Time to discuss how to Improve VP

[Lucky Larry]

Casinos seem to be reducing the number of VP machines and lowering pay tables often significantly.   

Its time VP players become more pro-acive. But, how?

Background observations:

#1 It appears VP players make up a small percentage of patrons. Why?
#2 Many casino patrons know little about VP and are often scared/intimidated by the machines especially multi-hand games.
#3 Patrons don't realize the VP games give them a better chance to win than slots or keno due to higher pay returns.
#4 Regular slot machines require very little formal training to play versus VP which requires basic game strategy which varies with each games, knowledge of pay tables, etc.
#5 Slot players get better perks on club rewards than VP -due to higher returns than slots according to Casino gods.
VP players must share this information and sell our game!

Supply and Demand
Businesses generally respond to customers/patrons who provide the biggest profit to the establishment and represent the power demographics. Therefore, they meet high roller needs and give lower level players what they want - lots of low denomination, easy strategy-no think, action machines.

So Does VP have a big enough base to impact corporate policy?
My response is NO!   So what can we do?   Please send your suggestions.

Here are my commitments:
Become pro-active in recruiting and educating new VP players on every gambling trip and when I get back home, in the office, with family and in social groups.
This means I need to be prepared to educate at any moment. When I started playing I carried an excel spreadsheet that had Pay Tables for all the major games and their variances. The sheet also had links to major VP sites: Videopoker.com; Freeslots.com; VPFree; Wizard of Odds, etc. While I carried it to assist me, I often found myself giving my copy away to a new interested player. I'm going to print them up again and give them out to new recruits. I'll post a copy or send an excel copy to anyone who is interested free.

I also took time to sit by them and showed them how to play focusing on Jacks of Better or Deuces Wild the two foundational programs for all VP.

I commit to at least once a month meeting or taking a new player/recruit to the casino to help them become comfortable playing VP. I'm thinking using the low denomination multi-hands to give them a comfortable situation.

If each one of us recruited ONE New VP player every month to go to our casino and play and encouraged them to practice on this and other practice sites, our numbers would grow dramatically. With numbers come power and influence.

We can be passive or we can be pro-active! Casinos have put us in a defensive mode because they see us as a weak group of casino patrons.
I say its time to be pro-active and create a strong foundation which will cause casino/corporate powers to see the need to accommodate our wishes.

What are your thoughts? Suggestion? Commitments?

[FloridaPhil]

At the casinos where I play, I don't see any lack of interest in Video Poker. I think there are two types of people in this world; those that want others to make their decisions for them and those that want to chart their own course.  In other words, "Some people want to drive the bus and other just want to ride".  Also, most recreational players that I meet don't care that much about odds; they just want to have as much fun for their money as they can. It takes a lot of time and effort to learn to play video poker at a return anything close to the posted odds and most people don't want to get that deep into it. Frankly, I think the casinos make a bunch of money on Video Poker because most people are winging it and I would love to see the casinos take on quarter video poker players. 
 
Getting the casinos to treat video poker players the same as slot players is a stretch in my opinion.  With all the information out there like training software and pundits selling books on how they won a Million Dollars playing VP, it makes the casino managers uneasy thinking that someone could actually do that on their machines.  Frankly, I don't want any more video poker players at my casinos.  It hard enough to get a seat some days now.  Anyway, good post.  
 
 
 

[DaBurglar]

Hey Larry, first and foremost I want to say that this was BY far and a way the most thoughtful and earnest, as well as just plain GOOD, post I have read thus far on this site.....seriously, its great and has a lot of excellent points for discussion, debate AND ACTION.  I am not going to be the one to start a contrary argument to what you said or propose, because I would love to see what you propose come to pass and fruition.    So let me just throw this out to help possibly modify your goals or change slightly your objective and definition of success in this endeavor: I just posted in another thread that at the core of today's Video Poker debate and dilemma is the following.......It is now almost impossible for (serious) Video Players to squeak out a positive return over the course of time playing today's machines.....in fact, just breaking even has become a huge stretch, unless a player gets really creative in their personal accounting practices by including EVERY SINGLE casino comp, perk and benefit in the "profit" column against all the money spent in the "loss/expense" column.    That is the crux of this whole debate/discussion and includes even our ongoing debate about "rigged" versus "unrigged" versus "crappy paytables" Versus "re-seeding and defining the LONG TERM"  debates..... as phil just pointed out, casinos everywhere became very aware and even worried about "advantage" players (like B O B  DANCER) and, around 2005 with the continued explosion and proliferation of internet games and info and advice, it was worried that a whole army of advantage players might swoop in and start eating into the casinos' vulnerable profit margins.    Thats why paytables plunged and comps started becoming very elusive to many VP players....er, well, one of the reasons..... what is worse, in my experience back when I played in Vegas during the years 2006 thru 2009 (the last year I played a lot in vegas),  any casino where I actually WON money over the course of 12 to 18 months (rolling 12 to 18 months) I stopped getting any comps except the comp dollars on my card(s)!   So in other words, unless you are a LOSING player at VP, chances are your comps really suck!    Sure there might be exceptions to this, there always are, but I am certain it represents the majority.  If a slot player gets lucky and wins a huge jackpot to put them UP for a year, casinos typically INCREASE their comps because they KNOW with slot players, they will get their money back and THEN some.   not the case in past times with VP players playing 99% games....it takes too long to get the money back or to be sure when you will get it back.   I encourage what you suggest about being helpful and friendly to other players, i know I am helpful in the casinos I play (even in AC)....I always share knowledge and tips in the hopes it will come back to me some day (and it has, in more ways than one!)  But what I would suggest more than anything is simply to have each serious VP player become more agressive with their hosts and favorite casinos, and start asking and threatening to leave unless certain comps meet your expectations.  Dont ask for anything outrageous, but tell them "look, you USED to give me this, and now its down to THIS....I want it back to where it WAS or else I am taking my play elsewhere..."      All they can say is NO, but in my experience, they usually (at least initially) are willing to give you some of what you want.....and SOME is better than NONE. I will stop there and see what everyone else says......  AGAIN, awesome post Larry

[olds442jetaway]

I had an up month last September. ( very rare). My free play plumeted accordingly. My free play for Jan. was like 30 or 40 bucks. That is unbeliveable considering I pump over 50k a month through their machines. My slot playing buddy runs about the same amount through on dollar only slot machines and plays the max bet of $2 bucks a hand. Not counting comp rooms which he gets 24/7-365, his free play, perk points to spend on anything, food comps, free gas, etc. was over 2,000- for Jan 2014. In addition, the spendable points you earn on regular slots accrue at three times the rate of vp points. And there are about 300 vp machines that pay no points at all. For most recreational players, like my friend, there is just not enough incentive to switch to vp. Especially, when in the long run we all lose too. I even offered to " train " him and spend as much time as necessary on vp. When we compared our mailers from the same casino, he just said forget it.

[mammajamma]

Very good post.I often wonder, though, why are casinos lowering the pay tables if there are few VP players at their establishment?

[Lucky Larry]

DaBurglar,
Thanks for the kind words.


The response I get from the Director of Slots is that because VP has such a high return compared to slots they need to reduce the comps (1/2 comps/$ Coin In-vesrsus slots), no daily multipliers applied on Multiplier Days, etc.

My arguments are:

1) if you are lowering the pay tables increase my comps to match slots.   
2) most VP players don't know how to play at a high rate so the casino is still getting a high profit.

I'm pretty persuasive but I haven't beaten Corporate yet!!!!

Our favorite casino is reducing the total number of VP machines.

[Vman96]

As for #2. This is true, but on average, are players better than they were say 10 years ago? If they are that means the casino profits less obviously. But considering how popular ultimate X is around here, they should be making a ton off of that game. People play that game like garbage.

Also I have noticed regional differences. Both St. Louis and Chicago seem to have busier VP than Tunica. If 25% of the VP machines are in use in Tunica, that's "busy" to me.

[BillyJoe]

In the realm of machine games (versus table games), VP differs from slots in that a knowledable player can increase their profits through thoughtful play.


The overriding theme in casino gaming has been "reduce the exposure". You see this in table games with single deck shuffles and the lowering of max bet and max payouts at the tables. VP follows that trend with fewer 'high volitility' games, like TDB, available in higher denoms, as well as the reductions in pay tables.

The gaming industry is very healthy, but it no longer wants the exposure to have to pay out significant, or frequent, jackpots on individual hands.

[Tedlark]

  Vman the video poker in Chicago looks busier only because the players sitting in front of the machines aren't as "svelte" as the players in Tunica. This makes the Chicago video poker "appear" to be busier.
 
  Kidding people, kidding. I'm a lifelong Chicagoan.

[ko king]

As for #2. This is true, but on average, are players better than they were say 10 years ago? If they are that means the casino profits less obviously. But considering how popular ultimate X is around here, they should be making a ton off of that game. People play that game like garbage.

Also I have noticed regional differences. Both St. Louis and Chicago seem to have busier VP than Tunica. If 25% of the VP machines are in use in Tunica, that's "busy" to me.
I was just at Harrah's/Tunica and while I didn't count the number of machines I did notice there was only three people playing vp. Right before Harrah's put in the new machines I found myself playing alone all the time. We went by Fitz and there wasn't anyone playing vp, it wasn't quite that bad at The Roadhouse, maybe 5 or 6 players. I don't know how long you have been playing in Tunica but I can remember the day when it was tough to get a machine a lot of times. There's a lot of competition in the Tunica area and there's also a casino in West Memphis.