Running Hot and Cold

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Running Hot and Cold

            Through the years, a number of betting schemes have been created that are supposed to increase the chances of winning by the Player.  To the best of my knowledge not a single one of them has ever been shown to actually work.  I'm sure I could spend my time giving a detailed math proof as to why not, but there is actually simpler methods to use to prove it doesn't work.  The first is the most obvious one - no casino will stop you from trying to use one. 

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Video Poker Beginnings

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Video Poker Beginnings

            This past week, with my son in town, I found myself sitting at a blackjack table.  When I was in my 20's that is what I played when I went in to the casino.  It had a good payback (99%+) and it required a fair amount of skill in the form of strategy to earn this payback.  When video poker came along, I slowly found myself playing more of that and less blackjack.  Nowadays, I almost never sit at the blackjack table except when my son is in town and drags me over.  My experience this past week only reinforced why this is so. 

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Don't Deviate!

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Don't Deviate!

            This past week, I ventured over to Red Rock Station and had what was possibly the worst video poker session I have had in years.  I was playing Double Double Bonus on a Multi-Strike machine and I just had no luck from beginning to end.   To win at Double Double, you have to get the Bonus Quads.  To win at Multi-Strike, you need your Four of a Kinds to appear at the higher levels.  Well, I certainly didn't get many of the Bonus Four of a Kinds and what little I got in Quads were at the bottom two levels for the most part.

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Master of Your Strategy

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Master of Your Strategy

             Gambling strategies come in all forms.  For most table games, it is usually a set of rules in English.  For Three Card Poker, it is a single simple sentence - Play with Q-6-4 or better.  Four Card Poker strategy is a bit more complex, but can also be simplified to Betting 3x when your hand is of a certain rank, Folding when it is below a certain rank and Betting 1x for everything in between.  A game like Ultimate Texas Hold'em has far more complex strategy, but again, it comes down to betting based on the strength of the hand.

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Not Quite Perfect

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Not Quite Perfect

 This week, I received an e-mail from a reader looking for the strategy for Triple Double Bonus Poker.  My home grown programs do not handle the 'kicker' situation for games like Double Double or Triple Double Bonus Poker, so I could not provide it to him.  If he insists on playing it without the totally correct strategy, his best bet would be to use Double Double Bonus strategy for the most similar paytable as the Triple Double Bonus.  Don't get me wrong, I don't recommend just using whatever is the next best paytable.  Sometimes, the impact may be slight, but other times it might be far more significant.

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Brushing Up

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 Last week's column touched on the notion of gambling without even so much as the basic knowledge of what the Player is wagering on.  I used a real life example of a Super Bowl bettor who didn't understand the concepts of point spreads and/or wagering 11 to win 10, which is fairly standard for sports betting.  I couldn't understand how someone could make a wager without understanding what they are wagering on and how it works. 

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Never Heard of You

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Never Heard of You

Two years ago, at the Global Gaming Expo, I was talking to someone at a table gaming booth.  I was reviewing their new offerings when the gentleman I was talking to looked at my badge and asked me what 'Gambatria' does.  Gambatria is the name of my company, and I'll refer you to my website of the same name (Gambatria.com) for an explanation of how the name came to be.  I told the guy that I'm a 'math guy' which is the colloquial industry term for I'm one of the guys that analyzes and/or invents games from the math side of things.  He told me he had never heard of me.  I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little hurt.

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Much Ado About Something

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        I doubt there is another table game out there that has as many variations as blackjack has.  It is played with anywhere from 1 to 8 decks.  Blackjack might pay 3 to 2 or 6 to 5.  You might be able to split to 2 hands, 4 hands or maybe more.  You can double on any two cards you want or you might be limited to only 9, 10 or 11.  The Dealer may hit on soft 17 or he may stick on all 17's.  Why so many variations?

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