taking wins vs continuation?

[notes1]

on another thread the subject of walking away from the machines, after you are in positive territory, is being discussed as a method to increase your long term wins or at least, reduce your long term losses. makes perfect sense to me.

i have only visited one other VP site and it has been years since i last checked, until today. have never posted. the site is VEGAS CASINO TALK, and i believe it was started by a guy named alan mendelson. he was as hooked on vp as much anyone else. of note, Fa La La La La.... La la la la posts there. when i used to check in, it was normally some argument between Fa La La La La.... La la la la and everyone else. it gets pretty nasty there.

but, i do remember the discussion about stopping play when ahead. again, it seemed to make sense to me. the advanced players, as they were often referred to, took issue with this belief. and, i think they referred to it as 'continuation'. i will surely mess up their position, but it went something like this; all play is one continuous act. does not matter if there is a couple of hours separation or a couple of years. it does not matter if you play on different machines, different casinos, if the payouts are the same, in the end, the math always works out.

[Sea Lion]

If I hit a 4AWK or a Royal, I stop for the day and savor the win... until next time when I return and it takes it all back.

[Tedlark]

If I hit a 4AWK or a Royal, I stop for the day and savor the win... until next time when I return and it takes it all back.

Sea Lion the casino doesn't take it all back; you give it all back.

[pokerpokerpoker]

Interesting doings going on at VCT lately, with Slob Dinger coming clean on how he really made money at VP. Allegedly.

[notes1]

can you save me the time of reading what he did? thanks

[BobDancer]

i will surely mess up their position, but it went something like this; all play is one continuous act. does not matter if there is a couple of hours separation or a couple of years. it does not matter if you play on different machines, different casinos, if the payouts are the same, in the end, the math always works out.

I have never heard it phrased as "continuation" before and I have never been on that site.

Your statement, however, is pretty much what competent players believe. The only thing you said that was wrong is when you said "I will surely mess up their position."

Over time, you get what you deserve --- usually. You will never totally eliminate all fluctuation, but if you play games where you have the advantage and you play these games well, over time you will very likely succeed. If you play other games, over time you'll most likely be a net loser.

If you don't like the "usually," "most likely," and other caveats, too bad. Anyone who doesn't use such words when you're talking about future events involving investments where risk is involved isn't being realistic.

And I bet I am correct. And I bet many, many millions of dollars a year to that effect.

Over the past week, I bet $250,000 on 9/6 Jacks or Better machines (expected loss about $1,200) where I was getting bonuses worth a lot more than that. My expected win was a few thousand dollars. Instead I lost $15,000 after collecting the bonuses. It happens. No big deal. If they had the same promotion next week, I'd be right back trying it again --- and again and again so long as they let me play with those rules. If I could have bet $5,000,000 last week with the same bonus structure, I would have, gratefully, but the bonuses quit after you played the quarter mil. The fact that I lost this time is of absolutely no consequence. My decisions are always made based on what would be the average result in the future.

(there are bankroll considerations here which I've discussed at other times. A loss this size would be a disaster for many people. You need to select promotions that are within your own bankroll limits. I am not advising you to over-bet your bankroll just because you have a small edge.)

[Sea Lion]

If I hit a 4AWK or a Royal, I stop for the day and savor the win... until next time when I return and it takes it all back.

Sea Lion the casino doesn't take it all back; you give it all back.

Yes, I do feed it back into the machine, however, the machine also knows that furry flippered bastid hit a premium hand the last time he played, so at the end, the casino does get it back... and sometimes even more. Players card suspicion or superstition? I dunno anymore. It's just lately I haven't been hitting much of anything on VP no matter where I play, and I do tend to stick to the 99% or better machines.

Several years ago they were running a promotion at The Orleans when you hit a royal with your players card in, you get a certain amount in free play depending on the denomination your playing, so I hit one and turned on the light for the attendant to come to give me a voucher to take to the players club, however when I got to the club, they had already closed for the night, so I returned the next day with my voucher. They were able to look up exactly what machine I was playing and tell me the exact time I hit that royal. They honored my free play voucher and gave me a T shirt. The players card knows...

[olds442jetaway]

I have to agree with Bob Dancer totally on this one. I wish I could play a 99.54 machine and have the casino give me their cost in cash ( meaning free play) of the rooms, shows, gifts, food, etc. and just let me pay as I go for the above things. That’s never gonna happen, but if it did, you can bet your bottom dollar instead of running about 20k a session through the 99 plus machines, it would running five or ten times that amount through them. I have no idea what their true cost is. As a wild guess, if on any given session the room retail value would be 300, show, 100, gift 50, and food 50 for a total of 500 bucks, My wild guess at their true cost at about 200 bucks. I would be quite happy with that in additional free play on top of my usual 40 bucks or so. Running 20,000 bucks through a 99.54 machine in the long run costs me about a hundred bucks a session. Of course that is a looooooong run. That 240 bucks in free play if given would give me an advantage. To get that though, I would have to play absolutely perfectly with mo math mistakes, sticky button mistakes, or daydreaming or distraction mistakes.

[olds442jetaway]

Just as an aside, I realize my expected advantage in the above example is still very small. However, based on where I play and knowing how much they give to a patron roughly based on coin in, I could my guestimate of my advantage running 100,000 a session through at about a thousand bucks in total free play based on what I would get anyway and their cost of the other free stuff. It ain’t gonna happen though. At least not now. If however, the Ct casinos continue to bleed profits like in the past several months who knows. Competition is only going to get tougher up here for them.

[notes1]

i will surely mess up their position, but it went something like this; all play is one continuous act. does not matter if there is a couple of hours separation or a couple of years. it does not matter if you play on different machines, different casinos, if the payouts are the same, in the end, the math always works out.

I have never heard it phrased as "continuation" before and I have never been on that site.

Your statement, however, is pretty much what competent players believe. The only thing you said that was wrong is when you said "I will surely mess up their position."

when i typed that line, what i was trying to say, was that my explanation of their term 'continuation', may not be precise. i attempted to be accurate, may not have come across that way.

as to the subject of this thread, is it your position, that stopping one's play when ahead, will likely make no difference over the long term in one's results.