Yes that Video Poker game IS rigged!

[bernynhel]

Not only are VP hands not random, but you will be dealt hands that will lure you into drawing incorrectly. How many times have you been dealt a pair of 10s-2s in a 2 draw to a rf? That's just one example that isn't a coincidence either. BTW, except in extreme bonus poker games where a rf pays ridiculously, stay with the pair. Where the long shot doesn't payout really big, to choose the 3 suited faces over the pair is just a sucker bet.

[kmartinusa]

I've given berny's strategery a go over the last 3-4 days and coincidence or not, I'm up a bit over 5k, 4k coming on a royal.

I've been playing about half of the time micro ddb and the other half split between level up aces and faces and 4 hands at a time of the same game.

My royal came after being dealt akq suited with I think a 4 suited. The program told me to keep the 4!!

Of course I discarded the 4 and got the royal...In truth, I would have done this anyway.

I really didn't get any big hands as a result of my altered play. I tried to keep up with outcomes in my head after discarding unsuited face cards, but really can't report anything because nothing big really happened. Sometimes I would have come out ahead, sometimes I would have been better off holding unsuited face cards. This is assuming that the cards that turned up on the discard would have been the same either way.

I will confess that I didn't adhere all of the time to his strategy while playing $1 level up (multistrike clone) as well as whatever the name of 4 hands at a time is. I'm just not comfortable enough at this time doing this because I was afraid to mess too much with the variance, and my strategy at levelup is more to get to the next level rather than trying to maximize each line.

I was ok with doing this at $5/hand, but at $20...?...Not so much. Yet.

I haven't played this way nearly long enough to have a feel for results and I don't know how to run the math anyway. I've been doing this a long time and although my feel is nothing approaching scientific, I rely on it over the long haul.

For example, I've about abandoned rtg vp because of my lack of royals and I don't like the speed of the game. My percentage # of royals playing mg is off the chart high, but again I don't have the numbers to prove it. My bank account does that rather nicely.

I'm going to stick with this for awhile and look forward to trying it out at the Grand Biloxi (b&m casino in Mississippi) in a couple of weeks as well.

Again, just my completely unscientific observations.

Kevin

[bernynhel]

I've given berny's strategy a go over the last 3-4 days and coincidence or not, I'm up a bit over 5k, 4k coming on a royal....

Congrats on your winnings! Are you typically up over 5k over 3-4 days? If not then you PM me and I can tell you where to send my %! LOL (jk) Hey, take what you can use leave the rest if you're more comfortable and satisfied with the results. It's just the way I was schooled in VP and I've been convinced over the years that the game responds to what choices I make in amounts bet plus cards held. Also, there may be other parts to this puzzle that my mentors weren't aware of that can still be discovered but as is, almost every friend I have turned on this have stuck with it, some for over 10 years now.

So what are you doing at the $20 a hand, holding unsuited faces to increase the chances for at least making Js or better? If so, try to make mental note of how often or seldom holding unsuited faces other than the one furthest to the left (or the exception of an unsuited A on the right end in #5 position) have attracted mates on the draw. My experience has been that it's too seldom to fool with, given the trips, straights, flushes and higher hands I've drawn four cards to the face held furthest to the left or an A in the #5 spot over the years.

A lost hand, IMO, played consistently, is expected and, on occasion, when, for example, if I'm dealt a Qh, Ac, 6d, Ks, 8h, and a K or A is drawn instead of the held Q, I feel that since the lost hand was played consistently with all other hands in the session the cumulative effect will be that future hands will be greater than if I had broken the routine. Like money in a piggy bank. But I understand that at first this playing strategy seems to go against intuition and even common sense but only if playing with the assumption that VP replicates random card play, which I think most of us find difficult to believe even after a relatively short history of playing. And I still look for the Super Aces (dbl dbl bonus) machine at the Aqua Caliente Casino near my house where the previous player's last hand shows that they held unsuited faces - I recently drew four cards to a royal flush with just the Ah held after only five hands on a machine I found showing the last (losing) hand included three facecards held, all of different suits - and the quarters only vintage machine pays $1,000for rfs on $1.25 bet!

[bernynhel]

A situation I neglected to mention: Some deals will result in a choice between 2 sets of suited faces, (sorry, I neglected to get a screenshot of the original 5 cards dealt - the 10h in the #2 spot, the Qh the #4 ). In this example, a choice between a Kd, Ad and a 10h, Qh was dealt. As in other hands involving unsuited faces, except when a sole, unsuited A is dealt in the #5 position, the unsuited faces farthest to left as in the held pair, below, the Kd in the #1 position being the dominant factor, the choice is the suited 2 cards farthest to the left. Had the deal been, say, 9c, Kd, Ad, 10h, Qh, the same Kd, Ad would be held applying the same rule as above.

In the case of a 3 draw to a rf, some players insist that royal flushes most likely result from a 10 and either a J or a Q of the same suit held over a 10 + K or 10 + A or even more than any 2 suited faces without a 10, included, and I have heard this, also. But it has not been my experience.