Pechanga Casino - Paradise for 9/6 Jacks Or Better

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Vman96
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Re: Pechanga Casino - Paradise for 9/6 Jacks Or Better

Post by Vman96 »

Weird. Then the IGT media sheet payback range must be marginally incorrect and maybe doesn't include the progressive. But the progressive doesn't lead to much anyway. How many people were playing the game the past weekend? If it was half full, that's a pretty big win for the casino, imo.

alpax
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Post by alpax »

Weird. Then the IGT media sheet payback range must be marginally incorrect and maybe doesn't include the progressive. But the progressive doesn't lead to much anyway. How many people were playing the game the past weekend? If it was half full, that's a pretty big win for the casino, imo.

There are two banks of 6 machines that are about hundred steps apart on the casino floor (I only took snapshot of 1 bank because it was not next to each other). I only went by it when I entered the casino and when I departed after I went through a brief playing session.

I saw just 1 player at one bank and 3 players at the other bank. All of them were playing the 6/5/3 DDB, their balance was under $100 so I think they are just playing a little before bailing out.

Not making this part up, but one lady was screaming for joy (at the bank all by herself) and was calling for her boyfriend to come over who was playing a slot. I thought it might have been a low quad with a multiplier but instead she was dealt quad Queens and got excited over holding each one before accepting the win. Problem was, she bet 1 credit for 3 lines for a total payout of 150 quarters... This goes to show people play this out of recreation when right behind the bank it she can find 8/5/4 DDB Super Times Pay for even nickels.

The two players that were playing later on, one was doing DDB and the other was doing TDB. The jackpot meter grew to $57,300. It has been 3 weeks since it was deployed.

I might try to play some (but not a whole lot) if the jackpot ever reaches $100,000. Turns out 8/5 DB might be the best option.

Vman96
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Post by Vman96 »

I wouldn't recommend much play probably. And each extra 50k in the meter is like a pathetic 0.2%.

And yeah 8/5 DB is the way to go. At that level it plays basically like 8/5 DDB except AH offsuit beats Ace only.

I would really love to see the raw hold numbers on these.

If you do take a stab at it, hopefully you have the bank to yourself.

See if it goes up when no one plays since it's "networked". I'm not convinced Pechanga is on a network right now other than its own. I thought GN was way higher than 57k. And when you do play, please watch how fast the meter goes up per $4.50 round. It should go up a penny every round at least...I'd hope.

This game should not fail. I think it's going to though thanks to terrible paytables.

alpax
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Post by alpax »

I wouldn't recommend much play probably. And each extra 50k in the meter is like a pathetic 0.2%.

And yeah 8/5 DB is the way to go. At that level it plays basically like 8/5 DDB except AH offsuit beats Ace only.

I would really love to see the raw hold numbers on these.

If you do take a stab at it, hopefully you have the bank to yourself.

See if it goes up when no one plays since it's "networked". I'm not convinced Pechanga is on a network right now other than its own. I thought GN was way higher than 57k. And when you do play, please watch how fast the meter goes up per $4.50 round. It should go up a penny every round at least...I'd hope.

This game should not fail. I think it's going to though thanks to terrible paytables.

I did not carefully think it out that an extra 50k would just add 0.2% to the pay, I mistakenly blindly stated I would give it a shot when it reaches 100k, I made the assumption that it will take a couple of months if it reaches that high, but the return will still be so bad.

I will keep an eye on this game on each visit to see how it does in the long run out of interest but I do not have a strong urge at trying to win the jackpot, especially with the tax implications that comes with it if one were to win it all. Getting an opportunity to play with the 10x multiplier is on average 1 in 375 (1 in 15 for the STP and 1 in 25 for the multiplier choice), judging by how quickly I lost the time I tried it the first weekend, I do not think it will be worth it.

I will pay attention to the network by checking out both banks, I should have asked if this casino is the sole property paying out the jackpot. I will take a 10 round shot for $45 coin in as well to see what the meter is like. In the weekday morning hardly anyone plays on the floor (the best time to play nickel Game King machines) so I will pay attention and report back what I see.

There are people willing to play progressive games at the casino, the cameras did a good job at backtracking a person who won the jackpot for the Walking Dead machine (since then they replaced it with Sons of Anarchy, same game but different theme). There is a cardboard cutout of the person holding the check on the casino floor.

Pechanga Blog of Walking Dead Winner

alpax
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Post by alpax »

I wouldn't recommend much play probably. And each extra 50k in the meter is like a pathetic 0.2%.

And yeah 8/5 DB is the way to go. At that level it plays basically like 8/5 DDB except AH offsuit beats Ace only.

I would really love to see the raw hold numbers on these.

If you do take a stab at it, hopefully you have the bank to yourself.

See if it goes up when no one plays since it's "networked". I'm not convinced Pechanga is on a network right now other than its own. I thought GN was way higher than 57k. And when you do play, please watch how fast the meter goes up per $4.50 round. It should go up a penny every round at least...I'd hope.

This game should not fail. I think it's going to though thanks to terrible paytables.

I have yet to finish up the September trip report which will still be somewhat bland as usual. But I made a couple of visits back to update about this Super Times Play.

I observed the two banks of machines on a morning and no one was playing on it. The progressive meter still went up. This led me to believe it is linked to some other places. Another time while the banks were empty, the progressive bank stopped moving. So I took 2 18-quarter cracks at Deuces Wild (I am winging this) and donated about $8 (1 of the lines hit 3 of a kind) to the casino. First spin went up 3 cents, and another spin went up 2 cents. It is hard to guage since when I was not playing, I've seen it go up by just 1 cent in between the 2 or 3 cent increments.

My best estimate will be 0.5% meter (or it might be 0.4%).

Now the casino produced a promotional video with regards to it:

Pechanga Youtube Link

Pechanga Facebook Video Page

The video reveals that the interstate link is between California and Oklahoma. It does not seem to be part of Nevada and New Jersey. The progressive meter is at $68,500 this past weekend. So it seems to be going up about 10k a month for the last two months. It will probably go up at an exponential rate once the progressive gets higher, just like the lottery.

Can the other location possibly be Winstar?

Vman96
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Post by Vman96 »

0.5% sounds reasonable. So if that's the case, then that's 3.7 million coin in so far. Assuming 7% house edge after errors (very stingy, probably closer to 8%), that would mean $259,000 made on those units (plus whatever is hooked up in OK and elsewhere). If there were 40 units total among the casinos for 60 days, then that would be $108 per unit per day. That's pretty poor (I would be hoping $200 for a "new game"). The big question is how many machines are hooked to the network. If there were only 20, then $200 per unit/day is being met.

Also like you say, the meter will go up, play will go up because people will ignore the rest of the paytable for that huge number. With a 0.5% meter, 6 figure jackpots should be not infrequent.

alpax
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Post by alpax »

I got around to completing the update, it took me a little while even though its bland. Makes me appreciate Vman's and Royal Flusher's trip reports even more.

Super Times Pay Poker Mega Progressive Update

I dropped by for another play session on Saturday October 10 and checked out the Super Times Pay Progressive banks. It seems to have
picked up in popularity. I saw 2 players on one bank and 3 players on the other bank, all playing DDB (no surprise). More notably, the jackpot has been reset to a lower amount. The last time I was there at the end of September, it was at $68,500. Now it is down to $52,000+, it starts at $50,000 so someone must have won recently. I do not have any details about the jackpot winner, but it must have happened recently.
Probably won at least $72,000 as I would project. I saw something that I have not noticed before. The videopoker.com logo in embedded on the cards if you look carefully.



EasyHeats Slot Tournament

One of the few reasons I try to strive for Gold tier membership is for exclusive invites.



This year the casino did away with the traditional slot tournaments where there is a dedicated bank of machines that is set to tournament mode with a flip of the switch (slots where payouts are set very high and only winnings count). A bunch of people get in a long line to take turns button mashing the spin button for a minute. Multiple rounds are played out so people have to stay at the casino for many hours if they get far.

Now the new format is called EasyHeats. It has been happening once a month, only Gold/Platinum/Red tier card holders are invited. Also on the month of your birthday there is a special tournament with a smaller pool of prizes. This is my third time trying it out. I could not make it to the other ones due to personal scheduling conflicts. When it is in the tournament time schedule, putting in the CLUB card will take over a slot machine screen (I put mine in an unoccupied Aristocrat's Amazing Money Machine - Similar game to Pompeii except with a different skin, 3x/5x wilds in Reel Power bonus rounds). A slot game appear and each player will get to spin this special game 20 times right from the touch screen. I wish more casinos adopt this slot tournament system.

I finished with 38,000 points, which was still 35,000 points off of the 100th place prize pool (I did this early and the tournament time frame last until the evening).
The top score at the time was over 110,000 points so I did not fare too good and did not feel too bad.



The total prize pool for these exclusive tournaments are $100,000. Though the first place winner gets $30,000 I was amazed that consolation prize was not too far off. I learned this from looking at the top scores screen on the player CLUB booth.

2nd place gets $15,000
3rd place gets $10,000
4th place gets $8,000
5th place gets $6,000
6th place gets $4,000
7th place gets $2,000
8th place gets $1,000

Cash prize winners have 48 hours to claim their prize. Free slot play winners have 30 days to use up their winnings.

Buffalo Stampede

Something interesting non-VP related that the casino was promoting during the September. It is proclaimed to be the biggest video slot in the world as of September 2015. There is a popular slot game called "Buffalo Stampede" by Aristocrat Technologies. A derivative from the original Buffalo game that is the Xtra Reel Power, wins are determined by
scatters (no line connects) left to right. For 75 cents instead of 40 cents, random events occur, a stampede of buffaloes can appear and expand reels, a random buffalo symbol can appear at the top to help the player connect buffaloes, or a random progressive jackpot of either $1000 or the major which is at least $15,000. There were 3 of them spaced apart on the wall, some of the nickel keno machines that used to be there are gone (sad news for bunch of them).



It is indeed huge where it had to be at least 12 feet tall since I do not think a professional basketball player can touch the top of it (the rim is 10 feet tall). Obviously people may conclude this machine can be tighter in payout to help pay for the cost of the machine.

Compare that to the original sized machines (this game is quite popular at this casino, there are 4 banks of these across the floor).



On the next visit, someone (wish it was me but it is not) had a lucky day filled with joy on the Buffalo Stampede slots. The security guards were all over (the winner accepted an escort out of the casino) so I had to take a far away and zoom in to take this shot (might be blurred).

The person triggered the random MAJOR progressive at $33,585+ by betting just the minimum 75 cents! I might as well put this up to show people betting bigger amounts does not matter to win the progressive on this game.



Minor Trip Report(s)

1st September Trip

I took another attempt at cheap strategy and played Bonus Deuces Wild for the day. I modified the conditions of the strategy by raising the stakes 5 folds. Took less attempts as a compromise.

Single Low Denomination Coin Quarters -> Max Coin Quarters
Max Low Denomination Coin Quarters -> Max Coin Dollar
Single High Denomination Coin Dollar -> Max Coin Dollar
Max High Denomination Coin Dollar -> Max Coin 5 Dollar

Start with $20 -> Start with $100
Denomination change at $25 mark -> Denomination change at $125 mark
Cash Out at $50 -> Cash Out at $250
A 4 for 1 win or better raises the stakes
$300 for 15 shots -> $1000 for 10 shots

On average the cash out happens 1 out of 3 times, on average the cash out tickets is half the bankroll.

Will write more details on the Recreational Forum but a couple of noteworthy hits.



Denomination switch happens quite often since I modified the playing conditions. I am not making this up but I accidentally pushed $2 denomination instead of $1 after the 4 credit win, but I will take the outcome.



This hit solidified a winning day. I got a natural full house with nax quarters. The next bet was for max dollar, started with 2 Deuces which is always exciting. I was shocked to see two more come up since I am not used to seeing it. I tried the Cheap Strategy about 8 times, this is probably the 2nd or 3rd time I walked away a winner. Out of the 10 $100 attempts, I cashed out 4 of them which is better than expected.



2nd September Trip

Played the reliable Jacks or Better to try to accrue club points before the year is up. It did go well to start off before the quads came in. Fortunately had enough in the bankroll to last.

I was able to get three quads on the double down bet (the hand following a 3 for 1 win or better), but whiffing a bunch of double down bet negated the benefit this time.





A DDB moment - I got quad 3s with an ace kicker along the way. And just about every time I get someone reacting negatively to it.
"Wow you got it! Lower quaads with an ace. No wait, why is it only 125?"



Potshot to the rescue

On breaks in between, I went over to the high limit room and took a shot at Deuces Wild. I got decent number of quads so I avoided
Bonus Deluxe and Jacks or Better. The first two whiffed, but the third one was the best outcome at the time (see Recreational W2G Win on the other
forum). Then the next potshot I whiffed. Did one more than usual and the fifth one whiffed too. I was down from the Jacks or Better, but this shot gave me a winning day exiting the casino. I do not expect the potshot to bail me out as the past attempts were no where near good.



1st October Trip

I went back to playing Bonus Deuces Wild, I did not play the Cheap Strategy this time. I tried out a new progressive system this time. Started with $1 bet, and if I did not get a single deuce dealt in 6 hands, I'd double down for another 6, if a Deuce appears, go back to $1.
If not, then will do a single $5 potshot.

Playing Bonus Deuces Wild can be brutal without seeing the 5 of a kinds. I did get a good amount of Wild Royals to keep me in the game, but none at the double down bets.






Ended up taking 7 potshots (So 12+ hands without a deuce can be quite common). And this is the best hit.



Another DDB moment, this one bailed out a losing session. Was down hundreds of dollars to have this pick me up.



The most memorable reaction from others: "Double Double Bonus is the game you should be playing! Its the best game, shame on you! You just wasted 4 aces!!!"

The Spring season was somewhat brutal, but it is nice to be winning lately. I do not propose potshotting as a winning system.
I just think flat betting can get boring, being able to higher and start out with wild deuces or 3 of a kind/2 pairs on JoB just creates suspense during
keep the trip exciting. It can sting when it does not hit.

Tedlark
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Post by Tedlark »

Thanks for the expansive TR alpax, it was a fun read. Congrats to you.

djc32
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Post by djc32 »

Great report, and congrats on the successful Sept!

Your progressive system sounds interesting ,I may have to give it a try.
If you read the royal flushers blog he sometimes uses a progressive system , I think he calls it " the strict rules of parlay"? , that can also be fun.

I agree that when playing negative games any kind of pot shot ,no matter which way you choose to do it is always fun, I just think players would be better off in most cases using your modification to the cheap system, going down in denomination and always betting max coin, rather than playing single coin.

alpax
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Joined: Sat Jun 14, 2014 4:42 pm

Post by alpax »

   Thanks for the expansive TR alpax, it was a fun read. Congrats to you.

Thanks Ted, good to hear you enjoyed it. I fixed a few typos just now. Almost similar to your experiences, I had one good hit on each of these last 3 trips to turn a losing day into a small winning one.

Great report, and congrats on the successful Sept!

Your progressive system sounds interesting ,I may have to give it a try.
If you read the royal flushers blog he sometimes uses a progressive system , I think he calls it " the strict rules of parlay"? , that can also be fun.

I agree that when playing negative games any kind of pot shot ,no matter which way you choose to do it is always fun, I just think players would be better off in most cases using your modification to the cheap system, going down in denomination and always betting max coin, rather than playing single coin.

Thanks djc32!

I know the vast majority flat bet and I see nothing wrong with that. The increased bet shakes things up a little and gets you amped up a little when you are dealt something good knowing you might win more. As Vman stated with these progressive bets, it matters most how you do on the bigger bets.

To most players, Jacks or Better feels like a boring game, thus winning on an increased bet keeps things interesting. A 3 credit win (trips) or better, the next bet you change the denomination double the amount (e.g. 50cents -> $1). If you get 2 credit win or better (2 pairs) continue with another hand at double bet. A high pair, if you are on a losing session, continue with another hand at double bet; if on a winning session go back to normal bet. In Jacks or Better, the double bet does not impact the bankroll as much as the common Phil's cheap strategy where you make 5 fold increases in bets. Nine of the 13 quads in DDB gives you 50 for 1, thus when you do double betting on Jacks or Better and get a quad, you can almost get the same benefit that DDB offers, except for the premium quads. The 2 for 1 2 pairs payout keeps you in the game, and you are compromising just an additional hand each time. A double down full house hit is not bad either.

For the Deuces Wild, I will just rely on the drought of deuces appearing. It is about 1 in 3 hands a deuce will appear. Starting with a deuce increases the chance of winning something in my experience, so its worth something to bet a little more. I've seen the drought last for more than 18 hands one time, so it is no guarantees. You can still win by holding a pair, and some times a third card will appear along with a deuce to give you a 4 for 1 4oaK payout.

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