Just read an article by Stickman on Casino City Times, http://stickman.casinocitytimes.com/article/how-to-pick-a-good-video-poker-game-63645 on how to pick a good Video Poker (VP) machine.
In that article, Stickman mentions that the variance for 9/6 Jacks or Better is 19.5, while 10/7 Double Bonus Poker has a variance of 28.26. The variance (how much payouts, in time and amount, vary from average) affects the size of your bankroll needed to play that VP. In this example, a safe bankroll for 9/6 would be 3 times the Royal Flush payout (4,000 credits), which equals 12,000 credits. But for Double Bonus Poker, the increased variance means a safe bankroll is 4 times the Royal, which is 16,000 credits.
I am looking at this issue, because RYR4Ever was complaining about long delays between payouts for the VP machines she used.
I asked RTR4Ever if her VP class provided a list of safe bankrolls, or a formula for calculating the safe bankroll for each game for which the class gives strategy guide cards. She did not recall any guidance on bankroll per type of VP machine, other than a general discussion of bankroll based on wager and desired rounds of play. I looked over the pocket guides and saw nothing regarding safe bankroll.
I’m not being critical of the 4 hour VP class. There is a lot to cover in only 4 hours. RTR4Ever found the class immensely helpful. And, the class manual has a good section on Bankroll Requirements. It’s just not specific as to each VP type of game. The software also has a bankroll calculator, but it does not appear to consider variance.
Does someone in our group have a list of variances for each type of VP game? And, I recommend that GTC publish its own VP pocket guides, copyrighted, that provides the game variance and corresponding safe bankroll for each game.
Replies:
Posted by: HenryTamburin on October 16, 2017, 10:14 pm
You’ll find the variance for different video poker games in the book that we gave to students that attended the GTVP class. (Video Poker for Intelligent Beginners: Part 1 beginning with page 16). About 20 years ago, when I first started studying and playing video poker, there were rather complicated equations that you can use to compute the short- and long-term bankroll requirements. As a general rule of thumb, we would tell students you needed 3-5 times the payout of a royal flush as your bankroll when playing Jacks or Better (and more bankroll if you were playing a high variance game). Nowadays, we have video poker software that accurately computes the short-and long-term bankroll requirements for any video poker game. The computation is based on the variance (or standard deviation of the game; this is interrelated: variance is the square of the standard deviation). The two video poker software products that I recommend to calculate short- and long-term bankrolls for any game are Video Poker for Winners (VPFW) and Dunbar’s Risk Analyzer for Video Poker). The latter software is only used for calculating bankroll requirements and risk of ruin whereas the VPFW software is used to practice and learn video poker strategies for different games and it also has a bankroll and risk of ruin calculator. The calculation of short- and long- term bankroll is based on the game (i.e., variance), denomination, length of time or number of hands you will be playing, and your tolerance of risk (i.e., chance of going broke, I recommend using 5%). I demonstrated this in the class since knowing how much bankroll you need is important to be a successful video poker player. I didn’t have enough class time to demonstrate using the software to compute how much bankroll you would need for , say, Jacks or Better vs. Double Double Bonus for same number of hands; however, I discussed the point that you always need more bankroll when you play a game with a higher variance vs lower variance. Students were also told to go to Chapter 19 in Video Poker for Intelligent Beginners book for an explanation of how to use the VPFW software to calculate short- and long-term bankrolls for any game. (I also mentioned to students that Dunbar has written several excellent articles in my Blackjack Insider newsletter on bankroll requirements for different video poker games, including single line vs triple line games. These articles are in the archived newsletters on our site
http://www.bjnsider.com. (You can search for them at the bottom of the Newsletter page; just type Dunbar in search engine). I hope I’ve answered your question.
Henry
Posted by: Preacher on October 17, 2017, 3:49 pm
Henry,
The information you provided is thorough and excellent. You’re right, 4 hours with a class of people new to Video Poker, such as RTR4Ever, is too short to go into much advanced guidance. It was more than enough, though, to get RTR4Ever ready to move to advanced analysis – with my help, of course. Ha.
I will examine the software you mentioned. If there is a phone app version for those 2 software apps, that would be ideal. If not, then you and I should consider making a GTC Android/Apple phone app to meet that need, with the GTC logo and approval. Personally, I would find a smartphone app much more useful than card guides. I could even get the phone to scan the VP screen to get the current hand, so there would be no need to manually enter the cards.
Enough of my day dreaming. Thank you for giving me exactly what I needed, Henry. GTC is such a great resource.
Posted by: Dominator on October 17, 2017, 3:56 pm
We should talk about this in AC Preacher – along with Matt and Michael
Dom
Posted by: ACPA on October 17, 2017, 6:39 pm
The Video Poker game I have been using for several years and I stronger recommend for iPnoes is WinPoker by Zamzow Software.
Noah
Posted by: HenryTamburin on October 18, 2017, 9:42 pm
I recently started using WInPoker (by Zamzow) on my smart phone and it is very good program to practice your playing strategy. Note: The strategy in WinPoker is at a slightly higher level than the strategy on the vide poker strategy cards given to students in GTVP class. That’s not bad but if you use WinPoker to practice on your smartphone you may see some errors appear on several infrequently dealt hands. That’s not because the strategy on the strategy cards is "wrong," it’s just because the strategy in WinPoker is slightly different for a few hands. (For average recreational players, It’s really nothing to worry about.)
Henry
Posted by: Finisher on July 3, 2019, 11:36 pm
We went to a VPclass in Vegas before we took the class with GT and was disappointed with it .That was a few years ago and I hope that they have gotten better . The class that we took in Vegas was at a casino and was free . It is done weekly . Each week is a different game . So you need to know what game you want to learn about .
Good Rolling. 😀 🙂
