Doubling Up and Heaving
Shingles
25 August 2006
By Mark Pilarski
Dear Mark,
What are your thoughts on the double up feature
of video poker? Is there any limit to the amount
of times you can double up? Is it a good bet?
Guy F.
Some video poker games, Guy, allow you a Double
Up or double-or-nothing bonus option on a
winning hand. Activated by your pressing the
"Yes" button after a win, the game then deals
one card face up for the dealer and four cards
face-down for the player. The player then
chooses one of the face-down cards. If this card
beats the dealer's, the player wins double the
amount previously won, along with the option to
try to double op again.
Like the odds bet in craps, the Double Up wager
is one of the few casino bets offered that
doesn't have a house edge. You have a
fifty-fifty chance of winning any given bet
(ties excluded) regardless of the amount wagered
or the results of prior bets.
Most machines limit the number of double-ups to
five times. How many times you should double up
depends on the paytable and your risk tolerance
level. Only you, Guy, know how much you are
willing to bet on the turn of a card. If your
goal is to achieve the highest expected return
the machine can offer by lowering the overall
house edge with the double-up feature, then you
should double up the maximum number of times
allowed.
Three caveats though, Guy: Many casinos do not
allow you to use your slot club card and chase
down cash points on double-up bets. Also, watch
your double-up winnings so that you don't go
over the $1,200 threshold and end up being
handed a W2G. Finally, because playing video
poker is typically a negative expectation game,
when saying yes to the double or nothing
feature, you increase the total money wagered,
but at no cost to that expected loss, thus
lowering the overall house edge. But if you are
playing a video poker machine that has a 100%
plus return paytable, I would recommend against
the double-up bet, since it will lower your
overall advantage.
Dear Mark,
My Brother bet me 10,000 to one for $10 that I
would never duplicate what he was dealt
naturally on a video poker machine, a natural
royal flush in hearts. He believes it would
never happen in my lifetime figuring it seldom
happens and most players need to draw cards to
get royal flush. I figure it's worth $10. What
do you think? Charlie G.
With a 52-card deck there are 2,598,960 possible
hands, and what you're asking for is that one of
them to be dealt straight away, in hearts no
less. Those, Charlie, are long, tall odds. And
what about all that time and money spent chasing
down a natural Royal flush in hearts? Well,
here's the barnyard math.
Leaving aside the fact that you know damn well
that Bro's never going to pay you the $100,000
anyway… at a buck and a quarter a pop, and a
house edge of let's say 4% -- I m guessing you
won't play every hand perfectly -- you'll end up
losing $129,948 to win $100,000. Plus, playing
three hands a minute, it could take you over 600
days playing 24/7 before a natural royal flush
in hearts appears. But why be extreme? Using
ordinary 8-hour days, it would take just under 5
years to play out the bet (no time off for
wedding anniversaries, holidays, sick leave,
birthdays or any of that foolishness), and even
then it's not guaranteed, you know, just because
the odds say it's likely. Hmmm. In the same
period, the kid that flips burgers, mows lawns
and heaves shingles would reel in a cool
$147,000. Again, Hmmm.
And yet your Brother's proposition isn't even
close to being as impenetrable as the one a
reader previously wrote in about: a casino
offering a poker machine with a payout of
$1,000,000 for a sequential royal flush.
For an ascending royal flush in any suit, the
odds are 77,968,800. If it is suit specific,
such as being in hearts, then the chances are
one in 311,875,200.
Sorry, Charlie, I'd pass on both.
Gambling Wisdom of the Week: "The commonest
mistake in history is underestimating your
opponent; happens at the poker table all the
time." --General David Shoup
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