Well, the VP was great, the room and food were great and I came home with more
money than I took, so it was a great trip by any measure. My bother joined me this
trip, he was well-practiced. A magical trip for me, VP-wise. About 63 hrs of my 100
hrs in town were spent playing VP. Day 1 and part of Day 2 were the only times I
played into my trip stake money.
Playing a 50 cent 9/6 Dbl Dbl Bonus around 5PM Friday, I held AK of hearts and drew
the Royal for $2000. After a first class dinner, my brother & I relaxed at our "default"
machines, quarter 10/6 Dbl Dbl Bonus, when I hit another Royal for $1K. This time I
held T-J-A diamonds and drew K-Q. I finished the Day up $2100; up $1200 for the
trip.
Thursday, I was scouting a newly opened area near the new Seafood Restaurant,
Oceano. All the machines are brand spanking new, albeit short-ish paytables, just
opened in the last week or so. Restaurant opened officially today, May 4. I had just
read in vpFree about a New game, "FIVE ACES", and there were 2 such machines. The
Ace of "Stars" is the 53rd card in the deck. Interesting game as none of the video
poker software can handle this extra non-suited card, so no strategy exists. I
"winged" it by intuiting a strategy. Denoms of .05/.10/.25 and 3 diff paytables -all
bonus type games. I got about 2 hrs in on it, and hit 4 aces for $100 four times,
playing quarters. See my post in regular vpFree for Five Aces Pay tables.
Saturday, I found 2 @ .25 and 2 @ $1 coin upright Jokers Wild with progressive Royals
with a ~99% payback at reset: they paid 18-1 on the quads. (I can't find their EV in the
vpFree database, which has 20-1 FP and 17-1 at 98.something%). The prog amount
on one particular $1 machine was WAY up, at $8200 when I first noticed it. It got a lot
of play during the day, one local couple in particular played tag team on it and even
"capped" it a couple times. The Policy is anyone can close it for 2 hrs max. I got my
play during the wee hours, 12:30AM - 4:30AM Sunday morning and midnite - 7AM
Monday morning. I ended up putting in only my first $100 on the first session: one SF
($250) and one wild Royal ($500) gave me the credits to not only endure the first
session, but 35 quads helped me profit $1000 for 4 hrs play. The 2nd session I hit
five SF's and one glorious FIVE-of-a-KIND, five 5'S for $1000 to give me the money
to last the the whole 7 hrs. My brother made up some handy strategy cards based on
the Tom Ski shorthand, WITH EV's, which was great for me to make slight changes as
a nod to the Big Royal progressive.
And ya know what? I HIT the damn thing! At about 7:15AM Monday. $8493: my
biggest Royal ever. What a rush after working it so many hours. Held one
stinkin' King of spades and the other four came in. I was just getting ready to let my
brother take over on it. He had pulled his all-nighter the night before and had
enjoyed about 8 hrs of sleep when I'd phoned his room about 6AM. I'll rattle on some
other time about the Zen-state I achieved after 11 hrs in two sessions on the same
machine.
Nevada Bonus (11/8 FH/FL) 4 machines are temporaily MIA. They were between
Oceano and the Fish Bar, but were shunted off to somewhere, in transit on May
3.They were doing a little remodelling of the area leading into the new Oceano area.
For the database: 10/6 DDB: qty 4 25c MG/MD GameKings near Red Keno
also, qty 4 25c/$1 MG/MD GameKings between cube bar and Romanzo restaurant
qty 8 $1/$2/$5 MG/MD GameKings in High Limit area
As far as Jokers Wild, FP, I would keep them at MIA status. I found some banks of
MG/MD machines between Fireside lounge and the Fish Bar, but I did not take the
time to check them all. "next time". Lots of 17/7 short pay JW. Does anyone have the
EV return for the 18/7 game I played (at Prog Royal reset)?
For the stat nuts:
51 Jackpots over 100:
6x100, 10x125, 5x200, 17x250, 4x400
2x500, 3x800, 2x1000, 1x2000, 1x8493
63 Hours VP-ing (of 100 hrs in-town)
Daily nets:
-900, +2100, -200, +8000, -1500;
Trip total: +7500
Tips: -250
Coupons: +370
($210 from $16 ABC bowling membership "FunBook" at promo desk)
I'd guess I booked close to $100K coin-in, I forgot to ask before I left.
Oh, and I tried my hand in the Sunday Peppermill Poker Room $33 buy-in Hold'em
Tournament. I lasted into the 4th "round" of Blinds increases & enjoyed it. On-line
hold'em for play money has been a fun (yet distracting) side-hobby for me the last
few months. The poker room was closed Monday for new carpet.
~Mark in Seattle