You are on page 1of 91

Beat

The reader should be advised that games of chance, sports betting and video gambling
are
illegal in certain jurisdictions. The author and the publisher advise the reader before
engaging in any gambling activity to determine the legality of such activity in his or her
state or other jurisdiction.
BEAT THE SLOTS

Introduction to Slots
There is no doubt that slot machines are the casino game of the nineties. The
casinos love them, and so do the casino patrons.
The casinos love the slot machines because they produce more net revenue per
square foot of casino space than any other casino game. Casino patrons love them
because
they are easy to understand, simple to play, and, on some progressive slot machines,
offer
the prospect of winning over a million dollars!
One reason the average person plays the slots is that almost no knowledge is
required to pull a lever (or in the case of the video slots, push a button). The fear of
appearing foolish is removed from the player as the machines will never criticize a
gambler's play. Another reason people like to play the slots is that they are a lot of fun.
There is something hypnotic about pulling a lever for hours accompanied by the myriad
of
sounds--bells and whistles and coins plunking into the trays.
However, this book is not about having fun playing the slots. This book is about
winning at the slots.
You have probably read slots books written by persons associated with or employed
by the casinos. If you have, you will conclude that there is virtually no way to beat the
slots, for if there is, the person whose livelihood depends on the "one armed bandits" is
sure
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (1 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
not going to tell you how.
Slots can be beaten. Played correctly, slot machines can offer a higher return than
any other casino game. Played incorrectly, which is the way most folks go about it, the
slots give the casino a license to steal.
The principles of winning at slots are similar to those used to beat other gaming
contests. In order to win, you have to know and use sound money management
principles,
you have to have specific knowledge about the game you are attempting to beat, and
you
must have a proven systematic approach to your gambling.
In this book, all of this information will be covered in detail as it relates to slots.
You will learn sound practical money management systems for playing slots. After
reading
and studying this book, you will have the specific knowledge necessary to win at slots.
In
addition, four tested systems for playing the slots to win will be thoroughly discussed.
We will not attempt to cover a detailed history of slot machines nor to entertain you
with "slots stories." If you want to read about how the rhythm method players beat the
slots in the late forties and early fifties, you will have to look elsewhere. The purpose
and
exclusive focus of this book is to teach you how to beat today's slot machines.
There are a number of factors which have a major influence on the slot player's
probability of winning.
The type of slot machine is critical. What started out as a three reel mechanical
gadget which only accepted one coin per play has proliferated into a myriad of single-
coin,
multi-coin, electronic, microprocessor controlled, progressive, variable jackpot jungle
of
choices for the would-be slots players. All of these choices do not offer the same
probabilities of winning. Certain machines offer indisputably better odds of winning.
Our
objective is to zero in on the best possible machine to play.
The location of the slot machine is critical. Is it located in Nevada or in Atlantic
City? Is it in a major casino or a small casino? Is it in a casino or located in a roadside
place such as a grocery store or bar?
What denomination of coins does the slot accept? Is it a nickel, quarter or dollar
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (2 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
slot? Does it accept only one coin or three or more coins?
What is the size of the jackpot
offered? Is it better to play
progressive machines with large
jackpots or machines with smaller
jackpots which pay more
frequently?
How is the player's bankroll related to the type of machine? If you have a small
bankroll, is it necessary to play only nickel slots?
How important is the casino's percentage? Does it vary from casino to casino, and
if so, by how much? How do we find the casinos offering the lowest percentage against
the
player?
These are some of the questions which we must answer in order to pick the right
machine at the right location at the right time.
In addition to covering four big systems you can use to beat the slots, we also
introduce the concepts of static and dynamic play of slot machines. Using the concepts
discussed in these chapters, you can literally customize a system to fit the machine you
are
playing, while you play.
I believe that this manual is unique in its clarity and its focus on beating the slots. It
doesn't rehash information found in the common slots books but presents the complete
strategies you must know to beat the slots.
I wish you the best of luck in your pursuit to become a winning slots player. I
earnestly believe that this manual will give you the tools to do so.
Slots Math
Slot machines operate on the principle of random selection and theoretical odds.
Random selection means that each time the slot lever is pulled is an independent trial
and
that no single outcome can be predicted on any given slot play. Theoretical odds are
built
into the design and program of the machine and mean that, over the long term, it is
possible
to calculate the exact payout percentage for that machine.
Except for the video slots, slot machines have wheels called reels with symbols on
each wheel. Each symbol on a reel represents a "stop" which may come to rest in the
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (3 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
slot
display window and which may or may not be part of a combination of stops offering a
payoff.
The likelihood of winning a jackpot on a given slot machine is a function of the
number of reels and the number of symbols or stops on each reel.
The most common type of slot is the three reel machine with 20 symbols on each
reel. To calculate the number of combinations of symbols possible on a slot machine,
we
multiply the number of stops to the power of the number of reels. For a three reel slot
with
20 symbols, we have 20 x 20 x 20 = 8,000 possible combinations of slot symbols.
This means that if you are playing a three reel slot with 20 symbols, your
probability of winning a jackpot which can be won with only one combination of
symbols
is 1 in 8,000.
Adding another reel to a slot significantly decreases the probability of winning a
jackpot. On a 20 stop machine, adding an additional reel for a total of four reels reduces
the probability of hitting the jackpot to 1 in 160,000. If we add one more reel for a total
of
five reels, the chance of winning the jackpot is reduced to only 1 in 3,200,000.
In addition to adding reels, slots also offer combinations of different numbers of
symbols per reel. The most common numbers of symbols per reel are 20, 22, and 25.
Adding symbols to a reel does not affect your chance of winning nearly as much as
adding
reels. On a three reel machine with 22 symbols per reel, the chance of hitting the
jackpot
combination is 1 in 10,648. With three reels and 25 symbols per reel, the odds are 1 in
15,625. While adding symbols does affect the probability of winning a jackpot, we can
see
that adding reels has a much greater effect. Below are shown the probabilities of hitting
a
jackpot on different combinations of reels and symbols.
Table 1. Reel and Symbol Combinations
Reels 3 4 5
Symbols
20 8,000 160,000 3,200,000
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (4 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
22 10,648 234,256 5,153,632
25 15,625 390,625 9,765,625
With this information alone, we cannot calculate which is the better combination to
play. In order to do that, we need to know the size of the jackpot offered and the
amount
the casino will hold out of our play as its "hold percentage." However, we can say that
any
time we play a machine with more reels or more stops, our possibility of hitting the
jackpot
drops, with the 5 reel 25 symbol machines offering lottery-like odds against us.
The casino's hold percentage is the amount the casino will keep on the average for
each $1, $100, or $1,000 played on the machine. The casino's hold is the casino's
"profit"
for providing the slots players with the machines as well as with the service and
atmosphere in which to enjoy playing.
Over short periods of time, the casino's hold will vary greatly. It is only over the
longer periods of play that the amount kept by a particular slot machine will
approximate
the theoretical hold amount.
Typical casino hold percentages will vary from 5% to 15%. In some locations on
certain machines, the hold percentage will be much larger, and conversely, in other
locations on different machines, the percentage will be lower.
Many people misunderstand the concept of the casino percentage. Let's say that the
casino holds 15%, on the average, of everything played in a particular slot. A common
misconception is that if you play with $100 on this machine, the most you should lose
is
$15 which is 15% of $100.
Now John Q. Public may play this machine and lose all of his money on it in a
couple of hours. His conclusion may be that the casinos are lying about the true hold
percentage. Otherwise, how could he lose all of his money in such a short period?
The answer to this question lies in the fact that the casino hold applies to every
dollar inserted in the machine. John probably did not just put $100 in the machine.
Chances are he put the first hundred through and then proceeded to plug in all of the
tokens
left after the first hundred had been fed in. The machine, programmed to take on the
average 15% of all tokens inserted, continued to take this percentage each time that
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (5 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
John
fed the tokens through.
Table 2, Comparison of Amount Retained After a Round of Play, shows how this
can add up in a short time as the effects of the hold percentage are increased by the
multiple
insertions. With a 15% casino hold, there would only be $85 left after the first round of
play. After this $85 is played for the second round, only $72 is left. As shown in the
table,
by the time John played ten rounds on a machine set to hold 15%, only about $20 was
left.
If John had continued to play this machine, after twenty rounds his $100 would be
reduced
to about $4. John lost his $100 so quickly because the slot lopped 15% off the top for
each
round of play.
Notice the tremendous contrast between the slot holding 15% and the one holding
only 2%. By the end of five rounds of play, the 15% slot has cut our money by 66%
while
the 2% hold machine has reduced our bankroll by only 10%. If you never much cared
what
the casino hold was before, this illustration should make you aware of the
consequences of
ignoring it.
Casino income from slot machines is a function of the number of slots in the casino,
the average amount received per slot play, the volume of slot play, the casino hold
percentage, and the relative competition for the slot machine player.
In general, when any of the factors making up the casino's slot revenue formula is
weak the casino is going to compensate for it, and the player is going to be offered a
poorer
deal.
Table 2. Comparison of Amount Retained After a Round of Play
Slot Hold % 2% 5% 10% 15%
Start Round $100 $100 $100 $100
1 98 95 90 85
2 96 90 81 72
3 94 86 73 61
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (6 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
4 92 81 66 52
5 90 77 59 44
6 88 73 53 38
7 86 69 48 32
8 85 66 43 27
9 83 63 39 23
10 81 60 35 20
Let's illustrate this point. The competition for slot machines in Atlantic City is high
as there are only a small number of casinos and slot machines available relative to the
demand from players who want to try the slots. The casino has almost no competition
for
its limited number of slots, so guess what happens. The casino hold percentage stays
high
at about 8% to 10%, a much poorer deal for the player.
By contrast, in Las Vegas, which has many more slots, casinos are forced to lower
their hold percentages because of the competition.
Let's take another example. Many Nevada casinos have a mixture of 5 cent, 25
cent, dollar slots, and even some penny slots. Each machine takes up about the same
amount of floor space, requires the same personnel costs to service it, and costs about
the
same to maintain. Obviously a 5 cent slot is not going to have the same amount of
money
played in it as a dollar slot unless the 5 cent is played continuously twenty-four hours a
day,
and the dollar slot receives almost no play. The casino has a weakness in its nickel slots
as
they cost the casino about the same as the dollar slots. The solution? Increase the hold
percentages on the nickel slots. This is what usually happens. In the same casino there
will
be nickel slots with a 15% hold and dollar slots with only a 1.5% to 2% hold. If the
casino
has a weakness in its revenue formula, it will make it up somewhere.
If we were to formulate a general strategy for the best place for the slots player, we
would want a casino with lots of slots (the casino doesn't have to make all of its money
off
a few machines), plenty of competition offering better deals to keep our casino in line,
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (7 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
a
large variety of machines so that we can pick the machine which is right for our slots
system, and a mixture of 5 cent, 25 cent, and dollar slots so that only one type of slot
will
not have to support the whole establishment.
Picking the Machine
The most common and familiar type of slot machine of yesterday is the mechanical
or electro-mechanical slot machine. This is the type of slot machine where mechanical
reels spin around, and if the right combination of symbols are showing when the reels
stop,
the machine will pay off.
In this modern age of electronics, the pure mechanical machines are dinosaurs. A
few can still be found in downtown Vegas and in Sparks and Reno, and you will still
find
them in roadside establishments. The true mechanical machines jerk and clang and
sound
like a slot machine is supposed to sound. The jackpots are usually small with $7.50 and
$15.00 being common jackpots on nickel mechanical machines.
Electro-mechanical machines look like the old mechanical machines, but their
innards have been supplemented with electronic goodies. These machines sport lights
and
bells, and often they are multi-coin machines rather than single coin machines like most
of
the mechanicals.
The wave of the future lies with the microprocessor-controlled slots. These are
slots with a computer chip inside which controls all of the functions of the machine.
Here
the computer chip controls the reels, and often the microprocessor-controlled machines
can
have over fifty symbols per reel. Many of the electro-mechanical machines have been
retro-fitted with microprocessor units so they look and sound like the old machines, but
they are really computer controlled.
Most modern slot machines accept more than one coin and are called "multipliers."
Most of these machines accept three to five coins maximum per play, although it is
possible to find machines where six coins or more may be played.
Most of the multipliers have a single payline across the reel display area. All
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (8 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
payoffs are based on the combinations of symbols which show on the single payline.
The
multiplier idea comes in as each additional coin inserted increases the payout for each
winning combination of symbols. In some cases, a bonus is paid if you play the
maximum
number of coins, and the machine hits its jackpot.
For example, on a machine where three sevens is the high payoff, the slot may pay
100 coins if only one coin is played, 200 coins if two coins are played and 600 coins if
three coins are played. The three coin payoff has a bonus of 300 coins built into it.
The casino's rationale in offering the bonus is to insure that the players always play
the maximum number of coins.
Multipliers that do not offer the bonus feature have the advantage that they can be
played as single coin machines as well as multi-coin machines without sacrificing any
advantage in the payoffs.
The buy-a-pay slot machines can be really confusing. With these machines, each
coin inserted brings into play additional symbols offering payoffs. There is nothing
written
on these machines to specifically identify them as such; you must read the payouts on
the
front of the slot machine carefully to spot one of these confusing machines.
In a buy-a-pay slot, the first coin might offer payoffs for cherries only. With the
second coin inserted, payoffs might be for oranges, plums, bells, and some bars. It is
only
with three coins inserted that the jackpot symbols, bars or sevens come into play. So if
you
play all three coins, you will have all of the possible winning symbols working for you
while, with less than three coins played, only some of the symbols will pay off. If you
want to hit a jackpot on a buy-a-pay slot, you must be willing to play the maximum
number
of coins on each play of the machine.
Multiple payline slot machines accomplish the same thing as the buy-a-pay slots by
offering more than one payline. Instead of having only one payline, there may be three
to
five paylines. With a five line machine, the first three paylines are horizontal, and the
last
two are diagonal, running criss-cross across the display. Like many of the multipliers,
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (9 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
the
jackpots or jackpot bonuses are available on only the last payline, so that you have to
play
the maximum number of coins to win the jackpot.
Some of these machines do not offer bonuses for playing the maximum number of
coins, in which case, there is no advantage to playing the maximum number of coins.
The
only way that this can be determined is to carefully read the payoff information on the
front
of the slot.
The entire slot machine industry has become more glamorous with the advent of the
progressive slot machines. When you read in the newspaper about someone winning a
prize in the millions, you can be sure that it was won on a progressive slot machine.
With a progressive slot machine, the jackpot prize is increased each time the
maximum number of coins are played. Progressive slot machines are basically
multipliers
which keep adding a little to the jackpot each time the machine is played until someone
hits
the jackpot.
Progressive slots can be found in two different types of setups. The older and more
common type of progressive is an individual, free-standing machine which will be
found
either by itself of in a designated area with other machines of the same type. These
machines operate independently of each other so that each machine's jackpot is
unaffected
by any other slot machine.
The most recent type of progressive is called a link-progressive, and as the name
implies, it is linked to other machines. Here there is a central jackpot so that play on
each
machine contributes to the overall jackpot.
Some of the link progressives, such as the MEGABUCKS system introduced by
IGT Corporation, are even linked between different casinos. These machines were
introduced to compete with the California lottery and to offer lottery-like payoffs in the
millions of dollars. Each machine in the system contributes to the jackpot with each
play,
with the jackpot climbing by $100,000 or more every week.
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (10 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
There are many other variations of slot machines around today. Some slot
machines are jackpot-only machines. With these machines, only jackpot payoffs are
offered, and all of the smaller payoff symbols are removed from the machines. You can
spot these machines fairly easily as there are a lot of blank spots or "ghosts" on the reel
where symbols ordinarily are. With these machines, the payoffs are few and far
between.
A final category of conventional slot machine is the giant slot machine called a
"Bertha." Several of these monsters used to sit at the entrance of the Four Queens in
downtown Vegas. The Berthas are abominably slow to play, with terrible payoffs, and
are
best avoided.
Video slot machines are the slot machines of the future. Today's younger
generation with its addiction to video games is being primed to play video slots.
Video slots, such as video poker, offer the player the chance to influence the
outcome of each play through skill rather than strictly facing a game of chance. In
addition
to video poker machines, there are video blackjack, video keno and other video
variations
such as video horse racing and video craps.
The most popular of all of the video slots is, without a question, the video poker
machine. Here the degree of the player's skill in playing five card draw poker with the
machine has a direct bearing on the player's winnings.
With video poker, a player can match his wits in a poker contest with a machine,
which is considerably less intimidating for most folks than going up against the sharks
in
the casino poker parlors.
With the large variety of slot machines available today, it is no easy task to pick the
right machine. It seems obvious, but one of the most important things to do in picking a
machine is to carefully read the instructions and payoffs printed on the front of the
machine.
It is important to identify the type of slot machine you will be playing as winning
slot systems are always geared to applying a particular system to a specific type of slot
machine.
For example, there are a number of slot machine systems which require that the
number of coins played be varied, depending on the machine's cycle or on a money
management system employed. These types of systems do not do well on the machines
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (11 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
which require that the maximum number of coins be inserted in order to win a bonus
jackpot. However, there are many slots which accept multiple coins which do not offer
jackpot bonuses, and the number of coins inserted per play can be varied without
sacrificing the potential of a bonus.
Some machines should always be avoided, such as the Berthas, which just don't
offer much value for the money.
Slot machine systems basically fall into three categories. The first is the grind
system category, where the goal is to win small amounts many times. The idea behind
using this system is that the vacation can at least be paid for, with perhaps a little left
over.
Many of the mechanical slots as well as the three reel multipliers, offer good prospects
for
applying a grind type of system. However, it would be totally inappropriate to play on a
million dollar progressive with four or five reels with the idea of winning at least a
small
amount. These giant progressives offer about the same probabilities of winning as the
Irish
Sweepstakes as they are just not the right machines to play to grind out daily winnings.
The second category of slot
systems falls into the middle ground.
They offer to possibilities of
reasonable daily winnings with more
upside potential than the grind
systems. A middle ground system
might be played on a three coin, three
reel, free-standing progressive
offering a higher jackpot than the
non-progressive machines.
Here the player would not want to sacrifice the prospect of numerous small wins,
but he would still be shooting for a higher jackpot payoff.
The final category of types of systems is the go-for-broke systems, where the goal
is a large jackpot. Obviously, the large payoff progressive machines will be sought out
as
the player goes against lottery-like odds in the hopes of a giant win.
Besides identifying the right slot for the player's system, it is incumbent that the
player become aware of some basic rules of slots play.
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (12 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
In picking a particular machine, the player must know what the symbols are that
pay the jackpot on that machine. Although bells and whistles are supposed to go off
when
a jackpot is hit, they don't always do so, and the ignorant player, not recognizing the
jackpot symbol combination when it appears, may void the jackpot by playing the
machine
again before the jackpot can be paid off.
Many of the modern slots, especially the progressives, require the assistance of
casino personnel for jackpot payoffs. The machines simply do not have the capacity to
hold enough coins for large jackpot payoffs.
When a jackpot is hit, the player should not touch the machine again until casino
personnel have reached the machine and verified the jackpot. If you hit a jackpot, do
not
leave the machine and do not take your eyes off it until the jackpot has been verified.
By
all means, don't let some other person wander up to your machine and pull the lever
while
you are waiting for a payoff. This action will void your jackpot, and you may be
tempted
to commit murder right there in the slots pit.
Before picking a particular slot machine to play which is right for your system and
your budget, you must do everything possible to make sure that the machine you have
picked offers the lowest possible house hold (casino percentage against you). As we
have
seen, the casino's take really mounts up the longer a machine is played.
Unfortunately, casinos don't print the house hold percentage on the front of the
machine. So how are we supposed to know which is the better machine to play?
The first selection criteria is to find the best location for higher paying slots. The
following chapter covers this topic in some detail.
Another aspect to consider is that, without exception, the casino payoffs increase
with the denomination of coin accepted by the machine. Want an example? Let's look
at
some recent statistics on slot payoffs for slot machines located in the state of Illinois:
Nickel machines 84.4%
Quarter machines 91.1%
Dollar machines 94.1%
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (13 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
Five Dollar machines 95.0%
While the range of payoffs is very extreme, this type of thinking is not uncommon
for casinos. Look at it from the casino perspective. A nickel slot machine costs about
the
same amount to purchase and maintain as a dollar machine. It requires the same
number of
casino employees to service its patrons and fix its innards when something goes awry.
It
takes up the same floor space as a dollar machine. So why install the machine in the
first
place?
The reason the nickel machine is there is because there are a lot of slot players
whose budgets require that they play nickel machines. If casino A doesn't have nickel
machines and Casino B does, Casino B is going to take quite a few customers away
from
Casino A. So, quite simply, slot consumers demand nickel machines and the casinos
supply them. But at what cost to the slot consumer?
The casinos say fine, we'll give the
consumers some nickel slots, but let's not
give them a very good deal with these slots.
We'll make sure that these machines are
programmed to pay at low rates and help
recoup our costs.
And that's the story with all casinos. You play at a higher coin machine, it pays
more. I don't have any statistics on the $100 slot machines at Caesar's Palace in Las
Vegas,
but I bet they pay at least 98%.
This starts to sound like Catch 22. If you play slots to make money because you
don't have any, you probably will have to play the slots programmed to pay out the
lowest
amounts, which means you are less likely to win. If you don't need the money, you can
play the higher denomination slots and are more likely to win.
Relax. It's not quite that bad. In many jurisdictions (except for the east coast slots)
the quarter machines pay out at acceptable rates. Throughout this book I have based
many
examples on playing the quarter slots. And I believe that most slot players who have
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (14 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
resigned themselves to nickel machines can easily move up to quarter play. Here's why.
Virtually all modern slot machines are multiplier type slots which accept a multiple
of coins. Some offer bonus payoffs for inserting all the coins the machine will accept
(usually three to five coins), but others play just like single coin machines, with the
payoffs
increased proportionally to the number of coins inserted.
If you are a nickel machine player, find a quarter machine which does not penalize
you for playing less than the maximum number of coins. If you can't find one of these
machines (and they are hard to find in the newer slot machine jurisdictions), the odds
are
good that a single quarter played in a quarter machine will offer a better chance of
winning
than five nickels played in a nickel machine.
There, I just solved a problem for some of you. Instead of inserting five nickels in a
machine set to pay out only 85%, try one quarter in a machine programmed to pay out
90%
or better. You just improved your chances of winning considerably.
In general, the higher the denomination machine, the better your chance of winning.
I draw the line at playing machines which accept more than a dollar, like five dollar or
hundred dollar slots. The reason is simple. If I am going to play at five dollars or more
per
pop, table games will give me a much better chance of winning than slot machines. So
if I
am in the mood to wager five dollars or more per turn of fate, I would rather cast my lot
with the roulette wheel, the dice or the cards (either blackjack or baccarat).
I am going to assume that you think the same way. If you don't, I'll do my best to
convince you. So you should limit your play on slot machines to quarter machines at
the
low end and dollar machines at the high end. If you pick downtown Las Vegas as your
favorite place to play slots, using our selection process, you will find quarter machines
paying the same or more than dollar machines. If you are playing somewhere other
than
downtown Vegas, our selection process will still serve you well, and you won't have to
play
dollar slots in order to receive reasonable payouts.
We now have a set of rules we can use to pick the best slot machine
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (15 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
for our play.
1. First, the machine should be some kind of regular slot machine. The giant
Berthas, arcade type slots, slots based on keno and anything else which the casinos
come
up with, but which we don't understand, is out.
2. The machine should be a multiplier. This part is easy. Every new slot is a
multiplier accepting multiple coins per play. The second part is harder. We prefer to
play
on a multiplier which doesn't penalize us for inserting less than the maximum number
of
coins. Hard to do in the newer joints, as casino management wants every player to
always
play the maximum number of coins and the machines reflect this thinking by offering
inferior payoffs for less than maximum coin play. We may have to accept a multiplier
which penalizes us for less than maximum coin play if we play outside of the state of
Nevada.
3. We will only play on quarter or dollar slots. The nickel slots are too chinsy,
the five dollar ones too rich. Forget the hundred dollar or the new and improved five
hundred slots (can you believe this, $500 a pull?).
In the next chapter we will learn where to find the best slots. When we combine
what we know about what kind of slot machine to play with where to find them, we
will be
well on the way to becoming a slot winner!
Where are the Best Slots?
Slot machines are showing up in the darndest places. I wouldn't be surprised to find
them installed in school cafeterias next. If you walk up to a machine and look it over, it
won't tell you whether it is going to pay you regularly or sit there and just gulp your
coins
without even an occasional coin spit back in your direction.
Fortunately, we are not quite clueless when it comes to evaluating a slot machine
without even looking at it or investing a single coin. There are patterns which are
followed
throughout the country in the placement of slot machines. If you know where a slot
machine is located, you can surmise quite a lot about it.
The slot's location can spell the difference between having a good chance of
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (16 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
winning or having almost no chance of walking out a winner. Slot machines are
manufactured by a limited number of companies and many have very similar external
appearances. However, two very similar slot machines may have been programmed to
pay
out at very different rates.
The first aspect of location we want to consider is the geographic location of the
establishment with the slot machines. In general, the old adage "Go west young man"
describes just about everything you need to know about the slot's geographic location.
With very few exceptions, slot payouts improve as you travel from east to west in the
United States, with the lowest paying slot machines located on the east coast and the
highest paying machines located in the state of Nevada (almost to the west coast).
There are published win percentages for slot machines in the states of Nevada, New
Jersey, Connecticut, Illinois, Iowa and Colorado. This information is accumulated and
published by various casino and gaming control boards. Unfortunately, information on
slot
machine paybacks is not published for many midwest or southern casinos or for states
where Indian slots have quasi-legal status like California and New Mexico.
Using both published and anecdotal information to fill in the blanks where
published information is not available, the average slot machine paybacks by
geographic
location are:
1. Nevada: Downtown Las Vegas and
Northern Nevada, including Laughlin
(but excluding nickel slots) 94 - 97%
2. Nevada: Las Vegas Strip 93 - 96%
3. Colorado 93 - 95%
4. Midwest and southern states,
including Illinois, Iowa, Missouri,
Kansas, Mississippi, Louisiana,
Minnesota and Wisconsin. 92 - 95%
5. Atlantic City, New Jersey
and Foxwoods in Connecticut 90 - 94%
6. Quasi-legal slot states,
California and New Mexico 82 - 92%
With the growth of Indian gaming, it has not been possible to rate all jurisdictions
allowing slot machines. For example, no rating has been established for Arizona. We
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (17 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
believe that in most cases Indian gaming, except for states specifically mentioned
above,
will tend toward the lowest category with the lowest payoffs.
Within each category, the lowest paying slots are the lowest denomination slot
machines (usually nickel slots, but sometimes quarter slot machines). The variation in
the
average payoff can be large. Take Illinois for instance. The data we have on Illinois
slots
shows an average payback of 84.4% for nickel slots and 95.0% for five dollar slots, for
a
range of over ten percent from top to bottom.
In Atlantic City, the quarter slots pay
an average of 90.2%, while the dollar
slots pay 91.7%. Only the five dollar
slots in Atlantic City, with an average
payback of 94.4%, offer paybacks in
the higher range.
In order to have a reasonable chance of winning, you should always try to play slots
which pay 95% or better.
Table 3 should help clarify the importance of "a couple of percent" difference in
payoffs.
TABLE 3. Comparative Hold Rates Geographically
Time Played
East
10%
Midwest
5%
Colorado
4%
Nevada
3%
Starting Bankroll $100 $100 $100 $100
After 1 hour 90 95 96 97
. . 2 hours 81 90 92 94
. . 3 hours 73 86 88 91
. . 4 hours 66 82 85 88
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (18 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
. . 5 hours 59 78 82 85
J ackpot
(25 x $0.25) 19 19 19 19
5 Hour Net With J ackpot
78 97 101 104
. . 6 hours 53 74 79 82
. . 7 hours 48 70 76 80
. . 8 hours 43 67 73 78
J ackpot
(25 x $0.25) 19 19 19 19
8 Hour Net
With J ackpot 62 86 92 97
Table 3 is based on the assumption that we are playing a quarter slot machine,
inserting three quarters per play. Under the rules of this game, we are using a $100
bankroll, which is inserted once per hour. After playing the bankroll once, we take the
coins returned and reinsert them over the space of an hour. By playing in this way, we
can
see very clearly the effects of a machine's hold percentage on our bankroll.
To reward us for our patient play, we have assumed that after the first five hours of
play, we hit a jackpot equal to twenty five times the number of coins inserted, in this
case 3
quarters ($0.75) x 25 for $18.75, rounded to $19.00 in the table. For play beyond five
hours we have assumed that no jackpot was hit after five hours of play, but instead was
hit
after eight hours of play. These mini-jackpots have been thrown in to give us an
optimal
chance of quitting a winner.
Let's first consider playing a quarter machine at Atlantic City or Foxwoods odds.
We will play on a machine with an average hold percentage of 10%, which means the
machine will keep 10% of all coins played, and on the average, return 90%.
After one hour on the 10% hold machine, our $100 bankroll is reduced to $90.
After two hours, it has become $81. At three hours the machine has reduced our $100
to
$73. After four hours, we have only $66 left, and after five hours of play we have $59
left.
At this point we hit the 25x jackpot, adding $19 to our bankroll. If we quit now, we
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (19 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
have a
total of $78 ($19 + $59), for a loss of 22% of our bankroll.
But what if we didn't hit the 25x payoff? The lower part of the table shows what
might happen if we didn't hit a 25x payoff after five hours of play. After six hours, our
$100 bankroll has become $53, a loss of almost one-half. After a full eight hours of
play,
our once mighty one hundred bucks has become a measly $43. Now we will assume
that
we hit a 25x payoff, worth $19. If we hit this jackpot after eight hours of play, and
combine our remaining bankroll with the jackpot, we are left with $62, for a loss of
38% of
our original bankroll.
In Nevada, we can easily find a quarter machine with no more than a 3% hold. This
results of play on this machine are shown in the right hand column in the table. After
five
hours of play, our $100 bankroll has been reduced to $85. With a 25x payback, worth
$19,
we will have $104, which will give us a net win if we stop at this point. If no 25x
payback
occurs after five hours of play, and instead we play eight hours, our bankroll will have
been
reduced to $78. With a $19 payoff after eight hours, our bankroll will be $97.
For comparison, both 4% and 5% hold rate machines are shown. The key numbers
to zero in on in the table are the Five Hour and Eight Hour Net Amounts after hitting
the
jackpot. These amounts are critical, because we have just received a moderate sized
jackpot and could consider quitting play after the jackpot. With the 10% hold rate
machine, we never even come close to breaking even. With the 3% and 4% hold
machines,
we have a profit after five hours of play and almost break-even on the 5% hold
machine.
After eight hours, no machine shows a profit, but the losses on the 3% and 4%
machines
are moderate and easily curable with a moderate payoff. The 5% hold machine has
reduced our bankroll by $14 and another 25x payoff will put us into the profit column.
The results from playing the 10% hold machine are scary. Even if we stop playing
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (20 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
after a 25x payoff, we are still deeply in the hole.
The moral to this comparison? No amount of luck or even quitting immediately
after hitting a moderate sized jackpot is going to help much with a machine
programmed to
hold 10% of the coins inserted. A 5% hold rate is much better, but if at all possible, we
should try to play on a machine with a 4% or better yet, a 3% hold rate.
There is no question that the best chance of winning is on the slots with lower hold
rates, and statistically your best chance of finding one of these machines is in the state
of
Nevada. The poorest paying slots are in Atlantic City, Foxwoods and on Indian
reservations in areas with non existent oversight, such as New Mexico.
The type of establishment also has a direct bearing on how tight the slot machines
are. Casinos are by far the preferred type of establishment for playing slots. Depending
on
the jurisdiction, slot machines may be found in grocery stores, service stations,
restaurants,
airports, horse and dog tracks, bingo halls and private clubs. Slot machines located in
non
casino establishments are offered as a sideline to the main purpose of the business.
Often
they are placed by off-site slot route operators. Because the machines are incidental to
the
main purpose of the business, they are often uncompetitive with slots available in
casinos.
Think of it this way. You are not likely to be hanging around an airport for the purpose
of
playing slot machines. When you play airport slots, you are killing time until your
plane
arrives or an arriving passenger you are waiting for arrives. The slots don't have to be
competitive because some people are going to play them anyway.
My advice regarding non
casino slot machines is not to play
them. Without exception, the states
which allow non casino slots have
casinos with slot machines, and the
casinos have to be more
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (21 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
competitive than the non casino
slots. So patronize the casino slot
machines and ignore the non casino
slots.
Casinos are not all created equal either, at least not when it comes to offering slot
players a fair deal. The best casinos in which to play slots are casinos catering to slot
players. The casinos are not hard to find. The casinos will specifically advertise higher
slot payoffs. Casinos catering to slot players are all over downtown Las Vegas, Reno
and
Laughlin. The casinos will have slot machines everywhere and of more importance, the
machines will be receiving a lot of play. Slot machine players will be everywhere. The
next time you are in Las Vegas, stroll through the Sheraton Desert Inn. While it is a
great
place to stay, you should not play slots there. Most of the slot machines are deserted,
day
or night. The ambience of the casino is quiet and elegant. The Desert Inn does not cater
to
slot players or try to attract them. How do you think their slots pay? Fair to middling by
Las Vegas standards. Of course if you are an east coast player, you'll think the slots are
loose as a goose, but by Las Vegas standards they are lousy. If they weren't, you would
see
more slot players.
Now meander over to Slots of Fun. Wall to wall slot machines. Jam packed with
players. Heineken beer for seventy five cents. Bells ringing every minute. Is this a
better
place for slot players? You bet your tokens it is.
Now we are not talking personal preference here. I'll take the elegance of the
Desert Inn any day over the noise of Slots of Fun. But only if I want to have a
contemplative walk around the casino. If I want to play slots, I will head for Slots of
Fun,
or to downtown Las Vegas.
What I am suggesting is that even if you don't like the noise, and let's face it, the
unbridled commercialism of the slot palaces, they cater to slot players and because of
competition, they offer slot players a better chance of winning.
So, besides picking the best geographic location for higher paying slot machines,
we should play slot machines only in a casino and preferably in a casino catering to slot
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (22 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
machine players.
Once we have found a likely casino, our next task is to find the most likely location
in the casino for a higher paying slot. While we can use geographic information to find
slot
machines which are programmed to pay out at higher rates on the average, we still find
tremendous variety of slot paybacks, even within a given casino.
There is no question that casinos advertising higher paying slots offer higher
paybacks, at least for casinos with some state regulation. However, an advertised
payback
rate of 98.3% or 99% does not mean that every slot machine in a casino will pay back
at
that rate. It usually means that some, but not all, machines will pay at the highest rate.
Casinos usually don't place signs on the machines saying "Play me, I pay over 99%
back,"
or "This is a high paying slot." But some do almost as well.
Many casinos catering to slot players will place some of the higher paying
machines on special slot carrousels with signs advertising higher paybacks. Is every
machine on the carrousel a high payer? Probably not, but your chance of finding the
highest paying machine is better in one of these special areas.
A study was conducted by Lawrence Steele and published in Super Slots (available
from Silverthorne Publications) at: http://www.casinogamblersbookcase.com/Slots.htm
He found that casinos place the higher paying slots in areas highly visible to other
slot players. And he also found that the reverse is true. Slot machines likely to be
played
casually, like those in airports, were more likely to be tighter, that is, programmed to
pay
out at lower rates.
He also found that well paying slots were never placed side by side.
Let's examine the casino psychology behind placing slot machines in this manner.
First, let's consider visibility. Perhaps the number one inducement for slot players to
begin
playing a slot machine or to continue playing on a slot machine is whether the players
around them are winning.
Picture this scene. You walk into a casino looking for a likely slot machine. There
are very few slot players. You walk over to an area with a large number of slot
machines
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (23 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
and some scattered players. In strolling through the aisles of slot machines, it seems
fairly
quiet. Not too many machines are announcing to the world their payoffs. The patrons
seem inordinately quiet, almost solemn. No one is smiling. Most seem to be playing
only
half attentively. The atmosphere almost seems depressing. You decide to walk over to
the
next casino.
As you enter you notice that it is much noisier; slots are clanging and ringing
everywhere. Some aisles are so crowded with players that you can hardly walk through.
You stand at an intersection of two slot machine aisles. You can see fifteen or twenty
slot
machines, with about half of them receiving some kind of play. One or two of these slot
machines seems to be paying off every two or three plays. The players are talking,
laughing, and in some cases, yelling. Change persons are scurrying about trying to keep
up
with the players. You walk a little further into the casino. There are slots all around the
blackjack and craps tables, but these machines don't have very many players. The few
players at these machines don't stay very long. Except for the clamor coming from the
table players, the slot machines seem almost subdued.
You walk even further into the casino.
There are slot machines in every corner,
all the way to the rest room door. The
machines in this area are receiving plenty
of play but the atmosphere seems
different. Some machines are buried in
corners and are attended by players seated
and frantically pulling the levers, but with
less enthusiasm.
You move back to the first area where the slots are clanging away. Is it your
imagination, or do these machines seem to be paying better? In this section, the players
act
like some kind of party is going on; the other slot areas you observed seem almost
depressing. You decide to play on a machine right in the middle of the slots party two
machines over from a woman chattering every minute about how this machine is her
baby.
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (24 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
How good is your decision to play in this area in this casino?
First, the neighborhood sounds very Nevadaish. You are probably in downtown
Vegas, or in one of the more congested areas of the strip. Or maybe Reno. Or walking
between casinos in Laughlin. So the neighborhood is right for slots players.
The first casino wasn't very appealing for a slot player. Or was it? Many slot
players would prefer the first casino. Not everyone likes noise or hoards of players
swirling around them. Since playing a slot machine is a personal experience, many
players
like to seek out quieter areas so that they and their machine can be as one. Sort of a Zen
Buddhist thing. Is this a good choice? Probably not. Slot players are a lot like drinkers
in
one respect; they like to patronize the popular gathering spots. So picking the second
casino was sort of a no-brainer and was the logical choice to make.
Now it gets harder. We have to find the best located slot in the casino. The quiet
machines near the back were tempting. More machines available and less risk on
having
an obnoxious neighbor. Many players think like this. The casino seems better for slot
players. Now let's find a nice warm corner to play in.
But this would probably be a bad decision. Casino management knows that people
seek their own space. When you go to a movie theater you will notice that the early
arrivals space themselves out, so that only two people may be seated in a whole row.
As
more people arrive, each row will start to fill up, but with large spaces between the
people.
Only as the theater is filling will you see people filling in the spaces and sitting next to
strangers. By the time the theater is filled, space no longer matters, getting a seat
becomes
the prime concern.
Slot players' behavior is exactly the same in casinos. They will space themselves
out. The noisy bunch of slot players will attract other players who will typically find
less
congested areas in which to play. Is this a good idea? Probably not.
Visibility to other slot players is the key to finding the higher payoff slot machines.
Our hypothetical slot player made the best decision. He decided to play in the visible
area,
two machines over from a lady seemingly having her own party with the slot machine.
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (25 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
This was probably the best decision to make.
But what about the slot machines next to the blackjack tables? Or the ones upstairs,
next to the posh restaurant? Not good choices. Remember the airport slots? You know,
the lousy slots that suckers play while waiting to catch a plane. The same principles
apply
for slots next to table games, upscale restaurants and incidentally, next to areas where
people are forced to wait, like show lines, or hotel check in lines.
Steele's study of slot machine placement makes a lot of sense, at least from a casino
marketing perspective. Human behavior being what it is, the logical way to place slot
machines is to make the better paying ones very visible, and then slot players will make
the
decision to stay and play in that casino for a while. However, because people like to
space
themselves out, most persons will not start playing in locations with higher paying
slots.
They will seek their own space and either move over a couple of aisles or seek out their
own little dark corner. It is only after the casino is nearly full that persons will "fill in"
skipped over slot machines.
So that casino is going to make a lot of money off of slot players, even when they
offer slots programmed to pay out 98% or even 99%. Players will typically scatter
about
the casino and end up playing on those 93% to 95% slots. Or even land on a 90%
clunker.
A few more assertive players will plunk down right in the midst of the winning
slots, often in an unoccupied seat between two seemingly winning players. The casino
doesn't mind because lower paying machines are mixed in with the higher paying slots,
and the chances are excellent that the assertive player just found a lower paying slot
between two higher paying ones.
You can see the picture. The casino is in little danger of having all the players
converge on the better paying slots. Because of the scatter principle, most people will
scatter about the casino. Even the players who squeeze in between two apparent
winners
will most likely find that they have picked a lower paying machine.
The philosophy of slot placement near table games, show lines, upscale restaurants,
and areas used primarily for access to elevators or for hotel reservations is similar to
airport
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (26 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
slot machine placement. In these areas, the slot patrons' primary purpose is not to play
slots; the slot machines are incidental. Think about how table players conduct
themselves.
A typical craps player only plays slots as a diversion. He is not going to spend much
time
looking for a slot machine. After all, his or her game is craps. The casino executives
know
this. So they place slots programmed to pay lower payoffs near the table games.
If you observe slots near the table games, you will find that the typical player has
either just taken a break from playing a table game, or is killing time. The table players
will not play very long on a slot machine, and they seldom win much. The casinos have
accomplished several things in offering the table players tighter slots.
First, the table player has little expectation of winning much, if anything, on the slot
machines. Otherwise why would they be table players? The tighter slots placed
adjacent
to the table games merely reaffirms this thinking and may reinforce the players'
dedication
to their favorite casino table game. After all, craps or blackjack can't be all that bad,
look
what the slot machine just did to them.
Secondly, why would a casino place better playing slot machines near the table
games? It doesn't make much sense to cannibalize the table games to attract a few more
slot players. Almost without exception, the slot machines placed directly adjacent to
table
games are lower payers.
The "airport slot placement" philosophy
is in full force in slots placed in or near
aisles used primarily for access to other
casino areas. If your purpose is to see a
show, and you are in line for that purpose,
a well paying slot is not going to divert you
from that purpose.
So you plunk a few coins in a slot machine convenient to persons waiting in the
show line. Your purpose in being in that spot at that time is not to play slot machines,
and
the casino is happy to accommodate you with a machine programmed to take a higher
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (27 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
percentage of your money.
I know that the slot machines next to show lines are highly visible. So what? They
are mostly visible to other persons in show lines who are not potential slot machine
players,
at least not at that time. Other persons passing through? What do you do when you
encounter a mob of people lined up to see a show? You go around them, usually as
quickly
as possible. Another aspect of human behavior is that most people don't like mobs.
From a
casino perspective, it would be a total waste of money to place better paying slots near
show lines.
The persons lined up are not good prospects for extended slot machine play at
that time and others will tend to pass through the congested area as quickly as possible,
so
that the benefit to the casino of having higher paying slots in this area is almost nil. One
group doesn't have the time to play slots, and the other group is going to try to get
through
this area as quickly as possible, without even observing the slot machines other than to
avoid running into them.
There is no question that slot machine placement is close to a science. A science
based on observed, and therefore predictable human behavior. But now that we know
how
the casinos think and how better paying slot machines are located, we can thwart the
casino
marketing types and find and play only the better paying slot machines.
A final, yet crucial element in locating the highest paying slot machines is finding
machines played regularly by local patrons. Locals, as they are often called, probably
spend a lot more time playing slot machines than an occasional visitor ever will. Some
of
them have become degenerate gamblers and will, unfortunately, find ways to lose
money
gambling that you and I can only dream of. But some of the locals do pretty well
playing
the slots. Many of their theories of why they do well border on bizarre, entailing lucky
charms they always wear when playing slots, the best time of day to play, how warm
(or
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (28 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
cold) their favorite machines are or which change girl always brings them luck.
But, if you find a local who wins fairly consistently playing slot machines, the
chances are very good that this local has done a lot of your work for you in finding high
payout slots.
Now locals don't wear badges saying "I'm a local." They don't normally tell
strangers their life histories in the first five minutes of conversation (I take that back.
On
more than one occasion I have been treated to a life history after no more than a nod
and
hello to a fellow slot player). A good way to find out about locals' playing patterns is to
go
where locals go and talk to them.
In Las Vegas, you will not find too many locals who regularly play slots on the
strip. They hang out downtown or in casinos located away from the major casinos like
Arizona Charlies, Texas and The Fiesta. To find and play the slots that locals like, you
first
need to meet and talk to locals. But you also need to qualify what the locals tell you
and
take much of it with a grain of salt.
With the exception of New York City, Las Vegas probably has more crazies per
square mile than any other city. Like New York, Vegas is a dumping ground for the
world's disaffected as well as its high rollers. More dreams have probably been crushed
in
Las Vegas than any other location, except maybe Hollywood. But that's another story.
If a
local tells you that he has a guaranteed way to win at slots and yet looks like he
purchases
all of his clothing at the local thrift shop, you should consider the source of the advice.
However, many locals are normal people. They have families, jobs, children, homes
and
lead very typical American lives, except they play more slots than a whole bus load of
tourists. They are the people you want to meet.
Locals who play slots several times a week, have done much of your work for you.
Not only will they tell you where to find the best casinos for slot players, but they can
show
you where the slots they like to play are located within the casino. Like anything else
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (29 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
that a
stranger tells you, you have to separate the wheat from the chafe, but if you get in the
habit
of talking to fellow slot players, you will find many locals are happy to share their slot
stories (everyone likes to talk about what they do well).
Cultivate slot players who live in the same town where you are playing. They
know more than you will learn in five years of vacation play.
I hope you have gleaned that finding a higher paying slot machine may be critical to
your success in playing slots. I make no apology that locating a good paying slot is a
little
more complicated than grabbing the first slot that rears its pretty face on your next visit
to
casino land. I didn't make the rules; I am merely observing and reporting. In the past I
have gotten angry letters from Atlantic City patrons who have accused me of being
everything from biased (mild criticism) to being a dupe for the Las Vegas robber
barons
(not true).
I approach every casino excursion as a private war between me and the casino. The
war is decided by who walks out of the casino with the most money them or me. I
have
no allegiance to any particular joint, although, like anyone else, I have my favorites. So
you east coast players, lighten up. You may not be playing in the best locale, but you
can
still make the best of an "iffy" situation by observing the other rules for finding the best
slot.
To help you do just that, I have prepared a little test for you. Don't worry, you
won't be graded and no one but you has to know how well you do. In fact, it is really
more
of a test about your favorite casino, so if your score is lousy, blame those guys.
This test is to help you rate your approach to finding higher paying slot machines.
If your score is low, you have probably not been doing too well with the one armed
bandits.
Now you have an explanation. It wasn't your bad luck; it was the crummy casino you
have
been playing in. So use this test positively. Find a better place to play slots and zero in
on
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (30 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
the best slots in the joint.
SLOT LOCATION TEST
Give yourself the number of points corresponding to each answer. At the end of the
test,
add up the points and see the next page for suggestions.
Geographic Location: Pick where you most frequently play and
give yourself the number of points corresponding to that location.
Nevada Downtown Las Vegas, Reno, Tahoe, or Laughlin 5
Nevada Las Vegas Strip 4
Colorado 3
Midwest, South 2
East Coast Atlantic City, Foxwoods 1
Type of establishment:
Casino 5
Non Casino grocery store, airport, roadside location 3
Illegal casino or unregulated casino 1
Type of casino:
Slot players emphasized 5
Posh, caters to high rollers 2
Location in casino:
In slot machine area, highly visible to other slot players 5
In slot area, but not as visible 3
Next to table games, on access aisle 1
Local Patronage:
High local patronage, verified by conversations with locals 5
Low local patronage, or local patronage not observed or verified 2
Score Ranges:
25 Points Perfect. You have found the best located slot machine for slot play.
If you use the money management strategies and apply one or more of our slot systems,
you are favored to win.
21 - 24 Points Acceptable. Slot machines in this range offer good prospects of
winning. If you have come this close, why not go for perfect?
18 - 20 Points Barely Acceptable. Machines in this range will do in a pinch,
but watch your bankroll. These machines are not for serious players.
10-17 Points Not Acceptable. The only way to play these machines is to set a
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (31 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
low bankroll and then walk away after you lose.
7-9 Points Don't Bother. Think of all the things you could do with this money
besides feed it to a machine. Take up sky diving or bungy cord jumping.
I hope you scored a perfect 25 points. If not, you now know where you need to
direct your efforts in finding a better slot machine to play.
Slots Money Management
Success at slot machines requires that a planned, methodical approach to money
management be followed. This is going to require a certain amount of discipline, an
element which many persons denigrate when it comes to gambling. "Luck" seems to be
the
only factor of importance. While we believe that luck can have a major influence on
any
slot player's wins and losses, we also know that the consistent winners are going to
have a
sound money management approach in place as well as lady luck.
The first and most obvious requirement to win at slots is to have an adequate
amount of money set aside for this purpose. While we have all heard of persons who
only
played with ten or twenty dollars and hit million dollar jackpots, these occurrences are
indeed rare, and to guarantee a fair shot at winning, certain funds must be designated as
strictly for playing money.
Money allocated for slots play must be for just that purpose. Additional monies for
traveling expenses, meals, and sundries should be kept separate from slots playing
money.
This requires some advance planning before assaulting the slot machines. You have to
know in advance just how much money you are willing to risk against the slot
machines.
This money will be kept separate from money to be used for other purposes.
The amount of money required to play slot machines will vary with the particular
person's personal finances, strategy for slot machine play, and the length of time
planned
for slot machine activities. The location will also have an influence on the amount of
money required for slots play, with the high casino hold destinations such as Atlantic
City
requiring more capital than Nevada locations.
Let me explain. If, like many slot players, you use planned playing time more than
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (32 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
bankroll considerations to determine how long you play slots, then if you choose to
play,
say ten hours in Atlantic City, you are going to need a larger bankroll than for ten hours
of
play in Las Vegas, because the Atlantic City casino is going to take your money at a
higher
rate.
Rather than playing the casino's game and bringing more loot for them to have a
crack at, I suggest that the east coast players limit the amount of their slots bankroll,
which
may entail limiting the amount of time spent playing slots. The solution? Learn a table
game, or save the extra money which might have been lost in casinos offering inferior
paybacks and use the money for slots play on an excursion to a better slot locale.
As a general rule, a slot player planning on playing dollar slots, at $1 a pull, should
plan on having at least $100 per day for slots play. A four day vacation with slots play
planned for each day will require at least $400, specifically set aside for slots play only.
If
the player plans on playing machines which require $3 a pull, then the bankroll should
be
tripled to $300 a day.
A quarter player, should have at least $25 a day for slots play. If the player plans
on inserting more than a quarter per play, this bankroll should be at least $75 per day.
Each day's bankroll is just that: the bankroll for one day's slots play. It is suggested
that each daily bankroll amount be kept separate from the remainder of the slots
bankroll,
so that if the money set aside for one day's play is lost, the player will not be tempted to
use
the next day's bankroll prematurely.
So, assuming that the daily stake is set at $100, the most that can be lost on that day
is $100. Now with this $100 stake, we are going to get at least five shots at slot
machines.
Using our slot selection criteria, you are going to pick the best slot machine for your
particular goals. If this machine does not meet certain minimum criteria within a short
time
period, you will cease play on this machine and move to a different slot.
By dividing your daily stake into five $20 stakes, you will risk no more than $20 on
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (33 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
any machine which does not pay off in a satisfactory manner. If the $20 is lost on a
machine, at least four chances are left to find a better machine. This approach sets loss
limits per machine and daily loss limits as well.
Our basic approach is going to be one of strictly controlling losses, and when a
lucky streak comes our way, letting our profits accumulate as quickly as possible.
The corollary to limiting our losses is to set reasonable daily profit expectations and
then to quitting when these targets are reached or exceeded. Now this approach will not
satisfy the player whose only goal is to hit a million dollars (or thereabouts), but it is
the
only realistic strategy for those of us who really don't expect to win this much but are
quite
content with smaller more easily attained amounts. Don't worry. If your goal lies only
in
the arena of the million dollar jackpot, you can still apply sound money management
techniques, especially by limiting your losses to your predetermined daily limit.
A reasonable, and certainly attainable, daily profit target is to win an amount equal
to the daily playing stake. If your daily bankroll is $100, then you should stop when
your
daily winnings reach or exceed $100. If this seems too tame for you (after all, if you
have
won $100, what's to prevent you from winning $1,000?), then your approach will be as
follows. After you have won a daily profit equal to your daily bankroll, you will set
aside
one-half of this profit and all of your daily stake. If you are playing with $100 a day
and
have won $100, you will now set aside $150, leaving $50 to play with. If this money is
lost, you are absolutely finished playing for that day.
You must either stop completely or use only a portion of the winnings when you
find yourself in this situation and want to continue playing. You may recall our earlier
example tabulating the possible results the casino hold percentage can enact on your
money. The longer you continue to play, the more likely the casino hold is to grind you
down and take all of your money.
The secret to winning at slots is knowing when to stop. We have just discussed the
happy circumstance in which you have reached your daily winnings target and must
make a
decision about whether to continue or quit for the day. What if things are not going
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (34 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
your
way? What are your best options?
When losing, your first option is to change machines. Too many players act as if
they have become chained to their machines. If a machine is not paying, your
"investment"
in it will have no effect. Your investment is not really an investment; it is, in fact, a
loss. It
is what accountants call a "sunk cost." It is gone, and for all practical purposes
irretrievable. Your best strategy is to take a break and then find another machine.
Likewise, there are a number of warning signs that things are about to go against
you even if you haven't started losing. If the other players are beginning to irritate you,
quit. If you feel that you are lucky and that you might as well use all of your trip
bankroll
right now, quit. If you are tired and losing faith in your system, quit. The old saying
that
"good things come to those who wait" has more than a grain of truth in it. If anything is
causing you to lose your patience or your temper, or if you just feel like you are losing
control, you need to take a break.
The best approach to win at slots, or at any other gambling game is a calm and
measured approach. You can still holler and carry on if you win a big one. After all,
playing slots is supposed to be fun. But, when it comes to your money, you will not let
emotions, either positive or negative, interfere with your sound exercise of good
judgment.
The fact that you are reading this book shows that you have some interest in
winning at slots. Keep this attitude when you are on the front line in the casino, and
you
will be ahead of about 95% of the players.
You need to add a final element to managing your slots bankroll. You are going to
record everything you do with this money. This is not a chore, and you will get a big
kick
out of recording your daily progress.
You will need to purchase a small notebook to be used for recording the results of
your slots play. Preferably this notebook will fit in your pocket or handbag as it is
important that you carry it with you to the casino.
You are going to use this notebook to record the results of every session of slots
play. This is going to offer you several benefits. First, you will not be able to deceive
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (35 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
yourself about how well (or poorly) you are really doing. Ever ask fellow gamblers
how
well they are doing? If they are losing everything but the kitchen sink, they will tell you
that they are down a little, or "I'm, down some today, but I made a killing yesterday." If
they are winning, they will tell you, "I'm up $3,112.00 at this point."
Neither answer is likely to be very accurate because we like to deceive ourselves
about what is really happening in a casino. Somehow the casino experience does not
seem
very real until we are on the way home and realize that we lost all of our cash,
borrowed on
every credit card we have and lost that too, and the real awful truth is that we lost a
whole
lot more than we could afford.
This is not going to happen to you! You are going to record every win or loss in
clear precise indisputable numbers in your gambling notebook. You don't have to tell
anyone else what is in there because they won't believe you any way. But you will
know,
and this will help you to become a consistent winner. An additional benefit is that if
you
record the right information, you will also have an excellent source of documentation
so
that you can actually deduct gambling losses against your winnings when you hit the
huge
jackpot, and the bells on your machine seem to ring forever.
A simple record keeping system might look like the following:
Machine Time Slot Won Total
Date Casino Number Played Bank (Lost) Won(lost) Comments
1.
2.
3.
4.
One line will be used to record the results of each session with a slot machine. It is
a good idea to record the machine identification number which can be found on the side
of
the machine. The slot bank is the amount used to play that particular machine. If your
starting bankroll for this particular machine is $20, then this amount is your slot bank.
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (36 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
The
amount won or lost is easy to compute. When you have finished play just count the
tokens
remaining and subtract the slot bank amount. Comments might include observations
you
have made, people you have seen that you know and notes and memory joggers you
want
to keep for future reference.
The total won or lost column will be used to keep a running tally of your position.
You can set up your score keeping sheet in such a way that 25 or 30 games can be
recorded
on one sheet, and the results of a three or four day trip can be shown on that sheet.

After you have completed a slots trip, you will file the score keeping sheet in your
slots notebook to be retained indefinitely. This is important for two reasons. First you
will
want to keep a record of your progress in trying different systems at different locations.
Human memory is not reliable enough to serve you well in this capacity. Secondly, all
of
this information will serve as a permanent record so that you will have the ability to
deduct
gambling losses against any reportable gambling wins you have. More on this later.
When you finish a slot session, you need to make it a habit to tabulate your
winnings (or losses), check the approximate amount of time spent at the machine, and
immediately record this information. You will find that the score keeping will become
second nature to you in a very short time period, and you will actually improve your
play.
Win Goals
Last week my wife and I went to a B. B. King concert. The old rhythm and blues
artist had just celebrated his seventieth birthday and put on a fine performance. At
intermission, the gentleman seated next to me commented on my tie, which depicted a
number of roulette wheels, and asked if I worked for a casino. I told him I didn't and
that
the tie represented my enjoyment of casino gaming and did not represent where I
worked.
He proceeded to tell me about how he plays craps. He cited a couple of craps
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (37 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
authors (not me, and not wanting to prolong the discussion, I didn't confess), and
described
in great detail how he places his bets. After some discussion of the old Ponzer method
(pass line wager plus odds, two come bets with odds) I asked him how he was doing at
craps. After some hemming and hawing he stated that he was losing because he hadn't
quite got the money management part down, but he planned on working on it.
This didn't surprise me. Most gamblers have heard of money management and
might get around to learning something about it "one of these days."
And guess what. Based on my totally unscientific survey consisting of hundreds of
conversations with gamblers who play like this, I haven't found one gambler who
ignores
money management and manages to win anything on a regular basis, regardless of the
casino game. Not one. The exceptions to this rule are lottery winners and progressive
slots
jackpot winners. So if you fall into one of these categories, I apologize to you. I guess I
just didn't have a chance to visit with you. As for the rest of us, it may be time to learn
a
little bit about money management.
Let's start with your bankroll. You already know what that is. It's how much
money you bring with to play slots. It is not your rent money. It's not your food and
beverage money. It's not the money you promised to use to buy your wife a birthday
present. It is money set aside for no purpose other than to play slot machines.
Say you bring $500. Now you divide this up into daily bankrolls of $100 each. It
could be $200 each, or $50 each or $250, but the point is, you don't plunk the entire
$500
into the first slot machine you happen to notice. You divide your bankroll up, sort of
like a
commanding general who doesn't throw all of his troops into the first engagement with
the
enemy. You are probably agreeing with me at this point. Makes sense to keep some
reserves.
Now I am going to hit you with a question that most gamblers can't answer. How
much do you expect to win with that $500 bankroll? Come on, give me an answer.
$5,000? How about $2,000? Or maybe only $1,000? Or haven't you even thought
about it?
Let me tell you a brief story about a friend of mine who was a
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (38 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
craps player as well as a slot player. I went on several
gambling trips with Bob, who was a great travel companion
and totally addicted to casino gambling. He always brought
$5,000 with him and always went home broke. Without
exception. On one memorable trip he was down to pocket
change. Not a solitary bill in his billfold.
This part is not so surprising. Most of us have known at least one Bob. The
surprising thing was that Bob was always shocked when he came home totally tapped
out.
It was like some kind of light went on when he boarded the plane, and he would ponder
and
say, "Well, I lost it all again, didn't I?"
You probably think that Bob was unlucky. Nope. I have been with Bob on
numerous rolls at the craps table where he would hold the dice for fifteen or twenty
minutes
and thousands would roll our way. On every trip Bob had at least one hot roll on the
craps
table. And every trip, he would keep raising his wagers until the casino had taken back
not
only all of his winnings, but every cent he had on him. Bob also went through some
casino
credit, but I'm not supposed to mention this. His wife would kill him.
So what was Bob doing wrong? He was certainly luckier than I was as a craps
shooter. His rolls were outstanding. Yet every chip he ever won would go back to the
casinos.
I could develop quite a list about what Bob did wrong. But we are talking about
win goals, so let's focus on that. Bob lost money because he was never satisfied with
any
amount he won from the casinos. Just walked away with $5,000? Bob would be back in
ten minutes trying to win $10,000. Just dropped a couple of grand? Bob would double
his
wagers to win it back. No matter what happened, Bob would eventually double and
triple
his wagers until he managed to lose it all back.
I remember on one occasion asking him how much he wanted to win with $5,000.
"About fifty or a hundred grand would be nice," he answered.
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (39 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
Let's see. If Bob wanted to win $100,000 with a $5,000 bankroll, then you ought to
aim at about $10,000 with a $500 bankroll. Right? Wrong.
Part of Bob's problem was that he would never set a realistic win goal. I am
absolutely certain that if he ever won $100,000 at craps, he would adjust his target to a
million dollars and go home broke.
A major principle of gambling, speculating or investing is that the lower your profit
objective, the easier (and less risky) it is to hit.
Want to earn five percent a year on your investments? Fine, I'll send you a list of
grade A money market funds. Want to earn 10%? No problem, Grade B- corporate
bonds
can do that. Want to earn 20% or more per year? Now it gets interesting. Let's try a
mixture of stocks, junk bonds and throw in some commodity futures. How about 100%
a
year? Let's go for it. Options on foreign stocks, currency futures markets, specialized
day
trading techniques of Standard & Poors stock options. Piece of cake. Or is it?
I am sure you recognize what is going on here. The investment earning 5% is
pretty close to a sure thing. The 10% investment is a little riskier. Once we go to 20%
and
beyond, the risk of losing all of our capital climbs exponentially. And the same
principles
hold with casino gambling.
With gambling, the lower the amount you expect to win, the more likely you are to
win it.
If you bring $500 to the casino, you might double your money. But if the only
thing you will be satisfied with is doubling your money, the risk of losing it all is very
high.
How about winning $200? Or $100? Now your risk factor plummets, and with it, the
chance of winning significantly increases.
You're probably thinking. "If all I can win is a measly hundred bucks I might as
well not even bother." And so you don't.
Most people play about like my friend Bob, but without his luck. Bob was never
satisfied no matter how far he got ahead. Think about it.
What's so bad about winning $100? Let's examine your pattern of play. Do you
lose $500 four times a year? What if, instead of losing $500, you brought home $600?
Then on your next trip you could take $1,100 (the $600 from your winning trip plus the
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (40 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
$500 you normally scrounge up anyway). With $1,100, your win goal could be $220.
I'm not going to do the math for you, but if you played like this for a couple of
years, you would graduate from being a $500 bankroll player to a $5,000 bankroll
player.
In a couple of more years, you could bring $10,000 or more for a gambling excursion
and
not bat an eye. All from setting a goal of winning $100 with a $500 bankroll.
Now I've got some good news for you. With a twenty percent win goal (same thing
as $100 with a $500 bankroll), your winnings are not limited to $100. This is your Win
Goal. When you hit it, you don't have to quit playing. Just take this step. Set aside all of
your original bankroll of $500 plus some percentage of your winnings, but not less than
50%. Now you will play with this excess. If you hit your Win Goal again, repeat the
process. But if you lose the excess, you wrap it up and quit gambling.
Let's see how this might work. Set your Win Goal at 20%. Let's say you finish a
session, take a break, add up all your winnings and find that you are now up $110. You
now set aside one-half of your winnings ($55) plus your original bankroll of $500 and
continue playing with the $55 excess.
In another hour you notice that you now have $100 in winnings. Break this in half,
set aside $50 and continue to play with $50.
In a couple hours more you count your coins and find that you now have $78. Do
the same thing again. Set aside an additional $40, and continue to play with $38. But at
this point, you add another ingredient to your play. Every time you have a winning play
on
the slot you lock up some of the winnings.
Finally you notice that the $38 excess is down to $10. Not much you can do with
ten bucks is there? So you lock this up too and call the slots play over.
How much did you end up with? Let's see.
After winning $110, we set aside $55 plus the original bankroll of $500 for a total
of $555.
Then we set aside another $50, for a total of $605.
We grabbed another $40, bringing our total up to $645.
Finally, we starting putting back winning from each play in our stash for another
$22. We noticed that we only had $10 left, and we added that to our bankroll, bringing
the
grand total up to $677, for a net win of $177 or 35% of our original bankroll. Now this
is a
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (41 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
nice win. If you do this four times a year, you will be earning 140% a year on your
money.
Not bad at all.
You might notice that a 20% Win Goal did not prevent you from going ahead and
winning 35%. Win Goals are not absolute stopping points but signals about when it is
time
to set money aside, so that no matter what happens from this point on, you will leave
the
casino a winner.
Using a Win Goal is a powerful tool. If Bob had used this concept, he would be
thousands of dollars richer today.
Loss Limits
What's the flip side of Win Goals? Loss Limits. Limiting the downside. Most
people do it every day. Except when they gamble.
The typical slot player's activities are geared to how much time he or she has for
gambling. Visiting the casinos for three days? Then let's play slots for three days.
This kind of thinking is natural, especially if you enjoy playing slot machines.
That's why I suggest dividing your bankroll up into daily sessions. In case I hadn't
mentioned this, if you lose all of your daily bankroll you are done for that day. You
don't
grab tomorrow's bankroll and keep playing.
So using a session bankroll has a kind of built-in stop loss. But I want you to think
about setting another more stringent limit on losses.
I want you to limit your losses so that you won't ever lose all of your daily bankroll.
Not once. Not even if you were celebrating your new promotion. Or mourning the loss
of
your favorite coon hound. Not ever.
And I want to go a step further. I don't want you to ever lose all of the coins
designated for play on one slot machine. Ever.
What we are aiming for is a series of loss limits, with the ultimate goal that you
won't ever go home broke. Remember Bob? Even though he was a lousy gambler, Bob
was an excellent salesman. Except after his gambling trips. He would go into a funk,
sometimes for weeks. And the number one reason he would do this is because he felt
bad
about losing all of his money gambling.
Winning slot play is a mixture of preserving your bankroll, following trends,
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (42 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
knowing which machines to play (and which ones to avoid), using a good system and
knowing when to quit. But it also has a healthy psychological component. But a huge
negative of playing slot machines is losing all of your money in the game.
So we are not going to do that. In order to
prevent the loss of our bankroll, we will control our
losses throughout the gambling process, starting with
losses on an individual machine.
Some of you may question why we have to go this far. Why not just say, "Don't
lose all your money," and call it good?
Controlling losses (or hitting Win Goals) is not some global concept that occurs or
doesn't occur. If we play this way, we might as well count our money when we first
start
playing and then count again as we are leaving. If we have any money left, we could
claim
that we controlled our losses, when the reality was, we did no such thing. We just
happened to have a few shekels left when it was time to leave.
Controlling losses has to begin with play on an individual slot machine. Sort of like
a business creating and controlling a budget. Those of you that have ever been exposed
to
this process know that the businesses which successfully control expenses, define this
process all the way down to ordering office supplies. And it has to be done this way. It
does no good to have a departmental budget if one secretary can order a gadzillion of
paper
clips costing ten million dollars.
The same thinking has to be applied to gambling. It does little good to say that you
are going to avoid losses and then lose all of your bankroll on one machine. So we'll
start
by watching losses on every machine.
I am going to show you a number of ways of controlling losses on an individual
machine.
First and foremost, you will never cash in your entire bankroll, or in many cases
even your designated slot session bankroll, for play on a single machine.
Your slot bankroll will be divided into slot session bankrolls, which may be further
subdivided into slot banks, with each slot bank representing the money available for
play
on a given slot machine. The division of the slot session bankroll has some refinements,
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (43 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
dependent on the slot system used, but the principles are the same with every system
described in this book. You will never lose even one individual slot bank on a machine.
Before I show you how to avoid losses, let's talk about how most slot players play.
Many gamblers I know (and I speak from first hand experience, I've been there)
start to anticipate a gambling excursion rather intensely several days before a planned
visit
to a casino. They may even dream about playing slots. The excitement of a planned
casino
visit will often dominate their conscious thoughts. By the time they reach a casino (or
any
location where slot machines are available) their desire to start playing has almost
reached
a fever pitch.
When they pick a particular machine, a little fear starts to creep in. They will
remember previous trips when things did not turn out so well, so there may be a mental
tug
of war between their desires to get in the action again and their fear of losing all of their
money. Actually, I think the fear of losing money is secondary to most people, and the
fear
of appearing foolish or of being thought a fool of is greater than the fear of monetary
loss.
So the slot player takes a deep breath, and his positive feelings about slot play
overcome the negative ones. He or she goes to the change booth, exchanges some cash
for
tokens and begins play.
This psychological dissonance is over, at least for a while. Most people feel a bit of
relief at this point. The fear of losing has been temporarily displaced by the exhilaration
that gambling produces.
Because of the emotional side of gambling, many slot players invest a lot of psychic
energy into the selection of a slot machine. And this may be the start of their downfall.
The machine begins to take on human characteristics as the slot players' fortunes and
emotions wax and wane. If the player becomes angry, this feeling is often attributed to
the
machine, even to the point of thumping or striking it. Joy can be translated into stroking
or
petting the machine, anxiety can be expressed by talking to the machine.
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (44 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
Even if you are thinking that you have never talked to a machine, I know that you
have experienced emotional swings while playing and that, most likely, you have
personified these emotions into giving the machine qualities that quite frankly, it just
doesn't have.
As your play continues, you start to create fantasies based on the emotional toil of
playing slots. If you just play a little longer you feel that this machine will pay big. Or
you
feel very comfortable playing this machine and this feeling of comfort makes you feel
luckier than usual. Or you may start becoming angry with yourself, and transfer this
anger
to the machine.
Before you started playing, you made a type of commitment to begin playing on
this particular machine at this time and this place. You may want to continue playing
on
the machine to "prove" that you made the right decision or to overcome feelings of self
doubt brought on by gambling in the first place.
With a virtual plethora of emotions swinging the slot player from elation to despair,
many players are relieved when they can quit playing slots. Because they know
themselves
they will not quit playing as long as they still have playing money. The lure of the
machines is too strong. To resolve this conflict, they continue playing, even on
machines
which pay back almost nothing, until all of their bankroll has been used up.
Now a kind of psychic relief comes over them. The temptation to play is over.
Now they can relax. At this point a kind of calm sets in. They don't have to decide to
play
or not play a particular machine anymore. They don't have to worry about losing their
money. They also have some good stories they can share with their friends who have
also
lost money playing slots.
Or, the loss of money may bring anything but relief. Maybe the loss happened too
quickly. Or the original fever to gamble had not resided. Instead of relief, the anguished
gambler feels a craving to gamble again, almost like hunger. Now, credit card cash
advances, loans from friends or even hock shops come into play. Anything to relieve
the
hunger.
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (45 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
The feelings we described in the last paragraph are becoming unhealthy. Gambling
has taken control of the person's life, and become a compulsion. But notice how, even
short of feeling compulsive, the gambling and the interaction with the machine seemed
to
take on a whole set of meanings, separate from reality.
This is why people change personalities when they gamble. Cautious, plodding
types become aggressive or even manic. The fever can be that strong.
Casinos, of course, know about the emotions which gamblers experience. They do
everything possible to alleviate the sense of passage of time or of "another world" out
there
to lull the gambler into doing what must be a source of relief for many, and that is to
lose
all of the money. With the loss comes a sense of freedom. Gambling no longer
beckons,
or for those with a strong compulsion, a feeling of fear, akin to panic may envelope
them.
I've made a pretty good case for not gambling at all, haven't I? However, it is
possible to experience the highs of gambling without setting yourself up for the lows
which
inevitably follow losses. Sort of a gambling without guilt.
And that is to never lose all of your money at any machine. In order to do this, the
individual's feeling of obligation to walk away from the machine has to overcome the
compulsion to keep playing.
Fortunately, this is not as hard to accomplish as it sounds. We have to give the slot
player a reason to walk away from a slot that lets them off the hook, so to say,
emotionally.
A way of walking away from a machine which can be accomplished without engaging
all
of the emotions which came into play while pulling the machine's lever, or pushing the
button on some of the newer slots.
And the alternative to staying chained to a machine is loss limits and a different
style of play.
What if the slot player's purpose became transformed from finding an individual
machine and then "playing it for all it was worth," to playing a series of machines, and
grabbing what each had to offer?
With loss limits we can move from machine to machine, because our limits tell us
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (46 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
when it is time to move. We can combine the loss limits with Win Goals and move
through the machines like a pearl diver looking for the right oyster.
Forgive me for waxing poetic. That is not our purpose here. We want to know
practical ways of winning and how to beat the bastard casinos. But before we can,
shouldn't we at least touch on the very powerful under currents which affect most
gamblers? And shouldn't we recognize that slot machine play exerts major, and often
conflicting emotional stresses on most players?
Figuring out how to set loss limits is fairly easy. Starting to use them takes a little
more effort. But humans have a powerful counteraction to emotional stirrings. We can
start a new activity or change the way we do an old one, and just repeat the changes a
few
times and something almost magical happens. We form a new habit and the old ways
start
to die.
But in order to do this, many times we must overcome the strong attraction of old
habits. That's why loss limits are so important. They help break the typical slot player's
habit of not leaving a machine until all of the coins purchased for play into that
machine
have been taken.
One way of limiting losses is to
subdivide our slots bankroll into a daily
session bankroll. Then we further divide
this bankroll into individual slot banks.
Let's say that these divisions and
subdivisions have given us twenty coins to
play on one slot machine. Now here is
where we must modify our old thinking.
When we begin playing with our twenty coins, we have not made some kind of
subconscious decision to "give" these coins to the machine like some sort of pagan
sacrifice. Far from it. We have graced the machine with our temporary, but very
conditional presence. The machine is on trial. It better pay up or we will walk away.
Very
simple.
So we watch our twenty coins like a hawk. If the machine takes too many of them,
we are gone, off to greener pastures or at least better paying slots. We have finished our
interaction with this machine, thank you. We have other places to go and better things
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (47 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
to
do.
One way to do this which is very simple is to commit to play our twenty coins
through the machine only one time and then count the coins which come out. If the
machine returns too few coins, we consider it to have failed our test and we move on.
But even this limit of play entails some risks. What if we insert all twenty coins
and nothing comes back out? We end up walking away from the machine empty
handed,
something our new rules of play commit us not to do.
So we put another limit on the machine. It must reward us with a payoff within, say
nine pulls. To further control the machine, we will insert only one coin at a time and
give
the machine up to nine chances to do its thing. If it fails to produce, so sorry Charlie. It
been nice knowing you Mr. Slot Machine, but hasta la vista, Baby.
When we limit the number of pulls we will tolerate without a payoff, we are
shifting the burden of performance back to the machine. We are blameless if a machine
can't fulfill its end of the bargain. No emotions here. The machine was a clunker, and
we
simply take our business elsewhere. Each machine decides its own fate. We are merely
measuring how well it can do.
The concept of setting the number of pulls without a payoff, or what I call "Dead
Pulls" is a powerful one. We control the machine rather than the other way around.
The number of Dead Pulls is set by the player before play begins. This number of
profitless pulls should be between seven and ten slot plays. Less than seven and you
may
disqualify a machine prematurely. More than ten pulls and the investment is too great
in a
non paying slot machine.
The concept of Dead Pulls or other techniques to limit losses are used with every
slot system presented in this book. Use the concept. It will become an important part in
your transformation from slot loser to slot winner.
Four Slots Systems
MONEY MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
The easiest and one of the most reliable slot systems is the Money Management
System. As its name implies, its main objective is to force you to watch your money.
This
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (48 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
is accomplished by cutting losses, but allowing your winnings to run.
There is no cap on how much can be won with the Money Management System.
You could conceivably work your way right up to a million dollars with this system.
On
the down side, you won't lose more at any slot machine than your slot bank for that
machine, and if you have winnings on that machine, you will never give them all back.
If you can do these two things alone, that is, not feed a losing machine and not feed
winnings into a machine until all of the winnings are gone, you will be ahead of the
vast
majority of slot players.
Here's how this system works. First decide on the denomination of slot you want to
play. If you are in Atlantic City, you will not have the option of playing penny or even
nickel slots. However, if you are in Nevada, you will need to make a choice between
penny slots (there are still some in downtown Vegas), nickel, quarter, and dollar slots.
In
general, it is better to play the quarter or dollar slots as the casino hold is lower on these
machines. Some players will play five quarters at a time into a quarter slot because they
don't have money to play the dollar slots. At $1.25 a pull, it obviously makes more
sense to play a dollar machine. If your budget can afford the dollar slots, you will have
a
better chance of winning.
After deciding on the denomination of slot you
will play, you will know the amount of playing money
you need. Playing a dollar slot, one dollar at a time, you
will need $100 a day, divided into five slot banks.
Before beginning to play, pick your location
carefully. A good place to start would be one of the
smaller to mid-size casinos catering to slots players and
advertising high payoff slots. These higher payoff slots
can usually be found on a "dollar carousel" or similarly
marked areas.
Before picking your machine, look around. You don't have to start playing the first
slot you come to. What you will be looking for is a three reel older machine (not a pure
mechanical, but an electro-mechanical type of machine) with a jackpot, without a
bonus.
The machine will probably be a multiplier accepting from one to three dollar tokens per
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (49 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
play. You are looking for a multiplier which does not penalize you for not inserting the
maximum number of coins. This information can be determined by reading the front of
the
slot machine.
If three reel progressives are available, you should try to play the one with the
highest jackpot. It's amazing how many people ignore the jackpot amounts when
playing
the free-standing progressives. Given a choice, you are better off playing the machine
with
the higher payoff.
Beat the Slots! 68 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
After picking your machine, you will buy $20 worth of slot tokens. Incidentally,
many people believe that asking the attendant is a good way to find a slot "ready" to
pay
off. We don't believe that the attendants know any more than anyone else about when a
machine is ready to pay off, and you will do better using the criteria given here and
your
own judgment on picking your machine.
You may now start playing the slot machine. If you have not received any payoffs
by the tenth or twelfth token, you should quit this machine. You may have picked an
alljackpot
machine which only pays jackpots, or your machine is just not paying off very
often. At any rate, if you have had ten to twelve plays with no money paid back to you,
it
is time to find another machine.
Set aside your remaining tokens and record a loss in your notebook. You will now
find another slot and begin the process all over. Buy another $20 worth of tokens for
the
new slot. Don't just use the remaining tokens from the first slot to keep on playing, or
in
short time, you won't have any idea what your wins or losses are.
You begin playing the second slot and notice that a number of small payoffs are
being made. This is what you are looking for. You will leave all tokens coming out of
the
machine in the slot tray until you have completed a cycle and inserted all of your $20
slot
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (50 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
bank. At this point you will know that you have invested $20 in this slot and that the
amount of tokens in the slot tray represents your original investment plus or minus any
wins and losses. Now count the coins in the tray.
If you have lost money, you will need to change slots again. If you have winnings,
you will remove your original $20 slot bank from the tokens and only play with the
winnings. Make sure to note how much your winnings are.
Beat the Slots! 69 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Let's say that after the first cycle you have $32 in the slot tray. You will remove
$20 and continue to play with the $12 winnings. After the next cycle, you will again
count
tokens in the tray. Now you are up to $21 in tokens, representing your winnings on this
machine.
You may continue to use
your winnings from this
machine as long as they
continue to grow. Let's
assume that after cycle eight
your winnings are up to $72.
You feed the tokens through one more time, count them and notice that you now
have only $56 in tokens. Obviously, the machine took back more than it gave on this
cycle. You will now take a break from this slot and go cash in your winnings, and any
other slot tokens you may have.
When you resume play, you can try your lucky slot again, but you must subject it to
the same test as any other new slot: if it doesn't pay off in the first cycle, quit, record
your
loss, and find another slot.
There are a couple of variations of this system you can use to either accelerate your
winnings, or if you are more conservative, to protect your winnings.
If you want to win at a faster rate, you might try this variation. Wait until you have
doubled your money on the same slot machine. If you are using a $20 slot bank, you
will
be ahead by $20. Now start inserting two coins each play instead of only one.
Everything
will continue the same. You will still count tokens after each cycle and quit if your
winnings have gone down.
Beat the Slots! 70 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (51 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
When your original slot bank has been tripled ($40 winnings from a $20 bank), you
now start playing with three coins. You continue this way until the machine costs you
money on two cycles. In other words, when you reach the three coin level of play, you
will
give the machine a little more leeway, and it must produce two loss cycles before you
quit.
Using this last approach, it is possible to build up a substantial win off one machine
with only a $20 bankroll.
Now for the more conservative approach. Your object here is to preserve your
winnings above all else. This is the variation for people who had rather win something,
even a small amount, than to run the risk of losing.
With this conservative approach, you are constantly going to remove some
winnings from play. You may not be able to take much out on the first cycle or two, but
from there on, you will "lock in" additional winnings each slot cycle.
For example, let's say that after two cycles you are $41 ahead in tokens. Before
starting cycle three, you remove $10 in tokens from your winnings and take them out of
play. From now on, you will remove about 25% of the winning chips from each cycle.
You will still quit as soon as you have a losing cycle.
There is a final variation you
might try which mixes these two
preceding variations. With this
variation, you are still attempting to
win as much as possible, but you
want to hedge against losses.
Beat the Slots! 71 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Here you will increase the number of coins played after you have doubled your slot
bank. After the first cycle playing two coins, you will start removing coins from your
winnings. The thinking here is that since you are risking more money per cycle (two
coins
per pull instead of one) that you have to compensate yourself for the additional risk.
With
this "mixed" approach you should remove about 10 to 15% of the winnings after each
cycle.
This hybrid approach offers excellent upside potential and has the added benefit of
locking up more winnings each cycle.
Try each of these approaches. If you have picked your location and slot machine
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (52 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
well, you will find that you will seldom have a losing day with the Money Management
System or its variations.
THE 1-2-3 COIN METHOD
This system is used by a number of old timers who live in Nevada. They swear that
it is the most effective winning system they have ever used to beat the slots, and the
success
rate is claimed to be 90%.
In order to use this system you have to be willing to risk as much as $100 on a
single slot machine. Before you begin plunking $100 in a slot, you are still going to
qualify
the machine by playing no more than $20 in tokens. However, with the 1-2-3 Coin
Method, you will wait until you have lost the entire $20 before disqualifying a
machine.
This method is designed to be used on the three coin multiplier type of slot which
uses the bell, cherry, plum, orange, bar, and seven symbols.
Beat the Slots! 72 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
The system is based on the concept that there are more bell symbols on the first reel
than are on the second or third reels. Yet, the bell symbol offers fewer payoff
combinations, with the only payoffs including bells being Bell-Bell-Bell and Bell-Bell-
Bar.
To find the right machine, read the front of it and look for the correct payoff
symbols.
The rationale behind this system is that when the bell symbols appear on the first
reel, there are almost no payoff combinations available other than the two bell
combinations shown above. Because of the number of bell symbols on the first reel, the
machine can go into a "bell cycle" with bell symbols appearing on several subsequent
pulls.
This greatly reduces the payouts possible on the machine. When the bell symbols
appear
on the first reel, only one coin should be played on the following pull, with only one
coin
continuing to be played until no bells show on the first reel.
To start this system, always play
three coins on the first pull. If a bell
symbol shows on the first reel, after the
first pull, immediately reduce the coins to
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (53 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
one coin per pull.
With this 1-2-3 coin approach, you will vary the number of coins played per pull
using the following rules:
1. Always play only one coin following the appearance of the bell symbol on the
first reel, except after a large win.
2. If a larger payoff is hit such as $30, $54, $60 or a jackpot is hit, continue to play
three coins per pull for a total of three pulls. This technique is used as many times
larger
payoffs will come within two or three pulls of each other.
Beat the Slots! 73 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
3. If a bell symbol has not appeared on the first reel, the number of coins is
gradually increased, from one coin to two coins and then three coins. The rationale in
doing this is that the machine is in the correct cycle to pay off if the bell symbols are
not
showing on the first reel, and you will want to gradually increase the coins per pull in
anticipation of a payoff.
4. A cherry symbol is considered to be indicative of a payoff situation. If cherry
symbols appear on either the first or third reel, or both, then three coins should be
played
on the next pull. Cherries appearing on the second reel should be ignored.
This system has produced winnings of over $1,000 in less than a day. However, in
using it, we recommend that you remain cautious, and remove some of your winnings
from
play as you go, so that if you suffer a setback, you will not end up feeding all of your
winnings back into the machine.
THE PROGRESSIVE SLOT SYSTEM
Most of the progressive slots will not return as many coins per play on the average
as the nonprogressive slots with smaller jackpots. The reason is simple: each pull on
the
slot must contribute something to the ever growing jackpot on the progressives.
As a general rule, if you try to play the progressives on an exclusive basis, you are
going to have a poorer chance of winning as those large jackpots don't come along that
often.
However, there is a way in which you can play the progressives without the
downside risk of losing all of your money. Only play the progressives after you have
accumulated winnings using one of our systems on another machine.
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (54 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
Beat the Slots! 74 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Say your target win is $100 a day, and you have had a very good day winning $180.
You can now take some of your winnings and use the money for play on the
progressives.
As you will recall, there are two different types of progressives: the free-standing
slot which operates independently of other machines and the link-progressive slot
which is
linked to other slots all contributing to a central jackpot.
Your probability of winning is higher with
the free-standing slots, and your shot at a
substantial jackpot will be a lot better on one
of these machines.
To pick the progressive you want to try, find the one with the highest jackpot on a
three reel slot machine. If the machine has two jackpots, average the two jackpots. This
is
now your machine. Using only the amount of your daily winnings that you feel you can
afford to lose, say $50 out of your daily win of $180, start playing the machine. Maybe
you will get lucky and hit a jackpot in the amount of several thousand dollars! If you
lose
the money you have set aside for playing, stop playing. Tomorrow is another day, and
you
can repeat the process and play the progressive again using your "excess" winnings.
THE SCIENTIFIC SYSTEM
The scientific system is a slots system which compares the amount of a jackpot on a
progressive slot with the cost of playing the machine. This gives us a value which
determines whether or not the machine is a good risk.
Using a mathematical formula, we can calculate the expected return from a given
slot and decide whether the return is high enough to justify the risk of playing the
machine.
Beat the Slots! 75 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
This system is not for the faint hearted. It requires a large amount of money to be
played successfully and is used by some professional slots players who have large
bankrolls and a large amount of patience.
The information needed to make this calculation is:
The Jackpot This is the amount of the jackpot offered on the slot. If two jackpots are
offered, the average jackpot is used.
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (55 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
The Probability of Hitting the Jackpot The probability of hitting a jackpot is
calculated
by multiplying the number of symbols per reel to the power of the number of reels. If S
=
symbols and r = reels, then this calculation is S to the power of r or Sr. For a three reel,
20
symbol machine, we have 20 to the power of 3 (203 = 8,000 (20 x 20 x 20 = 8000).
Co-log Factor The Co-log factor is used to calculate the number of slot plays required
to
give us a 50-50 chance of hitting the jackpot. Technically, we are calculating the co-log
of
the hyperbolic log of 2, which is calculated to be .693. This is multiplied by S to the
power
of r to calculate the number of plays needed to have a 50% chance of winning the
jackpot.
For example, with a three reel, 20 symbol machine, we expect to have a 50% chance of
winning in 5544 pulls (Sr x .693 = 5544).
Cost per Play This is the true cost of playing the machine. It is computed by
multiplying
the dollar amount of coins per play times the casino hold. If the casino hold is 5% and
it
costs $3 per play, then the cost per play is $3 x .05 = $.15 per play.
Adjusted Cost The adjusted cost is our investment in the slot to have a 50-50 chance
of
winning the jackpot. It is calculated by multiplying the co-log factor times the cost per
play.
Beat the Slots! 76 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Expectation The expectation is a numerical expression of our chance of winning. It is
computed by dividing the jackpot by an amount equal to 2 times our adjusted cost. If
the
expectation is greater than 1, then we have a better than 50-50 chance of winning. If the
expectation is less than 1, then our chances are less than 50% of winning. Our goal is to
only play on machines where the expectation of winning is greater than one. If we limit
our play to these machines, we will always have a better than even chance of winning
the
jackpot.
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (56 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
Suppose we find a machine with a jackpot of $5,000. We know it is a three reel
machine and is of an older design, so it probably has 20 symbols per reel. We are
playing
in a casino catering to slots players so we might assume that the casino hold is only
about
5% on this machine. It requires $3 per play in order to win the jackpot. Is this a good
risk?
We calculate our expectation (E) of winning as follows:
A = S r x .693 x C x H
E = J / (A x 2)
Where,
S is the number of symbols per reel
r is the number of reels on the slot machine
.693 is the co-log factor used to determine the number of pulls to reach
a 50% chance of winning
C is the cost per play, i.e., the number of coins we play each pull
H is the casino hold percentage
Beat the Slots! 77 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
J is the jackpot showing on the machine or the average of two jackpots on the
machine
A is the adjusted cost to have a 50% chance of winning the jackpot and is
calculated in the above formula.
To evaluate the risk/reward of the slot machine we compute the following:
A = Sr x .693 x C x H
A = 203 x .693 x $3 x .05
A = 831.60
E= J / (A x 2)
E = 5,000 / (831.60 x 2)
E= 3.00
The way we interpret all this is that, on the average, when we are playing this slot,
we can expect to invest about $1663.20 per win of a $5,000 jackpot. This is like
flipping a
coin. If we lose, our cost is $1663.20, but if we win, the prize is $5,000.00.
The number of plays required to reach the jackpot, on the average, is 5,544 plays.
This means that we are going to spend a considerable amount of time playing this
machine
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (57 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
in order to be assured of hitting the jackpot.
Beat the Slots! 78 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
In looking at these numbers, it is important to remember that even if we play the
machine 5,544 times, we still are not guaranteed a jackpot win. We are talking about
averages here. If this system is played consistently, on different slots at different times,
and
the assumptions about the slot's behavior are correct (such as the casino hold), then we
are
going to win a lot more money than we are going to invest in play.
The easiest way to evaluate a
particular slot is to look at the value of E.
If E is greater than 1, then the machine is
a favorable one to play. The higher the
value of E, the more favorable the
machine is.
We suspect that not too many slot players want to go around the casinos making
these types of calculations. To simplify these calculations, we have created four tables
you
can use to check the particular slot against the table value to determine if it is a
favorable
slot.
These four tables show the most common combinations of reels, symbols and
casino hold percentages. In each of the tables all you have to check is the amount of the
jackpot. If the jackpot shown on the slot machine (or average jackpot if there are two
different jackpots) is greater than the amount shown in the table for that particular type
of
slot, then the machine is a favorable one to play. The larger the actual jackpot shown on
the slot is in relation to the table jackpot, the more favorable the machine is.
To use the tables, you first need to identify the type of slot. Let's say that you have
found a three reel progressive of an older style. Because the machine is of an older
design,
you surmise that is probably has 20 symbols per reel. It is located in a small downtown
Vegas casino which caters to slots players. Because you have done well on other
nonprogressive slots in the same casino, you believe that it would be safe to assume
that the
Beat the Slots! 79 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (58 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
casino hold is probably no more than 10%. The jackpot showing on the machine is
$5,324.
Should you play this machine?
You will find the answer in Table 5, which has the minimum jackpots for three reel
slots requiring $3 a pull in order to win the jackpot. The minimum jackpot for a 3 reel,
20
symbol slot with a casino hold of 10% is $3,324. Any jackpot higher than this amount
indicates that the machine is favorable to play. You notice that the machine jackpot is
$5,324, considerably more than the minimum jackpot shown in the table.
Congratulations.
You have found a slot that will give you a favorable probability of winning the jackpot
at a
considerable profit over your investment in the slot.
You will notice, in looking at the
tables, that the minimum jackpots on the
four reel machines are considerably higher
than the three reel jackpots (Tables 6 and 7
show minimum jackpots for the four
reelers). For instance, a 22 symbol, four
reel machine, requiring $3 a pull, and with a
15% casino hold has a minimum jackpot
requirement of $146,106. Assuming that
the machine jackpot was higher than the
amount shown in the table, theoretically
qualifying this slot for play, you still
wouldn't want to play it as it would take an
average of 162,339 plays to reach the level of 50-50 confidence of hitting the jackpot.
The
tables for the four reel slots are presented more for your information and entertainment
than
with any realistic expectation that you will ever try the scientific slot method against
these
monsters.
Beat the Slots! 80 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Table 4
Minimum Jackpots for 3 Reel, $1 Per Play Slots
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (59 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
Hold% 5% 10% 15% 20%
Symbols
20 554 1109 1662 2216
22 738 1476 2214 2952
25 1083 2166 3249 4332
Table 5
Minimum Jackpots for 3 Reel, $3 Per Play Slots
Hold% 5% 10% 15% 20%
Symbols
20 1662 3324 4986 6648
22 2214 4428 6642 8856
25 3248 6496 9744 12992
Beat the Slots! 81 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Table 6
Minimum Jackpots for 4 Reel, $1 Per Play Slots
Hold % 5% 10% 15% 20%
Symbols
20 11088 22176 33264 44352
22 16234 32470 48705 64940
25 27020 54140 81210 108280
Table 7
Minimum Jackpots for 4 Reel, $3 Per Play Slots
Hold% 5% 10% 15% 20%
Symbols
20 33264 66528 99792 133056
22 48702 97404 146106 194808
25 81210 162420 243630 324840
Beat the Slots! 82 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Static Playing Strategies
The strategies available for using Money Management type systems, which were
introduced in the last chapter, are many.
In general, these strategies entail qualifying each slot machine, using predetermined
criteria as to expected wins and acceptable losses, using a playing strategy on each
machine, playing a set number of machines per playing session, locking up profits as
they
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (60 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
occur, and quitting using either a preset loss limit or a stop loss technique designed to
prevent previous wins from being given back to the casino.
Static Playing Strategies entail setting all of the parameters of play before beginning
to play and then fulfilling the plan, without varying the play on an individual slot
machine
because of the machine's payoff patterns.
Dynamic Playing Strategies entail all of the parameters of the static strategy with
the addition that the playing strategy on an individual machine will be changed,
dependent
on the machine's payoff characteristics.
Either approach can be as simple or as complex as you choose to make it.
Complexity is not necessarily better than simple. In this chapter and the one which
follows
dealing with dynamic playing strategies, a number of different variations are presented.
It
is not expected that you learn every variation or try to implement every variation in
each
Beat the Slots! 83 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
slot playing session. Your goal should be to pick out the strategies which you feel
comfortable with, learn them and then put them into action against the slot machines.
Static playing strategies are very similar to the basic Money Management Systems
discussed in the previous chapter. They entail dividing your bankroll into session
bankrolls
(or daily bankrolls), and further dividing the session bankroll into slot banks.
Each slot bank will be used for play on a slot
machine. Whether play continues on one
machine, or moves to a different machine is
dependent entirely on the machine's performance
against predetermined standards we set for that
machine.
The most basic approach is to set our standards
of play and then "play through" a predetermined
number of slot machines, attempting to find the
machine which pays out at a superior rate.
Let's assume that we have a daily slot bankroll (this could be considered our session
bankroll also) of 100 coins. We divide this up into five slot banks of 20 coins each. Our
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (61 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
strategy is to pick five slot machines and play through each of them until we find the
best
paying slot machines. We will use all of the information we have learned to find the
best
located slots in the best casino for slot players, so that we will have a fairly high
probability
of success.
In addition, we will use the concepts of Dead Pulls and we will lock up excess
profits as we play. We will also set a loss limit per round of play per machine, so that
we
have an objective way of "measuring" how well the machine on which we are playing
is
performing.
Beat the Slots! 84 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Let's set our loss limit per machine at 20% of the coins inserted, in this case 20
coins. So our loss limit becomes 4 coins for a round of play.
If we define a round of play as the insertion of 20 coins into the machine, then, after
inserting all of the coins, we must have at least 16 coins left in the slot machine tray to
"qualify" this machine.
For this test, we will insert all 20 coins into the slot machine. But what if the
machine is a total dud and we have no payoffs in 20 plays? Obviously the machine
would
be disqualified, but at the cost of losing all 20 coins in the slot bank. And we don't ever
want to lose all of our slot bank on any one machine.
So we use the concept of Dead Pulls in conjunction with our loss limit per machine.
You may remember that Dead Pulls are the number of pulls we will tolerate where the
machine does not pay off. So we set our number of Dead Pulls, say at nine pulls. Nine
pulls is the maximum number of consecutive pulls we will accept without a payoff.
Now if
we walk up to a machine and experience nine consecutive pulls without any payback,
we
will simply take our remaining unplayed tokens and leave the machine. The machine is
eliminated from consideration. It has failed one of our basic tests.
Assuming that our machine passes the Dead Pulls test, we will play all of our coins
through. Keep in mind, though, that the count for determining the number of Dead
Pulls
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (62 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
begins anew after each payoff, so that a machine could be disqualified on the very last
play
if that play was the ninth consecutive play without a payoff.
So, if we don't hit our set number of pulls without a payoff, we will play through all
of the coins for this particular slot bank, or to continue our example, twenty coins.
After
playing through our slot bank, we will count our remaining coins and determine if the
machine at least met our loss limit of paying back 16 out of 20 coins. If it does, we will
continue to play the machine. If it doesn't then we are off to hopefully greener pastures
and
another slot.
Beat the Slots! 85 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
When we are qualifying a machine, we will usually play only one coin at a time, so
that a bank of 20 coins gives us 20 plays. It is only after we have qualified a machine
that
we will consider inserting more coins per play.
There is one more item we need to consider. Whenever we disqualify a slot
machine, because the coins returned from a round of play are less than our preset loss
limit
calls for or because we hit our preset number of Dead Pulls, we will use a new slot
bank for
qualifying the next machine. We will not take the coins remaining from a losing
machine
and start inserting them in another machine.
However, once we qualify a machine
and continue to play on it, we may decide
not to replace any lost coins after a round
of play, but rather to continue to play with
the same slot bank. Let's illustrate this.
Table 8 shows the results of using this 20 coin play-through technique on just two
slot machines. On the first machine, we inserted all 20 coins (one at a time) and found
that
the machine returned only 15 coins of the 20 inserted. This disqualified the machine.
Setting up a new slot bank, we found another slot and inserted 20 coins (once again,
one coin at a time). After this round of play, we counted our coins and found that 18
coins
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (63 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
were returned, qualifying the machine. Our preset number of nine Dead Pulls were not
encountered on either slot.
Having qualified the second slot, shown as slot #2 in the table, we continued to play
the machine. On our second round, we inserted the coins remaining after the first round
of
play, or 18 coins and the machine returned 21 coins, for a 3 coin profit. We removed
one
coin from our slot bank, leaving 20 coins for the next round of play.
Beat the Slots! 86 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
On round 3 we started with 20 coins and finished the round down 1 coin as 19 coins
were returned. For round 4 we played with the 19 coins left from the third round and a
total of 32 coins were returned. We removed the excess 12 coins to reduce our slot
bank
down to 20 coins and played round 5 on the machine.
At the end of the fifth round, the machine returned 35 coins, for an excess of 15
coins on the round. At this point we decided to take a break from playing.
Table 8. Illustrated Slot Machine Play
Machine Round
Coins
Played
Coins
Returned Profit or Loss
Coins
Pulled
1 1 20 15 - 5 NA
2 1 20 18 - 2 NA
2 2 18 21 + 3 1 coin
2 3 20 19 - 1 NA
2 4 19 32 +13 12 coins
2 5 20 35 +15 Stop
Profit +23
Please notice that after our fifth round of play on the second machine, we had an
accumulated profit of 23 coins from playing on these two slot machines. With 23 coins
(or
23% of our slot session bankroll) in hand, we may want to change our playing strategy
at
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (64 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
this point and lock up all or most of these profits. If you are at all fatigued, pressed for
time, restless or otherwise disinclined to continue slot machine play, this is a logical
stopping place. There is nothing wrong with pocketing the entire 123 coins (your
original
session bankroll plus your winnings) and calling it a day for slot play. Any time you
have a
Beat the Slots! 87 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
return greater than 20% of your daily bankroll, you should consider calling it quits for
the
session and leaving with your profit intact.
The key elements illustrated in Table 8 are:
1. We will play an entire round of coins, unless a high payoff is hit. With a high payoff
win, we may want to quit playing before the round is completed.
2. We originally qualify a machine by playing through 20 coins and comparing the
results
against a preset loss criteria. In addition, we will always use a preset number of Dead
Pulls
to protect our bankroll. In the illustration in Table 8, we used 4 coins as our cut off
point
for losses per round of play.
3. We will pull winnings back from each winning round to the extent of reducing the
number of coins we have back to the size of the original slot bank, in this example, 20
coins. Once a machine is qualified, we will not replace coins lost on a losing round.
Please
note that the qualification of any machine is temporary and conditional. If the number
of
Dead Pulls is hit, or if more than 4 coins are lost in a round, the machine is disqualified.
4. We will stop playing when our profit goal is hit or adjust our playing to reduce our
risk
even more after hitting our profit target.
5. We will stop play whenever a preset loss limit for the entire session is hit. This limit
could be 20%, 30%, 40%, 50% or as high as 60% of the session bankroll. The
percentage
loss allowed for a session bankroll may be the same or greater than the loss percentage
allowed per individual machine, but it is never less. A reasonable loss limit for a
session is
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (65 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
40% to 50% of the session bankroll.
Beat the Slots! 88 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
In the previous illustration we continued to play one coin at a time on each of the
rounds played. But we could have just as easily decided to vary the number of coins
played, once we found a qualified machine. Studies of slot machine play have shown
that
superior results are obtained when the number of coins inserted per play are varied.
A simple, yet powerful technique of play entails using a preset pattern of coins for
each round of play. Some patterns which may be used for a 20 coin round are shown
below. Please note that to use the patterns you will need to replace any coins lost on a
previous round of play so that each round will start with 20 coins, or modify the pattern
so
that less than 20 coins may be used whenever a round is played with less than 20 coins.
a). 1-1-1, 2-2-2, 3-3-3, 1-1
b). 1-1-1-1-1-1-1, 2-2-2-2, 3-2
c). 2-2-2-2, 3-3-3-3
d). 3-3-3-3-3-3-2
e). 2-2-2, 1-1-1-1, 2,3,3,2
f). 1-2-3, 1-2-3, 1-2-3, 1-1
g). 3-2-1, 3-2-1, 3-2-1, 2
h). 2-1-2, 2-3-2, 1-2-1, 2-1-1
i). 5-3-1, 4,3,2,2
The patterns which may be used for a 20 coin round are more limiting than those
available for 30 coin rounds. If your bankroll permits it, you may wish to consider
using
20 coin rounds to qualify slot machines, and then playing 30 coin rounds on qualified
machines.
Beat the Slots! 89 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Here are some patterns which can be used on 30 coin rounds:
a). 1-1-1, 2-2-2, 3-3-3, 4-4-4
b). 1-1-1-1-1-1, 2-2-2-2, 3-3-3, 4-3
c). 2-2-2-2, 3-3-3-3, 4-4-2
d). 3-3-3-3-3, 4-4, 5-1-1
e). 2-2-2, 1-1-1-1, 3-3-3-3, 2-2-2, 1-1
f). 1-2-3-4-5, 1-2-3-4-5
g). 5-4-3-2-1, 5-4-3-2-1
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (66 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
h). 3-2-1, 3-2-1, 3-2-1, 3-2-1, 3-2-1
i). 5-3-1, 4-2-1, 4-3-1, 3-2-1
You will notice that more four and five coin plays were included with the patterns
for 30 coin rounds as the larger number of coins per round allows more flexibility in
the
patterns selected.
These patterns are not written in stone, nor is the number of coins which may be
used per round. You may decide to play 50 coin rounds. The number of coins used for
a
round should certainly not exceed 50 coins though. The major purpose of dividing your
bankroll into rounds is to gain additional control over losses and extending a round
beyond
50 coins may very well compromise your ability to control losses.
Some of the parameters of play which may be varied are:
1. You may vary the number of coins used per round for play on a qualified machine. A
round of play may consist of from 10 to 50 coins.
2. You may set different loss limits for each round of play. In general, loss limits will
be
from 10% to 30% of the coins played. Lower percentage loss limits may be used when
the
number of coins set for a round is higher, and higher percentage limits used with
rounds
where a lower number of coins are used. With a 10 coin round, you may want to set a
loss
Beat the Slots! 90 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
limit of 30% (3 coins). With a 50 coin round, a 10% loss limit (5 coins) may be more
appropriate.
3. The size of the win goal may be set anywhere from 10% to 40%. In general, a higher
percentage profit may be used with a lower bankroll and a lower percentage target
profit
with a higher bankroll. With a daily bankroll of $100, you may want to set a target of
30%
or $30. With a $500 daily bankroll, a target of 10% or $50 may be more appropriate.
4. You may vary the loss limit set for a daily session. The daily loss limit is usually a
higher percentage than the loss limit for an individual slot bank. Thus you may decide
to
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (67 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
set a 20% loss limit per slot bank and a 40% loss limit per slot session.
5. Once a machine is qualified, inserting one coin at a time, you may want to use a
different playing strategy. Use of one or two of the patterns we have shown would be
appropriate on a slot machine once it has been qualified.
6. After a target profit level has been hit on a slot machine, all or at least a part of this
profit should be removed from play as well as the original session bankroll. The excess
profit (which can be from 10% to 50% of the amount won) can be used to continue slot
play, but if the excess is lost, all slot play for that day should be stopped.
A typical set of playing parameters would be:
Slot Bankroll 500 coins
Session Bankroll 100 coins
Slot Bank 20 coins
Loss Limit per Round of Play 20% or 4 coins
Session Loss Limit 25% or 25 coins
Win Goal 25% or 25 coins
Beat the Slots! 91 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
The idea of "Play-through strategies" is that you will determine a set number of
machines on which to play, with one slot bank for each machine, and then play within
these
limits. However, this plan of attack can be executed in a number of different ways.
1. The Stay and Play strategy was illustrated in the examples in this chapter. Here the
player found that the second slot played qualified and the player stayed with that slot
machine until the Win Goal was reached.
2. Another strategy is called "Play and Run." With this strategy, if five slot banks are
set
up, then the player will play on five slot machines and not continue play on any
machine
which qualifies. After trying five slot machines, the player will return to play on the
slot
machine with the highest payback on the qualifying round. The risk of this strategy is
that
under crowded casino playing conditions the "best" slot may not be available when the
player returns. Another risk is that the best paying slot may be cold when the player
returns
to continue play. The advantage of this strategy is that a vastly superior slot machine
may
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (68 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
be discovered when five or more slot machines receive play.
3. A fun strategy which may be extremely profitable is to combine Play and Run with
changing casinos. This is most feasible in locales like downtown Las Vegas where
there
are a variety of casinos in walking distance. Here a set number of machines are played
in
each casino, with a slot bank set up for each machine. A player might play two
machines
in Casino A, two in Casino B and finish with two in Casino C. The player would return
to
play on the best paying machine. The risks here are the same as with Play and Run, the
machine may be taken by another player or may have gone cold when the player
returns.
The upside potential is good as the process of changing casinos as well as machines
offers
higher potential of finding a superior paying slot machine.
Beat the Slots! 92 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
The playing strategies may also be varied considerably. Some common variations
you may want to try are:
1. Do not replace coins after a losing round on a slot machine. For example, if after
inserting 20 coins you find that you have only 15 coins left, disqualifying the machine,
you
move to the next machine using only 15 coins. The biggest risk of taking this approach
is
that you may not have enough coins left to properly qualify a machine. This approach
should be considered only if you are short on bankroll and still want to try playing on a
number of different machines.
2. You may decide not to lock up excess winnings as you play. If you decide to play
this
way, you will be inserting more coins into the machine after a winning round and you
should reset the loss limit to reflect the higher number of coins to be used. As an
example,
assume that you play 20 coins through and the machine returns 25 coins. Instead of
pulling
the five excess coins and adjusting the round size back to 20 coins, you decide to
reinsert
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (69 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
all 25 coins for the next round. If your loss limit is 20%, then your adjusted loss limit
for a
25 coin round is 5 coins. If you want to be more conservative (recommended) then
don't
reset the loss limit, but leave it at the original number of four coins. This approach can
allow more experimentation with betting patterns which require higher numbers of
coins
per round, but in general, it increases the risk of a loss without a compensating increase
in
the potential of winning.
3. You may wish to vary the betting pattern for each round of play on a qualified
machine.
This is a sound strategy which is recommended. Say you start playing with betting
pattern
h. After one round, you decide to change from pattern h to pattern a. You notice after a
round using pattern "a" that your winnings are better than with pattern h. So you decide
to
stick with pattern "a" for a while. The results of your play might look like the
following:
Beat the Slots! 93 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Betting Pattern h a a a a
Played per
Round
20 20 20 20 20
Win (Loss) + 2 + 5 + 6 + 4 + 35 Stop
Here the change from playing pattern "h" to pattern "a" seemed to produce
immediate benefits which you might not have realized without changing betting
patterns.
Using a static playing strategy may be summarized as:
1. Divide a session bankroll into slot banks. Even though we have used five slot banks
in
our example, the number of slot banks may be from three to ten.
2. Set a loss limit for the session. Session loss limits may vary from 20% to 60%. A
mid
range from 25% to 40% is recommended.
3. Set a loss limit per slot bank. The limit can vary from 10% to as high as 25%. The
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (70 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
number of coins used in the slot bank may influence the choice of a limit, with lower
slot
banks receiving higher loss limits and higher slot banks using lower loss limits.
4. Decide on a machine selection method. The choices are:
a. Stay and Play on any machine which qualifies.
b. Play and Run and with the predetermined number of slot machines before
making a final decision.
Beat the Slots! 94 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
c. Play and Run and Change Casinos which entails playing on a set number of slot
machines in two or more casinos and returning to the best machine after playing all of
them. A variation of this method is to change machines and casinos until a machine
qualifies, and then stay with the machine.
5. Select a pattern for initial play. One coin play should be used to qualify a machine
and a
betting pattern may be used after a machine has been qualified.
6. Decide on a profit lockup policy. Some of your choices here are:
a. Lock up excess coins after a winning round of play.
b. Do not lock up excess coins after a winning round.
c. When playing with the excess coins (i.e. 25 coins instead of 20 coins, reset
the loss limit per round (i.e. 5 coins instead of 4 coins) or leave the loss limit the same.
d. Decide on the percentage of profits to be "locked up" after a Win Goal is hit.
The lockup percentages should be from 50% to 90% of the profit, leaving 10% to 50%
of
the profit for play.
7. Experiment with different betting patterns. You very well may find that a particular
betting pattern works better on a particular slot than other patterns.
Beat the Slots! 95 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Dynamic Playing Strategies
With Static Playing Strategies we decide on all of the parameters of slot play before
even making one play on a slot machine. Our planning takes place before ever entering
a
casino and we define measurable means of judging our success or failure. In doing this,
we
insure that we don't repeat the errors of my friend Bob who never quit playing until all
of
his money was lost.
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (71 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
Using Dynamic Playing Strategies involves the same amount of planning as using
the static strategies. However, when we decide to use Dynamic Strategies, we will
adjust
our betting strategy to match the behavior of an individual slot machine.
In the previous chapter we gave an example of selecting playing pattern "a" over
pattern "h" when playing a slot machine as the "a" pattern seemed to produce better
results.
With dynamic play, we may not only choose pattern "a" over pattern "h," but we
well may create a new playing pattern as we play to match the payoff pattern of the
machine we are playing.
Let's start with the basics. We will divide our bankroll into Session Bankrolls,
typically with one Session Bankroll set up for one day of play. We may decide to play
two
sessions per day and have two Session Bankrolls per day. If we take this step, we need
to
Beat the Slots! 96 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
safeguard against just throwing all of our bankroll into slot play. So each Session
Bankroll
has to be respected and protected, even if we give ourselves the opportunity to play
more
than one session per day.
We will typically qualify a slot machine in the same manner as is used with Static
Playing techniques, that is, use a slot bank of 20 or more coins, play one coin at a time
and
measure the machine's payback versus our loss limit for a round of play.
However, once a machine is qualified, we generally will not limit ourselves to
playing the same size round as is done with static play.
On a qualified machine, we may decide to commit all of our session bankroll to
continued play on the machine. Instead of using a round of a preset number of coins to
control our losses, we will set up rounds based on completing a series of bets, and then
measure our performance after completing the bets.
Beat the Slots! 97 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Dead Pulls take on even more importance with Dynamic Play as they become our
principal safeguard against continuing to feed coins into a losing machine.
We will continue to use Win Goals as well as Loss Limits for each playing session,
and we will have to stay aware of the size of our bankroll so that we know when to
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (72 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
react to
either excessive losses or when to start locking up excess profits.
Let's look at an example of Dynamic Play. Before beginning play, we set up the
following guidelines:
1. Our playing session consists of 150 coins.
2. Our Loss Limit for the session is 50%, or 75 coins.
3. Our Win Goal is set at 30% or 45 coins.
4. We will use the location selection criteria to select the best casino for slot players
and to
pick the most likely slot machines in the casino.
5. We will attempt to qualify a machine by using up to five slot banks of 20 coins each.
While qualifying a machine, we will only use one coin per play.
6. After qualifying a slot machine, we will play a round using a predetermined betting
pattern. We decide to use a betting pattern and repeat the pattern two times per round of
play.
7. We set our Dead Pulls at ten pulls. We will track plays with no payoffs throughout
the
session and any time we hit our number of Dead Pulls, the machine will be
disqualified.
Beat the Slots! 98 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
8. We will adjust our pattern of play based on the machine's payback characteristics,
starting with the betting pattern 1-1-1, 2-2-2, 3-3-3, 1-1-1, 2-2-2. We will set our slot
bank
equal to 54 coins, which is twice the number of coins required to play all of the bets in
the
betting pattern. By setting up a slot bank twice the size of the total of all bets in the
pattern,
we will be able to play the pattern twice per round of bets.
9. We will have paper and pencil handy so that we can record how the machine pays.
We start by attempting to find a qualified machine. After finding a machine which
pays back enough after a round to avoid our loss limit, we will start playing the
machine
using the preselected betting pattern.
If we use the pattern 1-1-1, 2-2-2, 3-3-3, 1-1-1, 2-2-2, we will have fifteen
individual plays to complete the pattern one time. With a round of play set at 54 coins,
we
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (73 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
can complete this pattern of play two times. Let's assume that we do this and that we
write
down the play number and the payoff as a multiple of the number of coins inserted for
each
winning play. Our record of one round of play with 30 individual plays might look like:
Play Number
of Win
Payoff
Multiple
3 5x
7 2x
15 5x
21 5x
28 2x
30 5x
Beat the Slots! 99 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
This record shows that on our third play, we had a payoff equal to five times the
amount played, that on our seventh play, the payoff equalled twice the number of coins
inserted, and so on.
A simple analysis will show that we had six winning plays out of 30 plays, with a
win occurring on the average once every five plays.
Using this information, we decide to modify our original betting pattern so that we
will make a larger wager every five plays, attempting to match the size of our wager
with
the average frequency of a payoff.
Noting that our average win occurs every five plays, we decide to modify the
original betting pattern and reduce the size of our wager to one coin following a win
and to
increase the size of our wager after four plays with no payoff.
In order to prevent our raised bets from continuing indefinitely, we decide to limit
the number of plays with larger wagers to four consecutive no-win pulls. This is
exactly
the same concept as that of Dead Pulls, except that we will only track the number of
consecutive no-win pulls against our standard of four pulls after we increase the size of
our
wagers..
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (74 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:35 PM]
Beat
Limiting larger wagers to no
more than four pulls without a
payoff is called a Short Pull Loss
Limit and the number of pulls are
called Short Pulls. Putting these
concepts together for the next round
of bets, we select 54 coins, enough
to play two cycles of our original
betting pattern.
Beat the Slots! 100 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
We start wagering just like the previous round. On our sixth pull we have a win. If
we continued to follow the static betting pattern, our next wager would be for three
coins.
Instead, we decide to drop our wager to one coin each for the next four plays and then
increase our wager to three coins for a maximum of four plays (the number of our Short
Pulls). If we have a win betting three coins, we will drop back to one-coin wagers and
start
the original betting pattern over.
Table 9 recaps some plays using this simple dynamic playing strategy. We began
this round of play betting the standard pattern of 1-1-1, 2-2-2, 3-3-3 etc. On our sixth
play
we hit a payoff. Following this win for the next four plays we reduced the size of our
wager to one coin per play. After four one-coin wagers, we increased the size of our
wager
to three coins and had a win. Following this win we again reduced our wager to one
coin
for the next four plays. After four consecutive no-win one-coin wagers, we again
increased
our wager to three coins and on the third three-coin wager we had another win. We
again
reduced our wager down to one coin and continued play.
Please note that the maximum number of three coin wagers we would make would
be four, the number of our Short Pulls. If we had made four three-coin wagers without
a
hit, we would start the standard betting pattern over with wagers of 1-1-1, 2-2-2 and
continue in this manner until we had another win.
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (75 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]
Beat
Beat the Slots! 101 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Table 9. Simple Dynamic Playing Strategy
Play Number & Style Coins Played Win
1 Pattern 1
2 Pattern 1
3 Pattern 1
4 Pattern 2
5 Pattern 2
6 Pattern 2 Win
7 Dynamic 1
8 Dynamic 1
9 Dynamic 1
10 Dynamic 1
11 Dynamic 3 Win
12 Dynamic 1
13 Dynamic 1
14 Dynamic 1
15 Dynamic 1
16 Dynamic 3
17 Dynamic 3
18 Dynamic 3 Win
19 Dynamic 1
20 Dynamic 1
21 Dynamic 1
Beat the Slots! 102 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
The essence of using a dynamic approach to playing slot machines is that it requires
observation of the slot machine's payoff characteristics and the flexibility to adopt a
plan to
take full advantage of the payoffs. The obvious way to gain maximum advantage is to
wager larger amounts whenever the slot is expected to product a payoff and to reduce
the
amount wagered when losing plays are anticipated. The simplest approach is the one
described above, where a basic pattern is used and dynamic play is initiated after a win
and
is of limited duration. Using this approach, any time the number of Short Pulls is
reached,
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (76 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]
Beat
we will revert to betting the basic pattern.
Obviously, a number of different betting patterns can be used. Machines accepting
a maximum of three coins will accept more limited patterns than machine accepting
five or
more coins. Here are some patterns which may be used for play on three coin slots:
a). 1-1, 2-2, 3-3
b). 1-1-1, 2-2-2, 3-3-3
c). 1-2-3, 1-2-3, 1-2-3
d). 3-2-1, 3-2-1, 3-2-1
e). 1-2-3-2-3-3-2-2-1-1
f). 2-3-1-2-3-1-2-3-1
g). 1-1-2-2-2-3-3-1-1-2-2-2-3-3
h). 1-2-2-3-3-3-2-2-1
The playing patterns offer greater variety and flexibility on machines accepting five
coins. Here are some patterns for five coin play:
Beat the Slots! 103 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
a). 1-2-2, 2-2-2, 3-3-3, 4-4, 5-5
b). 2-2-1-1-3-3-1-1-4-4-5-5
c). 3-2-3-2-3-3-3-4-3-5
d). 2-1-2-2-2-3-2-4-2-5
e). 1-1-2-2-2-3-4-4-4-5-5
f). 1-3-5-5-3-1
g). 1-2-1-3-1-4-1-5
h). 1-1-1-2-1-3-1-4-4-5-1
It usually makes sense to pick a playing pattern which fits the size of the slot bank,
so that the pattern can be played through completely at least two times. A pattern like 1-
3-
4-5-2 requires 15 coins to play and would be appropriate for a slot bank of 30 coins, 45
coins or even 60 coins.
Patterns can also be mixed depending on the payback characteristics of the slot
machine being played.
Assume that we are using the betting pattern: 1-3-5-5-3-1 which increase our
wagers fairly rapidly. If the third wager in this series hit, consisting of a five coin
wager,
we might decide to reduce the size of our wagers to one coin each for the next three
plays
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (77 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]
Beat
and then revert to using the betting pattern. This would be an example of a mixed
pattern
where we modify the basic betting pattern following a win.
If we don't like having to change our pattern of wagering constantly, we may decide
to track the frequency of payoffs on a machine using just one betting pattern and then
pick
a different pattern to better match the machine's payoff pattern.
Using a round consisting of 20 plays, Table 10 shows the results of tracking the
play number of each win and the payoff multiple.
Beat the Slots! 104 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Table 10. Tracking Payoffs on a Slot Machine
Round 1 Round 2 Round 3
Play #
Win
Multiple Play #
Win
Multiple Play #
Win
Multiple
6 5x 3 25x 2 5x
10 2x 10 2x 4 2x
12 2x 11 2x 10 10x
15 5x 15 5x 16 5x
18 2x 17 2x
20 2x
The table shows that in our first round of play (two left most columns) on our sixth
play we had a win equal to 5 times the amount of coins inserted, on play ten, our win
was
equal to two times the amount played, and so on.
This information can be further analyzed to determine just how frequently this
machine is paying off.
Table 11 groups the information shown in Table 10 in such a way that determining
the frequency of wins is easy.
Beat the Slots! 105 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Table 11. Win Frequency Analysis
Round
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (78 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]
Beat
Number of
Plays Total Hits
1 20 6
2 20 5
3 20 4
Total 60 15
Dividing the number of plays by the total number of winning plays (60/15) gives us
an average of one winning play every four plays.
Knowing that with a pattern which increases the size of our wagers every fourth
play, we are more likely to have a larger amount wagered whenever the machine pays
off,
we decide to use the following betting pattern: 1-1-4-5-4-1. We reason that this pattern
brackets the fourth bet in the series with higher wagers, so that we will have larger
wagers
on the third, fourth and fifth wagers of the series.
To start this betting pattern, we continue playing the machine inserting only one
coin at a time until we have a win. With a win, we start using the new pattern of
wagers.
With this approach we will not use Short Pulls, as the pattern itself calls for an
automatic reduction in wagers. We will, however, continue to use Dead Pulls and to
monitor the results of each round of play as well.
Beat the Slots! 106 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
There is no one "right" betting pattern to use. If you refer to Table 10, you will
notice that while the wins averaged one win for every four plays the number of plays
between wins varied from back-to-back wins to five no-win plays between wins. Some
other betting patterns we might consider for this slot machine are:
a). 1-1-2-3-3-4-4
b). 1-1-2-5-5-3-2 or
c). 1-2-3-4-5-4-3
Let's use the last pattern of 1-2-3-4-5-4-3. We will insert one coin per play until we
have a win. Then we start using the pattern. After each win, we will start the pattern
over.
Typical play using this pattern would look like:
1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 1 2 3 4 5 4 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4 5 4 3 1 2 3 4 5, where each win is shown in
underlined bold and the pattern is started over following any win.
We may decide that we don't want to target wins which only payoff two times our
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (79 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]
Beat
wager. Referring to the information we recorded about this slot machine as shown in
Table
10, we decide to ignore any hits paying only 2x and to target wins of 5x or greater.
Table 12 recaps only the wins paying more than 2x our wager.
Beat the Slots! 107 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Table 12. Win Frequency Analysis Wins Greater than 2x
Round
Number of
Plays Total Hits
1 20 2
2 20 2
3 20 3
Total 60 7
Here we calculate that we have a payoff every 8.5 plays (60/7 = 8.57) on the
average. To target these larger payoffs, we could use one of the following betting
patterns:
a). 1-1-1-1-1-2-3-5-4-3-2, set up for 11 plays, or
b). 1-1-1-2-2-3-3-4-4 which is set up for 9 plays.
To implement using either of these patterns of play, we would insert only one coin
per play until we had a win greater than two times the amount of our wager. On the
play
following the winning wager we would start over using whichever pattern we had
selected
for play.
We may decide that we want to target all wins using just one betting series. We
know that we receive some win on the average of once every four plays and that we
average winning a larger amount once every 8.5 plays. So we decide to use a pattern
which
increases wagers for both anticipated payoffs. A pattern like 1-1-2-3-1-1-3-5-4 where
the
fourth, eighth and ninth wagers are larger might be used. Using this series, we would
ignore any wins of two times our wager and only start the pattern over after receiving a
payoff at least five times the amount of our wager.
Beat the Slots! 108 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Whenever we reach our Win Goal, we will pull out a preset percentage of our
profits, plus our original Session Bankroll and play with the excess. Usually by the time
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (80 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]
Beat
a
Win Goal has been reached, you will have refined selecting a betting pattern to the
point
where profits will be coming in regularly. Still, it makes perfect sense to lock up the
original bankroll plus a portion of the win and to play with only the excess. Slot
machines
very seldom maintain a set payback pattern indefinitely and even though a particular
pattern seems well attuned to the payback characteristics of a slot machine, the pattern
of
the paybacks can change enough to cause a string of losses and eat up some or all of the
profits.
For this reason, we prefer to put some coins aside after each winning play once we
have reached the point of locking up our win. By doing this we continuously add to our
locked up win so that even if we eventually give all of our excess back, we will wind
up
with a nice win.
A common mistake all gamblers make is not having an adequate session bankroll to
correctly play the game being played. With slots, using either a set round size, as is
recommended for the static playing systems, or gearing a round size to match a
particular
playing pattern, as is done with many of the dynamic strategies, you must have enough
coins to completely play a round on the machine.
If your excess coins dwindle down to less than the amount needed to play a round,
it is time to lock up the remaining excess and call it a day. There is no point in
continuing
to play a slot when you don't have enough money to correctly play the chosen system.
Too
many times players will stay chained to a machine and give up coins unnecessarily.
Beat the Slots! 109 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Slots & Taxes
The official position of the U.S. Internal Revenue Service is that gambling
winnings are included in your gross income and that gambling losses are deductible
only to
the extent of your gambling winnings. Gambling winnings are supposed to be reported
as
gross income just like salary and wages, while any gambling losses are relegated to the
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (81 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]
Beat
category of miscellaneous itemized deductions, which you can deduct only if you
itemize
your deductions on your tax return. If you are a professional gambler, recent court
cases
have upheld the position that you can deduct all expenses ordinary and necessary to
carry
on your profession.
Most people don't even bother to learn this stuff, as most gamblers don't win. So
taxes on gambling income is no problem. If they do win, the winnings are in the form
of
cash, and there is no "paper trail" linking them with the winnings, so why bother to
report
anything?
IRS regulations require that a casino create a little piece of paperwork called a "W-
2G" for any gambling winnings of $1,200 or more. If you hit a jackpot in excess of
$1,200
at slots or Keno, you will run into this paperwork.
A W-2G form will be filled out by the casino on your gambling winnings of $1,200
or more. A copy of this form will be mailed to the IRS, and you will be expected to
report
this income on your tax return for that year.
Beat the Slots! 110 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
In order to comply with IRS requirements, when you win a jackpot of $1,200 or
more, the casino will ask for two forms of identification as well as your social security
number. (Don't blame the casino. Write your congressman).
If you have forgotten to bring your social security card with you, or some other
form of identification such as your driver's license which may have your social security
number on it depending upon the state in which you reside, instead of a casino check
for
the jackpot, you will receive a receipt pending your furnishing the casino with the
information the IRS requires.
If you are a resident of the United States, no taxes will be withheld from your
winnings. If you reside in Canada, 15% of your winnings will be withheld. If you
reside in
any other foreign country, 30% of your winnings will be withheld.
If you do hit a jackpot which requires reporting to the IRS, you want to be in a
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (82 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]
Beat
position to deduct any gambling losses you have incurred. The IRS will let you do this
as
an itemized deduction, but only so long as you can substantiate it. This is where your
notebook comes in handy. As we have seen, you will have recorded every loss on slot
machines you have played. The IRS will accept this notebook as proof of your losses so
long as you can supply other substantiating proof that you really were in that casino
playing
slots that day. To further document this, you should write down the names of persons
who
were with you while you were playing slots (witnesses), and you might jot down the
names
of any attendants helping you with change and other slot services. In addition, if you
win a
jackpot, you will be attended by casino management, and should ask for their business
cards so that you can record their names. Other documents you should keep include
restaurant receipts, keno tickets, airline tickets, and the invoice for your hotel room.
These
items will serve as evidence required to prove to the taxman that you really were where
you
claimed to be.
Beat the Slots! 111 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
An easy and fairly painless way to accumulate all of this information is to get into
the habit of always keeping this daily record and then filing it in a large manilla
envelope
when you return home. Then, when you hit the "big one," you will be fully prepared to
minimize the tax impact on your jackpot winnings.
Beat the Slots! 112 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Beat the Slots!
We started this book with a list of questions to be answered in order to become a
slots expert. You now know how to pick the location of the best slots, which
denomination
slots offer you the best payoffs, the size of jackpots to look for, which type of machines
to
play and which to avoid, the amount of cash you will need to become a "slots winner,"
and
how to judge the effects of the all important casino hold percentage.
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (83 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]
Beat
In addition, we showed you four systems which can be used to beat the slots. As if
this was not enough, the parameters of both static and dynamic slot machine play were
demonstrated, completing the approach to beating the slot machines.
If you utilize this information, you need not
fear the slots again. You now know more
than 99% of the so-called slots experts, and
you have at your disposal proven strategies
for beating the slots.
The importance of this information should not be underrated. It is proven
information which is being used by a small number of smart, successful slots players to
win
on a regular basis.
Beat the Slots! 113 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
If you wanted more theory or slots stories, we make no apologies, as the focus of
this book is to make you a winner. Who knows? You may start creating your own slots
stories!
We did not attempt to thoroughly cover the video slots. There are many theories
around on how to beat these machines, especially the video poker slots. Silverthorne
Publications has published several books on winning at video poker, and if you are
interested in becoming a skilled, winning video poker player, we invite you to order
one of
these books.
One thing you should always keep in mind: Pick the slots system that is right for
your temperament and your bankroll. It is always a good idea to have a larger bankroll
you
can use for gambling purposes than the minimums we have suggested. For some
reason,
gambling wins and losses tend to come in cycles, and while you are winning every time
you play a slot, you may begin to believe that you have a "magic touch," but if you run
into
a losing streak, there is no substitute for an adequate bankroll. Above all, if the slots are
going against you, don't continue to fight them. Take a break, change casinos or better
yet,
engage in some other activity for a while. Human intuition is more powerful than we
realize, and if yours is telling you that things are not going well, listen to it and do
something else for a while.
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (84 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]
Beat
The successful pros do not discount the value of hitting the casinos hard when luck
is running your way and backing off quickly when lady luck is not smiling in your
direction.
Many successful winners combine one of our winning slots systems with a
successful table game system. If you have an interest in learning how to beat the craps
table or the roulette wheel, Silverthorne Publications has excellent systems developed
for
these games. Changing casino games can be a wonderful strategy for relieving fatigue
and
enhancing your pocketbook at the same time.
Beat the Slots! 114 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
Learn the system or systems which are best for you. It's a safe bet that the times
you leave the casinos a loser will be few and far between.
Have fun. And BEAT THE SLOTS!!
Beat the Slots! 115 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
GAMBLERS'' BOOKCASE
The best gambling systems and
money strategies at any price!
THE LOW ROLLER - Winning Systems for Low Budget Gamlbers
Martin J. Silverthorne
Learn how you can win big off the casinos with a
minimum investment. Complete playing rules
and winning playing strategies are presented for
slot machines, video poker, roulette, craps and
even blackjack. The "ultimate edge" for stingy
gamblers.
See Order Form at end of book.
$39.95
Beat the Slots! 116 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
TARGET ROULETTE Incredible Roulette Winning System
Andrew Devereau
If you ever wished for a simple, effective way to
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (85 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]
Beat
win lots of money quickly, this is it! This
powerful strategy wins an unbelievable 94.3% of
the time. Yet it is so easy to learn to use that
anyone can learn to use it.
See Order Form at end of book.
$39.95
WINNING WITH EXPERT VIDEO POKER Players' Advantage at
Video Poker!
Silverthorne Publications
Winning strategies for video
poker that help you pick the best
machines to play, give you the
winning strategies and then guide
you to play at an advantage over
the casinos! Complete step by
step instructions to becoming a
winning expert!
See Order Form at end of book.
$39.95
Beat the Slots! 117 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
MINI-MAX CRAPS The ultimate system for the low bankroll player!
George Stearn
Would you like to turn $50 into thousands in a
few days? Or even become a professional craps
player? With Mini-Max Craps the sky's the
limit. Simple but highly effective craps winning
system is recommended for all serious gamblers.
See Order Form at end of book.
$39.95
SUPER SLOTS A proven slots winning strategy you can use now!
Lawrence Steele
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (86 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]
Beat
Win $150 or more an hour on slot machines
without hitting any jackpots! This is like nothing
you have ever seen. Without guesswork or luck
you can start winning consistently on slot
machines using the Super System.
See Order Form at end of book.
$39.95
Beat the Slots! 118 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
BANKER'S STRATEGY Outstanding Way to Make Money at
Craps!
Martin J. Silverthorne
Would you like to win $15,000 in only 28
hours, starting with a measly $15
bankroll? This is the power of this
devastatingly effective craps strategy.
Powerful manual shows exact betting
strategies to become and stay a winner!
See Order Form at end of book.
$39.95
THE WHEEL OF FORTUNES -- How to Beat the Socks off the
Roulette
Game!
Andrew Devereau
The best of the old time roulette systems are
combined with a new twist to produce consistent
winnings. Even against two zero American
wheels, Devereau shows you how to make $200
or more an hour! Start small and win big with
this system.
See Order Form at end of book.
$39.95
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (87 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]
Beat
Beat the Slots! 119 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
THE SILVERTHORNE BLACKJACK STRATEGY Easy Way to
Blackjack Riches
Martin J. Silverthorne
You'll make money consistently at
blackjack without learning to count cards!
Learn to play and win at blackjack the way
it is played in the 1990s. A $75 bankroll is
enough to get started winning so
consistently you may want to turn pro!
See Order Form at end of book.
$39.95
THE NEURAL STRATEGY The Proven Method of Beating the
Casinos!
Martin J. Silverthorne
How do a handful of people consistently win
while you struggle to inch ahead? What inside
knowledge do they have that you don't? The
Neural Strategy is a complete training manual
for winning at roulette, craps and baccarat. Start
small and win big!
See Order Form at end of book.
$39.95
Beat the Slots! 120 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
BEAT JOKER POKER! Put $3,000 to $5,000 in your pocket with
this breakthrough!
Lawrence Steele
If you like Joker Video Poker, you'll love
this manual. Play at an advantage over the
casino using Steele's remarkable proven
strategies for beating the Joker Poker
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (88 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]
Beat
machines. You can use this system to build
a solid income generator!
See Order Form at end of book.
$39.95
THE SIMPLEX BLACKJACK STRATEGY Amazing System
Beats the Dealer!
J. K. Blackstone
This is for the player who may never have
played blackjack and wants to win and win
quickly. It is for the player with limited
money. It is also for the experienced player
who is tired of losing. If you can afford even
$15, you can start winning. Recommended.
See Order Form at end of book.
$39.95
Beat the Slots! 121 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
THE PRO-VANTAGE METHOD The Proven Method for Beating
Double Odds Craps!
Martin J. Silverthorne
Double Odds are now offered at almost
every Craps table. With this specialized
system, you can win $10,000 in three days
with minimum risk! The Pro-Vantage
Method is designed to allow a player
wagering moderate amounts to win large
amounts quickly!
See Order Form at end of book.
$39.95
BEAT THE SLOTS! Not one, but four proven strategies for beating
the slots!
Silverthorne Publications
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (89 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]
Beat
Included is everything from the $1,000 A
Day System to the incredible scientific
system with Player Advantage! The exact
information you need to win.
See Order Form at end of book.
$39.95
Beat the Slots! 122 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
HOW TO SURVIVE & PROSPER AS A PROFESSIONAL
GAMBLER Must reading for all gamblers.
Silverthorne Publications
This complete manual contains the techniques
used by the pros to legally "fleece" the casinos
and avoid the clutches of the tax man. Learn
how to travel for free, to keep gambling records
of your wins and losses and professional money
management.
See Order Form at end of book.
$39.95
Beat the Slots! 123 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
ORDER FORM
Title Price
Enclosed is $_____________________. If ordering one book, add $3.95 postage and
handling. If ordering two or more books, add $5.95.
Beat the Slots! 124 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc
SILVERTHORNE PUBLICATIONS INC.
7200 Montgomery Blvd. NE Suite 172 Albuquerque NM 87109
www.CasinoGamblersBookcase.com
Name
__________________________________________________________________
Address
_________________________________________________________________
City______________________________ State_________
Zip_____________________
file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (90 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]
Beat
E-mail Address
__________________________________________________________
Phone Number
___________________________________________________________
Payment Method:
Cash, check or money order
Credit Card Visa MasterCard
(We accept Visa and MasterCard only.)
Credit Card #
___________________________________________________________
Expiration Date________________________________________________________
Signature______________________________________________________________
Please be sure to include your e-mail address in case we need to contact you. Thanks.
Beat the Slots! 125 2002 Silverthorne Publications Inc

file:///D|/Systems/Beat%20The%20Slots.htm (91 of 91) [7/19/2002 1:20:36 PM]

You might also like