Is Keno Trully Random? I Always Thought So Then Just Read This Article....Can Any Insider Verify Thi

Several years ago, less than ten, I came across an announcement on the Nevada Gaming control Boards website. Casinos and gaming manufacturers were requesting approval to convert all video poker and video keno machines as they put it to " the same technical standards of randomization as the slot machine". The announcement said " Approved". That's about the time that most keno and video poker players that I knew stated that they found it almost impossible to win anymore. So I would assume that video poker and video keno are no longer random games of chance.

Quote: redeye809

Several years ago, less than ten, I came across an announcement on the Nevada Gaming control Boards website. Casinos and gaming manufacturers were requesting approval to convert all video poker and video keno machines as they put it to " the same technical standards of randomization as the slot machine". The announcement said " Approved". That's about the time that most keno and video poker players that I knew stated that they found it almost impossible to win anymore. So I would assume that video poker and video keno are no longer random games of chance.

Can you post up a source?

The source of the document was the Nevada Gaming Control Board's site. The announcement was part of the agenda or the dispositions for the particular day. It's buried there somewhere but to locate it will surely take some time as I cannot remember the particular year in which it was published. If I can find it I will post it. Talk to most video keno and video poker players that have been playing the games for ten or fifteen years and they all agree that the games have changed in comparison to a few years back. I myself used to play seven spot and win 7 of 7 quite frequently but I could not hit one anymore after reading that announcement. Of course players still win but I believe that the games are now coded like the slots. I remember when the Travel Channel had a program about visiting Las Vegas. They interviewed players that were making a living playing video poker. Now when the Travel Channel showcases Las Vegas they say expect to lose. This type of gambling should not be taken seriously.

Damn!! No wonder I get dealt a pair of 3's five times in a row!

Quote: redeye809

The source of the document was the Nevada Gaming Control Board's site. The announcement was part of the agenda or the dispositions for the particular day. It's buried there somewhere but to locate it will surely take some time as I cannot remember the particular year in which it was published. If I can find it I will post it. Talk to most video keno and video poker players that have been playing the games for ten or fifteen years and they all agree that the games have changed in comparison to a few years back. I myself used to play seven spot and win 7 of 7 quite frequently but I could not hit one anymore after reading that announcement. Of course players still win but I believe that the games are now coded like the slots. I remember when the Travel Channel had a program about visiting Las Vegas. They interviewed players that were making a living playing video poker. Now when the Travel Channel showcases Las Vegas they say expect to lose. This type of gambling should not be taken seriously.

I have talked to several AP's who clocked a ton of hours on various low +EV games who kept good records and they are suspicious.

Personally I don't care because I'm not interested in low percentages.

As long as they have a long term payback that's = to the theoretical It's all the same to me.

http://gaming.nv.gov/modules/showdocument.aspx?documentid=2921

NGCB Reg 14.040, as of November 2015, still requires that
" 5. For gaming devices that are representative of live gambling games, the mathematical
probability of a symbol or other element appearing in a game outcome must be equal to the
mathematical probability of that symbol or element occurring in the live gambling game."

For a game like Keno, I believe the only way around this would be to tell the player "this game uses a virtual bucket of 82 balls with duplicates of numbers 10 and 20" -- that'd be a disclosure of a different "representation of a live gambling game." But if you're suggesting that Keno in Nevada can otherwise be based on non-uniform probabilities of drawing 20 numbers from 80, that doesn't match my reading of the regulation. Without any other disclosure in the help screens, this reg basically says that video keno has to have the same odds as live keno.

I'd be interested to read any other NGCB document that supports the alternate interpretation.

Nobody said they are cheating, regulations allow them to, in a word, SET the machine to return the allowed legal return. Any spin can be a winner! I play 6 spots and have had close to back to back winners 6 out of 6. Then nothing for hours & hours. IMO the regulations guarantee there is no random picks. A monkey can be trained to pick 6 numbers and win, if it's time.

That first page is like a time machine of long gone, but in many cases not forgotten, members.

Quote: MustGoFishin

Nobody said they are cheating, regulations allow them to, in a word, SET the machine to return the allowed legal return. Any spin can be a winner! I play 6 spots and have had close to back to back winners 6 out of 6. Then nothing for hours & hours. IMO the regulations guarantee there is no random picks. A monkey can be trained to pick 6 numbers and win, if it's time.

No, actually that is randomness. If you:

play 4 hours and don't win 6 of 6
then -- jackpot! -- 6 of 6!
play another 4 hours and don't win 6 of 6
then -- jackpot! -- 6 of 6!
play another 4 hours and don't win 6 of 6
then -- jackpot! -- 6 of 6!
play another 4 hours and don't win 6 of 6
then -- jackpot! -- 6 of 6!
play another 4 hours and don't win 6 of 6
etc.

then that machine is probably not random, but operating on a sequence.

Your last statement needs a small tweak (in bold) to be true:
"A monkey can be trained to pick 6 numbers and win, if it's RNG matches"

It has absolutely nothing to do with time. You could have won on the last drawing, or you could have lost the last 800 drawings. The monkey has the same chance of winning.

im bumping this thread because i feel there has been a misinterpretation of the patent quoted in this thread

The OP has an interesting theory.
Since we can't spend thousands of plays checking the coin-in & coin-out of the banks of machines involved, is it like the Bingo slots where someone else has to lose for you to win or vice-versa? And if nobody but me is playing those banks of machines, I could play for hours on $40 and rack up $40 of session points?
Seems the machines are always scraping by with the minimum hold to me.

Quote: tringlomane

Quote: reno

And yet the Peppermill Reno risked everything by opening up slot machines in competitor casinos. They didn't need to do it, but they did it anyway and it cost them $1 million in fines.

To clarify: I still believe that the games in Nevada are genuinely random. But I could be wrong!

And sometimes the lack of randomness isn't deliberate; mistakes happen. From the August 2011 issue of Harper's magazine: "In 1998, the Arizona lottery began using a computerized system for the Pick 3 game. A Chandler woman named Ruth Wennerlund always picked the same three digits, 9-0-7 (her son was born on September 7). After a month under the new system, she noticed something peculiar: the number 9 had never been drawn. She called the Arizona Lottery to complain. They told her that she was merely unlucky. A few days later the Lottery announced that a glitch in their random-number generator had prevented any 9s from being chosen. The thousands of people who had played the tickets with the number 9 were offered refunds-- but only if they had kept their losing ticket stubs."

What's nuts is...even after 32 draws, there was still a 1 in 24,701 chance that 9 would never have been drawn in a fair game, still decently within the realm of possibility.

http://www.dartmouth.edu/~chance/chance_news/recent_news/chance_news_7.07.html

Quote: RobInVegas

Ok I read it again and I don't see a reference to the Class II Keno machine. Is it implied in some way? How does one know if this method isn't being allowed in Nevada?

Although I've been writing code for a good long time I must confess I'm new to the details of gaming side of all this.

Any help is always appreciated.

Nevada has a "live game correlation" law. So the patent issued would not be a legal game in Nevada. But there are some US jurisdictions where "Class II" or "virtual pulltabs" are the only legal options for gambling games. Hence that patent for a keno game that functions this way.

Here is the Nevada "live game correlation" law:

14.040 2 (b)
(b) For gaming devices that are representative of live gambling games, the mathematical
probability of a symbol or other element appearing in a game outcome must be equal to the
mathematical probability of that symbol or element occurring in the live gambling game. For other
gaming devices, the mathematical probability of a symbol appearing in a position in any game
outcome must be constant.

It's in the bottom third of page 171 in this pdf:
http://gaming.nv.gov/modules/showdocument.aspx?documentid=2957

So a machine in Nevada functioning as described by the patent you linked would be against Nevada law, and it's highly unlikely that any reputable manufacturer such as IGT would send a machine that could function illegally to a casino. If they did, I would be 99.54% sure (to use a pun from the Wizard) it would be an accident.

And also from the patent:

Quote: IGT patent

Regulatory bodies in certain jurisdictions do not permit the use of probability-based gaming terminals, in part for these reasons. These regulatory bodies permit the use of wagering gaming terminals which are guaranteed to provide certain or definite awards, so that, for example, a certain number of wins is guaranteed and the overall amount paid back to players is guaranteed.

It's unfortunate they didn't clearly label the "certain jurisdictions" here. The two largest I believe are New York state-run racinos and Washington state casinos. Nevada is definitely NOT one of these places. IGT does serve all over the country though, including New York and Washington.
link to original post

what i am claiming is that tringlomane quoted a part of the patent

and that his interpretation of the quote is wrong

when it says "Regulatory bodies in certain jurisdictions do not permit the use of probability-based gaming terminals, in part for these reasons."

and then goes on to say "These regulatory bodies permit the use of wagering gaming terminals which are guaranteed to provide certain or definite awards, so that, for example, a certain number of wins is guaranteed and the overall amount paid back to players is guaranteed."

well the interpretation is backwards... the second quote ... "These regulatory bodies permit the use of wagering gaming terminals which are guaranteed to provide certain or definite awards, so that, for example, a certain number of wins is guaranteed and the overall amount paid back to players is guaranteed."

is talking about PULL TAB/BINGO because how can it be talking about a fully random machine... they cant garentee a paypack if its fully random

and the first quote is talking about the rest or "fully random" slot machines

There's 3 modes in the OP's post:
1) The machine sucks in coins and has a low payback percentage
2) The machine plays normally and the payback percentage is normal
3) The machine is spitting out money to a lucky player and the payback percentage exceeds 100% for a brief time (how brief? one pull?).

In the short term, all this is possible without tampering with the machine. In the longer run, say 10K spins or more, you'll get closer to the setting on the machine's payback percentage.

Quote: ChumpChange

There's 3 modes in the OP's post:
1) The machine sucks in coins and has a low payback percentage
2) The machine plays normally and the payback percentage is normal
3) The machine is spitting out money to a lucky player and the payback percentage exceeds 100% for a brief time (how brief? one pull?).

In the short term, all this is possible without tampering with the machine. In the longer run, say 10K spins or more, you'll get closer to the setting on the machine's payback percentage.
link to original post

i cant prove or disprove those statements

i am mainly focused on the sub conversation that was produced as a result of this original conversation

im trying to figure out what probability based gaming is

i know its not a centrally determined game thats for sure

Oh, woe is me, as I long for the glory days of WoV!