Bonus Issues at Mansion Casino

[RaiseThese]

Just got my email.

The settlement was made as I was hoping for and truly did expect from them(Although it took awhile)

Turnur's post seems to indicate that they may have refunded all players involved and not just those who complained. Not confirmed in whole, just going by what he said.

[deucebag]

I played it through once. After that it was fully cashable.

What a joke. I got $1k back, they're forcing me to wager another thou to make it cashable?!

[thelawnet]

Got the same email myself. Never send them any enquiries about it. They handled it pretty fairly imo.

Fairly?

Are you on crack?

They advertised a 98.2534% payout game, but instead offered a 95.2642% game.

Fair enough, maybe a mistake.

But then they claim that

"The theoretical affect is calculated to be an additional
advantage to the house of no greater than 1.3% dependant upon player strategy. "

This is a load of crap. 98.2534 - 95.2642 = 2.9892%, or 3% near as damnit.

So they ripped people off for 3% of every dollar they wagered, but to make amends:

"we have deposited into their MANSION account a Casino Bonus payment equal to two percent (2%) of their handle on Multi-line Video Poker during the period in question. "

And as BONUS payment, that you have to wager, rather than withdrawable cash?

What kind of bonus is it getting paid 2% of what you wagered when you were short changed 3%.

So in other words they have made off with 1% of every dollar wagered. This will be thousands of dollars in illicit earnings.

It's fine to screw up, but screwing up when you're supposed to be making amends is really really stupid.

And by the way, yes the 98.2534% and 95.2642% figures are correct.

If you look at their site, the paytable is normal 9/6 jacks or better, except that they pay 20 coins for a four of a kind, and 40 coins for a straight flush.

This is the same paytable as Cryptologic according to renowned gambling expert Michael Shackleford at ♠Cryptologic software review - The Wizard of Odds, and also confirmed by winpoker.

The broken game where discards came back is at ♠Bonus Video Poker by The Wizard of Odds except that that game gives a bonus when you draw the card you discarded

It is exactly the same paytable, and it says quite clearly that the return without the bonus is 95.264%.

Mansion have made a bad screw up much worse.

Oops.

Next time they might try hiring people who actually understand gambling to do their calculations for them.

[thelawnet]

btw, for what it's worth, Mansion have the worst game of video poker I have ever seen

All American
RF 800 coins
SF 200 coins
4oak 30 coins
FH 8 coins
Flush 8 coins
Straight 4 coins
Three of a kind 3 coins
Two Pair 1 coin
JOB 1 coin

This pays back 92.08%

[GrandMaster]

And by the way, yes the 98.2534% and 95.2642% figures are correct.

If you look at their site, the paytable is normal 9/6 jacks or better, except that they pay 20 coins for a four of a kind, and 40 coins for a straight flush.

This is the same paytable as Cryptologic according to renowned gambling expert Michael Shackleford at ♠Cryptologic software review - The Wizard of Odds, and also confirmed by winpoker.

The broken game where discards came back is at ♠Bonus Video Poker by The Wizard of Odds except that that game gives a bonus when you draw the card you discarded

It is exactly the same paytable, and it says quite clearly that the return without the bonus is 95.264%.

The situation is more complicated. 95.264% is the return from line pays assuming optimal strategy for bonus video poker is followed, but a player at Mansion would be the strategy for normal video poker, which would be different. I cannot be bothered to calculate it, but if Mansion publish their expert's calculations, I am willing to check it.

[jeremiahsjohnso]

Regarding the odds, you may be jumping the gun a bit. Their explanation states "(t)he difference existed only in the Multi-Line versions of Video Poker and meant that under certain circumstances discarded cards would be recycled in approximately half of the hands dealt."

So their claim, as I understand it, is that only sometimes was the recycling in effect -- I take it that they used the frequency to derive the additional 1.3% HA.

That's giving them the benefit of the doubt, of course -- it would be nice to know what 'certain circumstances' caused the recycled discards, and why it was 'approximately half' rather than exactly half, zero, or one.

(I trust/hope that Mansion isn't just noting that approximately half of the actual deals from June 6 to July 27 resulted in recycled discards reappearing, and using that to claim that only half of the deals were affected. That's a clear error.)

[thelawnet]

The situation is more complicated. 95.264% is the return from line pays assuming optimal strategy for bonus video poker is followed, but a player at Mansion would be the strategy for normal video poker, which would be different. I cannot be bothered to calculate it, but if Mansion publish their expert's calculations, I am willing to check it.

The strategy giving 95.264% is here ♠Bonus Video Poker by The Wizard of Odds

Because of the bonus, situations to watch out for are where there is a marginally better hand involving holding four cards, and a less good one holiding two cards - you might be encouraged to discard more cards.

Checking four to a flush/3 to a royal, the strategy with TQK, the lowest hand ranked above a 4 to a royal with two high cards is to hold the TQK. Checking with winpoker, this is indeed correct.

So there is no encouragement to hold 3 cards rather than 4 to get the bonus here - holding TQK is correct strategy

Checking 4 to a flush vs high pair, high pair is correct, so no cost here.

Next example is 9TJQ mixed suits, plus a pair of 9s or Ts.

Here correct strategy is 9TJQ for a return of 0.8085
But bonus poker says hold 99 or TT, for a return of 0.650

The same thing for 89TJ with a pair of 8s, 9s, or Ts
Correct strategy is 89TJ, for 0.74468 return
However, for Bonus poker, you hold the 8s/9s/Ts, for 0.650 return

For a T high outside straight, or lower, correct strategy gives 0.681, but holding pairs gives 0.650

Other wrong things:

suited JQ ranked above JQKA mixed: 0.59574 vs 0.53802
3 to a straight flush, spread five ranked below garbage. Cost = 0.4088 vs 0.3123
3 to a straight flush, spread four, ranked below JQ unsuited. Cost = 0.49028 vs 0.46538

So the differences are very small indeed. There is no way that these few strategy differences add up to 1.7% loss (the difference between what Mansion claim and what WoO says) - when the bonus on cryptologic bonus poker is only worth 3.2%, there is no way in hell that a few minor changes to strategy are (a) costing 1.7% off the return of the line pay, or (b) if they are costing 1.7% increasing the bonus pay by more than that one.

Mansion got it wrong.

Twice.

[GrandMaster]

Regarding the odds, you may be jumping the gun a bit. Their explanation states "(t)he difference existed only in the Multi-Line versions of Video Poker and meant that under certain circumstances discarded cards would be recycled in approximately half of the hands dealt."

So their claim, as I understand it, is that only sometimes was the recycling in effect -- I take it that they used the frequency to derive the additional 1.3% HA.

That's giving them the benefit of the doubt, of course -- it would be nice to know what 'certain circumstances' caused the recycled discards, and why it was 'approximately half' rather than exactly half, zero, or one.

(I trust/hope that Mansion isn't just noting that approximately half of the actual deals from June 6 to July 27 resulted in recycled discards reappearing, and using that to claim that only half of the deals were affected. That's a clear error.)

Excellent points. I also find it hard to understand how it is possible that the discards were only recycled half of the time. The only explanation I have been able to come up with is that they must have hired English Harbour's programmers.

We also need to know whether there was a higher likelihood of the discards being recycled when it was more to the casino's advantage. If Mansion want to come clean, they need to publish their calculations.

[ternur]

In my case, yes. I posted a personal comment, about my situation. The whole situation had a marginal effect for me.

And no, I'm not on crack. Again, I don't share your passion for the issue.

Fairly?

Are you on crack?

[thelawnet]

Excellent points. I also find it hard to understand how it is possible that the discards were only recycled half of the time. The only explanation I have been able to come up with is that they must have hired English Harbour's programmers.

We also need to know whether there was a higher likelihood of the discards being recycled when it was more to the casino's advantage. If Mansion want to come clean, they need to publish their calculations.

You are quite right. It's easy to see how they could recycle cards *all* the time, just by using a new deck. But only part of the time? Very unlikely