Harrah's - Las Vegas
Dec 6th, 2002, 05:41 PM
#21
Guest
Posts: n/a
David, David, David....don't wish to be harsh but you really don't understand the gambling thing.
Here are a few simple rules:
**slot machines have payout percentages which are set by the casino. They can be set to pay out 99% of coinage entered, or 79%. That doesn't mean every machine pays the set % every hour, but over many days it will pay what it's set to pay.
**since casinos have to make public record of their actual payouts, they don't want to set the % too low, but they want to make money also. Look at the records and you'll find most pay 94%-99%, a little higher for dollar machines than nickel and quarter machines.
**in a place like the LV strip, >98% of slot players have no idea which casino's slots are paying best. They just play where they're happy playing, or where they have slot club cards, etc. So if one casino's slots are busy and another's dead, it has nothing to do with payouts. It has to do with which casino is doing a better job of making people want to be in their casino (rewards programs, atmosphere, location, air quality, lighting, on site food and shows, etc etc all combine to determine whether a casino and its slots are busy. Not the payouts).
**I will grant you that local players in LV and in other cities with casinos are more likely to read the newspaper and track which casinos are paying best, then play at those places. But in a place like LV this is a tiny percentage (<1%)of all gamblers on the strip. Locals tend to favor non-strip casinos. And even then, only a tiny percentage of locals have the discipline or even concern to adjust their gambling habits to the monthly changes in slot payouts from place to place.
**and again, any one player simply cannot distinguish the payout differential from one casino to the next short of playing for inhumanly long hours on end.
As such, whether or not a casino's slots are busy has nothing to do with payouts.
Casinos cannot alter the payouts of table games, of course, as these are all based on probabilities of card and dice sequences. A casino can skew odds toward players by altering the rules, in blackjack for instance. But players know in advance exactly what the payouts are on all table games just by looking at the table rules.
*****and the final argument is that even casinos which make blackjack rules more favorable for players (single deck, better hit/stand rules etc) are often less busy than ones with lower payouts.
----An even better example is roulette. Wheels with a single green "0" (as opposed to those with both a "0" and "00") have house advantages HALF as high as the double green wheels. but if you go places like Monte Carlo, where they have a few single "0" wheels, most people play the double green wheels with the worse payouts! By your theory people should be playing where they win the most money. Even in table games where you can KNOW FOR SURE that your odds are better at a certain table, people don't gravitate to the better paying tables. In slots, where you CAN'T know if any one slot is better than another, there's no way people will gravitate by payout.
***a final point: casinos often set the payouts higher on slots which are off the beaten path. They want the lowest payouts on machines which are in high traffic areas (aisles, entry ways) because these machines attract more passerby business. Thus they want the profit margins highest on the high traffic machines.
But if people intuitively avoided low payout machines, the machines in high traffic areas would be the ones the casinos would NOT target for low payouts. The casinos are telling you that people spend more time playing the low payout machines!!
Here are a few simple rules:
**slot machines have payout percentages which are set by the casino. They can be set to pay out 99% of coinage entered, or 79%. That doesn't mean every machine pays the set % every hour, but over many days it will pay what it's set to pay.
**since casinos have to make public record of their actual payouts, they don't want to set the % too low, but they want to make money also. Look at the records and you'll find most pay 94%-99%, a little higher for dollar machines than nickel and quarter machines.
**in a place like the LV strip, >98% of slot players have no idea which casino's slots are paying best. They just play where they're happy playing, or where they have slot club cards, etc. So if one casino's slots are busy and another's dead, it has nothing to do with payouts. It has to do with which casino is doing a better job of making people want to be in their casino (rewards programs, atmosphere, location, air quality, lighting, on site food and shows, etc etc all combine to determine whether a casino and its slots are busy. Not the payouts).
**I will grant you that local players in LV and in other cities with casinos are more likely to read the newspaper and track which casinos are paying best, then play at those places. But in a place like LV this is a tiny percentage (<1%)of all gamblers on the strip. Locals tend to favor non-strip casinos. And even then, only a tiny percentage of locals have the discipline or even concern to adjust their gambling habits to the monthly changes in slot payouts from place to place.
**and again, any one player simply cannot distinguish the payout differential from one casino to the next short of playing for inhumanly long hours on end.
As such, whether or not a casino's slots are busy has nothing to do with payouts.
Casinos cannot alter the payouts of table games, of course, as these are all based on probabilities of card and dice sequences. A casino can skew odds toward players by altering the rules, in blackjack for instance. But players know in advance exactly what the payouts are on all table games just by looking at the table rules.
*****and the final argument is that even casinos which make blackjack rules more favorable for players (single deck, better hit/stand rules etc) are often less busy than ones with lower payouts.
----An even better example is roulette. Wheels with a single green "0" (as opposed to those with both a "0" and "00") have house advantages HALF as high as the double green wheels. but if you go places like Monte Carlo, where they have a few single "0" wheels, most people play the double green wheels with the worse payouts! By your theory people should be playing where they win the most money. Even in table games where you can KNOW FOR SURE that your odds are better at a certain table, people don't gravitate to the better paying tables. In slots, where you CAN'T know if any one slot is better than another, there's no way people will gravitate by payout.
***a final point: casinos often set the payouts higher on slots which are off the beaten path. They want the lowest payouts on machines which are in high traffic areas (aisles, entry ways) because these machines attract more passerby business. Thus they want the profit margins highest on the high traffic machines.
But if people intuitively avoided low payout machines, the machines in high traffic areas would be the ones the casinos would NOT target for low payouts. The casinos are telling you that people spend more time playing the low payout machines!!
Dec 6th, 2002, 06:37 PM
#22
Guest
Posts: n/a
Gamers 101, You entirely missed my point. I never equated how much money has been put into a machine with its payoff. If it were that easy, all you have to do is just watch someone drop a large sum of money and then start playing it after they give up. I do know that casinos set a payout percentage, nut some casinos have a highr number of machines with a higher payoff than the others. As I mentioned before, I have been going to Reno for many years, and in my experience Cal Neva has higher payouts than the other casinos downtown.
Also, how many people actually take the time to look at the public record of a casino's payout? Maybe the locals do, but tourists such as myself do not, and the casinos know this. So they probably could not care less if they have a lower published payout than other casinos in town.
By the way, sometimes the slot attendents can be very helpful in directing you to a looser machine.
Also, how many people actually take the time to look at the public record of a casino's payout? Maybe the locals do, but tourists such as myself do not, and the casinos know this. So they probably could not care less if they have a lower published payout than other casinos in town.
By the way, sometimes the slot attendents can be very helpful in directing you to a looser machine.
