Video Poker Forum

CS has three components; limiting losses, controlled betting increases and frugal money management.   It has proven to work best with Deuces Wild.  Keep in mind that the words "work best" have different meanings for different players.  The goal of CS is allow a player to play more hands with the same bankroll while retaining the possibility of a max coin jackpot.  Unlike other strategies, CS does not claim to allow you to "beat the casino".CS Deuces Wild  works primarily due to the presence of the quad deuce mini jackpot which is 9 times more common than a royal flush.  Unfortunately, DW has a nasty habit of coming down with "vanishing deuces syndrome".  If you don't hit a quad deuce or a royal, you are in for a very bad day.  For this reason and also because I'm getting bored with DW, I'm going to attempt to adapt CS to DDB.I believe CS DDB needs to go in a different direction when it comes to the timing of the betting increase.  Max coins after every four coin win won't work in DDB as the game variance is so much higher.  I have extensive casino experience playing single coin DDB as I enjoy playing the game but don't enjoy the cost of the long dry spells.  If you are open minded about this and have any ideas, feel free to voice them.   This is the Recreational Forum and as such we are free to discuss any strategy no matter how crazy you may think it is.  "The lighter side... playing for entertainment, less concerned about "the math."

I have an idea, but for me, this would be very hard to stick to. Play CS one coin on DDB until a full house hits. Then give it 2 shots at bet 5. Cash out any quad tickets and keep them until the end of your session. If you happen to hit something more than your money back on one of the two bet 5 shots, follow the usual CS rules until you go back to bet 1. In other words, just stay at bet 5 until you lose. This should help your bankroll a bit and tone down somewhat the high variance of this game. An optional strategy, might be to bet 5 twice any time you gain 10 units ahead from any given starting point in your play. I still think that unless the quads are hitting or you are extremely lucky in the max bets, this will cost more than playing CS deuces. I haven't tried it though. That is just my gut feeling.

The only thing we know for sure is that quads frequently appear in groups.  Sure you can get one at anytime, but it seems to me DDB has very long dry spells with short periods of multiple quads.   The trick is to figure out when to switch to max coins and when to return to single coin play.    We've all had the enjoyable experience of switching to a higher denomination and hitting a max coin quad.  Hitting a max coin quad could catch you up or put you ahead in quick order.  How to do that with any consistency is key.   I'm pretty sure it will require a fixed mini-session amount say $20 and a trigger number like $40 to pull this off.  I'll have to experiment with my software and see if I can make this work.   It's probably not possible, but it's fun to try and if it works it will be much better than paying 5% to play.The challenge is figuring out how to avoid the cost of long max coin dry spells by playing single coin until things start happening.  Maybe playing single coin at first until you hit a quad is worth the effort?

Funny how you mentioned playing DDB with 1 coin CS until a quad hits. I tried this a couple of times and it worked both times. I just never went back to the game much because I enjoyed deuces more. This goes back to when I had a 200 budget for the day. Not all that long ago either. I played 1 quarter until I hit the quad. Both times I was behind over 300 units when the quad hit. I then proceeded to divide how much I was still down by 50 and in one session number was around 5 and the other one closer to 6. I decided to bet 5 until a quad hit again or I ran out of my 200 bucks. I still remember. Both sessions ended up being winners because on one of them I hit quad 3's with a 2 and the other one I hit quad Aces. No kicker, but I ended up for the day. Granted this is kind like chasing the quads. It just happened to work out for those 2 sessions. It could have just as easily hit no more quads for the day and ate my 200 bucks.

It's a lot of fun playing around with these ideas, that's what recreation is supposed to be.  Anyway, I could always just flat bet max coins.  I know what the result of that is going to be.  

Flat max coins precedes flatlining.