Your Input Please Reducing Paylines + Higher Denomination Coins

[Nicola]

As I've been on night-shifts all week, I must have read hundreds of threads and looked through what seemed thousands of screenshots on CM. One thing that I noticed was the occasional screenshot where players have reduced their paylines to just 1 or 2 and they get 5 wilds, 5 scatters or a high value win of x2000+.

To experiment, I chose one of my worst games (never hit the scatter free spins or had any luck)... Mega Moolah Summertime.

Less than 10 minutes in, I get 3 scatters = 15 free spins and SEVEN retriggers (wtf) and two of the top paytable wins (see below)

So my question to the community is (or someone with the knowledge of this) does reducing paylines and/or upping coin value with less paylines have any affect on gameplay or payouts?

 

[AmarrEmperor]

Be extremely careful. Many slots are known to have lower RTP if not played on max lines. Some of the RTP reduction is huge, like from 95% to 60%.

So yes it does have an effect. Best not mess with it unless you're sure that particular slot had consistent RTP.

 

[Nifty29]

The only thing reducing lines does is increase the variance.

It has no effect on TRTP AFAIK.

The OP here got EXTREMELY lucky. I think if she posts the next 100 bonus rounds we might see a different story.

 

[rockycatt]

with out any documented proof I can tell you I have experienced it just my word that's all I have for proof

 

[QueenBee]

Been wondering too....

I have experienced the same. I have been playing in some tournaments lately at a Danish casino, where the number of spins is the only factor. Every day a new slot. So I have tried quite a few slots playing many spins on one line. I seem to hit the features and retriggers a lot more than when playing at max lines.

 

[Nifty29]

Yeah I've experienced it too. So what? It proves nothing.

All it proves is that sometimes you win when you up your bet/decrease your lines/play after 5pm on Tuesday/hold your breath.

It's a perception thing. You remember the big wins when you up your bet because.....well, they are bigger than you're used to because the bet is bigger, but they stand out because they're usually among your bigger wins overall. The truth is that there are MANY times when you DON'T win when upping your bet/holding your breath etc.....but you don't remember those because you LOST.

I'll throw out the challenge for anyone to prove/disprove this POV. Over the next month, when you get the urge to up your bet etc, record those bets/lines (or copy paste from playcheck etc) and let's see if doing these things DOES make you win more/more often. I'll put $50 to a CM charity on the fact that you will lose most of the time, just like if you were flat betting .20c a spin.

Saying something happens doesn't mean something always or consistently happens....and if it doesn't consistently happen, then it's pointless as a strategy and unusable in terms of trying to "beat" the game. The TRTP is the same folks whether you play one line or 50...only the variance changes.

 

[QueenBee]

We agree...

Yeah I've experienced it too. So what? It proves nothing.

All it proves is that sometimes you win when you up your bet/decrease your lines/play after 5pm on Tuesday/hold your breath.

It's a perception thing. You remember the big wins when you up your bet because.....well, they are bigger than you're used to because the bet is bigger, but they stand out because they're usually among your bigger wins overall. The truth is that there are MANY times when you DON'T win when upping your bet/holding your breath etc.....but you don't remember those because you LOST.

I'll throw out the challenge for anyone to prove/disprove this POV. Over the next month, when you get the urge to up your bet etc, record those bets/lines (or copy paste from playcheck etc) and let's see if doing these things DOES make you win more/more often. I'll put $50 to a CM charity on the fact that you will lose most of the time, just like if you were flat betting .20c a spin.

Saying something happens doesn't mean something always or consistently happens....and if it doesn't consistently happen, then it's pointless as a strategy and unusable in terms of trying to "beat" the game. The TRTP is the same folks whether you play one line or 50...only the variance changes.

I am not changing stakes, only playing 1 line on lowest bet, thousands of spins. I am not saying that I win more (I don't) only that the features seem to kick in more often, with more spins, multipliers and retriggers. Maybe to stay on the TRTP?

 

[miso]

The only thing reducing lines does is increase the variance.

It has no effect on TRTP AFAIK.

The OP here got EXTREMELY lucky. I think if she posts the next 100 bonus rounds we might see a different story.

Exactly.

Nicola, I`ve been playing Starburst on one line only for a couple of months now. You know what that slot is like,
you can play to oblivion on 10 lines without going anywhere. On one line though, a lot more dead spins, but bigger wins.

Some other slots that I play on 3 or 5 lines are Golden Shamrock and Egyptian Heroes (both have expanding wilds on 2,3,4).

It`s fun (sometimes). Can`t say that it`s especially rewarding, due to the awful number of dead spins, but when you hit, you hit

 

[Blathaon]

The only thing reducing lines does is increase the variance.

It has no effect on TRTP AFAIK.

The OP here got EXTREMELY lucky. I think if she posts the next 100 bonus rounds we might see a different story.

On some slots it does.

NetEnt - Ghost Pirates
The theoretical return to player for this game is 95.3% - 96.9%
The higher the number of bet ways played, the higher the RTP is.

NetEnt - Egyptian Heroes
The theoretical return to player for this game is 93.8%-96.7%
The higher the number of bet lines played, the higher the RTP is.

NetEnt - Frankenstein
The theoretical return to player for this game is 71.0%-96.7%
The higher the number of bet lines played, the higher the RTP is.

It's hard to say if this is the case with Microgaming since they don't publish the TRTP of their games.

But since this seems to only be the case with a handful of NetEnt slots then I'm guessing it's the way the wilds work in these slots, Egyptian Heroes have expanding wilds and the middle reel is locked wild in free spins, and Frankenstein have spreading wilds.

 

[Captain Chaos]

71%? Bloody hell! Pub fruity's pay better than that! Why the massive swing on that one I wonder?

Also, why does MG not publish TRTP for their slots? I mean, what harm could it do? Most others do it and I can't imagine the TRTP is that bad compared to others they decide not to publish it. Bit odd.

 

[Blathaon]

71%? Bloody hell! Pub fruity's pay better than that! Why the massive swing on that one I wonder?

Also, why does MG not publish TRTP for their slots? I mean, what harm could it do? Most others do it and I can't imagine the TRTP is that bad compared to others they decide not to publish it. Bit odd.

I know videoslots lists the TRTP for MG slots but there is no additional info like on the NetEnt slots, so if there are MG slots that have reduced RTP while playing less than max lines then we wouldn't know.

And the RTP for MG slots is not in the help file of the slot this is something that videoslots had to drag out of them, for some reason they don't like to give it out.

It's not like the RTP for most MG slots is any worse than the RTP from other providers.

Having said that i doubt that this is a big issue, on many newer slots you can't even reduce the number of lines.

 

[skiny]

I know some people seem to think that the games hit more often when they play less lines but they don't. If you only reduce the amount of lines you play by 1 or 2 you're not really gaining much and you're risking your one big hit being one of those lines but if you drastically reduce the amount of lines you play you can take a low variance game and turn it into a high variance game.

So what's the point?

The point is the bonus rounds. If you drop your total lines to 5, 7 or 9 you can spin a lot longer than if you're playing 20 or 25 lines. That gives you a better shot of actually making it to the next bonus round. The chances are you're going to miss some good lines along the way but it's a slot game so the chances are you're also going to go broke whether you played those lines or not before you trigger a bonus round.

You can do well by decreasing the amount of lines you play but you need a strategy to increase your potential win and in my opinion that all rests in the type of bonus round. Simply getting 10 free spins with a 2 or 3 times multiplier isn't going to help much.

The best strategies to benefit from playing less lines are;

Pick games that have very high multipliers during the bonus rounds so if you do get a decent hit on one of your lines it will pay for all the lines you missed and then some.

Pick games that have expanding wilds. That way you have a good shot of hitting multiple lines even though you're only playing a small portion of the lines available.

Pick games that give a ton of free spins. Obviously the more free spins you get the better your chances are of hitting something during the free spins and when you do you'll be playing with a multiplier.

There is also one RTG game (Fruit Frenzy) that requires you get a line of 5 to trigger the bonus round but when you do the bonus plays with all 25 lines regardless of how many lines you played when you triggered it.

High variance means you can hit big by betting less and betting less means you get to spin longer. That's the only benefit you'll receive from playing less than the available lines but I've got some pretty good hits playing like this when I know I would have been long since broke if I kept playing all the lines.

This one didn't require a bonus round but I only had 2 bucks left and started auto-spinning it hoping for the 100x10. I got this instead.

 

[maphesto]

I often play with reduced number of lines, I love it!

Remember that on many RTG slots you have a higher TRTP when you reduce the number of lines.

 

[tinybettor]

From my personal experience, changing lines and coin sizes has had absolutely no effect whatsoever on the payout of the slot. What I can gather though from your screenies is you are one incredibly lucky person. I wish I could have that luck sometime.

 

[miso]

I know this is a ridiculous screenshot, but perfect to make a point.

I had 20c in party account, so went to clear that. I could have opened any slot and make one spin, but went to Grand Monarch,
with stacked wilds. Playing one line gave me 20 spins, thus bigger chance of hitting anything.

And even though the win is measly, 250x bet is 250x bet.

 

[Vegasbum]

Good reply Skiny. You are right on.

I ALWAYS play reduced lined and have done so for many years. I could post screen shots every day because when you do hit, your stakes are much higher and hence a large payoff. But Skiny is right in that you have to pick and choose your game. Playing reduced lines on some games will break you while on others it is the key to winning. Also with reduced lines it helps to vary your bet size (I will not explain this)

If you notice most new games released in the past year force you to play all lines.....why do you think that is.....Casinos love players who hit max lines and play blind.

 

[catapultaudio]

It never fails to amaze me when for whatever reason I drop a game down to one or two lines and all of a sudden hit some outrageous combination .. I often play Great Blue on 9/13/17 lines at the moment just because when that slot is withholding the bonus it can really test your bankroll, and much as I love playing the full 25 lines I won't do that at the moment even on min bet without at least 250x starting balance, although I absolutely hate hitting a tonne of stacked wilds in the feature when not playing max lines!

Break da Bank Again is another one that has made me laugh more than once, I've literally had 1p left in my balance, hit the bonus, then hit a 750x bet win in the feature ..

I seem to remember in the winner screenshots thread there are a couple of players who have the game set up at 1 line, but playing some outrageous bet size on the one line, and it left me amazed - surely you MUST go broke 99/100 times with this strategy?? ...

 

[nisosbar]

I often play with reduced number of lines, I love it!

Remember that on many RTG slots you have a higher TRTP when you reduce the number of lines.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think what you are referring to is the arbitrary cap placed on wins, to 50,000x the line bet (which has been discussed in the forums here previously).

That is, RTG has a cap on total $/bet which you can win on any single spin/any single free spin feature. So that even if you are playing 25 lines on, for example, Count Spectacular, and you get that once-in-a-lifetime 5 expanding wilds, you will be paid only on 5 lines, due to this cap.

 

[maphesto]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think what you are referring to is the arbitrary cap placed on wins, to 50,000x the line bet (which has been discussed in the forums here previously).

That is, RTG has a cap on total $/bet which you can win on any single spin/any single free spin feature. So that even if you are playing 25 lines on, for example, Count Spectacular, and you get that once-in-a-lifetime 5 expanding wilds, you will be paid only on 5 lines, due to this cap.

Exactly!

I think that the older RSVS have a cap of 50 000x line bet and some newer have 150000x line bet (at least Vulcan). 50 000 x line bet sounds very good but when you see that you on ONE line on Paydirt can win 30 000x line bet you understand that you have a lower TRTP already when playing two lines instead of one.

 

[nikantw]

The effect is mostly in your mind. You see all the wins you could have had, if you had played more lines. And get bored from the slot being dead almost all the time. You get more playtime maybe. But, in the long run, RTP stays the same.

If it makes the game more fun for you, then do it!

 

[chayton]

I've actually noticed it the other way, as soon I reduce my line bet, I hit something great on a line I WASN'T betting.

I don't have anything to add to the gist of the thread except to be careful when playing jackpot games using this method because some will only pay a jackpot if you're betting the maximum amount of lines.

 

[dunover]

Yeah I've experienced it too. So what? It proves nothing.

All it proves is that sometimes you win when you up your bet/decrease your lines/play after 5pm on Tuesday/hold your breath.

It's a perception thing. You remember the big wins when you up your bet because.....well, they are bigger than you're used to because the bet is bigger, but they stand out because they're usually among your bigger wins overall. The truth is that there are MANY times when you DON'T win when upping your bet/holding your breath etc.....but you don't remember those because you LOST.

I'll throw out the challenge for anyone to prove/disprove this POV. Over the next month, when you get the urge to up your bet etc, record those bets/lines (or copy paste from playcheck etc) and let's see if doing these things DOES make you win more/more often. I'll put $50 to a CM charity on the fact that you will lose most of the time, just like if you were flat betting .20c a spin.

Saying something happens doesn't mean something always or consistently happens....and if it doesn't consistently happen, then it's pointless as a strategy and unusable in terms of trying to "beat" the game. The TRTP is the same folks whether you play one line or 50...only the variance changes.

Well, that pretty much sums up what would have been my reply to the thread. By eliminating most win lines you avoid the smaller 'tick over' wins and your balance decreases maybe slower than using full stake but with many dead spins. Your RTP curve will show dramatic swings when you DO hit a 5-reel win as this say becomes 500 x your bet on playing one line rather than 25 x if you played for example 20-lines.
If you play a 20-line feature slot on one line you are effectively changing it from a videoslot to a 5-reel version of the standard 3-reel fruit machine-type games.
P.S. Nicola don't shout about this winning run at limited lines, or Vinyl will think you've found an 'emptier' and something to replace the AWP's he yearns for..

 

[skiny]

I agree there's nothing you can do to change the TRTP of a slot game. Playing less lines only lets you spin longer provided you don't increase your wager per line. I wouldn't advise playing like this when you have a balance that allows you to play all the lines because the best line hits just might be on the ones you didn't play.

For me it's just being stubborn when I'm almost bankrupt. If I have 5 bucks left I can play twenty spins at 25c per spin or a hundred spins at 5c. You're a lot more likely to hit a bonus feature with a hundred spins than you are with twenty and you're a lot more likely go get a good hit with a big multiplier.

I couldn't count the amount of times I dumped my entire balance in a matter of minutes and then built it back up playing 5 or 7 lines and patiently waiting for a bonus feature. Of course once I build it back up I go back to playing all the lines. In the long run if you can play all the lines you're probably going to be better off.