Video Poker Payback

A freshie made this comment to me from his video poker machine:
“…If one played $1,000,000 on one 97% paytable/machine, one is GUARANTEED 97% of the total bets; one is guaranteed $970,000….”

As a slot designer, with a few years in the industry, I cringed. I had been explaining the balance between strategy and luck for skill-based games as opposed to playing games of chance. I stated that strategy has to be perfectly applied, to achieve the stated RTP. And that it will vary, according to the number of hands.
So he revised his statement:
"There has to be a value that when played through that game GUARANTEES a return based on the stated RTP".

As designers, we have ways of providing strategy to encourage skill, math to support probabilities and the opportunity for the player to be lucky - But, I am not comfortable agreeing anything is 'guaranteed'. And, I took exception to the lack of respect the speaker had for the small print, 'if one plays perfect strategy', which he did not seem to be doing. Yet, as a game designer, we are tasked with creating an experience, often relying on the illusion of control to provide the player with the basic challenge and reward we all play for - I did not want to say anything further to dash all that!

The short of this is: is there any amount a player could put into one 97% video poker machine to guarantee he would get paid 97% of it back?

And what is a nice 'player safe' way to phrase it?

It's variance, not luck.

There is no "guarantee" and it all depends on the game (variance), wager and how many hands. Of course, it also depends on the player using perfect strategy.

If the player plays a $100 denom game, this only represents 2000 games. The variance will be enormous. What if they play a $0.25 game - that is 800,000 games, which will have much lower variance.

I think the OP is referring to a skill-based game and is concerned that players with little or zero skill are not guaranteed anything.

Haven't we all seen clueless blackjack players make terrible plays? I don't care what return you calculate for a blackjack game, if a player starts splitting TT or hitting 16 vs 6 or doubling on a hard 12, they are NOT likely to achieve the return you calculate.

I have seen a young man bet all his bankroll, $200, betting on a Jack-high in 4-card Poker. If you know that game, you understand that he had a very small chance (<4% ?) of winning.

In video poker, a clueless player can make plenty of decisions that will reduce the RTP way below the value that is on the WOO site. Like discarding a small pair to draw to 3 suited cards.

Can someone please help me? I've been designing games for almost 4 years now but I'm new to the gambling industry. Something doesn't sound correct when you're talking about skilled-based games. Maybe I don't know better but I thought skilled based games were different than strategy based games? You keep saying skilled based games but then reference the strategy behind the game? I'm confused, are the type of games your discussing skilled based or strategy based???

It might be easier to think of games as either requiring (i) no skill, (ii) tactics/strategy/skill, or (iii) some kind of physical skill.

Examples would be (i) Roulette (ii) Blackjack, 3-Card Poker (iii) Coconut sky at fairground games, Horse race betting.
(i) Ignoring ball tracking etc. you make your bet and the outcome is independent of any further action by yourself.
(ii) You may have decisions to make during the game and using the "perfect strategy" achieves the stated "House Edge" (e.g. play Q64 but fold Q63).
(iii) There's no fixed "strategy" to follow but more skilful players will tend to do better.

If you're in the gambling industry then I imagine it would tend to be the first two categories of games you're dealing with.

Some strategies are very complex and are either not completely known or otherwise cannot practically be memorized.

Examples: Pai Gow Poker - has an incredibly complex "perfect strategy" and I doubt any player has memorized it and plays it perfectly

Ultimate Texas Hold-em has lots of obscure strategies for how to make post-flop decisions for rare borderline hands. Very few players can play perfect strategy. Similarly, no one knows all the perfect strategies for every possible hand of 4-card poker.

Russian (Lunar?) poker has a very complex strategy that virtually no one can memorize and apply.

So the house edge for these games is a theoretical number calculated by a computer that players can approach but most can never achieve. We refer to players who know many of the optimal decisions as being "skillful" at these games. Its just terminology.

I'm sorry but in still having a difficult time understanding everyone. But it almost sounds like your saying strategy is a skill??? Charlie says "It might be easier to think of games as either requiring (i) no skill, (ii) tactics/strategy/skill, or (iii) some kind of physical skill." but this doesn't make sense to me. Your categorizing tactics as separate from strategy and your separating mental and physical skills, but can't games have skill and not strategy or strategy & no skill? "There's no fixed "strategy" to follow but more skillful players will tend to do better." Why do skillful players do better at strategy? I'm so lost.

Gordon says "We refer to players who know many of the optimal decisions as being "skillful" at these games. Its just terminology." Wouldn't you refer to those players as strategist players and players that are good at skills as skillful???

It sounds to me like a conflict between what is strictly accurate and common parlance, barring some unusual circumstances.

Like, defining a "skilled blackjack player" as "somebody who plays with a mathematical advantage" would probably be generally agreed upon, even though the extent of 'skill' in this case is being able to memorize a series of conditions and keeping track of which condition is currently active. Alternatively, the ability to follow strategy can be considered a skill.

Keep in mind that the legal definition of skill-based gaming is also different based on the jurisdiction-- In some parts of the world, poker is a game of chance. In others, it's a game of skill. (And in some cases, what's legally considered skill-based gaming is downright stupid, from a real-world perspective.)

What kind of game design have you done before? It might be easier to draw a parallel from there.

Repeat

Quote: Venthus

It sounds to me like a conflict between what is strictly accurate and common parlance, barring some unusual circumstances.

Like, defining a "skilled blackjack player" as "somebody who plays with a mathematical advantage" would probably be generally agreed upon, even though the extent of 'skill' in this case is being able to memorize a series of conditions and keeping track of which condition is currently active. Alternatively, the ability to follow strategy can be considered a skill.

Keep in mind that the legal definition of skill-based gaming is also different based on the jurisdiction-- In some parts of the world, poker is a game of chance. In others, it's a game of skill. (And in some cases, what's legally considered skill-based gaming is downright stupid, from a real-world perspective.)

What kind of game design have you done before? It might be easier to draw a parallel from there.

I had no idea that there was a legal definition for skilled based game. You seem to know a lot about gambling games, maybe I could mentor under you? I had a mentor before who taught me that skill & strategy were 2 separate things. Been designing games for almost 3 years now, just card games like exploding kittens. Been trying to figure out a new gambling game but all the games I come up with on a deck of cards all seem either basic or a copy of multiple different game mechanics from other games. I've used all kinds of different deck designs for my games to get the game mechanics how I like it, maybe you could help with some ideas on how to get some fresh ideas from the old 52?