Random? I don't think so.

[BobDancer]

Here's a plan.  What if we only went to the casino once a year?  We fly to Vegas and play one of those positive games we keep hearing about.





I know you were being sarcastic --- but your plan is seriously flawed.The 100% games (without including the slot club) are all for low stakes and you can make perhaps $10 per hour --- maybe --- if you play fast and are more accurate than you claim to be. How many hours would you need to play to cover your airfare and other expenses? To play positive games requires a bigger bankroll than you are willing to put at risk --- and it is NOT playing the 100% games. It includes the cash back and free play offered by casinos  on a "bounce back" basis === meaning you don't get it your first trip but you get $100 in free play if you come back next week. For somebody who lives 2000 miles away, this doesn't cover expenses.There are numerous drawings (which you mistakenly call raffles) and tournaments that add significant EV --- but you have to be here when they are held. You insist on your right to be a free bird who comes and  goes as he wishes. Such income sources would not be of value to you.The 2017 tax bill is a significant cost for players who hit W2Gs and who don't file as professional gamblers. (Listen to the Russell Fox interview on GWAE recently). Playing for quarters and lower so you can avoid W2Gs will not give you enough to live on.

[FloridaPhil]

[quote=BobDancer]There are numerous drawings (which you mistakenly call raffles) and
tournaments that add significant EV --- but you have to be here when
they are held. You insist on your right to be a free bird who comes and 
goes as he wishes. Such income sources would not be of value to you.[/quote]This sounds awfully risky and like a lot of work to me.  Why would someone choose a career path with so many drawbacks?   Why not make the same effort and start a commercial business?   At least in the end you would have something to sell.  I've had a few businesses that depended upon me to operate and they were worthless to someone else.  The little company that I started in 1969 turned into four businesses that I sold in 2000.  My son still owns one of them.  I can't imagine sitting alone in a smokey casino at midnight waiting for my name to be called in a drawing while my wife was at home in bed.   I wonder how many nights that would go on before I called and no one answered?   I also can't imagine explaining to her how I fed a $100,000 royal back into the machine waiting for a second one.  I am not disrespecting APs, but it does make we wonder why they exist?You were smart enough to capitalize on all those years as an AP and I applaud you for all you've done for the game.   I personally think the curtain is coming down on advantage play.   It never existed for me, so I'm OK with that. 

[royal flush]

because few of us have certain abilities to only to an edge and play correctly the same way i treat the securities markets find the edge and exploit it. while most folks keep doing the same thing and expecting different results

[Carcounter]

Just goes to prove that smart people (both Bob and Phil) are wired differently.

[FloridaPhil]

Everyone is unique.  God gives us different talents and the ability to make our own choices.  What works for him, may not work for me and vise versa.  When it's all over, what matters is if we did the best we could with what we had to work with. 

[Carcounter]

The main thing is to be comfortable with your choices. Sounds like Bob and Phil are, even though they approach VP very differently. I am comfortable somewhere in the middle of those philosophies. Play only good games, but don't count on vp winnings paying the bills.

[FAA]

I only play 99.54 minus the occasional brief foray into 99.1% BP. But I'd still likely bust at anything over a few hundred bucks coin in. Back to playing on my terms. Every trip is ostensibly on my terms. But I've capitulated to the greed frenzy. Fan is short for fanatical.

[case]

  I can't imagine sitting alone in a smokey casino at midnight waiting for my name to be called in a drawing while my wife was at home in bed.     
















The drawings I attend are often at 4 pm to 8 pm and never at midnite

[FAA]

The latest I know of at CET is the 9 PM hour. But even that is too late for me. I wish they'd get the dog and pony show up by four, tops. But they can't bend over backwards to cater to day trippers.

[FloridaPhil]

Our casinos have a habit of scheduling their drawings late in the evening on weekend nights.   I suppose it's to get weekend players to gamble more?  I have been going to the Hard Rock Casinos for about ten years.  As far as I know, my name has never been called.   I sat next to a lady once who won a car and I saw another win $500 in free play.  They don't use the barrel ticket method, they call the names from a list of player's card holders.   The number of player's cards issued at the Florida casinos must be in the multiple hundreds of thousands.  If you count tourists, it might be in the millions.   If I was waiting for a drawing win to make VP profitable, I would have a very long wait.  I am sure the drawings Mr. Dancer enters are not open to quarter players like me.    This is another example of the difference between high limit Vegas VP and what's available to the average small time VP player across America.   For 99% of us, VP is a loser.  Once you get that in your head, you can pick how much you want to pay.If you have no alternative, you can play 97-98% VP games and still keep the cost manageable.   You use some of the same tactics Bob Dancer uses only on a smaller scale.  You play as accurately as possible, play as small as possible, accept your losses as part of the game and control how long you play.   You should also take advantage of all the comps and incentives available.  My wife plays max coin quarter 97.579% to 98.9% deuces wild with an annual cost of no more than a few thousand dollars.   She doesn't make a long term profit, but she enjoys the game as entertainment and believes she gets her money's worth.