When To Walk Away From A Slot Machine
- The most successful gamblers always know the right time to walk away and come back another day. Set Yourself Limits. Alongside learning when it's time to quit and walk away from a casino session, setting yourself limits to how much you are prepared to bet is just as important.
- Jan 28, 2016 Whether it’s a slot machine or another insurmountable obstacle, knowing when to walk away is a skill that would serve us all well to master. I Have More than I RealizeMuch More. My first instinct when I saw that woman toddle away with her hundred dollars was to wonder, Why not me?
There’s a whole host of betting strategies and tricks that people employ in order to get ahead at the casinos. But what most people forget is that cashing out at the casinos is more dependent on your willpower, rather than some over complicated gambling strategy, which your casino already knows about and has put safeguards in place to combat.
Don’t fly in on a Sunday. Play in heavily trafficked areas. Always use a player card. Never use a player card. As soon as anyone heard we were dashing off to Sin City this past December, advice on how to beat the odds in Las Vegas bubbled over.
Want the best odds of returning home with lots of money after a jaunt to Las Vegas? Don’t get off the plane. I know full well that stepping foot in a casino is akin to lighting my dollarsquartersnickels pennies on fire. But the cacophony of blazing neon, screaming bells, victorious whoops, and defeated sighs is too much of a siren song for me to resist. While I certainly did not win big, I left with some interesting lessons after sitting one seat away from a winning slot machine on this past vacation.
It’s Hard to be Genuinely Happy for Others
While I’d like to think I’m a good person, maybe I’m not. When I plopped myself down in front of the Goldfish slot machine and fished out a $10 bill, I was happy. Even though I knew I would lose this money and then some, I was happy. Then, I watched a woman slide over to the machine next to me, push in a twenty-dollar bill, and win over $100. I was no longer happy. I was gobsmacked. Sure, I smiled and clapped for her in her excitement until her friends came over and could celebrate with sincere gusto. But I wasn’t actually happy that she won. I was annoyed that I didn’t.
I know comparison robs joy from everyone. I know my momma raised me better. But sometimes it’s hard to be genuinely happy for other people. Maybe I’m a giant jerkface, maybe it’s human nature. But spending time in Vegas reminded me of how important it is to cheer on other people and mean it. Life is about so much more than our own experiences. There’s no reason to hope we don’t all win big.
People’s Stories are Private
I know exactly one fact about that winning machine. The woman put in $20 and left with over $100. I know not because she told me, but because I saw it happen. I have no idea how long she’d been playing. Maybe this was her first half hour on a casino floor in her entire life. Maybe she had already been in Vegas for a handful of days or the better part of a week. Maybe she is a local who plays before or after her work shift every day. Perhaps she wins thousands and only puts in a few hundred. Perhaps she wins hundreds but puts in a few thousand. I’ll never know.
What we see when we meet someone very rarely tells us the whole story. Of course, we make judgments and assumptions, inferences and hypotheses. Even if someone starts to connect the dots for us, we’ll never know everything. While it might be really easy to dismiss or exalt someone based on a single encounter, that’s a fool’s errand. In fact, you probably have better odds at the craps table than figuring out a person’s life story.
There’s No Such Thing as Luck
Las Vegas is brilliant — not just the blinding lights, but the masterminds who have engineered the entire concept. Let’s make losing money fun. So much fun that people will want to come back. Not just once, but yearly. In fact, let’s add so many bells and whistles that many people will make the pilgrimage several times a year. Everybody wants to get lucky. Vanguard could take a lesson from Vegas.*
When the woman stood up from the slot machine, she giggled to her companions, and they hugged her and screeched. Like football players entering an arena, they tried to high-five other gamblers who lined the aisle on the way to the exit, shouting about her good luck. There’s no such thing as luck. All of those squawking machines are computers in disguise. Mathematics, probability, patterns, and programming, yes. Luck, no. The sooner we realize that life has very little to do with luck, the better.
Knowing When to Walk Away is a Skill
That woman got up and left as soon as she won big. Perhaps she went out to dinner. Maybe she went to a nightclub. For all I know, she went back to her hotel room, packed her bags, taxied out to McCarran International Airport, and left Las Vegas a bonafide winner. If she’s anything like Mr. P, though, she strolled over two aisles and found another one-armed bandit to gobble up her winnings and then some.
If I’ve learned anything watching Mr. P become transfixed by the bells and cherries and sevens, it’s how difficult it is to walk away. I’m usually never up enough to do anything other than simply lose the $10 I started with, but I’ve seen Mr. P quadruple his money in one pull of the lever. However, because his is a perpetual quest to hit it big one more time, very rarely does he leave with anything. Losing $10 might sting a little. Winning $40 and then losing $50 stings a lot more. Whether it’s a slot machine or another insurmountable obstacle, knowing when to walk away is a skill that would serve us all well to master.
I Have More than I Realize…Much More
My first instinct when I saw that woman toddle away with her hundred dollars was to wonder, Why not me? And then I mentally tallied up all the different things that I would have done with that money. But the further I followed that train of thought, the more grateful I became. I could afford to gamble away some money. I had the fortitude to walk away. Beyond that, we also had the insight to gift a trip to ourselves instead of more stuff for Christmas. We had the resources to make the trip really affordable. Most importantly, we had the ability to plan a vacation knowing full well we would come back financially poorer but richer in experience.
It is so easy to get caught up in the successes of others and shortchange ourselves. It is especially difficult when those successes are so visible, so applauded. Nothing I have ever earned came with bells, flashing lights, and extra IRS forms to report my winnings. But I have a lot, much more than I often allow myself to realize.
*Bogel, you did a lot of things right. But man, think of the missed opportunities with that login page.
So Tell Me…Have you ever been to Vegas? Have you ever found yourself learning lessons in strange places?
Slot machines are the most popular game in a casino today. About 85% of a casino’s revenue is generated by gambling machines.
Unfortunately, slots are games which can’t be beaten no matter how smart you are or how much strategy you use. The best you can do is hope to get lucky once in a while. But you can also use some smarts and strategies during game selection to lose money more slowly and increase your chances of winning.
This post is written with the first-time slot machine player in mind. There’s nothing advanced in this explanation of slots games and how they work. It’s just a basic step by step guide to playing slot machines for the first time.
1. Get Ready to Play by Having a Plan
It sounds silly, but getting ready is one of the first steps you should take. Going into a casino without a plan is a good way to lose a lot of money fast. Having a plan is step 1.
Your bankroll is the first thing you should consider. A bankroll is an amount of money that you’ve set aside to gamble with. It’s separate from all your other funds. It’s important that you don’t gamble with money you need for other purposes (like rent).
I like to have an overall bankroll for my trip, but I divide that into smaller bankrolls per day and per gambling session. For example, if I’m going to Las Vegas for a 3-day weekend, I might take $1500 to gamble with. I’ll plan on gambling with $500 per day, and I’ll plan on 2 sessions a day with a $250 bankroll for each session.
Once I lose my bankroll for a session, I have to stop playing. No going to the ATM, no dipping into the bankroll for my next session, and no dipping into my budget for dining out or show tickets.
I also make up my mind beforehand that I’m not going to drink while I play. You might or might not make the same decision. But my experience leads me to think that I’ll make poor decisions and forget all about any plans I have if I’m drinking alcohol.
I also try to choose my companions wisely. I don’t want to be stuck with someone who refuses to leave when my bankroll runs out. But I also am willing to leave when THEIR bankroll runs out.
2. Learn a Little Bit About How Slot Machines Work
You can do this step right now. Here’s how slot machines work:
Slots are just gambling games which have spinning reels with symbols on them. You input money to pay for each spin that you get. When you get certain combinations of symbols, you’re paid off with winnings.
Early slot machines were mechanical affairs with gears, springs, and levers. Modern slots are powered by a tiny computer program called a random number generator. This RNG is what determines the results on the spinning reels.
The games are programmed to pay off at less than the true odds of winning. (This is true of all casino games, in fact.) For example, if you have a 1 in 1000 chance of getting 3 cherries in a row, the payoff for that bet might only be 500 to 1.
This gives the game a house edge, just like any other casino game, but when talking about slot machines, everyone talks about payback percentage. (It’s also called payout percentage or return to player.)
This is just a word that describes how much of each bet the casino returns to the player over a long period of time. The best slot machines in the world usually have a payback percentage of maybe 96% or 97%, but most of the time, you’re facing a payback percentage of 95% or less.
This isn’t a literal result that you’ll see in a given gambling session or even over several gambling sessions. It’s a long term expectation based on tens of thousands of spins. In the short term, anything can happen. That’s why people sometimes walk away winners.
In fact, this is by design. If a slot machine literally gave you a 95 cent win every single time you bet a dollar, you’d never play. It would become obvious quickly that the game favored the house. But since you’re going to win or lose on a random basis, you get to feel like you can beat the odds.
And you can beat the odds—sometimes.
Modern slot machine games also have lots of bonus features, like bonus games, progressive jackpots, and wild symbols. Almost all of these aspects of gameplay happen automatically without any decision-making or strategy necessary on the part of the player.
3. Have Some Manners
Playing slots isn’t really a social activity, but you are playing these games in a public place. Other people are around and will be affected by your behavior. And there are certain rules of etiquette to keep in mind.
If you’re playing a game and need to take a break and go to the restroom, you can leave some kind of personal item (like your jacket) on the seat in front of the game to reserve it for when you return. I wouldn’t recommend leaving anything too valuable, though, because it is possible that someone will steal it. At the same time, if someone has left something to reserve their spot, don’t be rude and move it so that you can take over their machine.
Keep up with your players card. This is the card that you insert into the machine so that the casino can track your play and give you your rebates and comps. If you wander off with the card still inserted, you have to bother the customer service people to get a new card. Or you might have to bother someone who’s taken over the machine to get your card back. If you find someone else’s card still in the machine, remove it and put it on top of the machine.
If you win a huge jackpot, it used to be customary to tip the person who took care of your payouts. In modern casinos, though, everything is handled electronically via a ticket in/ticket out system, so this doesn’t come up. But you should still tip your cocktail waitress, even if she’s only bringing you a Coke.
If you’re a non-smoker, don’t complain about someone smoking at their machine. Just find a non-smoking casino instead. There are plenty of places where you can gamble without being subjected to tobacco smoke, but if you choose to play in a smoking casino, then let the smokers do what they do without harassing them.
Some slots players like to play more than one machine at a time. That’s fine, but if a casino is crowded, you should stick with one machine in order to let others play.
None of these etiquette tips will help you win more money, by the way. But it’s good practice to try to fit into normal society.
4. Choose Your Slot Machine Wisely
When To Walk Away From A Slot Machines
You cannot control the whims of lady luck, but you can try to choose slot machines which offer better odds. Pay no attention to the advice you see about how the loose machines are placed on the edge of the rows. That advice is outdated and useless.
Here are some modern, accurate tips about which slot machines have higher payouts:
Slot machines in major casinos pay out better than slot machines in other areas. You’ll find machines which pay out better at a casino on the Las Vegas Strip than you will at the airport, for example. Bars are also notorious for having slot machine games with low payback percentages.
The more complicated the game is, the lower the payback percentage is. All those extra bells and whistles like bonus games, fancy animation, and multiple paylines cost money to implement. And you pay for it in the form of a lower payback percentage and a higher house edge. If you can find a 3-reel, single line slot machine, you’ll have the best chance of walking away a winner.
When To Walk Away From A Slot Machine Without
Progressive slot machines have an ever-expanding jackpot, but you pay for that via a lower payback percentage, too. Every bet you make helps to fuel that jackpot. They take a tiny percentage from each bet and divert it directly to the jackpot. Your odds of winning that jackpot are long enough to be practically 0, so that money fueling the jackpot is just gone forever. It shouldn’t even count toward the calculation of the theoretical payout percentage.
Finally, consider trying video poker games. These aren’t true slot machines at all, but they offer a higher return to player even if you’re not familiar with how to play. They also offer you the opportunity to think and make decisions while you play. You might enjoy the mental stimulation of a video poker game.
5. Put Your Money In
There are still machines where you can input coins, but in today’s casino market, you’ll probably just be putting cash in the machine. They have a reader which looks similar to a change machine. When you feed cash into it, the credits appear on the machine so that you can start to play.
Since most gambling machines at most casinos use a ticket in/ticket out system, they also accept tickets in the reader. In the old days, you’d have to deal with lots of coins and cups to carry those coins around, but the tickets are a lot easier for both the player and the casino.
Before you put your money in, be sure to look at the front of the machine so you’ll know what denomination you’re playing for. If you insert a $100 bill into a dollar machine, you’ll have 100 credits. Insert that same bill into a $5 machine, and you’ll only have 20 credits.
You should also make yourself aware of how many coins you’re wagering per spin and per line. Most modern slots have multiple pay lines, and you have to pay to activate each one. This can add up fast even if you’re playing a low-denomination machine. For example, if you’re playing a penny slot machine which allows you to bet 5 units per line on 25 lines, you’re wagering $1.25 per spin if you place the max bet.
6. Always Play With Your Players Club Card Inserted
Almost all modern casinos have a players club you can join. You should join the players club and play with the card inserted into the machine. The casino tracks how much money you put into action over time and provides you with comps and rebates based on how much you are wagering.
You get these comps and rebates even if you walk away a winner.
That’s because the casino wants to reward you for playing. The more you play, the more you’ll lose in the long run. The casino doesn’t care about what happens in the short term, because they’re dealing with thousands of players on thousands of machines playing for thousands of hours a year. The long run happens for a casino much more quickly than it does for a player.
You might have legitimate reasons for not using the players club card, though. If you hate getting advertising in the mail, you might not want to join. If you have a philosophical problem with the casino tracking your playing tendencies, that might be a legitimate reason, too.
But if you want to minimize the house edge, use your players club card. It’s worth between 0.1% and 0.3% in rebates, and that might as well be real money. Over time it adds up, too.
Conclusion
Slot machines are available in a bewildering array of sizes, shapes, and sounds. Most of them are straightforward enough, though—you input your money, spin the reels, and hope for the best. If you get confused about what’s happening, you can always ask a friendly nearby gambler who looks like she knows what she’s doing. The casino staff are usually eager to help, too.
There’s no such thing as a professional slot machine player, but if you use a little bit of good sense, you can have a lot of fun for your money when you’re playing. Just stick with the games I recommended in this post to maximize your probability of winning.
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