Quick Question about slot play?

**cpdnd31** · 9th March 2010, 01:16 AM

Hi all while looking thru screenshots I noticed that some players dont play full bets on slots meaning on a 25 line slot they will play 21 ant 5 x there bet. Is there a reason why? Im just curious there are some nice wins with these bets.

**Simmo!** · 9th March 2010, 01:25 AM

One reason can be that it's a method for increasing the variance.

For example, if you want to play $1 a spin on a 25 line slot, normally you would be playing 4 cents a line. So when you hit a payout that pays say 1,000 coins, you get 4,000 coins. If you reduce the lines to 20, you are betting 5 cents a line, so the same payout would be 5,000 coins, however you are reducing your chances of getting it by 1/5th (25 lines down to 20).

It would therefore be natural to see higher wins, but less often...the symptoms of higher variance. But bear in mind that in this example, your bankroll will be depleted 20% faster ;-)

You're effectively sacrificing some of the smaller wins for the chance of more bigger wins, but there's the danger a big win will come in on a line you discarded which is a real bummer LOL. It's quite a good way of turning those slots that tend to give you lots of small wins that are less than your bet size into more interesting propositions, if you find that kind of game frustrating.

I wouldn't recommend it on high variance slots like Isis, Scary Rich or Rain Dance though

And you definitely don't want to do it if you are grinding out a WR!

**baabaa006** · 9th March 2010, 02:44 AM

Simmo is spot on. It's a very good way to increase the variance of a slot.

It can also be used to increase your chances of cashing out (generally at the expense of playtime though).

I'll explain further.

Let's say you have a bankroll of $100 and will cash out if you get this up to say $500. If your betting $1 per spin (with 25 lines selected), you are going to require a lot of multiple good hits to get this up to $500. However if you are betting $1 (and single line selected), you have the potential to get to your cash out limit in a single hit.

Some machines betting max lines will never get you too your cash out requirement (they are just two low variance), this is where this method of betting comes into play (for me anyway).

**cpdnd31** · 9th March 2010, 04:31 AM

Thank you for your help but it now leads me to another question. Lets take rtg how do you figure out which slots are the high varience? At 3 dice they list them but Ive never noticed on rtg sites. Well I guess the question should be how do you figure out slot varience?

**maphesto** · 9th March 2010, 05:08 AM

I think that Kasinoking is linking to a site with such info. He is probably the owner of the site. I am not sure of that.

I know that I liked much of the info there.

**blonde** · 9th March 2010, 07:17 AM

I always played max lines until one day someone told me to try just playing 23 out of 25 etc. I tried it and wow I seen a difference in my pay outs. I go back and forth now as I don't want to miss not winning something lol.

**Simmo!** · 9th March 2010, 09:48 AM

Originally Posted by cpdnd31

Thank you for your help but it now leads me to another question. Lets take rtg how do you figure out which slots are the high varience? At 3 dice they list them but Ive never noticed on rtg sites. Well I guess the question should be how do you figure out slot varience?

I put up a rough guide to variance of some of the original individual slots at www.slotjunkies.info and some of the more recent ones (with videos of the bonus features) on www.slotjunkies.net (a work in progress).

**KasinoKing** · 9th March 2010, 01:16 PM

Originally Posted by maphesto

I think that Kasinoking is linking to a site with such info. He is probably the owner of the site. I am not sure of that.

I know that I liked much of the info there.

I guess you are referring to SlotBeaters.com?
I do give my opinion on the variance of all the slots from some softwares on that site - but not for many of the RTG ones because I very rarely play them...
If RTG's had better bonuses & I knew what each casino had their RTPs set on it would be a different story.

Thanks for the compliment!

KK

**Jasminebed** · 9th March 2010, 01:31 PM

For RTG games with stacked wilds, like Paydirt or expanding wilds, like Realm of Riches, playing less than max lines might be advantageous, given that there is a max cap of 50,000x line bet.

While 20 lines pays $1,000 if you get bunches of wilds, 15 lines might well pay the same $1,000.

RTG is the only platform I know that caps a spin win.

**KasinoKing** · 9th March 2010, 01:49 PM

Originally Posted by Jasminebed

RTG is the only platform I know that caps a spin win.

Very good point!
And one thing I don't think we've ever had fully explained is how does that effect the RTP?
If a lot of people were hitting these "capped wins" that would definitely reduce the RTP (unless it is already factored in).

WagerWork also have a cap - on the number of free-spin re-triggers you can get on some of their slots, and I think some have a "Max win from a single spin" rule as well.
However, the odds of getting to the max free-spins on their slots is probably similar to the chances of getting struck by lightning just as you win the lottery while giving birth to sextuplets...