and I am not a computer programmer.
Another reason that I believe that we are seeing Bally's assigned
payback is the quarter pick'em machines have a 2 pair Joker game with
the following pay table: 1000(no joker royal)-100-50-50-20-8-7-5-2-1
(99.07% / 28.48 var) which is close to the JP pay table that people
have seen. I also feel that when the casinos change the pay tables
they change it by selecting a different pay back percentage, not a
specific pay table, so that could be another reason for the techs to
see those numbers. As far as triple trouble I think the game is well
below 100% due to the fact that you can play 50 coins at a time on
that game. As we know with the Sun, most of the time if the game is
good, 5 coins max, and if the game is bad, 25-50 coins max. Goldmine
is another game that I would like to know what the average full house
payout is. From my experience the average is somewhere around 85
putting the payback at 96.5% which is standard for their most .25
games.
--- In vpFREE_NewEngland@yahoogroups.com, "billkennedy3"
<billkennedy3@...> wrote:
This is interesting -- the numbers that Stevie saw are very close
to
my original observation. With the number of hands that these
machines go through, I don't think variance is a factor. The
numbers
should pretty much hover very close to some expected theoretical.
The question is: what do they represent? In my opinion, the
numbers
seem too high to be displaying actual return values. Even given
that
a large percentage of the Pick 'Em play is done by full-coin
knowledgeable players, 98.28% is too close to the theoretical full-
coin "perfect play" EV of 99.95% Factor in short-coin play, all
players that do not have perfect strat memorized, and mistakes due
to
sticky buttons, etc -- and I don't believe that the actual return
is
98.28%. I've logged about a million hands of PE at MS now, and
although my trips are much less frequent now, I know all the
regular
faces. The deal speed on PE is sufficiently slow that I'm able to
watch my neighbors play, and people that come close to perfect play
(including regulars) are quite rare. If any of you practice on
software such as WinPoker, you know how much even a few mistakes
per
hour can destroy your ER. I don't believe that the actual return
on
any VP machine is within 2% of the theoretical EV. I know PE strat
cold, and still make the occasional mistake due to a sticky button
or
boredom (I once picked Q over K when my first two cards were KK)...
The point is -- nobody is capable of reaching a VP game's ideal
ER.
You may be able to come close (very close, even), but everyone
makes
the occasional mistake, even if you know how to play every hand.
Those that come close to a game's potential ER are much rarer than
those who do not. PE should have the smallest gap between
potential
(perfect play) ER and actual ER, due to it attracting better
players,
and being relatively simple game compared to other VP games. I
still
think 98.28% is too high.
Some of you may not agree with me on PE, but the JW number is
definitely too high to be the actual return. 99.13% is OVER the
theoretical perfect play ER. Statistically, the odds of that
occurring given that these machines see tens of millions of hands
of
play are negligible. JW is a much more complex game than PE, and
likely does not see much knowledgeable play since there are much
better alternatives available.
I shrugged off my initial observation as being actual return
figures
from a machine that perhaps hadn't had many hands played on it.
Given a 2nd report of numbers that match the original ones almost
exactly, I no longer believe that these numbers represent the
actual
return, but I'm at a loss as to what else they could be -- any
ideas?
Side note on the Triple Trouble game (with the devils). I play
this
from time to time at the quarter level for fun. My gut says that
the
game is probably pretty close to break-even, but there is no way to
know for sure without knowing the rate that the devils appear. I'm
usually able to play for quite some time on a $20, so the variance
seems very low as well. On my last trip, I actually hit a royal in
about 15 minutes of play (dealt 10-J-Q-K-6 of diamonds, discarded
the
6 and in came the A of diamonds). 5 minutes later got 4 aces and
cashed out about $1300 (on a quarter machine). I lost it all and a
good deal more playing lots of $1 PE the next day, unfortunately
(about $80K coin-in with only a single quad -- ouch). My friend
played much less than me and managed 9 PE quads in less than 3
hours
(!).
>
> Stevie,
> Below is part of Bill Kennedy's February post. I can see one
report
> of the JW returning more to gamblers than optimal EV. But two
> reports catches my attention. But, I still think its just
variance.
> In the long run it all works out so that MS can pay their
electric
> bill et al.
> Like Bill K, I wonder if the Triple Trouble VP game is AP. Last
time
> my wife was there, she bumped into one of her regular AP friends
> playing the TT game. Playing $10/hand no less. She tried to
> discourage her from playing the game to no avail. Good news in
the
> short run is her friend got 4 Aces for $2K.
> AND just maybe it is a decent play after all! Sure looks like fun.
> Haaljo in Boston
>
>
>
> --- In vpFREE_NewEngland@yahoogroups.com, "billkennedy3"
> <billkennedy3@> wrote:
> >
> > Just wanted to post a quick message re: the $1 Pick 'ems. I was
at
> > MS Friday-Saturday, and happened to be sitting next to a
disabled
> $1
> > PE machine when a tech came by with a replacement mainboard for
> it.
> > I watched him go through the setup procedure, and one screen in
> > particular caught my eye.
> >
> > This screen listed all of the games available on the machine,
and
> had
> > a column labled "Pct", which I assumed was the longterm
percentage
> > payback on the game with perfect play. The numbers in the
columns
> > didn't make sense, though:
> >
> > Pick 'Em: 98.28 (or something close to that -- definately 98.xx)
> > Triple Trouble Poker (the game with the devils): 98.48
> > Joker Wild (or whatever the single Joker game is named): 99.10
> > That video slot game: 90.xx
> >
> > The highest number was 99.10 for the Joker Wild game, and the
> lowest
> > was 90.xx for the Slot game. I was curious about Triple Trouble
> > because it seems to be a popular game, but it is impossible to
> > analyze because of the random nature of the devils -- it was
> actually
> > listed a bit higher than PE.
> >
> > I know that PE returns 99.95% with perfect play over the long-
term,
> > so I'm curious as to what these numbers represented. I don't
> believe
> > that they represented the actual longterm return, since the tech
> was
> > looking at EPROM settings (electronically-programmable read-only
> > memory), and there wouldn't be any technical way to have the
> numbers
> > update as people played. I also believe that the number would be
> > much higher for PE as it is an easy game that gets a lot of use
by
> > regulars that I would assume know how to play.
> >
> > Anyone know?
> >
>
>
>
>
>
> --- In vpFREE_NewEngland@yahoogroups.com, "steviemcc1"
> <steviemcc1@> wrote:
> >
> > Played ~7000 hands of PKM in Sky -- up $860 (3 quad, 1 SF).
> >
> > Early in morning female clerks came by with clipboards and went
> from
> > machine to machine, turning each to the screen that showed the
> payback
> > % for each game and wrote them down. I asked one who told me
they
> do
> > this 3 times/yr. Of course, when they got to the machine next
to
> mine
> > I got a very good look and carefully noted that Pick 'Em on
that
> one
> > was 98.48% and was the the second highest figure listed. What
was
> more
> > intriguing was that Joker Poker (ie. Joker's Wild) was 99.13%.
It
> has
> > slightly bothered me that Bill Kennedy back in February, when
> watching
> > a technician work, also saw JW to be the highest one at 99.10%
> (PKM at
> > 98.28%). The JW is using a 1-2-4-5-8-16-100-100-800 paytable.
> (Note:
> > when analyzing these figures, those %'s are including short-
coin
> > activity; PKM's optimal short-coin return is 98.94% and full-
coin
> is
> > 99.95%.) I fully believe the PKM figure is indicative and
> expected of
> > it's actual return. I am definitely surprised at the Joker
Poker
> > figure being as high as it is, especially after it corraborates
> with
> > Bill's figure. I'ts short-coin 5oaK pays 400; and there are
more
···
--- In vpFREE_NewEngland@yahoogroups.com, "haaljo" <haaljo@> wrote:
> short-
> > coin players on dollar machines than quarter machines.
> >
>