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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.

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Dec. 22, 2009

A Look at DreamCard --- Part II of II

We began our discussion of DreamCard in last week's column. If you didn't read it or don't remember it, I suggest you review that one before you begin this one.

You get a lot more dealt royals in this game than you normally do in regular video poker. Let's say the first four cards you're dealt are all part of a heart royal flush. In regular video poker, you have a 1-in-48 chance to get the royal flush. If you received the DC every time, you'd get the royal every time you started this position, which means you'd get 48 times as many dealt royals. If you receive the DC half the time, which is true (rounding) for Jacks or Better, you'd get 24 times as many dealt royals. It follows then that you'll get more dealt royals playing Jacks or Better DreamCard than you will play Double Double Bonus DreamCard simply because of the frequency of DCs.

In addition to dealt royals, you get a lot more "one at a time" royals in this game as well. Whenever you get dealt a DC as the fifth card when the first four cards contain 3-to-the-royal, the DC will be a royal card. You now have a 46-to-1 chance on every line to connect. (If the cards are dealt 'KQJ9' DC, the DC will obviously turn into the Tc, giving you a dealt straight flush. If you're playing Deuces Wild, you toss the nine, say a prayer, and go for the royal. If you're playing any other game, you keep all five cards.)

Although the total number of royals is increased, you get more dealt ones and ones with a 1-card draw. You get fewer of them with 2-card, 3-card, 4-card, or five-card draws. As an example, let's assume you were dealt Kc Qc 5h 4d DC in Jacks or Better. The DC will become another king or queen and you should hold the high pair, making a royal flush impossible on this play. In regular video poker, sometimes that fifth card will be another high club, which you'd hold for a 1080-to-1 shot at a royal.

(Michael Shackleford, aka the Wizard of Odds, discusses a similar hand www.wizardofodds.com/dreamcard where the DC was erroneously given as the Jc. This is an error in Jacks or Better, but would be the correct play in many pay schedules of Double Bonus or Double Double Bonus. This leads me to speculate that the DCs are table driven, rather than calculated on the fly, and that several different games use the same decision table.)

You'll get more W2Gs in this game than you're used to --- depending on your stakes --- simply because dealt royals and dealt quads come about so much more frequently than they do in regular versions.

The game is designed to intentionally make your choices as difficult (interesting?) as possible. For example, assume you start with Ah Kh Jc 5d DC in a game without wild cards. There are nine equally valuable DCs you could draw --- any other ace, king, or jack), but the machine will ALWAYS deal you the Jh. This makes your choice the suited high 3-card royal flush 'AKJ' or the high pair.

If the machine dealt you the Kd instead, there would be nothing to think about. The high pair would stick out by a mile to virtually everybody. But when you must choose between the high pair and the 3-card royal flush, many players will go wrong. For the record, the high pair is a better play "by a mile," but there are many players who haven't studied the game and simply aren't sure. Or even if they are sure what the "book" says, some players play hunches and just "feel" that the royal is coming this time and wish to go for it.

You're going to be getting the same types of "tough" hands over and over again, although there are many tough hands you won't get. In the regular version of 9/6 Jacks or Better, for example, from Ah Kh Th 5h Jc, the correct play is 'AKT5' (and many players consider this a tough hand --- many others don't consider this tough at all and just make the inferior 'AKT' play), but this is not a hand that could exist when a DC is present. Whichever four of these cards come out first, the DC will give you a better fifth card. If the first four cards were Ah Kh Th 5h, for example, the DC will be a Jh or Qh --- and never a Jc. On the hands where you don't get a DC, however, this type of hand could certainly come up.

I've played the game for many hours and I've never seen a case where the DC isn't perfect --- or at least tied for being the best. (The Wizard of Odds, who has played online rather than in a casino, has had a different experience.) If, however, you wish to change the DC you can. When you're betting maximum coins, there's a half-inch by inch-and-a-half box on the screen that says "DreamCard Enabled." If you get dealt a DC, the wording in the box changes to "Change DreamCard," and there are arrows to the right and left.

In the hand Jh Th 9h 6c DC, for example, the machine will turn the Dream Card into the Qh. (It will never become the 8h. Even though 'QJT9' and 'JT98' are both 4-card straight flushes and superior in value to a high pair, 'QJT9' gives you an extra high card "target" to shoot at.) But let's say that you (erroneously) think that a pair of jacks would be better than 'QJT9'. If you press either the up arrow or the down arrow the Dream Card will go through all 48 possible cards (you won't get a duplicate of one of the four cards you are dealt) one at a time. When you get to a card you like, stop and press the draw button.

Although it's not really obvious, jackpots only play half as much percentagewise as you're used to. A dollar royal pays still $4,000, but you have to invest $10 to get that four grand rather than the usual $5. That means the payoff is 400-for-1 rather than the typical 800-for-1.

Since you get so many more dealt royals and dealt quads in this game, and it only a little more than the game without the DreamCard feature, this means that you're going to lose much more rapidly than normal between the good hands.

The variance on this game, per coin bet, is approximately the same as in the regular version --- but since you're betting twice as much, the total variance is twice as high. That is, the variance on 50� Five Play Jacks or Better DreamCard is about the same as $1 Five Play Jacks or Better. In Deuces Wild variations, there is a significant increase in the variance --- making the variance for Deuces Wild DreamCard similar to that of Double Double Bonus DreamCard.

A big plus on the game is you don't need to learn another strategy to play it well. I predict that this game will be very successful in casinos --- should they install decent pay schedules.