Playing Video Poker Online

Playing video poker isn’t hard. Winning at video poker, though, is another story. If you want to master the rules and begin collecting the knowledge needed to win, you might want to try online video poker.

Online video poker is in many ways better than casino video poker. It is somewhat the same as home video games are compared to old arcades. Once, the big game machines were best, but now the home computer has caught up and in some ways surpass the machine experience. Online video poker on a home computer is often as colorful and exciting as the casino experience. The online video poker experience comes closest to capturing the casino experience of any online gambling versions on the internet.

Online video poker allows you to see a lot of hands from the comfort of your own home. The "own home" part may be most important. You are able to sit and relax at home, concentrate on the strategy of the game, away from the hustle and bustle of the casino. You can go at your own pace, while listening your favorite music and drinking a Pepsi…or whatever it is you drink these days. Whether you like deuces wild or jacks or better, whether you like to play one hand at a time or multihand, there is some kind of online casino offering the game you want to play.

Just like a casino, you must pay per hand in online video poker. You get the same payouts, though sometimes there are bonus offers online. The competition for costumers is fierce, because it is a world full of potential casino affiliates, so you will find great deals at the online casinos. Almost all online casinos offer play money, free video poker games. These allow you to practice and (sometimes) win special prizes.

There are literally thousands of online video poker games these days, so you should not have any trouble finding the game suited for you. Shop around, have a look at the many options. I recommend any casino powere by Microgaming, Playtech, or Realtime Gaming software for online video poker. For the beginning simply wanting to look at hands, you can look at a thousand hands a week if you are willing to play online video poker just ten hours a week. And let’s face it, most of us play that much poker in a week in our sleep.

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Slot Machine Strategy

Article written by Joran Johanson

Why Do We Lose?

Most people do win while playing slots. The problem is they don’t stop once they do. The nature of slots is more random with less control given to the player than other casino games. Given this, your strategy is going to be different from other games. Instead of trying to beat the machine you need a more goal oriented approach to playing, and success is measured by the accomplishment of these goals.

Establish Goals

Before you walk-in or login to your favorite casino you should have already determined what it is you want to achieve. Common goals of slot playing include making a certain amount of money, having a good time or a combination of the two.

If your goal happens to be winnings, get a reasonable number in mind and stick to it. Say you bring $300 to wager at your favorite machines, a reasonable goal would be to walk out with $360; A 20% return is great, especially if you enjoy yourself while doing it. Once you reach the goal you set, get up. You’ve won.

Casinos are venues designed for entertainment, so going to a casino, online or otherwise, with a set dollar amount to spend in order to have fun for a while is a wise decision. Again, make the goal specific. If you want to spend three hours playing, pace yourself. Don’t choose a machine out of your price range. Once you reach the established time, leave. If you are up or still have money left, perfect, the evening worked out better than you planned!

Understand the Rules

The first two goals are the guidelines set before play, but in order to maximize your payout you must pay attention to the game you are playing. Know how many coins or credits must be played to hit the jackpot. As you might imagine, when you finally nail the right combination for the big win, missing the payout because you didn’t play enough credits is a highly unsavory situation to find yourself in (this should also be considered when picking a machine and pacing yourself). So read the instructions.

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Craps Rules and Strategy

Craps seems like a complicated game, and it can be, but you don’t have to know all of the intricacies to play it well and receive a fair return. If you stick with the common bets with a low house advantage and don’t wage when you aren’t certain what it is you are betting on and its odds.

By betting on the pass line and buying odds you can wager with virtually no house advantage. This almost makes the term ‘gamble’ invalid if you think about it.

Pass Line

The game begins by placing a bet on either Pass or Don’t Pass before the Come Our roll. If a 7 or 11 is rolled first you win and 2, 3, or 12 mean you loss if you bet on pass. The opposite is true if you bet on Don’t Pass. Except 12 is a push if you bet Don’t Pass. Most everyone bets on Pass, so if you choose Don’t Pass, do not draw attention to yourself, especially if you win. If you win that means everyone else just loss, and aren’t going to take kindly to boasting. Should any number besides 2, 3, 7, 11 or 12 be rolled first, that number becomes the point. Do not bet on the Pass line after the Come Out roll, it is legal, but the odds are against you.

Buying the Odds

In order to take advantage of the wager with virtually no house advantage, you must initially bet on the Pass Line. Next you can wager a multiple (depending on the casino) of your Pass bet that the point will be rolled before a 7. Depending on the number of the point, you can win up to 2:1.

Betting along these basic lines will provide you with honest chance of coming out a winner. Add the excitement that the craps always seems to generate and the only way to lose is not to play.

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Casino War Rules and Strategy

If you’re going to gamble at a casino, online or land-based, it’s important to know how the casino makes its money from you. Casinos make money from the players because they don’t pay out at the real odds for the game. Expectation is what you can expect to win or lose long term on a given bet if you make it over and over again.

If you flip a coin, you have a 50% chance of it landing on heads, and you have a 50% chance of it landing on tails. If you paid someone $1 every time you were wrong, and they paid you a dollar every time you were right, you’d be making an even money bet (also known as an even odds proposition). Your long term expectation would be 0. You would break even.

The way a casino would pay out in this situation would vary from the actual odds of the game so that they could make a profit. They might pay you 95 cents every time you were right, and you would pay them $1 every time you were wrong. This would create a positive expectation for the casino, and a negative expectation for you. Half the time you would lose $1, and the other half of the time you would win 95 cents. Instead of breaking even, you would lose 2.5 cents per bet over time. (Because half the time you would win.) If you stated this in percentage terms, the house would be said to have a 2.5% advantage in this game.

This might sound like an oversimplification, but it’s really not at all. One of the newer casino games in Las Vegas is casino war, which is a gambling version of the card game War that you used to play as a kid. You and the dealer each get dealt a playing card. If your card’s value is higher than the dealer’s, you win, and vice-versa, just like when you were playing as a kid.

Here’s where the casino changes the expectation in their favor though: If your card is the SAME as the dealer’s card, you can either surrender (in which case you lose half your bet), or you can go to war, which means you have to make another bet the same size as your original bet. When you go to war, three cards are burned and you each get another card. If you win the "war", you ONLY get paid out on the original bet. If you lose, the house gets both bets.

So you’re facing even odds unless you go to war. If you go to war, the house has an advantage, because if you win, you only get paid $1 for every $2 you’ve wagered. The casino could just as easily create a game called "casino coin toss war", with very similar rules, and it wouldn’t be too different from the coin-tossing game I described earlier. The single difference would be that the casino would have an almost 3% edge over you.

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How to Play Blackjack

Blackjack gets more attention on television than any other casino game (with the exception of poker). Every other week on The History Channel, Breaking Vegas features one cunning blackjack player after another manipulating the system to beat the house edge in Las Vegas or Atlantic City. Besides taking months to learn card counting, though, blackjack offers other techniques to allow a player to reduce the house advantage. So it is no surprise that new players would look at blackjack as a natural casino game with which to begin. Learning how to play blackjack is a reasonably straightforward process.

Contrary to popular belief, the object of blackjack is not to get as close as you can to 21 without going over. The object is to beat the dealer. To beat the dealer, you either need to be involved in the hand and have closer to 21 than the dealer does, or still be playing when the dealer busts. This distinction might seem minor, but as you learn to play blackjack, you’ll realize that it has a crucial effect on your strategy decisions.

The first thing you do when approaching the blackjack table is to let the dealer know you want in the game. You’ll usually have no problem getting his or her attention. If you need to turn your cash into chips, the dealer can usually accommodate you. The dealer normally holds the money up to the overhead camera, shows the money to the pit boss, or does both. Don’t get nervous that they’re taking such interest in your cash; it is standard operating procedure to show everything is on the up-and-up.

The dealer deals clockwise around the table one card at a time. Each player gets two cards in his hand. Then you have the choice of asking for more cards or not. If you want another card, you say "hit me" and tap on the table once or twice as if you were checking in poker. If you do not want another card, that is called standing. To do this, simply wave your hand over the table in a negative motion. It is proper etiquette to verbalize either "hit me" or "I stand", so there is no confusion about your intentions.

Your bets go where bets are indicated on the felt. This is usually self-evident. When you make your bet, place it out for both the dealer and the cameras to see. When you are deciding whether to stand or be hit, you can also decide whether to double or split (if either is appropriate).

Doubling down is normally only allowed when you have an 11, but rules vary from casino to casino, and some casinos offer doubling down options on other hands as well. This is a big plus for the player. To double down, you place an additional bet the same size as your initial bet on the felt and tell the dealer you’re doubling down. You will receive 1 and exactly 1 more card at this point, and the game moves on. (The dealer is always last to act unless he has a blackjack.)

Splitting cards is only done when you have two cards of the same rank. To split cards, you put an additional bet on the table, and the two cards become the first cards in two more hands of blackjack. Traditional wisdom is that you always split aces and eights, and you never split 4′s, 5′s, or 10′s.

The dealer than continues to deal cards until you stand or go bust. Those who win are paid off by the dealer, while the dealer collects money from those who lose. Never touch your money after it has been bet, until the game is over and you’ve won. If there is a tie between you and the dealer, neither side wins. This is called a push, and you get to keep your money. You move on to the next hand.

(About dealer play: The dealer must play by certain rules and doesn’t get to make decisions about whether or not to hit or stand. The dealer stands on 17 or better and hits a 16 or worse. The dealer never splits his hand. This also affects your strategy, because you’ll stand more often when the dealer has a 6 showing than you will if the dealer has a 10 showing. )

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Effecting Blackjack Odds

Blackjack is one of the few casino games which you can affect the odds through sound playing. With foolish play, you can screw up in most any game of chance. But the decisions you make in games like craps and roulette don’t necessarily change the odds. In blackjack, you decide when to hit or when to stand, as well as how much to bet and when, so you have control over the
house edge. Quite simply, your odds will not be the same as the poor sap standing next to you.

You will often hear the words "basic strategy" when you read about blackjack. This is an important term to take note of…and an important guide to follow. When you follow basic strategy, you follow where the hard science of mathematics points. Following basic strategy, the house edge can shrink to 0.5%. Reckless players will see the house edge notch up to somewhere between 3% to 5%. That means they are wasting the opportunities they have to win at
blackjack.

Keep in mind several things when considering blackjack odds and basic strategy. First, keep in mind the number of decks being used, as well as whether the dealer hits on a Soft-17. Basically, the fewer decks, the easier it is to tell which card might next come up. Also, dealers who stand on the Soft-17 are better for you.

Second, figure out the rules on doubling down. Do not play at a table where doubling down is not allowed. Double anytime the charts call for it. Find out whether you can double on a split, or whether you can surrender. You want to have these options, which help your payout odds.

Third, remember to keep a handle on your bankroll. If you win early, pocket most of your winnings. That way, you either walk out with big winnings, or have minimal losses. If you lose early, make it a hard-and-fast rule that you don¹t bet again when you get past your limit.

Generally, it is wise not to double bets when you are on a losing streak. This might not be conventionally sound, but it keeps you from doubling your bets to recover from your losses quickly. It is when you aren¹t thinking clearly that you can hurt yourself in a casino.

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Common Blackjack Mistakes

All blackjack players make mistakes, even experienced card-counters. But there are some innocent mistakes that rookies seem to make on a regular basis that it’s better not to make, especially if you’re playing for the first time at an actual land-based casino.

The blackjack mistake I’m most guilty of is sitting down and trying to play at a higher limit table than I have a bankroll for. It probably happens consistently all night long that players sit down and try to make $5 or $20 bets at a $100 minimum table. The dealers and other players get understandably frustrated when this happens. The solution to preventing this mistake? Just have a look at the little sign on each table stating the table limits, and make sure it’s the right stakes table before you sit down.

Another common mistake is throwing chips haphazardly into the betting circle. Your chips should always be in a single stack, so the dealer doesn’t have to get confused about whether or not you’ve doubled down. Related to this mistake is handling your bet after you’ve placed it. Dealers will snap at you over touching your bet, because they need to make sure you’re not adding chips to your bet when you have a good hand, or removing bets when you’ve got a bad hand.

Don’t touch the cards in a face up blackjack game. Cheaters will often try to mark the cards with a sharp fingernail, and the rule for not touching the cards prevents this. Be careful when handling the cards in a face down game too, because if you’re careless with the cards, you can expect correction from the dealer rather quickly.

Playing live blackjack is a lot of fun, but it’s a lot more fun when you avoid these common and sometimes embarassing rookie blackjack mistakes.

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Why 5′s are Most Important Cards in Blackjack

Counting cards in blackjack is a way to increase your chances of winning. If you’re good at it, you can actually take the odds and put them in your favor. This works because card counters raise their bets when a deck rich in cards that are advantageous to the player comes around. As a general rule of thumb, a deck rich in 10′s is better for the player, because the dealer will bust more often, and the player will hit a blackjack more often.

Most card counters keep track of the ratio of high cards, or 10′s, by counting them as a +1 or a -1, and then gives the opposite +1 or -1 to the low cards in the deck. Some systems use a balanced count where the number of low cards is the same as the number of 10′s.

But the most interesting card to me, mathematically, is the 5. There were card counting systems back in the day that involved doing nothing more than counting the number of fives that had left the deck, and when the 5′s were gone, the player had a big advantage and would raise his bets.

A good basic strategy player is getting a 99.5% payback percentage from the casino. Every 5 that’s come out of the deck adds 0.67% to the player’s expected return. (In a single deck game, anyway.) That means that, all other things being equal, having one 5 gone from the deck gives a player a small advantage over the house.

Having two or three 5′s gone from the deck will actually give the player a pretty significant edge over the casino, and this is when a card counter will usually raise his bet. The problem with counting 5′s and nothing else is that a deck low in 5′s happens pretty rarely, so gaining a big advantage and making a profit from that situation only comes on rare occasions.

Any card between 2 and 8 that comes out of the deck increases the player’s expectation. And all 9′s. 10′s, and aces increase the casino’s expectation. But 8′s and 9′s have very small effects on the outcome. (An 8 only adds 0.01% to the player’s expectation, so it’s generally not even counted. A 9 only has 0.15% affect in the other direction, so it’s not counted either.)

Understanding the effects the low and high cards have on your expected return on a bet is the first step in learning to count cards and play blackjack as a winner.

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Bingo Rules and Strategy

Most of you know about bingo, especially if you have ever been older people on Friday night. But how do you play bingo? How do you pick the card that is right for you? These questions will be answered for you in this bingo rules and strategy article.

Bingo Rules

Bingo is a game of chance with some similar characteristics to a lottery or keno. The main difference is that numbers are drawn until there is a winner. Each player gets a square card consisting of 25 smaller squares. Twenty-four of the squares have a number inside and the middle square is an empty, ‘free’ space. Players are usually allowed to play multiple cards.

Numbers in bingo range from 1 to 75. A new number is picked every several seconds until a player achieves bingo. This is done when you form a straight line of five spaces with numbers matching numbers called. The line can be horizontal, vertical or diagonal. Diagonals only require you to match 4 numbers because of the free space. The free space can also be utilized horizontally or vertically in the center of the card. Some online games require you to fill the spaces as they are called, others fill them for you (personally I like to be involved somewhat when gambling.)

Bingo Strategy

Being that bingo is a game of chance, and the numbered balls are drawn randomly, most people dispel the possibility of bingo having a strategy. Turns out that the very statement that people use to dispel the possibility is the reason a strategy exists.

Say of the 75 numbers to be chosen, the first called is number 16. What this does is slightly reduce the odds that another ball ending in 6 will be drawn again. Similarly, the odds are greater that a higher number will be pulled next, as well as an odd number. The premise is that as the sample size (balls that have been pulled) increases and approaches the size of the population (all balls 1-75) the attributes of the sample will more closely reflect the attributes of the population. For instance, the average of all numbers 1-75 is 38, so the average of numbers pulled should approach 38 with each new number.

What this boils down to is card choice. As each new ball is pulled you will begin to notice the numbers are evenly spread among:

1. Numbers ending in 0-9
2. Odd and even numbers
3. High and low numbers

However, there is a degree of variability that you can not eliminate. This variability usually begins to show up after about 6 numbers are chosen. The first 6 numbers will probably all end in with a different digit, but around the 7th pick a duplicate will appear (like 24 and 54). This variation cannot be explained or predicted.

All of the complicated calculation that goes into this can be easily simplified. In choosing a card, look along horizontal, vertical and diagonal lines for a good balance of high/low, odd/even and ending digits. Pay careful attention to the lines that only require 4 matching numbers to win.

You cannot predict the numbers that will be called, but you can choose a card that is compatible with the laws of probability.

Good Luck, and don’t forget to yell BINGO. So what if no one can hear on the other side of your internet connection.

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Baccarat Rules and Strategy

Article Written by Joran Johanson

Basic Baccarat Rules

Baccarat is played with 8 decks of cards in a shoe. Cards under 10 are worth face value while 10, J, Q, K are 0, and A is 1. Bets are placed on the ‘banker,’ the ‘player’ or for a tie (these aren’t actual people; they just represent the two hands to be dealt).

Two hands of two cards are then dealt to the ‘banker’ and ‘player’. The score for each hand is the sum of the two cards, but the first digit is dropped. For example, a hand of 7 and 5 has a score of 2 (7+5=12; drop the ‘1’).

A third card may be dealt depending on the following rules:

• If the player or banker have a score of 8 or 9, both players stand.
• If the player has 5 or less, he hits. Players stands otherwise.
• If player stands, the banker hits of 5 or less. If the player hits a chart is used to determine if the banker stands or hits.

Baccarat Odds

The higher of the two scores wins. Winning bets on the banker pay out 19 to 20 (even money less a 5% commission. Commission is kept track of and cleared out when you leave the table so be sure to have funds remaining before you leave). Winning bets on the player pay 1 to 1. Winning bets for tie usually pay 8 to 1 but sometimes 9 to 1. (This is a bad bet as ties occur less than 1 ever 10 hands. Avoid betting on a tie. However odds are substantially better for 9 to1 versus 8 to 1)

Played correctly, baccarat offers relatively good odds, aside from the tie bed of course.

Baccarat Strategy

As with all games Baccarat has some common misconceptions. One of which is similar to a misconception of roulette. The past is not an indicator of future events. Keeping track of past results on a chart is a waste of paper and an insult to the tree that gave its life for our stationary needs.

The most common and probably most successful strategy is the 1-3-2-6 method. This method is employed to maximize winnings and minimizing risk.

Begin by betting 1 unit. If you win, add one more to the two on the table for a total of 3 on the second bet. If you win you will have six on the table, remove four so you have 2 on the third bet. If you win the third bet, add two to the four on the table for a total of 6 on the fourth bet.

If you lose on the first bet, you take a loss of 1. A win on the first bet followed by loss on the second creates a loss of 2. Wins on the first two with a lost on the third gives you a profit of 2. And wins on the first 3 with a loss on the fourth mean you break even. Winning all four bets leaves you with 12, a profit of 10. This means you can lose the second bet 5 times for every successful streak of 4 bets and still break even.

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