Video Poker A Grinder's Story

A Grinder's Story
I live in the SE part of town. I have played video poker and poker in almost ever casino in town. I'm a players' card holder at all of them, as well. I see the ads on TV from Stations "WE Love Locals." I see the South Point's ad, "We Love You More," etc. But words mean nothing. Performance counts. I'd like to share how the various casinos I play video poker are for me. I know many members of this forum are professional poker players and don't play low limits and many poker players refuse to play any other games in a casino. This thread is mostly for the average locals casino player who grinds out a profit...or tries to.

For background information:
I keep a contemporaneous journal of the casino, machine number, amount in and amount out in to and out of every machine. My video poker denominations are anywhere from .25c-$2.00 (mostly progressives AND exotic games like multistrike and Ultimate X.

For the calendar year 2014 I made the most profit $34,000+ at Green Valley Ranch. True, its close to my house and a short drive. BUT I will go anywhere to play. Next is South Point with a profit of $12,000+. Tuscany was $9,000. The Cal $6,500, Planet Hollywood $4,500, Sam's Town $3,100,.

My biggest losses were Gambler's Bonus bars, Sunset Station, Fiesta and every Harrah's property here (except P. HO) and Laughlin.

I made a nice profit for the year in video poker. How did I do it? By playing Bob Dancer's strategy...mostly.

He is truly an advantage player; looking ONLY for full pay machines. I don't look just for that. In fact I play VP games he'd probably never play gimmick games-multistrike, Ultimate X, 5 Star poker, etc. And here is where I commit the ultimate sin, take the biggest risk and make (and lose) the biggest amounts of money. Here is my gambling confession, folks.

I CHASE ROYALS EVEN WHEN THE PAY TABLE ISN'T POSITIVE EV-Sorry Bob
(crash of thunder, blots of lightening come crashing down on my house)

I can and do play them till my BR is gone for that day and the next day or two. I often hit them and I lose them, too. But when I chase them, they're big! The win covers my loses. About those losses. Well, let's see...I'm home now for the third day this week. Its been a bad year so far. I often see gaming forums with people bragging about all of their wins. No one tells about the losses. I have them and they suck. A lot.

I am proof positive that you can make a living on VP with a huge BR. If you're willing to take a risk. The best piece of advice Bob Dancer gave me was in response to my question that went something like this:

I'm dealt either 5 to a flush or a straight but the hand has 4 royal cards in it. What do you do? His answer? Throw away the made hand and go for the royal-This advice has made me hundreds of thousands of dollars. Sure, you're giving up a few dollars, but the Royal, its the Royal, man GO FOR IT!

I hope this helps some of newbies understand what it takes to grind out a living in VP and where some of the better paying local casinos are. If you have any questions, I'm NOT a published author, just a daily player who has turned a compulsion into a profitable venture.

 

I think you should start a "Grinder's Blog" on here, provide us weekly updates, unusual occurances, jackpots, stories.. Types of machines, what's hot, what's not.. fun stuff to read.

Maybe get admin to delete the post above and use it to kick it off. Just a suggestion.

 

VegasGalPoker wrote:
"I'm dealt either 5 to a flush or a straight but the hand has 4 royal cards in it. What do you do? His answer? Throw away the made hand and go for the royal"

This is simply going for the highest expected value, which in this case is a very big gain -- on Jacks or Better it's an EV of 18.4 vs. only 4.0 for a dealt straight, or 5 or 6 for a dealt flush.

That advice is not from any particular author. Everyone with any knowledge of probability math will tell you that. This was in print at least as early as 1989 by Lenny Frome, and possible back even further by David Sklansky.

The point is that to be a winning player you must learn a mathematically sound strategy, and the easiest way to do that is to practice on a computer program that displays the strategy chart next to the game window and checks your play by the chart so that you learn to recognize hand types as described in the chart.

 

Dan Paymar,. there is two hand charts, the first i ran into i coped years ago from Phi Gordon site,. at that time,. it was the one that you can buy easy now, showing cards in a square with blue red colors , it goes by positions, the other which i would like to get a copy of,. is the one that shows i think 8 levels , of cards instead of position, it shows card i think 1 through 8 that have best value and any given time., i still have the Gordon one but not the 8 level one., would like to get another copy of that one,. this is the one odds charts seem to go by.,

 

Do you think people want to read about losing? I don't always win...not this year! I wish this was last year!!! Last year was AMAZING! I won a fortune! This year has been horrible, so far. I'll reconsider when I start winning. In fact, every ear starts out horribly, then picks up. Hopefully this one will, too. I'll post about it when it does, if it does. I'll show you my phone anytime I meet you; it's full of my taxable wins (no children, just dogs and wins).

 

Maybe the journey, showing not the easy times only would be interesting to read, how you cope with the loses, what you do, how you self motivate, when you feel the turn around is happening, why it's occurring.

 

I agree. We all know it's not always easy. In fact it's hardly ever easy. I for one would be interested.

 

DRAikins, I don't know whose cards you're referring to. Check mine out on my web site.

 

the cards are also a chart , its all the hands put in a sequence , suited on the top and not suited, with pairs going down the middle, its a chart like the , odds were it has ranges of hands that play better in position and the odds of making them. i will check your site out, you probably have them, i will let you know when i realize what they are called.

 

your site is base on video poker, what i am talking about is for live play or online play with other people. i use to have it i will see if i can find it again. thank you anyways.

 

Well, I'll use this thread to begin. Tonight down $900 trying to hit a .25 progressive that is $1,156 over. I was the only one playing. No one found it. I hit several quads playing bonus poker deluxe. Played the money back trying to hit the progressive. Not a single quad in any other version of the game. Kind of weird. Four machines on the bank. Hit quads on all four, but only hit multiple quads (again only on Deluxe) one one of them. Feel like shit about the loss.
What did I do to deal with it?

Know I can't go out and play for three days so I bought groceries, using coupons. The mere fact of slowly shopping between 1:15am and 2:30 am with no one shopping in the store, no crying kids is really calming. Getting a savings with the coupons was nice. I have so much free food at the casinos that there is no need to ever cook, but I hate going to eat the free food if I'm watching my spending, so I cook to avoid playing. On the 25th, I can play again.

Meanwhile, I'll play the $5 and $10 WSOP games online and the facebook games (free). Play with the pups and force myself to gasp exercise. Crap I hate exercise. I'll read poker strategy books and review my WPT workbooks from my (3) bootcamps. I binge watched the entire 2014 season of Chicago Fire this week whilst saving up to play today-since today was a disaster, more binge watching.

 

I used to have this one, too. I bet if you phone the Gambler's General Store they might have it or tell you where you can get it. Ask for Mary. (702) 382-9903 800 S. Main Street. They have a FaceBook presence. It used to be the Gambler's Book Club which Howard Schwartz owned but he sold to Avery (VERY sad sigh).

 

Yes, of course my site is about video poker, as is this particular forum. Perhaps you should try the Poker forum?

 

since i originally came across this under the poker one , i mistakenly thought it went both ways, until i tried your site,. i done posting for a while anyways,. i meant no harm,. i was just looking for the grouping chart, not that i remembered what it was called, and seeing as teach liked it and probably knew what i was looking for, have fun by./

 

DRAikens I knew you mean Texas Hold 'em and I, too was referring to that chart. It should be at the Gamblers' General Store. I was confused about why you were talking about it here, but I figured you were trying to bring the two pokers together in your head. Believe me, I've tried to bring even two more dissimilar things together than these two things. My head is cluttered with so many things video poker and hold 'em, I can't tell you how much each of the two infects (not affects) the other. Or, maybe it is affects. I see AK suits in triple double and I almost want to hold them when I have a pair of AA...but then I remeber I'm playing vp not hold 'em. Arghhhhh.

 

Good News! Was pretty broke yesterday and took a beating at the Palsm yesterday. Had $100 free play there...lost some of my money, too. (This isn't the good news, FWIW). Played my $65 free play at Rio, lost there, too. Went to Orleans for my $35 free play and I figured it was nickles by then. Triple play. OMG have I suck this low? I was hitting and decided to play till either I hit or someone hit the bottom row royals which for 5 nickles was $429. Someone else hit it. But by that time, I'd hit enough to play quarters. I went to the double bonus progressive that was up to $1,722. Hit it! Yesssss! Back in the game! Paid off a $500 marker AT Sam's via Orleans. I wasn't sure if that was possible, but it is. Debt free and I have play money. WTG, me!

 

Nor sure whether this type of post is appropriate in this forum.

 

I have no problem with you deleting it. Al wanted me to blog my vp experiences. I thought this was what he meant. My apologies if I misunderstood. My feelings are not hurt. Since I wrote it so long ago, it seems I can't delete it. Please do so.

 

Dan, please if that's what you want, delete the post

 

I'm not the manager. I can't delete your post. It's not offensive -- just seems off subject.