CS Basics

[FAA]

To hit a lot of jackpots you have to play a lot of hands. The more
hands you can play, the more jackpots you will hit.  I
average about one quad deuce every 5,000 hands.   For me that's about a
full day's play. Some days you don't hit one, then you will catch back
up on double or triple days.-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------That seems to apply to JOB quads, too. Yesterday was a quadruple day. I felt like they were rewarding me for being such a good January customer with an end of month clearance. All quads must go! No reasonable wager refused! The 3,000 Hand Club (daily) has a lot more stories and memories than I do. But unless they grind CS, they also have a lot more losses. Desperately trying everything to stay disciplined until the hour hand changes and I can pot shot. Next week I may write the time on the back of my hand. No pot shots until an hour from then.

[FloridaPhil]

[quote=FAA] I felt like they were rewarding me for being such a good January customer with an end of month clearance. All quads must go![/quote]I enjoy your posts.  Definitely the most entertaining here.  

[FAA]

I won't disagree. Very unproductive quad quartet. They bought me playing time, TCs and photos for my collection.

[billryan]

   
   
   












To hit a lot of jackpots you have to play a lot of hands. The more
hands you can play, the more jackpots you will hit.  I
average about one quad deuce every 5,000 hands.   For me that's about a
full day's play. Some days you don't hit one, then you will catch back
up on double or triple days.-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------That seems to apply to JOB quads, too. Yesterday was a quadruple day. I felt like they were rewarding me for being such a good January customer with an end of month clearance. All quads must go! No reasonable wager refused! The 3,000 Hand Club (daily) has a lot more stories and memories than I do. But unless they grind CS, they also have a lot more losses. Desperately trying everything to stay disciplined until the hour hand changes and I can pot shot. Next week I may write the time on the back of my hand. No pot shots until an hour from then.

Do you have a phone? Most phones from the last few years have alarms you can program. Some people use them to let them know when to take their meds. You can set a one hour alarm on it.

[FAA]

Tried the phone alarm system twice for leaving the casino. Unfortunately, I disabled it and kept on playing! But now that you mention it, if I'm already playing cheap, it has a better chance to actually work!

[olds442jetaway]

I have a watch, phone, and a knack for knowing what time it always is within 5 minutes even in the middle of the night. Hasn't helped me at all. Now, the calls from the wife.....car 54 where are you...that's a different story.

[FAA]

I have a great old watch as well. Huge repair bills. But my subconscious keeps saying, "Watch me hit a quad." I seem to barrel on with triumphant visions holding sway.

[olds442jetaway]

If you did have a great old watch, I could have saved you those repair bills. used to be my hobby for 50 years before my eyesight got too bad to work on the tiny parts even with a jewelers loupe.

[FloridaPhil]

Playing video poker is like the guy who keeps hitting himself in the head with a hammer.  Someone asks him why he keeps doing it?  "Because it feels so good when I stop!."    There is no stopping in VP until you run out of money or your arms can't move anymore. 

[Vman96]

[QUOTE=FloridaPhil]







I switched to max coin play about 6 months ago.  It's been a blood bath.   One quarter royal and a lot more walking out with empty pockets.  However, my comps and free play have doubled.  At this point I'm torn between max coins and CS.  It's so hard to shake off the depression of hitting a short coin royal.  You are always second guessing yourself.I still use CS for $20 pot shots on the $5 machines.  I hit another $1,000 quad deuce last month.  I haven't hit a short coin royal for $1,250 yet.   It would trigger a hand pay and be pretty embarrassing.  If I ever hit one for $20K, I'll be dancing on the moon.  I hear that even with the advances in our lifetime, space travel is still prohibitively expensive.Here are the numbers on a 98.91% Deuces Wild $5 machine with CS:CS Expected Gain/Loss between $20,000 royals:  -$60,363.42.  That's not including the $20,000 reimbursement for the royal.  That would reduce the loss to $40,363.  Cycle:  290,343 hands. Max Coin Expected Gain/Loss between $20,000 royals: -$31,799.21.  Again not counting the $20,000 reimbursement for the royal.  Loss reduced to $11,799.  Cycle:  43,423 handsIt may seem cheaper if pot shots are only after wins, but over time these add up.  All the single coin hands with a lower EV eventually accumulate plus they get in the way of getting at that royal.The good news: The surprising fact (to some) is that there is about a 63.2% chance that you will hit the royal before a complete cycle has elapsed (1 - 1/e = 0.6321 for you math types out there).  And you might even hit it if you are up ... or down less than $20,000 over the entire course of going for the royal.   And, of course, there is an approximate 36.8% chance that it will take longer than one cycle.  For example, there is about a 13.5% chance (1/e^2) that it will take longer than two cycles, which would more than double the earlier presented expected losses.  And none of us are getting any younger!The Clint Eastwood, "Do you feel lucky?" quote comes to mind.Of course, this is not an advertisement for or against any particular strategy, game, or methodology.  As you like to say, it is gambling, which is why we're in a casino.  So the following is offered not as mathematical advice, but an alternative since you seem to rotate between bloodbaths induced over the years by CS and those from max coin play.Hard to offset $20K in losses playing quarters.    It is obviously not as likely to get $20K playing quarters as playing $5 coins, but Super Times Pay (or Double Super Times Pay) offers a random multiplier that allows for 5x, 8x, and even 10x payments on Royals and other outcomes.  DSTP has more opportunities for multipliers with the pie-in-the-sky possibility of 20x.  So you can drop down from dollars on standard machines to quarters on STP or DSTP and still get chances at the size of pots that standard dollar machines offer.It costs 20% more for STP and 40% more for DSTP.  With CS, you're actually paying 60% more on average than what a single-coin payment would be.With the 98.91% Deuces game and your rules for switching between single coin and max coin, you are hitting the max button 14.96% of the time.  This can be thought of as applying a 5x multiplier to the single coin payouts on everything but the royal.  With DSTP, the multipliers could be as low as 2x but go up to 20x and they are activated 12.89% of the time.Multipliers are activated by an RNG with STP or DSTP instead of the 4-coin win with CS.  But how do you get wins?  Well, it's still an RNG determining that.  The multiplier streaks would definitely not last as long as they do with CS.  But with DSTP, they will interrupt the non-multiplier streaks more often.  A multiplier will occur 12.89% of the time after a non-multiplier hand as opposed to a win occurring 9.78% of the time with CS triggering a max-coin attempt.If you want to bet more after a win you could add a hand on a multi-hand machine.  Many STP and DSTP machines allow triple play, five play, ten play or more.  Unlike some other games, these allow you to select the number of hands without imposing any penalty like preventing the multiplier feature.  So, you could occasionally increase the number of hands for additional action if desired.  And 12.89% of the time that you do, you will have multiple hands AND a multiplier.What happens if you hit a royal without a multiplier with STP or DSTP?  Well, it's 4000 coins, not 250.  With CS, 4000-coin royals are only possible 15% of time.With STP or DSTP, you put in 20% or 40% extra (1 or 2 coins more than the usual 5 coins) all the time.  With CS, you're putting in 400% more 15% of the time (4 coins more than the usual one coin).  Multiplication makes this work out to an average of 60% more (59.82% in less round numbers).The average multiplier for STP is "only" 4.05 as opposed to the implied 5x CS multiplier and it occurs less often.  The average multiplier is 4.1483 for DSTP.  It's advertised as 4.01, but on average every 225 hands, you get two multipliers added together, so that feature increases the effective average multiplier.  This means that the multiplier is lower than CS's 5x more than 1/2 the time, but not all the time.  A dealt royal with ANY deal multiplier even as low as 2x automatically becomes 20x, a $20,000 quarter royal.  If that happened on a 5-play machine, that could be $100,000 (or $200,000 on 10-play).If you like switching strategies when you change from single coin in CS to max coin, you wouldn't get to do that with STP or DSTP.  The same optimal strategy works whether or not there is a multiplier.  Of course, if that influenced your decision to perhaps hold AK suited in a Deuces Wild game dependent on the multiplier, that would be your choice.Will the adrenaline pump when the multiplier alert sound starts to sound?  I imagine it will be similar to what you feel when you're taking what you call pot shots by playing max coin on a machine that you are not comfortable taking too many max-coin shots on.Will you win with this strategy or will you lose?  No one knows for certain, but odds are that in 6 months your overall results will be negative ... whether you're playing max coin, CS, STP, DSTP, or any other negative game in the house.  Of course, if that 10x or 20x royal comes in, chances are that you might just be up.What are the pay tables and returns that are available with STP or DSTP?  I can't tell you.  You have to decide how much is about pay schedules and how much is about bigger hand pays while playing only quarters (or whatever you decide is the best denomination for you).  One thing to keep in mind.  The STP multipliers add about 0.27% to 0.28% to the base game return and DSTP adds about a full 1/2%.  I think Vman has spoke favorably about this feature in the past.Good luck.  I know you like CS with all its trappings.  It's more fun for you to talk about it and apply your custom playing style than simply picking a different type of machine in the casino and playing it straight up.  And I expect that you will continue switching between some overall policy of CS and then full max coin.Right before posting this, I see you've switched back from quarters to dollars.  I understand.  It is difficult to move down.  Wins at a lower denomination than what you are used to just don't elicit that same excitement.  Not enough endorphins!  But ... if you do decide to play STP or DSTP more often and happen to win (or even lose less by playing quarters), please give me credit.  Just teasing.  Because I definitely don't want the blame if, as expected, the results on negative returning machines actually turns out to be negative!
[/QUOTE]

You said it better than I could.

I definitely promote the game (both STP and Double STP). But it can be difficult sometimes to find casinos that offer equivalent pay tables which would make STP or Double STP "the better long term bet".

I did get in a lot of STP last trip, which I still need to toss up on here.