Video poker is all about getting the jackpot. In that respect, the game is similar to slot machines, which is also all about getting jackpots.
But in video poker, you have an element of skill that's lacking in slot machines. You have some control over how often you get jackpots and what you can do to get there. How to win in roulette casino.
There are at least four ways that APs use to beat video poker. The first way APs beat video poker is by identifying machines that are set to 'full pay.' Premium pay tables allow the casino to post a sign saying the machine pays 'over 100%,' usually with an asterisk indicating that the return is based on optimal play. In the Deuces Wild version of video poker, in which a deuce can represent any card and you need at least three of a kind to win, the odds are actually in the player's favor with optimal strategy. The player edge is close to one per cent.
- You will be happy to know that the pay table does illuminate any win on the screen, which will be of help to players who have limited experience playing video poker. The pay table is located above the five cards on most machines and usually draws a line through – or highlights – the particular winning combination of cards you have put together.
- In the Power Video Poker Strategy Manual I will show you how to find the best paying video poker machines and give you winning strategies to play and beat them. I take two very different approaches to playing video poker machines in this book and present different strategies for each type of play.
- Video Poker - How to Win and How it Works Video Poker instruction from casino expert Steve Bourie that teaches you the insider secrets to winning at video poker and details on how video poker machines work.
This post offers some realistic advice about how you can get more jackpots in video poker than other players. Keep reading below to learn what it takes to earn more profits in video poker.
Understand How Video Poker Jackpots Work
A video poker jackpot is the top prize for that game. I don't know of any video poker games which don't have a jackpot based on a royal flush, which is just a straight flush that consists of the 10, jack, queen, king, and ace of a single suit (and it doesn't matter which suit).
This is the best hand in all of poker, but it has special significance in video poker. In wild card games, by the way, five of a kind beats a royal flush, but not in video poker.
On average, you can expect to see a royal flush about once out of every 40,000 hands
Since an average video poker player plays 600 hands per hour, this means that the average amount of time it takes to get a royal flush is 40,000 divided by 600, or 66.67 hours.
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That's an average, though, you need to understand that. Someone could get a jackpot on the first hand they're dealt. They might also go 133 hours before seeing their first jackpot.
The game is random and bases its probabilities on a 52-card deck. It doesn't 'cycle' in any way. The odds of getting a royal flush on the next hand is the same regardless of what you had on the last hand.
You could even get a royal flush twice in a row.
You Can't Get a Royal Flush If You Don't Try
One of the secrets to getting a royal flush more often is to go for it. It's not the optimal video poker strategy to go for a royal flush every chance you get, though.
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For Example:Suppose you're dealt a hand with the seven of hearts, the seven of spades, the seven of clubs, the 10 of hearts, and the jack of hearts.
If you keep the three of a kind and discard the other two cards, you have a shot at getting a full house or a four of a kind. But if you keep the 10 and the jack, you have a chance of getting the jackpot.
In some instances, it makes sense to go for the jackpot, but in others, it makes more sense to go for the easy win. Most of the time, you won't break up a winning hand to draw to a royal flush.
When You Should Draw to a Royal Flush
Any time you have four cards to a royal flush, you should discard the one card that doesn't fit and try to get the royal flush. The probability of hitting is low, only 2%, but it's way better than the probability you'd face if you only had three cards to a royal flush.
In fact, you'll never break up a winning hand to draw two cards to a royal flush. It doesn't make mathematical sense to do so.
If you're only interested in maximizing your probability of hitting a jackpot, then you'll always draw to a royal flush no matter how long the odds are. But you'll be giving up an amazing amount of expected return to do so, and, frankly, it's not worth it.
One of the first rules of video poker strategy I was taught was to try to let the machine deal me a winning hand.
One Situation Where You Should Always Draw to the Royal Flush
The royal flush pays off at 800 for 1. That's the jackpot hand, and it's the best you can do.
When you're calculating the expected value of one play versus another, you look at the probability versus the payoff. In other words, a 20% probability of winning $100 is better than a 100% probability of winning $2, from an expected value perspective.
When you look at a large number of iterations, that starts making sense, too.
Suppose you took such a bet 100 times. If you had a 100% probability of winning $2, you'd have $200 at the end of that experiment.
But if your buddy took the 20% probability, he'd wind up winning $100 on 20 different occasions, or $2000. Even though your buddy lost 80% of the time, and you won 100% of the time, your buddy came out way ahead.
That's how you want to look at video poker strategy decisions.
Four Cards to a Royal Flush
The probability of hitting your royal flush when you have four of the cards you need is pretty easy to calculate.
There's only one card in the deck that will complete your hand. And there are 47 cards left in the deck, so that's a little better than a 2% probability of winning 800 for 1.
On the other hand, if you have a pair of jacks as part of that hand, and you decide to discard that draw to the royal flush in favor of the pair, you have a 100% probability of getting even money.
If you ignore the other possibilities which, in this case, is a reasonable thing to do, you can see that one move has an expected value of 16 units (800 x 2%), and the other move has an expected value of 1 unit (1 x 100%).
It's easy to see which is the better play. Even when you account for all the ways you can improve a pair of jacks, none of the payouts are good enough to make that expected value get anywhere near 16 units.
Playing Max Coins to Get More Jackpots
Betting five coins is the only way to get the 800 for 1 payout on video poker. If you bet less than that, you'll get the standard 200 for 1 payout.
If you define the jackpot as the best possible prize, then the only way you can win the jackpot in video poker is to bet the max coins.
This does NOT mean your probability of getting a royal flush is lower if you bet fewer coins, though. The odds stay the same. The only difference is the payout for that top hand. And 800 for 1 is SO much better than 200 for 1 that it's not even funny.
NEVER play video poker for fewer than five coins per hand. If you need to drop down and play on a lower stakes machine, do that instead. You'll be a lot better off.
How Video Poker Jackpots Compare to Slot Machine Jackpots
A slot machine jackpot is usually 1000 coins or so, while the average jackpot on a video poker game is 800 for 1.
If all you did was compare the size of the jackpots, you'd conclude that slot machines are a better game to play than video poker machines. But you'd be wrong.
The size of the jackpot is meaningless unless you know the probability of winning that jackpot. Www wagerweb com.
For Example:if the jackpot were 1,000 coins, but the probability of winning that jackpot were 10,000 to 1, it would be obvious that it's not a great deal for the player, right?
The average video poker machine has a payback percentage of around 95%, and a large percentage of that is based on the probability of hitting the jackpot.
A slot machine jackpot is usually 1000 coins or so, while the average jackpot on a video poker game is 800 for 1.
If all you did was compare the size of the jackpots, you'd conclude that slot machines are a better game to play than video poker machines. But you'd be wrong.
The size of the jackpot is meaningless unless you know the probability of winning that jackpot. Www wagerweb com.
For Example:if the jackpot were 1,000 coins, but the probability of winning that jackpot were 10,000 to 1, it would be obvious that it's not a great deal for the player, right?
The average video poker machine has a payback percentage of around 95%, and a large percentage of that is based on the probability of hitting the jackpot.
The average slot machine has a payback percentage of close to 92%, and that's also based, in part, on the probability of hitting the jackpot.
But we don't have enough data about a slot machine to determine its payback percentage. You could wind up with a slot machine with a 75% payback percentage as opposed to a slot machine with a 92% payback percentage, and the difference would be invisible.
Since we know the odds that come along with a deck of cards, though, we're able to come up with an estimate for a video poker game based on its pay table.
Conclusion
How do you get more jackpots in video poker? One way is to always bet five coins per hand.
The other way is to learn the appropriate strategy for video poker. Almost all the time on almost all video poker games, you'll always draw to the royal flush when you have four cards to that hand.
You'll also draw to the royal flush when you have two or three cards to that hand, but only if you don't already have a paying combination.
At the end of the day, hitting a video poker jackpot is still a longshot, but if you play long enough, you might hit one.
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