This will be a tough one to answer because we'll all have different answers based on our limited slot machine experiences, but it would be interesting to discover if there are one or two casinos that we can all agree with when it comes to "loose-ness".

I play the slot machines about two or three times a week in three casinos that are considered to be 'loose' by the locals and I limit my slot machine 'investment' to $20 on any particular machine. (I am not a big slot machine enthusiast)

The three casinos that I find to be 'loose' are:
1. Ellis Island
2. The Palms
3. The Orleans

The machines which seem to pay off the best are as follows:
1. Ellis Island - Mermaids / Alien Cows / Crystal Forest / Joker's Heist
2. The Palms - Cats / Vamp / and the penny Poker slots
3. The Orleans - Cats

Things I've noticed while playing the slot machines. (Please remember that my slot machine 'bankroll' is usually limited to $20 per day for any one particular machine.)

a. I find it difficult to believe that the machines are "random" ... or maybe I don't know what 'random' actually means. Why would the Wheel of Fortune stop at the $5 space instead of the $1,000 almost 90% of the time I play that game or observe others playing it? If that low pay-off shows up almost constantly... is it really 'random'?

So I rarely play WOH.

b. I almost never see two slot wins back to back om any machine unless each win is very small.

c. I most always increase my $20 'investment' by $3 to $7 before I begin an eventual losing streak. (It seems that that machine wants to make you happy for a little while before it takes all your money and I always wonder if those 'random chips' inside that machine can be 'designed' to do just that.)

d. And how come I always pick the smallest win when given the option to select one of three to five buttons on the screen? Are those figures really behind those buttons before I choose one .... or will a $1 win show up regardless of what 'button' I choose to pick?

In the above situation I always manage to miss picking the $1,000 button but I'm a 'master' at picking the $1 win.

e. And before I bore you all to death, I gotta say this ....

The Palms has a few penny poker machines by the west side entrance. These machines are very popular and seem to be very loose. (I've gotten about 5 Royals over the past couple of years but since I am a five cent poker player I never see a major win.)

And I find that the 'good' cards don't show up when you are only playing one-cent per hand. Go to five cents per hand and the cards that are delt are somewhat better.

I've also noticed that the machine 'seems to notice' that you tend to save a pair of low cards with the hope that you will be delt one or two more for a win. And once you save those two low cards, the machine seems to deal you more low pairs which never seem to get any better.

f. Is it possible that new slot games on the casino floor are very loose for the first few weeks in an effort to garner attention? There seem to be a lot of slot machine 'wizards' who concentrate their play on new games the first week that they hit the floor.

Last week I played JOKER'S HEIST ( a brand new slot machine game) and hit the BONUS just about every 4th punch of the button, but I know that that machine will be tighter within the next few weeks.


Is it just me or do others think of things like this while playing the slot machines?

And in conclusion ... there are a good number of new slot machines that have been gaining in popularity lately. These machines have vibrating chairs and stereo sound that are very exciting. Here are a few you may want to look for on your next LV visit....

TO FOLLOW

Will, honestly, you don't already know the answers to most of these questions?

A. there are 9000 stops on $5, 999 stops on the other various amounts, and 1 stop on $1000. hence random!

B. see above

C. learn when to quit, greed kills

D. again, see A

E. Stop thinking "the machine knows" or " the casino is watching" the machine is a computer and that is all, its circuts and wires, it has no brain, no feelings and no ears, so for god sakes, don't talk to it either, it just makes you look kooky! LOL
Most all offers we (as pieons) are going to see are all computer generated on our play, because of the casino card reader on the machine tracks us.

F. I beleive new machines get more play, because people get board with the old ones. The latest and greatest, always seem to be busy and there for, you notice the wins. People sit and wait for the pennies to rack up, because it's new and they are learning, instead of re hitting the deal button to quickly rack up the points and play the next game. I call it the "what did I hit" syndrome. you get a big win and you sit there trying to figure what triggered the pay out.

Now the disclaimer, I'm not a big slot player, but when I do, it's like mind candy, I do not think much at all, I'm hitting a button to see what the machine does on the bonus rounds. I ouh and ahh just like the rest of us!
My 3 lucky casinos (slots)

Main Street Station
Jokers wild
California

All Boyd properties

An interesting discussion......

Regarding randomness - think of it as a bucket of 100 ping pong balls. 99 of them are white and worth $1, while one of them is red and worth $1000. If you choose one ball, each ball has an equal chance of getting picked (each is a random choice) but only one of them is worth $1000. That's how the WOF bonus wheel works. The odds are low that you'll pick that red ball but statistically speaking, it should happen 1 out of 100 times.

After everything I've read over the years, I have a hard time believing some of these machines are fixed to be less than random, expecially in Nevada and New Jersey where the regulations are very strict. It's just not worth risking your casino license to fix the machines. (Keep in mind, slot machines are designed to pay back between 85%-98% in these states. Each one is set differently. The higher the denomination, the better the payback percentage). In other places outside of Nevada and New Jersey, I'm not so sure about the regulations and required payback percentages (I think some Indian casinos can go as low at 75%) so I can't comment on how "honest" other places are.

For these reasons, I rarely gamble outside of Nevada. I just don't trust other places. I've tried in Illinois and Louisiana but have never had any luck there.

I don't tend to play very many slot machines although I do dabble now and then. I'm always afraid of the really new ones. I've been burned in the past and always thought the newer machines were set with a lower payout. I never won a THING when the video Star Wars machines came out - not even a bonus round ever. However, I got very lucky when the video Wizard of Oz machines came out and now I'm hooked on them!

Since I don't play too many slots and rarely get off the Strip anymore, I can't say who has loose slots around Vegas. However, my luck at New York-New York over the years has been amazing with both slots and VP. But I think it's just luck!

Lee - where is Joker's Wild? That's a casino?

My thoughts, even though I haven't spent 20 minutes at a slot machine in the last 7 years.

I've had many video poker sessions where I was up 20% early in the session. Right or wrong, my initial training and core theory is that I am looking for a royal flush dealt to me. Anything less than that is damage control until I do get that royal. I try to select paytables to minimize the damage. Therefore, I almost never quit when I get an initial 20% bump. I admit there was a phase in my residency here that when I went to a casino to eat, I would play a little VP, and when I was up to a value that equaled my projected meal value, I would cash out, essentially giving me a free meal. That actually worked pretty well.

About those slots, and this ALL THEORY in my head. I believe that they are set for a percentage and have nothing to do with tempting a new player. I think it is entirely possible that a machine with a huge top end payout has more blanks or zero payout possibilities in order to achieve that percentage. OTOH, a machine with a top payout that is "relatively" low will have more even money and lower payouts because it doesn't have to compensate for "the big one".

I also think that locals casinos have better percentages on slots.

Therefore, I think will800 has several factors that are adding up in his favor. First, he is playing at locals casinos. Second, he picks games with smaller top line payouts that have more smaller returns. And third, will has previously talked about cashing out early when he is ahead, where most of us use time or bankroll as a stopping point inbetween sessions.

Jokers wild is way out boulder highway.... way out!

LEE. MIKE, JMT, Thanks for your intelligent remarks regarding this subject matter and I think that I do tend to agree with each of your remarks (almost) ...... but I still got loop-holes in my cranium regarding the topic of' 'randomness' and how relative it may or may not 'appear' to be while hitting them little slot machine buttons.

I hope to be able to express myself more clearly when the hour ain't so late, but I'd just like tgo take this opportunity to thank ya all for commenting on my random but very frequent observations of the wheeling, dealing, and button punching within many highly respected and reputable gambling operations.

I find this difficult to explain because I am far from a mathematician but I’m gonna give it a try in the hopes that it may prove to be of interest to some of you Las Vegas fans.

Consider this to be my attempt to explain my inherent problem with the reality of ‘randonness’ within the casino environment.

Let me start by saying that I THINK that there are two types of randomness;

The first type is what I’ll call ‘natural randomness’ and the second is ‘man made’.

And in my own mind, each is completely different.

As I see it … natural randomness is related to the game of Craps and man-made randomness is related to those computer chips they use inside each and every slot machine.

Here’s an attempt to explain how I came to that conclusion and how it affects your wins or losses at any casino you plan to visit.

Many years ago I had the opportunity to enjoy the company of Bob Stupak while eating one of his famous Portugese Hot Dogs at the now defunct Vegas World Hotel/Casino.

While we stood beside his little hot dog cart our conversation centered around the game of Craps and how the casino makes a somewhat predetermined profit when those dice are rolled.

I knew a lot of this ‘house percentage’ stuff already so I concentrated on the enjoyment of my Polish sausage until Bob got my full attention by saying, “The house only wins when the player wins!”.

Right away I thought I caught him in a lie!

But that conversation continued and I soon discovered how much I really didn’t know about throwing dice on that green, felt table.

TO BE CONTINUED …

If you have read what was posted previously you know that Bob Stupak claimed that his casino only made a profit at the game of Craps when the players won.

And that simple statement made me doubt his honestly.

But he saw the doubt in my eyes and went on to explain the following:

Think of the game as having three (3) accounts.

1. The Player’s Account
2. The House Account
and
3. The Escrow Account.

Two of the above accounts are somewhat evident but the third is not.

The ‘un-evident’ one is the Escrow Account.

And if I continue with too much detail, I’ll run into too much difficulty to explain it properly, but here is the general concept.

When a player loses while rolling the dice, those losses go into a factitious Escrow Account which actually doesn’t exist but is best used here to explain the wins and losses process.

From that point on the House and only ‘the House’ controls that Escrow Account in accordance with the rules of the game.

If a player wins when the dice are rolled, his winnings are paid out of this Escrow Account …. But the house also wins due to the fact that the house does not pay the true odds resulting from that winning roll.

So, in essence, the house pays the winning player his winnings (the Player’s Account) from that Escrow Account but the house also keeps a small portion and places it in the House Account.

The House Account increases whenever the player wins because the player never receives the true odds from any roll of the dice when he wins (odds bets excluded).

The house always takes its share and places it into the House Account from which no funds are taken until it goes through the proper channels to pay the monthly bills.

So when playing craps in any casino you never bet with or against the house and all winnings are paid from the Escrow Account from which the house also benefits.

And to get back to the original subject matter …. Can any casino game be more random than tossing the dice? I don’t think so!

I look upon this dice tossing as ‘natural randomness’ (it cannot be changed by human forces), but randomness on a slot machine is more man-made and can be readjusted at any time.

To Be Continued