Page 28 - August 2015 • Southern California Gaming Guide

GIoing Down in Stakes
’ll begin this article by discussing live poker. Some of what I’m going to tell you is hearsay. I’m not a strong player at poker, but I believe what I am saying is true. When we discuss video poker later in this article, I’m on more solid ground.
you’re not a vip. Even if you earn that free bu et, you’re going to have to stand in line for an hour to redeem it.
On the ip side of the coin, video poker is a much easier game at which to succeed than live poker. In video poker you’re competing against a xed target. Software is available to tell you how to play each hand exactly, and how much each game is worth.
And the stakes at video poker are more predictable than in No Limit poker games, where you could play several pots, say from $10 to $30, and then all of a sudden be in one for $1,000.
Conversely, the payouts in video poker are often large multiples of the maximum bet where an
Poker is a game where many good players go broke — often more than once. Bad players certainly go broke, too. It can be di cult for a player to know if he’s a good player running bad or just plain not good enough.
Poker is a game where it’s di cult to accurately gauge the strength of your game and that of your opponents — either of which can uctuate, depending on who is ahead or behind, who is tired, how much alcohol has been consumed, etc. e swings (both positive and negative) can be large with respect to your expected hourly win rate. Plus, every gambling game attracts a certain number of degenerates, many of whom fail to properly care for their bankroll.
Poker is also a game where the skill level of the players varies greatly with the stakes played. e players who play in a $1/$2 game are typically not as good as those who play in a $5/$10 game, who in turn are not as good as those who play in a $20/$40 game.
Players who are good enough to regularly beat a $20/$40 game (meaning their play is su ciently better than the average player in that game allowing them to more than make up for the casino rake) can typically crush a $1/$2 game. ey are just that much better. If they go broke at the higher stakes, players often step down a level or two in order to build up their bankroll again.
It may not always be pleasant to go down in stakes. Ego is involved for many players, and to be seen in a mere $1/$2 game can be humiliating if you’re used to playing with the better players in the higher stakes games. Still, if you’re broke and you can’t convince anyone to back you in the bigger game, you do what you have to do and play at the lower levels. If you can. Some players used to higher stakes feel that playing for lower stakes is like playing for “play money,” and they can’t concentrate well enough to succeed. Although the caliber of players is
di erent, the rules of the games at the $1/$2 level are the same as those at the $1,000/$2,000 level.
In video poker, it’s a di erent dynamic. You still have players going broke, of course, but it’s wrong to assume that a player who is usually successful at a $5 game can crush a 25-cent game. One reason is that these players don’t play the same games. Being really good at Jacks or Better, for example, doesn’t automatically make you a good player at Deuces
Wild. Each game, and each pay schedule, must be learned separately.
If you know one or two games well, it’s not that hard to pick up others. But it’s not a gimmee either. Every game has its own idiosyncrasies. e most successful players at high stakes video poker games use hosts and know how to work the comps system.
ey can sometimes negotiate front money just to show up and play. ey can get travel money reimbursement. Often they receive gifts of various sorts that can later be sold on eBay.
“It may not always be pleasant to go down in stakes. Ego is involved for many players...”
800-for-1 royal ush can happen at any time. In live poker, usually the amount youcanwininahandisonlyafew times larger than what you can bet. (You might “triple up” if you go all in and two others call your bet).
e bottom line is that it’s probably easier to avoid going broke at video poker than it is at live poker. But it still happens. In both games, going broke is tougher at age 60 than it is at 25 because you have less opportunity to
“make it back.” So whatever the video poker software tells you that you need for a bankroll, if you’re a senior citizen, you probably need more than that.
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PAGE 28
SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA GAMING GUIDE
AUGUST 2015
If you’re going to cut back from
good $5 games to good 25¢ games,
you’re often going to have to change
casinos. Some casinos have good low-level games. Some casinos have good higher stakes games. It is not usually the case that one casino is looser in all games than other casinos.
In both games, senior citizens are rightfully more concerned with preserving whatever bankroll they have, while a young player might rightfully be more concerned with building her bankroll for bigger and better things down the road.
Professional video poker player Bob Dancer’s radio show Gambling With An Edge, is on Thursday evenings 7 p.m. to 8 p.m. Paci c Time on radio station 1230 AM in Las Vegas online at klav1230am.com. Dancer’s products may be ordered at bobdancer.com or at 1-800-244-2224 Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Paci c Time.
Changing casinos means you start all over again learning the comps system and moving up in players club tier levels. Knowing the Caesars’ system doesn’t give you much of a head start at learning the Boyd system. Even dollar players learn to feel entitled standing in the shorter vip lines. At a new casino,
Video Poker with Bob Dancer