Hi and welcome to our series of educational videos
that are designed to make you a smarter gambler my name is Steve Bourie
and I'm the author of the American casino guide which is the number one
bestselling book in the US on the subject of casino gambling and travel
and the only book that comes with more than one thousand dollars in casino coupons
if you want to know more about me or my book be sure to visit my website at americancasinoguide.com
In this video I'll be speaking with gambling expert Michael Shackleford
who is also known as The Wizard of Odds
and I ask him all about video poker We video taped this interview with Mike in
Las Vegas in September 2010
and I'm sure that it will help to answer many of the questions that you have
about video poker and how you can be a long-term winner at the game
How does a video poker machine differ from a slot machine?
What they both have in common is the
odds or the outcomes on the screen are determined by random numbers
the moment the player presses the button to
make his bet random numbers are chosen in the case of a slot machine
they determine where the reels stop, in the case a video poker
they determine what cards you get How does the paytable
of a video poker game affect the payback percent on that game?
The way the paytable affects the payback percentage of a (video poker) machine
is players are going to get
each hand a certain percentage of the time assuming optimal strategy or
actually
assuming any kinda strategy so say for example
the player is going to get a full house
1 percent of the time if the machine
one machine pays nine for a full house and another pays
8 for a full house the player who's playing the machine that pays nine
is going to get one extra coin every 100 bets
and a good gambler will fight for every percent that he can get
How does a player's skill
affect the payback percentage on a video poker game? A player's skill level
has a lot to do with the return that he can expect to get from a video poker
machine over the long run
if you took a game where a perfect player
would get 99.5 percent I
estimate that a completely recreational player is
only gonna get about 95 percent out of that machine
skill is very important in video poker
a lot of players play video poker like they would play live poker
keeping kickers and and things like that that are
absolutely horrible in video poker it's
critical to do some homework on video poker
to learn proper strategy Is a video poker machine ever due to hit a royal
flush?
Absolutely not. Much like slot machines
each time you play it the odds are independent of
everything else that happened in the past With video poker excuse
me
the of hitting a royal depending on the pay table and strategy
is about one in forty thousand and it's always gonna be
that same probability it doesn't make any difference when the last time a
royal was hit
Can a player use the same strategy on all video poker games?
The player absolutely should not use the same strategy in all video poker games
for example you would be an absolute fool to use Deuces Wild strategy
on any game where deuces were not wild
Even on more similar games say double double bonus and jacks or better
they still have a very different strategy a
skilled video poker player will have memorized
several different strategies for the games that he's most likely to play
and if he comes across a game that's over a hundred percent
that he deems worth his time to play but it's a
game that's not familiar to him he will learn that strategy before he plays it.
Is there a best video poker game to play for the average player?
Most of the time the best video poker
games out there are either Jacks or Better or deuces wild
in some casinos Jacks or Better will be the best in some deuces wild will be
the best
and some casinos it'll be something different so
if you just want to memorize one strategy which should it be?
If forced to a decision I would say
learn Jacks or Better this strategy
isn't you can learn it simple strategy they're not that complicated
and you can also once you know Jacks or Better
its easier to learn other strategies like double bonus or double double
bonus because you only have to
learn some exceptions to the jacks or better strategy
whereas with deuces wild while its often a good game
that strategy stands on its own and it doesn't help you with
with other kinds of games. Can video poker players really find games that are programmed to
payback more than one hundred percent?
Absolutely. Here in Las Vegas, if you get away from the strip there
are locals casinos that do have some machines not all of them
that are set to pay over a hundred percent with proper strategy for example
where we're doing this interview at Sam's Town they have full pay deuces
wild
that with correct strategy will pay 100.77 percent
of money back. If some games
pay more than 100 percent why don't players just play those games and make lots of
money?
For one thing a lot of players are too lazy to learn the proper strategy for
them
another thing is that the machines that
are set the pay over 100 percent usually they don't take very big bets
a dollar at the most sometimes just 25 cents
the best machine in Las Vegas pays 101.7 percent but it's just a nickel
game
so these games are not going to be worth the time of most
professional gamblers however if you're just a recreational gambler and are
gonna play anyway
absolutely look for those machines that are set to pay over 100 percent and many
casinos for example here in Sam's Town they have big signs that say
something like optimal play video poker
return over a hundred percent with optimal strategy Do casinos ever make a
mistake and offer a 100 percent game in a higher denomination?
one of the best video poker games is called full pay deuces wild
it's characterized for paying $25 for a while flush
15 for a 5 of a kind nine for a straight flush
five for a four of a kind three for the full house
and two for a flush and straight With optimal strategy that game pays
100.76 percent
you might ask what's the most I can bet on that game?
I think the highest I've ever seen it for is fifty cents
usually it's just a quarter or nickle however
about a year ago Caesars Palace here in Vegas
accidentally set their one hundred dollar denomination game
so it's a five hundred dollar maximum bet to full pay deuces wild
a very rich skilled player
found out about that and he played that game
very very hard and at first I hear that he was way down
but then he hit four deuces I think twice
and then hit a royal and I think that
he won over a hundred thousand dollars before the casino
realized that they completely blew it
and changed the paytable Is there such a thing as a professional video poker
player?
There absolutely is such a thing as a professional video poker player
here in Las Vegas their are hundreds of them
and what these players do is they seek out the best machines
they know all the strategies very well some of them are out there
hunting for progressive machines where the jackpot is high
there are any number of angles that they can use to to get their odds over a
hundred percent
sometimes they will play at machine that's under 100 percent but they'll do
it because of
points mailers and other niceties that the
casinos gives them on top of their play
How can a player improve their skill at playing video poker?
There are plenty of books, websites,
software that show the player
the correct way to play just about
any given pay table out there my website for example has strategies for
lots of common games like jacks or better and deuces wild
lotsa software out there where you can put in
any paytable in game and it'll tell you
a correct strategy books about video poker it is not difficult to obtain
good information about how to play video poker How does volatility affect the
players bankroll on a video poker machine?
First of all there's volatility in any form of gambling
when you play any game for a long time
it's like throwing a dart at a bell curve that's going to determine your
win or loss
with video poker that bell curve can be very wide for some games like
double double bonus or can be tighter with some games like Jacks or Better
You can tell the
more volatile games if they
have a lot of high-paying awards
at the high end for example four aces and a 2-3 kicker
and if you can see that they're paying
only one for a two pair and putting
and making the high pays higher that's going to be a more volatile game than say
a jacks or better game
playing video poker is like riding a roller coaster your bankroll is gonna go
way up
and way down all the time and
that is just a fact of the game it's just the laws of mathematics
that you're going to have great days, horrible days
and some days in between How do Players Club benefits and casino promotions
affect the overall payback percentage on a video poker machine? Well first of
all those things don't affect the machine itself
if for example a 9/6 Jacks or Better machine is gonna pay
99.54 percent with optimal play
no matter what the casino is giving you
through their Player award program however
the player is a fool to ignore the benefits
that the players club will give them The player
absolutely should always use his player card in the machine
no matter what kinda machine it is and the player should carefully consider
how much do I have to bet to earn a point and how many points
do I have to earn to get a dollar of say cash or free play
or comps how generous is the casino
with mailers if I ask for a comp how generous are they gonna be
the astute video poker player absolutely
considers very carefully the niceties
that the casino will give the player on top
of the paytable of that machine
What is your best advice for video poker players?
My best advice for video poker players
is first of all hunt out the best machines
you absolutely should
go looking for the best machines and you don't necessarily need to
check every single machine in a whole casino there are
good websites like VPfree2.com
that list for every casino what are the best
video poker machines in that casino what denominations
and sometimes information about where they can be found for example
here at Sams town they have full pay deuces wild you have to know
what the full pay Deuces Wild pay table is
go look for it and then once you start playing it
play the best strategy that you can
video poker strategy can get very complicated but if you're just a
recreational player
it's fine to just use a simple strategy that will get you very close to the
optimal return
How can people learn more about you and your work?
if you want to improve your odds in any casino game
I welcome you to visit my website wizardofodds.com it'll show you the
correct strategy
to at least a hundred different casino games or you can buy my book gambling
102
which will show you how to play the most common casino games don't forget that
you can see more of our educational gaming videos on our YouTube channel
just go to youtube.com/americancasinoguide