CasinoGaming.com


	Sundays: Inside Gaming Tuesdays: Video Poker Wednesdays: Off the Shelf Fridays: Richard Eng, Player's Edge Saturdays: Pocket Aces

VIDEO POKER

Columns

• Back to Bob's index

• Back to columnist index

Bob Dancer writes a video poker column for beginners to experts. He also writes a column with Jeffrey Compton, "Player's Edge", featuring information on promotions at various Las Vegas casinos. Player's Edge is published each Friday in the Neon section of the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Click here to send Bob Dancer an e-mail.

For more details and a schedule of Bob's free classes, visit www.bobdancer.com.

June 23, 2009

Knowing the Name of the Rule

I was playing $2 Five Play 9-7 Double Bonus at the Orleans. Although this game only returns 99.11%, the casino was offering 9x points (0.90%), for a total return of 100.01%, and there was a drawing. In addition, at the time this happened, if you averaged $100,000 of play a month, the mailers return $400 for a 0.40% return (plus food plus show tickets). All in all not a great play, but an acceptable one if you wish to play for these stakes.

Seated next to me, watching me play every hand, was a friend of Shirley's. "Lisa" is an intermediate video poker player who wishes to become better. She knew Double Bonus reasonably well, but not all of the penalty card situations, although she did take my "Advanced Double Bonus" class on two separate occasions. Whenever a tricky hand came up, I'd wait and let her make suggestions on how to play the hand. If she was wrong, we'd discuss it a little.

There are LOTS of tricky plays in Double Bonus, and this isn't going to be an exhaustive article on this game. We'll limit the discussion to two separate, albeit similar, types of plays, and then I want to go on to the way Lisa was reacting to them.

First, let's consider an unsuited KQ or KJ (which are equal in value) versus a 3-card flush with one high card. Letting quote marks indicate suited cards, we're talking about these types of hands:

'K73' Q5 --- hold KQ
'K93' Q5 --- hold 'K93'
'K73' Q9 --- hold 'K73'
'K73' QT --- hold 'K73'
'K73' QJ --- hold KQJ
'K73' QA --- hold 'K73'

In each of these hands we could have substituted a J for a Q and gotten the same results (except for the hand (e) which already had both a J and Q so what's to change?) The only time you hold KQ (or KJ) rather than the 3-card flush with one high card is when there are no cards in the hand (other than the KQ or KJ) equal to a 9 or higher. It doesn't matter if the 9 is part of the flush or not. (The "reason" for this rule is that 9, T, and A are straight penalties to the KQ or KJ. If you don't understand this terminology, don't worry about. You can learn the "9 or higher" rule whether you know why or not.)

The second case is when the 'KQ' or 'KJ' are suited with each other, and we're comparing it to a 3-card flush with two high cards. For example:

'KJ3' 72 --- hold 'KJ'
'KJ4' 92 --- hold 'KJ4'
'KJ5' T2 --- hold 'KJ5'
'KJ6' Q2 --- hold 'KJ6'
'KJ7' A2 --- hold 'KJ7'

We again have a "9 or higher" rule with a few subtle differences. In the second group, if the 9 is suited with the 'KJ', we'll have a 3-card straight flush which is far more powerful than the hands we're talking about here. Also, if you compare "e" in the top grouping with "d" in the bottom grouping, you'll see there's a difference in playing KQJ when all three cards are unsuited versus when two of them are suited with each other.

Okay, let's move on. Whenever one these hands would arise, I'd pause and let Lisa tell me how to play it. Frequently she'd say "9 or higher" and I'd hold the correct cards and move on, confident that she knew the correct play. One time we had 'KQ4' 95 and she said "9 or higher" and I said, "Tell me exactly what cards you would hold." She then told me that she would play 'KQ', rather than the correct 'KQ4'.

What I realized then is that Lisa could recognize which hands the rule applied to, but she wasn't clear at all what the rule meant or why. She'd just say "9 or higher" and that would be the end of it. After that, I'd make her tell me which cards to play and why (and the answer was always that the 9, T, J, Q, or A was a straight penalty). It didn't take her long to start getting these 100% correct once we started spelling them out.

I assume that Lisa's problem isn't unique to her. Many other players learn rules by name but are still confused about the exact play. It takes a lot of practice to get it all correct. Setting the "Level of Difficulty" to "Advanced" on "Video Poker for Winners" will give you a lot of these hands (among other problem hands).

A name for a rule is a good mnemonic device to help you remember. But you need to have the basic rule down cold before the mnemonic device is useful.

Also, penalty cards, when used correctly, add a small percentage to the return on a game. If you get confused on penalty cards, trying to use them is likely more expensive than ignoring them completely. It takes the right sort of intelligence and diligence to master them. (It's not so much "high intelligence" but rather the right sort of "at-least-medium intelligence.") I wouldn't consider playing a game without trying to master the penalty cards, but I realize that they are not for everybody.