$5 progressive question DBonus

[RonW]

The Orleans had a 9-7 Double Bonus progressive until recently eliminating it. The $5 dollar jackpot was 38k. I was dealt As, Ah, 10h, Qh, 5c. What's the optimal play here? Let you know the results in a day or so. Thanks.

[shadowman]

With the RF almost double the reset value I figured it was most likely the 3RF draw. So, I went into winpoker and verified it was indeed around 1.2 credits better than holding the aces. Of course, with only a 1 in 1081 chance you would be more likely to hit the aces (1 in 360).

[RonW]

Thanks for the confirmation shadowman. I mistakenly held the 2 aces and lo and behold the King and Jack of Hearts popped up and bit me in the butt. The progressive was eventually hit in the 40's and the bank was shut down when they moved the High Limit area.

[Benford's Law]

Ouch, Ron!~Benford's Law

[shadowman]

Thanks for the confirmation shadowman. I mistakenly held the 2 aces and lo and behold the King and Jack of Hearts popped up and bit me in the butt. The progressive was eventually hit in the 40's and the bank was shut down when they moved the High Limit area.
 
First, the good news. Assuming standard IGT game king machines the actual time difference in pressing the different keys would probably have led to a different draw. The bad news? You'll never know.

[Benford's Law]

Shadowman,         That's an interesting point I've never been sure about.  An article I read (circa 2003-2004) claimed that "newer machines continuously shuffle the cards both before the deal AND draw since those "Hacking the Casinos...." RNG cheats did their thing some years back....          What do you think.....do all the machine manufacturers (Bally's, Sigma, etc.) shuffle on the draw, too?  How far back in machine age do we go before the older version of keeping a static 5 cards on top of the deck for the draw?          I never knew for sure who did what and when on this one....          You've mentioned your bad luck with 4-card royal draws....but how do we know whether or not it depends on when you press the DRAW button or whether the result was already set in stone at the time?~Benford's Law

[shadowman]

From what I've heard the shuffling after deal started with the IGT game king platform around the year 2000. If you're playing old coin droppers like I do quite often then the card is preset before the draw (10 cards selected initially).
 
I have yet to hear anything about other manufacturers. However, I suspect they may the do the same as IGT to reduce the liklihood of their machines being compromised. Even if it never happened it would not be good competitive postioning.