Friday, December 31, 2010

A minor mistake

Last night while playing blackjack I made a mistake regarding the taking of insurance. It was an understandable error, but one I have made before and vowed never to make again, which made it partcularly annoying.

Insurance is offered when the dealer's upcard is an ace. A player who thinks the dealer has blackjack can put up to half his bet on a line on the table, making a side bet on the dealer's hand. If the dealer has blackjack, the insurance bet pays two-to-one. The player loses his main bet but is made whole by the win on the insurance bet. (This assumes the player does not himself have a blackjack. If he doesn, he can choose to take "even money" rather than the higher blackjack payout, coming out twice as good as with the push he would have if he decline even money.)

Insurance and even money are both bad bets most of the time. Unless a player is counting cards, he should never take insurance or even money. But if the remaining deck is rich enough in 10-value cards, the bet is a good one. In my counting system, Knock-Out, insurance is taken when the cout reaches one below the number at which the maximum bet is put out.

Last night I was playing a double-deck game with the cards dealt face-down. I was sitting at first base. When the dealer offered insurance, the count, based on his upcard and my two cards, was where I had to take it. I put the chips on the line. But I hadn't looked to my left to see whether either of the other two players at the table had flipped over a blackjack. After I put the money out, I noticed that the player at third base had done just that, bring the count below the point at which I should have taken insurance.

I would have felt better about my error if the dealer had blackjack anyway, but he didn't.

A little mistake, but one with a cost.

Two blackjack rules my brother hates

My brother, who lives in the Northeast and plays most of his blackjack at one of the huge Indian casinos in Connecticut, recently visited Las Vegas and couldn't stop complaining about the rule requiring dealers to hit soft 17, which has become pervasive here. (A few games are still available, at higher limits, in which the dealer stands on 17. Examples are the double deck games at the Mirage and Aria -- lowest minimum $25 --and in the high-limit room of the M Resort -- $100.)

He also railed against the "no double after split" rule at the Caesars (formerly Harrah's) properties where he gets free rooms and plays. (This rule is also common downtown.)

The first rule, hitting soft 17, costs the basic strategy player 0.2 percent. The second, no double after split, costs 0.13 percent -- at least in theory. But there are key differences in the ways the rules work in practice. I believe that the first is here to stay and likely will spread to those parts of the blackjack world where it is not now the norm. I'm not happy about that -- it's costing me money -- but I understand the logic from the casinos' point of view. The same cannot be said about the second rule, which probably doesn't help the casinos nearly as much as they think and hurts their employees as well as players.

First, a little background: In blackjack, a "soft" hand is one in which an ace can function as either a one or an 11. So a soft 17 is a hand such as ace, six or ace, three, three. Traditionally, dealers would stand on such hands. Hitting the soft 17 gives the house a chance to improve its hand. If the dealer's first two cards are ace, six, the hand is immediately improved if another ace or a two, three or four is drawn. In addition, the dealer can draw a card that seems to hurt the hand -- say a seven, resulting in a total of 14 -- but then can come up with a result better than 17 by drawing one of an even bigger number of cards. Because 10-value cards make up 30 percent of the deck, the dealer will often turn a soft 17 into a hard 17. This might seem to have no effect on the players -- the dealer's total is unchanged -- but it removes a card valuable to them.

On the other hand, this rule gives the dealer an opportunity to bust, giving all the players at the table with hands of less than 17 an unexpected win. This doesn't happen often enough to offset the harm the rule does to the players, but it happens often enough to add to the suspense and excitement of the game. Because of this, the typical player, who probably has no idea of the statistical disadvantge of the rule, probaly does not mind this rule.

From the house's point of view, the rule is always applied perfectly and there is no way the statistical gain it offers can be lost. Except to the relatively rare knowledgeable player -- not a desirable customer to the casino anyway -- there is no apparent downside to this rule.

The story concerning no double after split is different in key ways. First, where it is in force, there is usually a sign to that effect on the table. Even the relatively unsophisticated player is being told he is being deprived of a privilege he knows he has elsewhere; who wants to be told that? Second, to some degree, the rule is self-defeating to the casinos in pure financial terms. The 0.13 percent edge is provides assumes all players use perfect basic strategy, which is far, far from true. The house gains when players split when they shouldn't and then double on those split hands. This rule deprives the casinos of that gain. By limiting doubling and reducing splitting -- fewer hands are worth splitting if doubling isn't possible -- casinos with this rule are taking the most exciting hands out of the game, reducing its entertainment value. And they are hurting the dealers they employ by depriving them of the the tips that result from big wins -- such as the ones that result when a dealer busts and a three- or four-way split with a double down or two pays off.

To the extent that I can take the casinos' perspective, hitting soft 17 makes sense. Not allowing doubling after split appears to be, at best, not worth the cost, and at worst totally self-defeating. And, fortunately, players still have plenty of opportunities to avoid these games. If this rule can't be eliminated, I believe it can be contained if players vote with their feet.

Saturday, November 20, 2010

A stunning surprise

I'm not much of a football fan, or a sports fan in general, but I have been participating in the Coast Casinos' and M Resort's free football contests this year. Both are easy to enter and the Coasts make it particularly easy to check for winning entries. In both cases, entries are handled at kiosks, and it's possible to pick your winners using a quick pick feature, as in lottery games. In the Coast contest, you also have a pick a "tie breaker" for each entry, a prediction of the total score of the Monday night game. I always use the quick pick feature for both contests, and for the tie breaker, I just type in a number more or less randomly.

Each week I press the "winning entries" button on the screen on a Coasts kiosk, and each week I've been told "no winning entries" -- until this week. On Tuesday when I hit the button at the Gold Coast, the message said something like "Winner $10000." There was no comma in the number so I had to look twice to make sure it was what I thought it was -- $10,000, and not $1,000. The kiosk spit out a ticket. I couldn't concentrate well enough to read the fine print, so I stepped over the the players' club counter and asked the woman there, "What do I do with this?" She read the small print, gave me a high five and told me to take it to the sports book.

There a supervisor handled the paper work and explained to me that I was one of nine people who "picked" the winner of all 12 games that week. Further, I was the big winner because my tie breaker came closest to the actual point total for the Monday night game. The other contestants who picked all the winners got only $2,500 each.

In my entire gambling "career," including the 3-1/2 years I've been living in Las Vegas, this $10,000 win was my biggest single hit. 

Sunday, November 14, 2010

Barely off the Strip

This post is directed to serious blackjack and/or video poker players who are coming to Las Vegas and staying on or near the Strip, but looking for better games than the Strip casinos offer.

When it comes to blackjack, there are good games on the Strip, but the double-deck games are often available only at minimums of $25 and higher. There is little good video poker on the Strip, defined as games with 99.5 percent payback or better. Some Strip casinos do offer 9/6 jacks or better, but rarely at less than $5, unless you're willing to forgo comps (New York New York offers 9/6 Jacks at $1 and $2, but those machines don't accept a players club card).

This may come as a surprise, but Hooters offers some of the best video poker near the Strip. The good video poker is all on two banks of machines in front of the cage. Games include jacks or better (99.54 percent payback), "not so ugly" deuces wild (99.73 percent) and, on one machine only, double bonus deuces wild (99.81 percent). Slot club points for video poker accrue at a rate of one for every $3 coin in, but each dollar of free play costs only 100 points.

Hooters also offers $10-minimum double deck blackjack with typical locals casino rules and a 0.40 house edge. This game is not open all the time and is never on more than one table. Penetration varies by dealer.

This casino is a very short walk from the Strip at Tropicana, just east of the Tropicana hotel. It is easily accessible by the Monorail, which stops just across Tropicana Avenue at the MGM Grand.

Moving north, a longtime favorite of Strip casino workers and other locals is Ellis Island, a few minutes’ walk east of the Strip on Koval Lane just south of Flamingo Road. This casino, which got its name from founder Gary Ellis, features shoe and double deck blackjack games at $5 and video poker including “not so ugly” deuces at 25 cents and 9/6 jacks or better at up to $2. The casino building also houses a microbrewery, karaoke bar, restaurant, barbecue and Metro Pizza outlet. The casino and karaoke bars serve very generous drinks at moderate prices. Expect a wait at the restaurant (open 24 hours every day) and barbeque (open 4-10 p.m. every day). The restaurant is famous for its off-the-menu steak special, a 10-oz. filet-cut sirloin for $7.99, including an Ellis Island beer.

Farther east at Flamingo and Paradise Road, a fair walk or short bus or taxi ride from the Strip, is Terrible’s (named after founder “Terrible” Herbst, so-called by his competitors in the gas station business for undercutting their prices). The only video poker that meets the 99.5 percent criterion here is 9/6 jacks or better, at up to 50 cents, near the cashier. Double-deck blackjack is consistently offered at $10, based on my experience.

On the other side of the Strip, a long walk or short bus or taxi ride away, are the Palms and Gold Coast, directly across the street from each other. The Palms has one of the best and biggest selections of good video poker in Las Vegas, including a 25-cent full pay deuces wild (100.76 percent) progressive and a $1 full-pay double bonus (100.17 percent) progressive with progressives on the straight flush and quads as well as the royal flush. “Not so ugly” deuces and 9/6 jacks or better are available at pretty much all denominations, including on Triple Play/Five Play machines. Slot club points are worth a generous 0.25 percent.

The Palms also offers a range of blackjack games, including the variation Blackjack Switch. In the past double deck has been offered at $10, but I haven’t seen that for a while. Expect a minimum for double deck of $15 or even $25. Card counters would do better elsewhere; double deck penetration is set at 50 percent with a notch.

The Palms is a big, high-end property with lots of dining and entertainment options. On weekends it is filled with young club goers; during the week it draws an older crowd heavy with locals there for the good video poker and promotions.

The Gold Coast, across the street, has lots of $5 blackjack at all times with good Vegas rules (but consistently lousy penetration) and lots of good video poker, including 9/6 jacks, “not so ugly” deuces and double bonus deuces, at denominations of up to $2. A favorite of Chinese Americans, the Gold Coast has two Chinese restaurants among its dining options. Another nearby casino, the Orleans, is also part of the Coast group owned by Boyd Gaming. A free shuttle connects two and goes to the Strip at Flamingo as well.

Bracketing Las Vegas’ Chinatown area to the north, at Sahara Avenue at Interstate 15, is Palace Station, which offers blackjack with excellent rules and, usually, good penetration at as little as $5 for shoes and $10 for double deck. The selection of positive video poker games (found on machines labeled “Optimum Play” is less than at most other Station properties. To my recollection, no such games are offered at more than 50 cents, but like all things casino-related, that could change at any time.

Finally, the property most like a major Strip resort, but with much better games, is the Las Vegas Hilton, on Paradise Road east of the Strip and south of Sahara Avenue. The Hilton is a major property famous for its entertainment offerings and with excellent restaurants and full major-resort amenities.

The only downside concerning video poker at the Hilton is that all the good games are in the sports book area, which can be crowded, loud and smoky. The upside is the games themselves, including “not so ugly” deuces, loose deuce deuces wild (100.15 percent) and 9/6 jacks. All are offered at 25 cents and $1; the jacks are also offered at $5.

Blackjack at the Hilton is also excellent, with surrender offered not only on shoe games but also on double deck. Shoe games are sometimes offered at $5, usually at $10; double deck is offered at $25. Penetration for both is set by a notch, with about a deck and a third cut off for the six-deck game and about a third of the pack cut off the double-deck game.

The Hilton is a short walk from the Sahara or Riviera, and is accessible by the Monorail, which stops right at the hotel.

Wednesday, October 13, 2010

The joys of low volatility

Let’s say you’re a video poker player who normally plays moderately to highly volatile games, such double double bonus or “not so ugly” deuces at $1 or higher. Let’s assume further that you’ve run into a rough patch and are concerned about your dwindling bankroll. You know that if things continue to go south, you’re going to have to drop down in denomination, and you don’t want to do that.

That was the situation I was in a few months ago and I decided to take a different tack, which worked out well for me. I usually play NSU, “pseudo” NSU, double bonus deuces wild and loose deuce deuces wild at $1, sometimes on triple play machines.

As I wrote on this blog, a while ago I took the plunge and started playing what for me was a new game, jacks or better. The game has a lower long-term maximum payback than some of the other games I was playing, but it has the advantage of very low volatility. That means the fluctuations in amounts won and lost are relatively small. Unless you hit a royal flush, you’re generally not going to win much when you win, but compared with most other games you’re not going to lose much when you lose.

The downside to jacks is that the maximum long-term payback to the player is less than for the games I usually play (except for “pseudo,” but I play that mostly on progressives, when the jackpot adds significantly to the player’s return). But I found that because of the low volatility of jacks, I could comfortably play it at $2. My plan was to do just that, particularly when a good point multiplier would bring the return to about 100 percent. My hope was to hit a royal for $8,000, twice the amount I would get playing for $1, and solve my problem in one fell swoop.

Well, it worked! A few weeks, if that, into the “plan,” I hit for $8,000, bringing my bankroll most of the way back to where I wanted it to be. A few weeks later, I hit again, this time holding only two cards. Coincidentally, both of the big royals were in diamonds, my new favorite suit.

This was somewhat of a gamble, because you can lose quite a bit of money playing even jacks for $2. But it worked this time, and I have kept $2 jacks in my repertoire, playing it when point multipliers and/or other considerations make it a break-even play or better.

Another low volatility play I like: South Point has 50-play machines with NSU deuces in nickels in front of the oyster bar. (There are also 100-play machines with this game elsewhere in the casino). This is by far the best pay table I have seen anywhere on 50- or 100-plays; in fact, it’s the only playable pay table I’ve seen on these machines anywhere.

The bad news about this game is, if you hit the deuces, it’s $50. A royal flush without deuces is $200. The good news is that losses tend to be similarly small, especially considering the huge amount of money you’re putting through (which means you're earning lots of slot club points, particularly on point multiplier days). I can’t remember ever losing more than $500 in a session, and I usually play for at least an hour. On the other hand, you’re not likely to win a lot, unless you are dealt the deuces ($2,500) or a royal flush ($10,000). But if you’re more of a tortoise than a hare, this can be a very good game.

My favorite Vegas sign

This sign directing motorists to the Asian-American Cultural Center stands directly in front of the Gold Coast  casino (above right) on the north side of Flamingo Road a little west of Interstate 15. The arrow can be seen as pointing into the Gold Coast, though it actually directs drivers to turn onto Wynn Drive, which forms the western border of the Gold Coast property.

What’s great about this sign is that the Gold Coast, the favorite casino of local Asian players, does function as sort of a cultural center, in that gambling is very important in East Asian societies. The Gold Coast has two excellent Chinese restaurants, Ping Pang Pong and the Noodle Exchange, and is always full of Asian  players. It has a massive table games area for a casino its size to accommodate the Asian players’ interest in baccarat as well as other table games.

Below is another sign, this one behind the Gold Coast off Valley View. It’s all in Chinese except for one word -- comps. It’s hard to believe there’s no Chinese equivalent, but there you have it. If anyone can translate the rest of the sign, I’d love to know what it says.

The Gold Coast is the nearest casino to Las Vegas’ linear, strip-mall Chinatown, which runs west from Valley View along Spring Mountain Road, a few blocks north of the Gold Coast. Two other locals’ casinos popular with Asian players are Palace Station, on Sahara Avenue just west of I-15, and the Orleans, on Tropicana a little farther west of I-15. Like the Gold Coast, the Orleans is part of the Coast chain owned by Boyd Gaming.

Mailer mystery solved

For several months my wife and I have played at a particular locals’ casino that offers 16/10 “not so ugly” deuces as well as a relatively obscure game that my wife plays and that pays back slightly more in the long run with perfect play than NSU. With point multipliers and other considerations, both these games can be positive for skilled players.

I was playing the NSU deuces exclusively, and she was playing the other game (I’m intentionally omitting details to avoid tipping off the casino to what has become an advantage play for us and apparently at least one other person). If anyone was playing more money through, it was me.

A couple of months ago she got a mailer from this casino that made our eyes bug out -- three $40 dining credits, $45 in free play several times a month, entry in a slot tournament, two free room nights. I got $5 in free play twice a month and a coupon for $2 off the buffet.

We couldn’t figure out why she was getting so much more until I realized that the games we were playing were on different machines. The machines with NSU also have other relatively good games on them, such as 9/6 jacks or better. The machines with the game she plays have a bunch of obscure games on them. I haven’t looked up the pay tables, but I assume they are not very good for the players. Also, this casino has a different version of the game my wife that pays back less to the players. It is on machines near the ones she plays.

According to the video poker author and teacher Bob Dancer, NSU deuces has become a favorite of players who make a living off the casinos. With point multipliers and other considerations, the game has a positive payback for skilled players, and the casinos obviously know this is a good game and one that can cost them money. I was being “punished” (by not being rewarded nearly as much as my wife) for playing this game.

But she was playing a game that actually returns more money to the player. I finally realized that the casino must be mistaken about the value of her game. We figured this casino groups games with similar paybacks on the same machines, and gives them all the same value for marketing purposes.  Perhaps the casino thinks the game on the machines my wife plays is the inferior version; perhaps whoever set the machines up just didn’t know how good this game is.

At any rate, my wife appears to be benefiting from some kind of casino error. I have started playing her game at this casino and stopped playing the NSU deuces. I am looking forward to getting a much better mailer from this casino.

Incidentally, I knew my thinking was on the right track when, on a recent visit to this casino, I saw Dancer playing on the bank of machines that my wife (and now I) play there. I unobtrusively walked behind him to see what game he was playing and, sure enough, it was the same one my wife plays.

Mystery solved!

Saturday, October 9, 2010

A suprising development at the Las Vegas Hilton

First, a little background. Traditionally the game of blackjack is based on a payout of 3-to-2 for a player's two first cards of ace, ten (unless the dealer also has ace, ten). Such a hand is called a blackjack, indicating its singificance to the game.

A few years ago someone, probably an MBA, got the idea that you could pay less -- 6-to-5 -- for blackjack if you give players something in return for the lower payout. At first, that something was a single-deck game, which had disappeared from most casinos because it was too advantageous to good players.

More recently the 6-to-5 payout has spread to shoe games and games with rules that are less advantageous to the playes. In some cases the tradoff was entertainment, often in the form of sexy young women dealing and/or dancing. This was the case at the Las Vegas Hilton, which in the past few months installed a large pit with stages inside for young women to dance on. On recent visits I saw lots of players at these tables, which were all 6-to-5 games, some shoes, with minimums as high as $25. The players seemed happy and the money surely must have been rolling in.

Some imagine my surprise the other day when I walked through the main casino at the Hilton and saw empty carpet where the party pit had been. I decided to ask a floorman at the remaining pit what had happened. Surely, I said, the party pit was making money. Yes, he said, but many of the hotel's older customers didn't like it, and the casino decided to get rid of it.

I'm not sure exactly what to think of this development. I'm not a big fan of the party pits and would never play a blackjack game that pays 6-to-5. But I suspect that the bad games in casino subsidize the good ones, and I'm worried about what the Hilton might do to make up for the lost revenue.

I also don't know whether the Hilton did the right thing in respect to the customers who didn't like the party pit, or just made a business decision.

Whatever the motive behind it, the decision leaves a big hole on the Hilton's casino floor. I'll be interested to see what fills it.

Friday, May 21, 2010

Hello, Old Buddy

When the M Resort opened a little over a year ago, it had a video poker game I had never seen before. It was the same as 16/10 "not so ugly" deuces, except that it paid 15 instead of 16 for the five of a kind and 11 instead of 10 for the straight flush. These seemingly small changes bring the game's return with max coins bet and optimal play to 99.96 percent, compared with 99.73 percent for the 16/10 deuces. (The higher payout for the straight flush, which occurs more often, more than offsets the lower payout for the five of a kind.)

This game was available for a while at the M at quarters on triple play machines. That casino also had full pay deuces (100.76 percent payback) at the time, but only in single line quarters, and at one quarter the points awarded for playing most other games. The 15/11 or "almost positive" deuces were wildly popular. Then one day they were gone, to be followed by the M's 16/10 deuces.

Tonight I came across the 15/11 deuces at 50 cents at the Skyline, a small casino on Boulder Highway in Henderson. What's more, it's on a progessive. This game is break-even when the jackpot hits a whopping $2,054, as opposed to the base $2,000 for the 50 cent game.

I expect to be playing this one a lot.

Learning a new video poker game

My wife and I both started gambling more or less seriously as blackjack players, but about four years ago, when we started coming to Las Vegas for vacations, she decided to start playing video poker. As a music teacher, she was going to approach this like learning a new instrument, which meant practicing until she could play well. But first she had to decide which video poker game to learn.

Many experts suggest learning jacks or better first. Full pay or 9/6 jacks is easy to learn. It is widely available in all popular denominations. Most important, it is the basis for many other popular games, including bonus poker, double bonus poker and double double bonus poker. The big drawback of jack is its payback -- 99.54 percent with optimum play.

She became interested in full pay deuces wild, mostly because of its strongly positive payback -- 100.76 percent. Full pay deuces is harder to learn than full pay jacks, but not extremely difficult. It’s also more volatile -- wider swings of wins and losses -- but not dangerously so. The game was available almost exclusively in quarters, but that is what she wanted to play. And it was more widely available then than it is now and the casinos were giving more points and other comps for those playing it.

She decided to learn full-pay deuces, and it served her well. When we moved to Vegas three years ago, I followed in her footsteps. We both later learned other deuces games, including loose deuce deuces wild and “not so ugly” (16/10) deuces, which allowed us to play at the dollar level.

Recently we decided to take another look at 9/6 jacks, mostly because it is now the best game available at some of the casinos we want to play at, including the M Resort. And we have discovered some good full pay jacks progressives.

I have started playing using the simple strategy found on Wizard of Odds Web site (I learned to play the full pay deuces using the Wizard’s simple strategy for that game). This strategy uses words, which I am more comfortable with than the symbols used in the more advanced strategies. There’s a trade-off in payback -- the simple strategy gets you 99.4 percent instead of the game’s full potential, 99.54 percent. But it’s a good stopgap until I can learn the advanced strategy.

As casinos change their video poker inventories and the rewards they offer for playing different games, it is necessary to learn new games to take advantage of new opportunities. Fortunately, learning jacks or better has been -- so far -- a lot easier than I had expected.

Sunday, May 16, 2010

The value of free play

Those who have been reading this blog know that serious gamblers in general and video poker players in particular often think in terms of percentages, particular the percentage return of a particular game. What we hope to find are advantage plays -- situations where a game returns more than 100 percent. Although some “full pay” video poker games such as deuces wild, joker poker and double bonus pay back more than 100 percent in the long run with optimal play and max coins bet, advantage plays also can be found in combinations of other games, slot club benefits and promotions.

I’m going to describe two current casino promotions to illustrate how this works. In particular, I’ll explain how to put a percentage value on free play, a benefit commonly offered both as a slot club benefit to a casino’s regular players and as part of many promotions. A few casinos still give “bounce back” cash instead of free play, and the principles for putting a value on it are the same.

In the first promotion, the Eastside Cannery on Saturdays is offering a minimum of $10 in “mystery” free play to anyone who earns 300 points. Players may earn a maximum of two free play awards. Some players are mailed postcards entitling them to one free play award and can earn a second; those who do not get a postcard can get two by earning 600 points.

On video poker, the Eastside Cannery awards one point for every $2 coin in. (As noted in an earlier post, this does not mean $2 deposited in the machine; it means money played through, including the proceeds of winning hands.) So two “mystery” free play awards require running $1,200 through a machine. This gets the player a minimum of $20, or 0.167 percent.

The best video poker game at this casino is 16/10 “not so ugly” deuces wild, which returns about 99.7 percent. Slot club points are worth 0.125 percent. If we add the percentage return of the game and value percentage value of the slot club points (0.167, 99.73 and 0.125), we get just over 100 percent, essentially break-even. However, the play involved in taking advantage of this and other promotions is likely to result in a mailer with additional free play and other benefits, making this clearly, but not spectacularly, an advantage play. (For players who got a postcard and/or more than $20 in mystery free play, the promotion itself is an advantage play.)

One caveat: Playing through more than $1,200 “dilutes” the percentage value of the free play, making the promotion less valuable. A typical quarter player probably needs about an hour and a half to earn 600 points, but a dollar player needs only a quarter of the time. Playing longer may or may not be worth the extra benefits, but there’s no way of knowing until next month’s mailer arrives.

A promotion at the Silverton is more mysterious than the Eastside Cannery’s mystery free play. The Silverton has mailed pull tabs to many of its customers. These little cardboard squares have a tab on the front that must be pulled at the casino, in an employee’s presence, to reveal what the player has won. In addition, all players can earn 1,000, 5,000 or 10,000 points in a day to receive a pull tab. The tabs for the different point totals are kept at the players’ club in separate boxes, and presumably the ones for the higher totals have better prizes.

My spouse and I received pull tabs in the mail even though we have played very little at the Silverton in recent months, since the casino took out what had been its best video poker game, $1 16/10 “not so ugly” deuces. We took our first week’s tabs to casino last Saturday. She won $50 in free play and I won $25. We found a good play on the quarter 1/9/4 “pseudo not so ugly” deuces progressives near the Flare (could they have meant “Flair”?) Bar. With the jackpot at more than $1,500, this game, which has a base return of just under 99 percent, was nearly positive. We decided to go for the 1,000 points and another pull tab each, about an hour and a half’s play for me, less for her. She won another $10 in free play; I won another $25.

The value of Silverton points, nominally 0.2 percent, is not the same to all players, because they can be used only for comps, not for cash back or free play. So if someone has no use for the restaurants or rooms there, or already has more points than he can use, the points are worthless. For the sake of discussion, let’s say our progressive was break-even with slot club benefits considered. My wife’s $50 in free play added a full 5 percent to the game’s return for the $1,000 coin-in needed for another pull tab. That’s like a bank account paying 5 percent not a year, but instantly -- a very strong advantage play. Even my $25 increased the return to 102.5 percent, nothing to scoff at (keep in mind that these figures represent the long run return for playing under these circumstances, not necessarily the result of a single session.) The second set of pull tabs yielded $10 for the spouse and $25 for me, in both cases in free play. So for the first day at least, the promotion turned out very well for both of us.

It would have worked out well even if the progressive had just been hit. They are, however, worth 0.2 percent to those who can make good use of them. The best games in the house, not counting our juicy deuces progressive, are 9/6 jacks or better in dollars and a quarter progressive, with the base game paying back 99.54 percent. Add the slot club points but not anything for the progressive and those games return 99.74 percent. The promotion would have been highly positive for us had we been playing jacks instead of the deuces progressive.

The next day we were able to go back and use the second pull tabs we got in the mail. This time my wife got a bottle of wine and I got $25 in free play. It’s hard for us to put a value on the wine because neither of us is a wine expert, and its value to us is probably negligible because with so many casinos giving out wine these days, another bottle is something we don’t really need. The pull tabs we got for earning 1,000 points each were for a free buffet (worth about $15) and for dinner for two at Mi Casa, the Silverton’s Mexican restaurant. It’s hard to put a value on that one because the tab itself doesn’t make clear what’s included, but I’m guessing it’s worth $25 to $40 -- not bad at all. We’ll definitely be back at the Silverton this week with our next set of pull tabs.

Although the amounts of free play, free bets, match plays and other cash equivalents most players receive might not seem like much -- $5 here, $10 there, an occasional $20 or more -- over the course of time it can make a substantial difference in the bottom line.

Sunday, April 25, 2010

Eureka, we've found it!

The spouse and I discovered a spiffy little casino on Sahara Avenue in Las Vegas, a bit east of the Strip, called the Eureka. It's a small place and isn't much to look at from Sahara, although the back of the building facing the parking lot presents a nice facade. It's a small place, with slots and video poker only and a bar and small cafe, but nicely appointed. And the video poker, including positive games and progessives at the bar on 16/10 "not so ugly" deuces at 25 and 50 cents are among the better plays anywhere. Unlike some other casinos of its size, the Eureka has a players' club (the cashier's cage doubles as the players' club booth). It's affiliated with the larger Eureka in the city of Mesquite, about 80 miles north of Las Vegas. I'm looking foward to seeing what kind of mail we get from the Eureka, but from what I saw it won't take much to get us back there.

Insurance

Playing blackjack recently at Sunset Station, I was reminded of one of the most widespread misconceptions among not only players but the dealers who advise them.

The dealer was showing an ace and the count was high. I put chips amounting to half my bet on the insurance line (no one else at the table did), and the dealer flipped a 10 for the dreaded blackjack. Except for one who had blackjack and pushed, every other player but me lost his bet. My insurance bet paid 2-to-1, conveniently covering the main bet I lost and leaving me, effectively, with a push.

One of the players asked the dealer to explain insurance, which he did pretty well. If the dealer has an ace up, players can put half their bet or less on the insurance line. If the dealer has blackjack, a full insurance bet covers the lost main bet, leaving the player whole. If the dealer doesn't have blackjack, the insurance bet loses, and play of the round continues normally, with the main bet winning or losing based on the player's and dealer's hands.

Then the dealer said something I've heard dozens of times even though it makes no sense at all. You should insure a good hand, he told the player -- unless you want to gamble. Many players believe you should insure a had such as two 10-value cards but never a bad hand such as two small cards. (Many players also believe you should never hit a soft 18, another part of "folk" basic strategy that is wrong.)

Here's why that belief is wrong: The insurance bet has nothing to do with the player's hand. It is a bet on whether the dealer has blackjack. If the dealer has BJ, the insurance bet wins, no matter what the player's hand. If the dealer doesn't have BJ, the player loses the insurance bet no matter how good his hand is. In fact, as the authors of "Knock-Out Blackjack" point out, if a player has two 10-value cards, that's two less cards available for the dealer to get and make blackjack with, meaning the odds of winning the insurance bet are actually less when the player has such a hand than when he has, say, a 7 and 8.

So what to do about insurance? Unless you're a card counter, don't ever take it. It's a good bet only when the remaining deck or shoe is particularly rich in 10-value cards, and unless you are counting you have no way of knowing when this is. The cards in your hand have no significant effect on the dealer's likelihood of making a BJ, which is all the insurance bet is about. So don't ever insure a "good" hand unless you're counting, but be ready to hear "you should have taken insurance" if the dealer has BJ against your pair of monkeys.

South Point: Best video poker?

The staff of the R-J this year picked South Point as having the best video poker. (Readers picked the Fiestas). Both are places with good video poker, but the best? I'm not sure.

Part of my definition of good VP is lots of games with a long-term return to the skilled player of above 99.5, and South Point passes this test with ease. In particular, the casino is full of 16/10 "not so ugly deuces" in a variety of denominations, a game that returns 99.73 percent. With South Point's strong slot club, these games are break-even for skilled players without point multipliers or other considerations such mailers.

But many players want the opportunity to beat the casino on a cash basis by playing games with a 100-plus percent return. Numerous casinos have such games, which include full pay versions of deuces wild, double bonus, double double bonus and joker poker. I think the best casino for video poker would have at least some "positive" games, at quarter, 50 cent and dollar denominations. To the best of my knowledge, South Point no longer has any positive video poker.

Another consideration for me and many other video poker players is the availability of progressives with decent pay tables. A progressive is a video poker (or slot) machine or group of machines from which a percentage of the players' coin in goes to fund one or more jackpots. You've probably seen groups of machines with a sign above them with a dollar amount, or a sign above a bar with a dollar amount, representing a progressive jackpot.

My wife and I did a sweep of South Point for progessives a few months ago and while we found a fair number of progressives, all the games we checked had pay tables that we consider unplayable (anything much below 99 percent return). This is common with progressives; because part of the money going into the machines is siphoned off to fund the jackpot, the casino makes it up with a bad pay table. The best casinos for progressives put them on games that give players a chance to hold on to enough of their money to survive between royals.

The Palms is famous for its progressives on positive games, including full pay deuces wild. Unfortunately, the jackpot on this group of machines near the main entrance to the casino now accrues quite slowly, and the amount rarely reaches $1,100 and is often just a few dollars above the standard $1,000 for a quarters-game royal. Still, it's a highly positive game and you get full slot club points for playing it, making it one of the best deals in town. The Palms also has a progessive on $1 10/7 double bonus with jackpots not just on the royal, but also on the straight flush and "quads." Another fabulous opportunity. Downtown, the Four Queens has a $1 10/7 double bonus progressive. I'm sure there are more.

In judging which casino has the "best" video poker, other players might take into account which has the latest or most exotic games. This isn't my thing so I can't be of much help here. And, as with blackjack, a place that offers good games for high rollers ($1 and up video poker players) might not be so good to to the little guys. And those who play a particular game of family of games may find better tables and a wider choice of denominations at some casinos rather than others.

So it's hard to say which one casino is best for all video poker players. South Point certainly is good for many, but not for those who want to play a positive game or a progressive with a decent pay table.

Saturday, April 3, 2010

Best of Vegas? (Part I)

Each year the Review-Journal comes out with the in numerous categories as chosen by the newspaper's readers and staff. Many businesses use the "Best of Vegas" seal as a kind of Good Housekeeping seal of approval to gain public confidence. In my opinion these "awards" are just about meaningless, as a close look at some of the gambling winners will show.

Forget (if you can) that the same pool of voters who selected the gambling winners found that in Vegas, which has some of the finest restaurants in the world, the "best" this year included Applebees, the Olive Garden and the Red Lobster. These people don't have any particular expertise in the areas in which they voted, and they are not statistically representative of the R-J's readers. They're just people who decided to vote.

Nonetheless, just as the blind squirrel sometimes finds an acorn, some of their choices aren't bad. In particular, a case can be made for Sunset Station as offering the best blackjack, though not for the reasons stated in the newspaper, which cited "Wicked 21" blackjack offered on Friday and Saturday nights.

So what criteria would I use to choose the "best blackjack" winner, and what casino would that be?

First, we need to address the issue "best for whom" -- the $5 player or the $100 player? The tourist or the card counter? In blackjack and other categories, there is no one "best" for everyone. Here are the criteria I would use in evaluating casinos for the quality of their blackjack, in descending order of importance:

1. Availability. Most players should be able to find a seat most of the time at a game they want to play for a minimum bet amount they're comfortable with.

2. Rules. Doubling on any first two cards and doubling after splitting should be allowed in all games. Resplitting of aces, dealer standing on soft 17, and late surrender earn extra points. If games that pay 6-to-5 for blackjack are offered, they should be in a small minority and clearly labeled.

3. Variety. Double deck should be available. Shoe games should be six decks, not eight. Continuous shuffling machines are OK for lower-limit games as long as players have other choices.

4. Extras. Promotions especially for, or at least that include, table players earn extra credit.

5. Atmosphere, surroundings, decor, including ventilation and availability of non-smoking areas.

6. Friendliness and competence of dealers and pit staff.

7. Good penetration. Dealers don't spend half their time shuffling.

8. Tables without side bets so players have a choice.

By these criteria, I think the choice of Sunset Station is a reasonable one. The casino generally has a reasonable number of tables open, including double deck for as low as $10. The rules are better than average, with resplitting of aces allowed, though surrender is not offered on any games. The table games area has a spectacular ceiling and is well ventilated. Dealers are competent and mostly friendly. As primarly a locals' casino, Sunset attracts mostly reasonably competent players who allow the games to keep moving.

On the negative side, the Stations in general don't do much to promote blackjack (or other table games). Their comp system for table games is opaque and, in my experience, not very generous.

On the whole, though, the Stations are among the best places in Vegas for the low- to mid-level blackjack player. Other places I like to play include the M Resort, Mirage, Aria, Rampart and the Orleans.

In my next post, I'll discuss why I disagree with the Review-Journal readers' choice of South Point as having the best video poker, though I don't think it's a bad place at all for that game.

Laughlin, Nevada

The spouse and I spent a couple of days this week in Laughlin, a gambling center about 95 miles south of Las Vegas on the Colorado River. We had two free room nights at the Golden Nugget as a result of some play by the spouse at the Nugget in Vegas. If you're going to Laughlin and want to stay at a nice place, I recommend the Nugget, despite an incident in the parking garage that I'll describe later.

Laughlin caters mostly to low rollers, and a few places offers some decent opportunities for quarter video poker players and $5 blackjack players. A friend who is a low roller and a frequent visitor says he has gotten very generous room and dining offers from some of the places where he has played. He served as our guide during our first trip to Laughlin, just for a day, earlier in the month.

Probably the best gambling overall in Laughlin is at the Colorado Belle and Edgewater, adjacent properties owned by the Marnell family. Both have $5 double deck blackjack games with good penetration and each has a bank of 100 percent payback video poker machines, with all games at the quarter level. We also saw positive video poker at the Aquarius, which is affiliated with the Stratosphere and Arizona Charlie's properties in the Las Vegas area. The Aquarius has a $1 10/7 double bonus progressive, with a jackpot for the four aces as well as the royal. The same machines, just outside the hosts' office near the main entrance, have 16/10 "not so ugly" deuces for $1 as well. These were the only good video poker plays for $1 or more we saw in all of Laughlin, except for one game of 10/7 double bonus (100.17 percent payback) that we think was a programming mistake because it was in a casino where all the other games were horrible.

With few exceptions, the video poker situation in Laughlin can be described only as deplorable. In most places we checked the prevailing pay tables were 9/6 for double bonus (97.81 percent payback), 8/5 for jacks or better (97.30 percent) and 16/13 for deuces wild (96.77 percent). This appalling version of deuces is known as Colorado deuces and I always assumed the name came from the state, not the river. After visiting Laughlin, I'm not so sure.

The blackjack in Laughlin is characterized by a prohibition against doubling after split, even in some shoe games. This gives the house an additional edge of .13 percent against a perfect basic strategy player. It also takes the most exciting moments -- when the big money is out on the table -- out of the game, and prohibits customers from doing something many know they can do somewhere else, which I'm sure most appreciate as much as I do. Further, this stupid rule is self-defeating for the casinos because so few people play perfect basic strategy. They should want most of the players I saw to split and double down whenever they want; it would be money in the bank. Such rule can be made only by executives who go by statistics and not by any real experience at the gaming tables.

A couple of more things about blackjack in Laughlin: The signs at many tables say "double after any first two cards." A dealer at one place told us that in the past, many places in Laughlin allowed doubling on first two cards totaling 10 and 11 only. These signs conveniently avoid the issue of whether players can double after splitting, which was barred in all the double deck games I played in Laughlin, though it was allowed in the six deck shoe games at the Golden Nugget. If in doubt, ask the dealer. Also, table minimums are low -- mostly $5, some $10. I found it disconcerting when, at a couple of places, I put out a $30 bet and the dealer called out "green action." Nothing came of it, but the pit needs to know if someone is betting $30?

In terms of atmosphere, most of the places in Laughlin are on the level of downtown Las Vegas. As noted, the Nugget is the classiest, though the Aquarius claims to have the best (newly remodeled) rooms (you can see a mock-up on the casino floor). Out room at the Nugget was pretty standard. One thing I liked was the honor basket of snack items that were so reasonably priced we actually went for a couple of them, something I have never done in a hotel. The Nugget also has a nice tropical forest inside the main entrance, on a smaller scale but along the lines of the one at the Mirage, but with some of the flowers plastic, along the lines of the foliage at the Fiesta Henderson.

The one disconcerting thing that happened during our stay: One evening we went to our car in the parking garage at the Nugget and found a man, passed out, lying on the floor between our vehicle and the one next to it. My wife went inside to call security. I approached him; he seemed to breathing and there were no signs of violence, so I decided not to do anything further. The two security guys who came were able to rouse him; he expressed surprise at being at the Nugget, but never said where he thought he was. While this conversation was taking place, I noticed a bunch of gaming chips on the roof of the car next to ours. The security guys pointed out the chips and he said, "I guess I'm a winner." "One of the very few," one of the security guys shot back. Pretty funny stuff, since it was apparent by this time the man was OK.

Thursday, March 4, 2010

A horrifying possibility

I just became aware of reports that Harrah's Entertainment has taken over some of the debt of the Palms and may have its eyes on taking over the property, as it recently did to Planet Hollywood. The Financial Times published a fairly detailed story on Feb. 24 and the Las Vegas Sun Web site carried a brief summary the following day. Sun readers posted some interesting comments on the story. (Incidentally, the Sun failed to note that the Greenspun family, which owns the paper, also has a small stake in the Palms.)

To say the least, a Harrahs takeover of the Palms would not be good news. The Palms is a unique casino that serves a diverse group of Vegas locals and visitors in ways that no Harrah's property does or could.

Perhaps the most basic difference betweeen the philosophies of Harrah's and George Maloof, the Palms' owner, is their attitude toward locals. Maloof got his start in Vegas with what is now Fiesta Rancho, a locals' casino in North Las Vegas. Although the Palms is known for its trendy clubs and fancy restaurants, on weekdays it is filled with locals who come for good games, including some of the best video poker on the planet, as well as some of the best promotions in Vegas.

On the other hand, Harrah's, the owner of a number of Strip properties and the Rio, has consistently shown nothing but contempt for local gamblers. Its games are among the worst and its comps are among the stingiest. Most of its properties (Harrah's, Flamingo, Imperial Palace, the abominable O'Sheas) are second rate or worse. Harrah's uses Vegas largely as a reward for players at its casinos in other parts of the country, who fill its rooms here, paying little or nothing. They certainly don't come for the 6-to-5 blackjack or Colorado deuces.

If Harrah's takes over the Palms, the changes will come quickly, and they will be drastic. The result will be what a blackjack dealer at Caesars Palace told a player there after Harrah's changed the rules: "This used to be one the best places to gamble. Now it's one of the worst."

Updates

It appears that since my recent post about the Westin Casuarina, the casino has dropped 16/10 "not so ugly" deuces. On a happier note, nearby Ellis Island has added full pay deuces to a group of machines against the wall of the restaurant. Labels on the machines indicate that point multipliers do not apply. These are the closest full pay deuces machines to the Strip.

Also, Peppermill's Rainbow in downtown Henderson no longer has 10-coin full pay deuces wild, leaving the Skyline on Boulder Highway the only place I know of with full pay deuces for, in effect, 50 cents. This casino has something else I haven't seen anywhere else -- wild sevens video poker, with the same pay table as full pay deuces wild. You'd have to use a different strategy for this game because in deuces games, "proximity to the deuce" is a factor in determining whether some cards are held.

Sunday, February 14, 2010

A different kind of casino

After almost three years living in Vegas, I've visited most of the casinos in the area's major tourist areas. Until recently, one of the few exceptions was the Westin Casuarina, on Flamingo Road just east of the Strip. I did duck in a couple of months ago for a few minutes but didn't play. The other night a good players' club sign-up offer and a $25 table games match play coupon in the American Casino Guide got me in the door again. The offer was a rebate in free play of up to $50 in first-day slot or video poker losses. When I signed up, I was also given a $10 table games match play coupon.

What's different about the Westin is that although it's a short walk from the Strip, it has the atmosphere of a business hotel rather than a Vegas resort. The casino is small by Vegas standards for the size of the hotel, and it was quiet and crowd-free. The only businesses in the casino are a restaurant called Suede, a gift shop and a Starbucks coffee. There's one bar in the casino, with video poker.

The best video poker in the casino is 16/10 "not so ugly" deuces wild, which pays back 99.73 percent, for 25 cents. According to vpFREE2.com, 9/6 jacks or better (99.54 percent) is also available for 25 cents. The best game at higher denominations (50 cents, $1 and $2) is 15/9/4 "pseudo not so ugly" deuces wild (98.92 percent). Playing the 16/10, I quickly lost $50 and went to the players' club booth (which doubles as the cashiers' cage) and got my $50 rebate in free play, which I managed to turn into $50 cash for a break-even session.

Then it was time for blackjack. Two tables were open, one with a continuous-shuffle machine, the other with six decks, hand-shuffled. The minimum at both was $5. I chose the latter. A sign on the table detailed the rules, which are pretty standard: Dealer hits soft 17, double on any two cards, double after split, no re-slitting aces, no surrender (for a house edge of .63 against a basic strategy strategy player. For you card counters, penetration is set by notch at about 67 percent -- two full decks cut off.

For the center-Strip area, and especially with a $5 minimum, this isn't a bad blackjack game. It's certainly a lot better than the horrific 6-to-five games at the nearby Harrah's places. It's not a game I would normally play, but with $35 in match plays, my chances of winning a little money looked good. Alas, I lost my bet with the big coupon and left a loser by $40.

For machine play, the Westin gives both points than can be converted to free play and comp dollars for use in the restaurant, gift shop and Starbucks. According to vpFREE2, it takes $10 coin in to earn a point, and 100 points equal $5 in free play, which adds 0.5 percent to the players' return. This alone makes the 16/10 deuces a positive game for those who play it well. In addition to points, comp dollars are awarded at rates ranging from 0.48 percent to 0.93 percent, according to vpFREE2. Presumably the lowest rate is awarded for at least the better video poker games, but even so the total value of free play and comps comes to almost 1 percent, with this caveat:

Through the conversation at my blackjack table, I learned that the restaurant prices are quite high. In many casinos, restaurant prices are low, to draw in potential gamblers. Apparently the Westin restaurant is more of a typical of a business hotel, where many customers are on expense accounts and more interested in convenience than value. So the real value of the comp dollars may not be as high as their nominal value, considering available alternatives. Still, the overall return of the players' club benefits is quite good.

How often I return to the Westin may well depend on the offers, if any, I get in the mail. It doesn't seem to be a place that targets locals, but if I were a visitor who wanted to stay or play near the center Strip, it's definitely a place I would consider.

Sunday, February 7, 2010

Slippage at Hooters

One of the casinos we've tended to visit occasionally is Hooters, just east of the Strip on Tropicana. We've gotten room offers for our play and stayed there several times, always enjoying the experience.

No one is going to mistake Hooters for the Wynn, but it has its charms. It advertises itself as "the cure for the ordinary casino," and it is refreshingly self-deprecating. At the front desk, a sign guarantees same-day check-in. The hotel towers are the "ocean view" and "bayfront," and the "do not disturb" signs say "no knockers." Unless you're a women's studies professor, you'll probably find a lot to laugh at. The crowd is usually high spirited and a mix of the young, middle aged and even families. (I once encountered a couple with two young boys in an elevator and asked the kids how they liked Hooters. They grinned widely and said they loved it, but Mommy glared and said, "DADDY booked us in to Hooters.")

I play 16/10 "not so ugly" deuces, available in denominations up to $1 on one bank of machines in front of the cashier's cage, and double deck blackjack, available on one table with a minimum of $10 and maximum of $500, never on more than one table. My spouse plays double bonus deuces wild (99.81 percent payback), which is on only one of the machines that also have the 16/10 deuces. 9/6 Jacks or Better is also available.

The rooms at Hooters are basic but have always been acceptable. This weekend we had the room from hell. It was at the end of the hall, overlooking the airport, so we got that noise, plus noise from the adjoining room. It seemed like there was no soundproofing at all. The bathroom sink didn't drain; the toilet ran; the bathtub faucet dripped. One of the closet doors had been knocked in; the blackout curtains were missing a pull rod; the clock radio didn't work.

A sign on the check-in counter and in our room invited us to a manager's reception with free hors d'oeuvres at the Mad Onion, the restaurant that until recently was Dan Marino's. We went one day and found that the hors d'oeuvres were available only with the purchase of a drink, which could have been made clear by the signs but wasn't.

The room was comped, and some might think it's ungrateful to complain about something you get for free. In the casino business, though, room comps serve as a reward for previous business and an inducement to come back. A substandard room fails to accomplish these goals for the casino.

Saying goodbye

There are many reasons to play at one casino rather than another, but the bottom line for me is games I want to play -- games that give me a fair chance to come out ahead. For video poker, these include not just 100 percent payback games but games such as 16/10 "not so ugly deuces" with 99.73 percent payback that can be combined with players' club benefits to yield a positive return. Progressives can make games with otherwise unacceptable pay tables a good play.

In recent weeks and months, several casinos have downgraded their video poker inventory, making it diffuclt for me to continue playing there. A case in point is one of the few Strip casinos that has made a genuine effort to go after the locals' business -- the Sahara.

This aging Strip property has been doing many things right. It has a generous players' club program that awards comp points, cash back and free play. The mailers I've gotten for my video poker play have offered generous amounts of free play. It offers point multipliers, gifts to local players and invitations to special events.

The Sahara deserves compliments for its $1 blackjack. Many casinos that offer low-limit blackjack have only one table of it; the Sahara always has at least one full pit open. Players get paid only even money for blackjacks and don't get rated for comps unless they bet $5 per hand (in which cases blackjacks play 6-to-5). But it's the only place I know of in Vegas where you can play blackjack for $1, and at that bet level the average loss from the reduced payout for blackjack is about $1.50 an hour. (Normally any game that pay less than 3-to-2 for blackjacks is to be avoided like the plague; in this case the disadvantage to the player is mitigated by the small amount of the bets.)

For slot and video poker players the Sahara has a "Locals Lane" with video poker that used to be better than that in the main casino. Not too long ago the best game there was 10/7 double bonus (100.17 percent payback) for 50 cents; most recently it was 16/10 "not so ugly" deuces (99.73 percent payback), in denominations up to $1. I was happy to play this game there given the Sahara's slot club benefits.

A few weeks ago, I found that the deuces pay tables had been changed to 15/9/4 "pseudo not so ugly," aka "Illinois deuces," which pays back 98.91 percent. The best double bonus is now 9/7, which pays back 99.11 percent, and it isn't even in Locals Lane. Absent incentives such as a big progressive jackpot or point multiplier, there is no reason to play games with these pay tables. The Las Vegas Hilton, right across the street, offers better games, including 16/10 deuces and 9/6 jacks or better (99.54 percent payback).

Nothing's forever in the casino business, and it's possible the folks at the Sahara will realize they've gone too far. But until they bring back the better pay tables or something else worthwile, I'll be using up my free play and than spending my time at other casinos.

Monday, February 1, 2010

An all-too-common problem

Last night I went to a casino I will not name because the problem I encountered there is all too common. I had received a postcard from this casino offering me, among other things, $50 in free play during January. The month was almost up and I didn't want to let this free play lapse.

When I got to the casino I sat down at a machine and tried to download the promotional credits. They were not there. I was ready to play so I decided to download $25 worth of slot points, play for a while, then check at the players' club on my $50. I had the postcard with the offer but had left it in the car, in my accordion folder of casino coupons, calendars, etc.

When I went to the players' club, the attendant checked her computer and told me I didn't have $50, I had $25, and I had used it in a previous month. All of this information was incorrect. She apparently saw that I had downloaded the $25 worth of points but couldn't understand that was not promotional free play, even though I explained it. I have no idea where she got the idea that my offer applied in more than one month. Basically, she blew me off.

Fortunately, I had the card in my car and brought it in. Another attendant downloaded the free play. I asked why it was not on the machine even though the card indicated it would be. She said all such offers have to be brought to the players' club to be activated. I can't say whether it said this anywhere on the card because she asked me to surrender it to her.

This is far from the first time I have found a casino employee ignorant of an offer or promotion or the procedures involved. Failure to communicate necessary information to those on the front lines appears to be common, if not endemic, in the gaming industry.

What's more annoying to me is when an employee pretends to know something he doesn't or gives a wrong answer without making an effort to understand exactly what is going on. Years ago, when I worked in retail, I was trained to take all customer complaints seriously and, if I was unable to provide satsifaction, to call a supervisor. This seems to be the obvious way to deal with customers, but in many casinos, the philsophy seems to be: Give them an answer, any answer, and get to the next customer.

Why not train employees to say "I don't know the answer but I'll try to get hold of someone who does"?

The lesson from this incident is always to come to a casino with any evidence you have to support any offer or promotion you plan to take advantage of. If the notice was an e-mail, print it out. If it's from an ad in the paper, cut it out. You get the idea.

One other thing: Many casino offers contain fine print. Read it before you make a trip to take advantage of what the large print seems to promise. A particular discount may not be available on weekends or holidays, for example. Even if you have the ad with you, if the fine print says the offer doesn't apply, you're unlikely to get to use it.

Sunday, January 24, 2010

Las Vegas coupons can add real value

It's January, and for savvy residents of and visitors to Las Vegas, that means it's time to purchase two coupon books. Normally I'm skeptical of any deal that involves spending money to save money, but both these books are worthwhile, and most people who buy them should be able to save many times their price by using just a small percentage of the coupons.

There are important differences between the two books. The first, the American Casino Guide, is particularly suited to relatively inexperienced gamblers and visitors to Vegas. In addition to coupons, it contains detailed, reliable information on most forms of gambling. Some of the coupons are good only for players' club sign-ups. For example, we used a coupon for my daughter recently that doubled the $10 in free slot play offered by the Silverton to new members (that one coupon covered nearly half the list price of the book). The American Casino Guide has coupons for casinos throughout the country as well as in Las Vegas and is available in major bookstores and through online booksellers.

The other major book is the Las Vegas Advisor Member Rewards, which comes with a subscription to the Advisor, a monthly newsletter that is an excellent source of information on all things Vegas. The price is $37 for the online edition, $50 for print. Unlike the American Casino Guide, the Member Rewards book contains only coupons that all subscribers can theoretically use –- no offers for new players' club sign-ups only. And the coupons are almost all for casinos in Southern Nevada.

There’s also a difference in the way the coupons must be handled. The Casino Guide is a bigger book, and users can cut out the coupons they plan to use and leave the book behind. The book does come with a cardboard card to identify the purchaser, but we have never been asked to show it. Coupons in the Pocket Book, which fits in a pocket or purse, must be torn out in the presence of an employee of the businesses where they are used. You must bring the whole book with you and leave the coupon in it until you are ready to use it. At a buffet, for example, take the book out tell the cashier you would like to use the coupon. In most cases, she will ask you to tear out the coupon. Do not remove the coupon until you are instructed to do so; in rare cases, an employee other than the one you initially show the book to may need to see the process (for example, a floor person rather than the dealer for a table game match play coupon). This sounds more onerous than it is; you’ll quickly get the hang of how the book works, and the process is usually smooth and fast.

To avoid potential problems or disappointment, be sure to read carefully the general instructions on use of the coupons in each book and on each coupon you plan to use. Many coupons, for example, are not valid on holidays, and some are not valid on weekends.

OK, so what are these coupons for and how much can you save? Both the American Casino Guide and Las Vegas Advisor Web sites list all their coupons, which change from year to year. A few generalizations apply to both books: Smaller, locals' and downtown casinos are represented more heavily than the giants on the Strip. Most of the coupons are for dining or gaming. Typical are two-for-one buffets (or 50 percent off one), free drinks and snack items such as hot dogs, players' club point multipliers free slot play. There also are usually coupons for items such as T-shirts and decks of cards, and discounts on restaurant meals, hotel stays, rental cars and show tickets.

Until this year, both books contained table game "match play" coupons. With one of these, a player can double his bet up to the amount of the coupon. For example: A player puts down a $10 bet and a $10 match play coupon and wins; the casino pays him $20. (If he loses, the casino takes his $10 and the coupon; if there's a push, he can use the coupon again.) This year's Las Vegas Advisor book does not contain match plays, but does have a few coupons for an increased payout for a blackjack. The idea is to discourage the "hit and run" use of coupons -- people playing one hand with a match play, then leaving the casino. The American Casino Guide still carries match plays.

For those with casino players' club points, many coupons can be leveraged. In most but not all cases, buffet coupons can be combined with players' club discounts, and the non-free buffet (or half of the price) can be paid with points. For example: A casino offers $1 off the price of its dinner buffet to anyone with one of its players club cards. Give the cashier your card and a coupon, and in most cases you’ll get the dollar off the buffet you have to pay for, whether you pay with cash or points.

Both of these coupon books have been around for years, and there are rarely problems, but sometimes a casino will refuse to accept a particular coupon, usually because it has been fraudulently reproduced or otherwise abused. The casinos generally reserve the right to alter or cancel all offers, but rarely do so. Occasionally a casino employee will not understand how an offer works, but usually someone is available who does.

Other sources of coupons are the free tourist magazines, coupon sheets of "fun books" given to hotel guests when they check in, the daily newspaper and online sources. Once you’ve signed up for a casino’s players club and gambled a bit there, you may get coupons or other marketing offers in the mail.

Keep in mind that any coupon may not offer the best deal available. For example, a discount show ticket outlet may beat the box office price less the amount of a coupon from a tourist magazine.

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Drawings -- the big picture

A big part of the locals' casino culture is drawings. Most casinos have them at least weekly, often on Friday and/or Saturday nights. In addition, many have added drawings on weekdays at part of their seniors' days. Some have daily, several-times-daily or monthly drawings. Drawings for cars and other big prizes are not uncommon.

Drawings and other events such as tournaments can add to the return on a player's gambling dollars. But with all the drawings out there, which ones are worth entering? (And remember, in most cases, winners must be present to collect the prizes they're awarded.)

Entries to most drawings are awarded based in whole or in part on amount of money bet. So if you're a frequent player and a high roller, you're in a good position to win. If not, your chances are slim. This may seem unfair; many casinos depend on a large number of small players for their profits. If it's any consolation, the prizes awarded in most drawings may be only a small fraction of what the high rolling winners wagered to earn their entries. If you're a low roller, your chances will be better at small, neighborhood casinos than at the Stations or Coasts.

The move by many casinos to electronic drawing tickets has allowed them to award large numbers of entries to each qualifying player. To an individual this may seem advantageous, but if hundreds or thousands of other players also have a virtual drawer full of tickets, it doesn't improve anyone's chances of winning.

For all but the highest of rollers, I believe the drawings that still use paper tickets are best. Among big casinos, the Las Vegas Hilton is the only one I know of that still uses paper for its weekly drawings. This drawing also gives low rollers a good chance. Players can earn two tickets a day by playing any slot, video poker or table game at any denomination for 40 minutes. Regular players get coupons in the mail for a few additional entries if they earn tickets on specified days. Those who play every day earn more tickets, but not so many more that anyone has that much more of a chance of winning than anyone else.

The drawings are held at 7:30 p.m. Thursdays in the Spacequest Casino. Five people are called to spin a wheel, which has spaces for prizes ranging from $1,000 to $5,000. Some of the $1,000 spaces have a decal awarding a bonus that the player claims by picking an envelope. If any of the people called to spin are not present, names are called until five people get a chance to win.

One more thing -- tickets must be obtained at the players' club booth the day they are earned. If you play Thursday, plan to pick up your tickets before 7 p.m. The lines at the players' club can get pretty long as the drawing approaches.

Should you be impressed?

At least two locals' casinos have in recent months advertised their large numbers of video poker games returning 99 percent or more. At first glance, 1 percent sounds like a pretty thin profit margin. But what does 99 percent return really mean?

It most certainly does not mean that if you play one of these casinos' 99 percent payback games, you can bring, say $100 for a session and expect to lose an average of only $1. This is because the 1 percent applies to the money you cycle through the machine and not the amount you put into the bill acceptor.

Let's say you play for quarters. At max coin, which you must play to get the 99 percent return, you're betting $1.25 a hand. Some hands result in a loss; $1.25 is deducted from your credits. But some hands are winners, resulting in additions, some quite substantial, to your credits. With a little luck, after an hour and, say, 800 hands, you haven't had to feed the machine anything other than your original $100. But you've put $1,000, including recyled winnings, though the machine. At 99 percent payback, your theoretical loss is $10 -- 10 percent, not 1 percent, of your $100 buy-in. After an average of 10 hours of play, on average, 100 percent of your original $100 will be gone, a return of 0 percent, not 99 percent.

And your $100 may not last nearly that long. Returns stated for video poker games assume perfect play, which few players can approach; strategy errors can multiply the house's 1 percent take. Returns also assume maximum coin betting at all times. This is because of the premium for a royal flush with max bet, which is a significant part of the overall return of any video poker game. And the stated returns are long-term mathematical averages; what serious gamblers call variance or fluctuation (and ploppies, or novices, call luck) can make any session or number of sessions much worse (or better) than average.

On the other hand, stated returns are for only the games themselves and do not include the value players receive in the form of slot club points or other benefits. For example, the Orleans, one of the casinos that touts its 99 percent games, offers point multipliers of up to nine times. With base points worth 0.1 percent, nine times brings the theoretical return of a 99 percent game to a much more acceptable 99.9 percent. (Points can be converted to cash or free play or for comps.) In the above example, this reduces the average hourly loss from $10 to $1.

At most locals' casinos, the returns of many video poker games fall in the range of a little under 99 percent to a little over 100 percent. To the casual player, it doesn't make much difference. The main thing that determines winning or losing in the short run is variance. But to regular, serious players, the real questions are where in the range is the payback of a game and what is the casino doing to add to the players' return. If a game's payback is near the low end of the range, they will play it only if a point multiplier, progressive jackpot or other benefit significantly increases the total return.

Another thing to keep in mind: A casino that advertises that it has many, many games with 99 percent payback or better also is likely to have many, many games with payback that are worse. There are numerous versions of all major video poker games, and some pay back players much less than others. The return of a particular game is determined by the pay table, which can be found on outside of the machine or on the screen. You must know which pay tables for the games you play offer acceptable returns.

It's raining in Vegas -- and in Sam's Town

The part of Sam's Town in the area of the buffet and movie theaters has a metal roof with what appear to be large skylights. As I was playing video poker there yesterday, employees scrambled to cover machines with plastic bags and place garbage cans to catch the water dripping from the ceiling. My wife was there today and told me the same thing was going on.

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Full-pay deuces wild for more than a quarter

Full-pay deuces wild offers, far and away, the best percentage return to the skilled play of any widely available video poker game. With perfect play it yields 100.76 percent. It's relatively easy to learn, and it's loads of fun to play. But in recent years, full-pay deuces players have run into some roadblocks.

As more people have learned to play the game well enough to beat it, casinos have taken countermeasures. Most give reduced reward points for playing full-pay deuces and other positive games; at least one, the
Gold Coast, gives no points at all (the Palms, acorss the street, still gives full points for play on positive games). Some, such as Sam's Town, have set the speed on their full-pay deuces at slow. Station casinos no longer mail calendars with free play, point multipliers and other offers to those who play only positive machines. And of course, some casinos have simply taken these games out. (This is one example of the best games being at locals' casinos; there is no full-pay deuces anywhere on the Strip.)

Because players can make money from this game, many would like to play it at high denominations. And because players can make money from this game, almost all casinos have eliminated full-pay deuces for anything more than quarters. At this denomination, a player who pushes $1,000 an hour through the machine can average a maximum of $7.60 an hour. This isn't enough to interest the professionals who can do a casino's bottom line some real damage.

At this time I know of no casinos that offer full-pay deuces for more than quarters. But I do know of two small casinos in Henderson that have machines that allow maximum bets of 10 coins rather than five, effectively making them 50-cent full-pay deuces machines. Neither of these casinos has a slot club, so players earn no points that can be used for comps, cash back or free play. (They do have promotions that can add to the return of the game.)

I noticed a few machines with this game recently during my first visit to Peppermill's Rainbow on Water Street downtown. There are no signs to help you spot these games; you'll have to look for the pay table and "bet 10" on the screen.

The other casino with these games is the Skyline on Boulder Highway just south of Sunset Road. Its machines are old coin droppers outfitted with bill acceptors along the back wall and in the "Deuces Wild Corral." The face plates above the screens say in large characters "Win 8,000 coins." The pay table is printed on the glass. A short cut for spotting full-pay deuces that it's the only version of the game that pays 5 instead of four for four of a kind.

These machines are a bit slow by modern standards, and if you hit the four deuces for $500, you'll have to wait for a hand pay. When you cash out, the machine will drop a load of quarters, which you'll have to take to the cashier's cage to be converted to bills.

Monday, January 18, 2010

A good day for a quarter video poker player

Playing at the Orleans today, I saw a fellow player on a 25 cent triple play progressive hit a jackpot for more than $6,800, then, about 15 minutes later, for more than $2,100.

This progressive, outside the buffet, has jackpots for each of the three lines and a separate jackpot for a dealt royal, which resets at $5,500. (A player who is dealt a royal gets this jackpot only, not the three jackpots for the individual lines, which remain unaffected when the dealt royal jackpot is hit.) The individual-line jackpots reset at $1,000, the standard amount for a royal flush with full coin played on a 25 cent machine.

Incidentally, there is a similar quarter triple play progressive between T.G.I. Friday's and the Club Coast booth. Sam's Town also has two similar progressives, but there the dealt royal jackpot resets to $3,000.

OK, you might be thinking, this guy hit for almost $9,000, but how much was he down before that? I don't know how long he had been playing, but I noticed the game he was playing was 9/7 double bonus, which returns just over 99 percent with perfect play. A fast player can put through $3,000 an hour on a triple play machine, for an expected loss of about $30 an hour. Because the royal flush is part of the expected return, a player can expect to lose more than 1 percent before hitting the royal. Also, all games of chance are subject to variance, meaning the results of any one session can be much better or worse than average. As pretty much a wild guess, I would be surprised if this lucky guy was down much more than $1,000 for the day when he hit. Even if it was twice that, I'd say he had a pretty good day.

More on L.V. Hilton blackjack

In a comment to my post, a reader asked whether the Hilton dealers hit soft 17. Yes, they do, on all games that I've seen there. This has become the standard rule in Las Vegas, with only a few exceptions, and gives the house an additional .2 percent edge compared with the dealer standing on all 17s. The reader also asked about penetration, a reference to what percentage of the pack of cards is dealt out. This is of interest to card counters for two reasons. First, the more cards that are dealt, the more likely that a high count will be reached. Second, the more cards that are dealt, the more accurate the information is about the composition of the remaining cards.

Penetration in double deck games generally ranges from about 50 percent (very poor) to about 80 percent (excellent). In most casinos, pentration is determined by the dealers, who place the cut card manually, usually according to a house standard. Other casinos, including the Hilton, eliminate variations in penetration by having the dealers use a notch placed in the discard rack (for double deck games) or shoe (six or eight deck games) to place the cut card. Double deck penetration at the Hilton appears to be between 60 and 65 percent, about average. A player can "improve" the penetration by spreading hands, which requires each bet to be double the table minimum.

A welcome sign at Green Valley Ranch

Since Green Valley Ranch Station Casino closed its cafe, there hasn't been any place to eat in the casino late on weeknights except the Fatburger (a fast-food place) in the food court. On weekends the Turf Grill by the Sportsbook has been open all night, but its menu is limited. In the casino last night I saw signs announcing some welcome news: China Spice is now open until 1 a.m. on weeknights and 3 a.m. Saturdays and Sundays, serving American as well as Chinese cuisine.

Las Vegas has long had a reputation as a 24-hour-a-day town, and a part of that was the cafes or coffee shops at most casinos. In the past couple of years, to reduce costs, many casinos have closed or outsourced their cafes or cut back the hours they are open. Station Casinos, for example, replaced the cafes in its two Fiesta properties with Dennys and some of the cafes in its Station branded casinos with Coco's Bakery Restaurants.

This has created a bit of problem for Vegas residents who are used to eating at the cafes and paying with their slot points. Station points, for example, can be redeemed at company-owned restaurants at a rate of 600 points for a dollar but at non-company-owned restaurants at 1,000 points for a dollar, the same as for free play. Station's closing its cafes deprived their customers of a 40 percent discount.

So the recent move by Green Valley Ranch does more than give its customers the option of getting a nice meal at a sit-down restaurant late at night. It gives the casino's loyal players another option for getting good value for their slot points.