The fastest-frowing segment of video poker games consists of "Bonus" games. If you're used to Jacks-or-Better games, you may need to make some changes by Bob Dancer

"They're getting rid of all the 9/6 Jacks or Better machines," lamented a friend as we sampled homemade pizza at Las Vegas' newest house of chance, Barley's Casino and Brewing Company. His remark was prompted by the selection of video poker machines that surrounded us. A decade ago, the video poker inventory in a new casino was likely to consist of 9/6 Jacks or Better, 8/5 Jacks, and maybe an 8/5 progressive or two. When wild-card machines became the rage, players could also try their hand at the more volatile (and sometimes better paying) Deuces and Joker games. But in the past few years, the look of the landscape has been changing as a new machine has hit the scene. "Bonus" games--Bonus Poker, Double Bonus Poker, and even Double Double Bonus Poker--are now found alongside, or heaven forbid, in place of the older Jacks or Better standbys. What's a dyed-in-the-wool Jacks or Better player to do? Adapt, baby. Take what you already know and apply it to the new machines. Do you need to learn new strategies? Is it expensive to use the old Jacks or Better strategy on the bonus schedules? Let's take a look.

Why the Bonus Games?

As you might guess, casino economics is at the core of the proliferation of bonus games. Over the years, players in the aggregate have increased their level of video poker skill. Books, magazine articles, and computer software have educated the playing public so well that casinos have seen their margins shrink. Today's players can not only distinguish between good and bad pay schedules, but are getting closer and closer to achieving the 99.5 percent return that's possible with perfect play on 9/6 Jacks or Better machines. One way to combat this is to throw the customers a curve. By introducing a few wrinkles into the pay schedules, casinos can recapture some of the lost expected value. Convincing players to accept something new, though, is sometimes easier said than done.

The wild-card games worked to a degree. Video poker aficionados who tried to make the switch to Deuces or Jokers without taking the time to read about and learn proper playing strategies encountered a long and expensive learning curve. Many players did not switch, knowing intuitively that they were better off staying with the game they were familiar with. Converting this group posed a greater challenge, and Bonus Poker filled the bill.

There are many different types of Bonus Poker games, but all have one thing in common--they pay more for various Four of a Kinds, but take away from some other part of the pay schedule. Players love big payouts, and the potential for the jackpot on the quads is key. In the basic bonus game, for example, the Four Aces "mini-jackpot" ($400 on dollar machines) adds a great deal of excitement. If you're stuck $150, you have more chances to catch up on one big pop. You can hit the Aces, or even the Twos, Threes, or Fours, which pay $200 each. In regular Jacks or Better, all quads pay $125, so you need two good hands to catch up.

On a strict payback comparison, most Bonus Poker options are inferior to 9/6 Jacks or Better. But many casinos have eliminated the 9/6 games. At these places, playing Bonus Poker is a much better gamble than 8/5 Jacks or Better, any of the slot machines, and most of the table games. (Note: The numbers presented below assume 5-coin play on a dollar machine. If you normally play quarter machines, simply divide all the amounts by four.)

Bonus Poker

Choosing the best Bonus Poker machine is a lot like choosing a machine for Jacks or Better--the important variation shows up in the payouts for the Full House and Flush. The higher the combined payouts for these hands, the higher the machine's return percentage. The most prevalent type of machine that gives the player good value is 8/5 Bonus Poker. These machines pay 8 for a Full House and 5for a Flush. These are each one unit lower than a 9/6 Jacks or Better machine and each unit costs the player about one percent in overall return. Most of the difference is made up for with slightly higher payouts for quads. Four Aces pays 80 and Four Twos, Threes, or Fours returns 40. These compare with a payout of 25 for all quads on a Jacks or Better. Adding up the numbers, the bonus game returns about 99.2 percent, compared to 99.5 percent for Jacks or Better. If you play 500 hands per hour, which is pretty fast for a recreational player, the 8/5 bonus will cost you $9.40 per hour more to play than Jacks or Better.

Some places have 7/5 Bonus Poker games (which cost you an additional $26 per hour to play), and some places have 6/5 Bonus Poker games, which cost another $26 per hour. Needless to say, you should avoid these games.

Assuming you've decided to take on 8/5 Bonus Poker, how much are you giving up by using the Jacks or Better strategy? After all, shouldn't we make some adjustments to take advantage of the higher pay for Aces, Twos, Threes, and Fours? Truth is, the standard Jacks or Better strategy works just fine. Sure, there are strategy adjustments that an expert would make, but most are on rather rare hands, and the gain in return is quite small. Further, most are on hands that many players misplay in Jacks or Better, anyway.

Consider the following three hands. They all play differently in bonus poker than they do in Jacks or Better, but the difference is very small:

In Bonus Poker, it is better by 3?on average to play AKQJ. In Jacks orBetter, playing QJ is preferred by 2?

In Bonus Poker, AQ is preferred by about half a cent. In Jacks or Better, Q10 is the smarter play by 6?

In Bonus Poker, KQ is preferred by about 2? In Jacks or Better, 567 is the better play by 11?

Since each hand requires a full $5 to play, these are piddly amounts, and the hands aren't that common. The other strategy differences aren't any more important. For the occasional or recreational player, spending time and energy to learn all of the differences is simply not worth the effort. Far more dangerous are seat-of-the-pants adjustments that many players make. For example, consider the following two hands:

I've seen players hold 22 because of the bonus on low Four of a Kinds. Passing up the one-card draw to the flush costs 23?on average.

Likewise, many players just hold AAA because of the big bonus if they can catch the fourth. Don't do it! It costs about $1.41 every time you do

Double Bonus Poker

This game is catching on big. It pays twice the rate on all quads than does regular Bonus Poker, but the price for this is that Two Pair pays 1 instead of 2.

The best Double Bonus Poker game for the player is the 10/7 version. That is, Full Houses pay 10 and Flushes pay 7. This version is worth almost 100.2 percent for perfect play. Other common, but lesser-paying, versions of Double Bonus Poker include 9/7 (returning 99.1 percent) and 9/6 (returning 97.8 percent). Avoid these.

As we can see by the 100.2 percent payout, the 10/7 game can actually be beaten by the player! But be warned, the game is very ugly (non-intuitive). Look at these two hands:

No seat-of-the-pants player would consider either play, but trust me, they are both correct. In addition to these bizarre plays, proper strategy for the game is fraught with subtle variations. Look at this example. With AS KD 10S 9D 6H, you should hold the Ace alone. But change the 6 to a 5 (AS KD 10S 9D 5H), and the proper hold is AK. Perfect strategy for Double Bonus Poker is both strange and difficult. When I decided to learn this game it took me more than 30 hours of study, with a computer at hand, to be able to play accurately.

Given that it's not worth the effort for most recreational players to learn the complete double bonus strategy, what happens if you play this game using 9/6 Jacks or Better strategy? Good things happen, thank you very much. Playing double bonus poker with Jacks or Better strategy returns about 99.7%. This is fantastic. In fact, it's better to play Jacks or Better strategy on a Double Bonus Poker machine than it is to play Jacks or Better strategy on a Jacks or Better machine!

I wouldn't expect anybody to spend 30 hours mastering the game, but how about ten minutes? Here are a few tips that will improve your odds a bit:

Hold AAA only. The big bonus on quad Aces makes it worth going for. But don't get carried away on the Ace thing (see next).

Here we keep Two Pair. This should come as a surprise. After all, Four Aces are worth a ton and Two Pair are worth the same as the pair of Aces by themselves. What gives? The answer lies in the 10 units we receive for a Full House. Holding both pairs makes the Full House much more likely. Keep in mind, this strategy is for 10/7 Double Bonus; if Full Houses pay only 9, then hold AA only.

Hold 3456. Open-ended Straights are worth more than any low pair.

Hold AKQ5. A four-card Flush with either two or three high cards is worth more than most three-card Royal Flush draws. The one exception is QJ10.

Hold KJ4. With two high cards in a suit and not much else in the hand, hold any other card in the same suit (except with QJ, which you hold alone).

Hold J987. Inside Straights are worth keeping in this game. This hand actually has two inside Straights in it. In Double Bonus Poker, we keep the one with the most high cards.

There you have it. Apply these changes to your Jacks or Better rules, and add in the value of the givebacks from almost any slot club, and you can play the 10/7 double bonus machines at or above the 100 percent return level. Not bad.

Double Double Bonus Poker

This game has shown up widely in the past six months or so. The most common version resembles a 9/5 Double Bonus Poker game. It pays more for certain quads one fourth of the time, depending on the fifth card. If you get four Twos, Threes or Fours, you receive the normal 80, if the fifth card is a 5 through a King. But if the last card happens to be an Ace, Two, Three or Four, you're paid 160. Similarly, Four Aces are worth either 160 or 400, depending on the fifth card.

These games have become quite popular with a lot of players; the high bonus on Four Aces with a Two, Three or Four ($2,000) is attractive to many. The best strategy for this game is to avoid it completely. It returns less than 97 percent, which is worse than many slot machines. And that's for perfect play, which is even more difficult to learn than Double Bonus Poker. Players trying to figure it out as they sit are playing at the 95 percent to 96 percent level. I'd rather have a root canal.

More Help

The schedules discussed above are for the most popular versions of Bonus Poker. There are many other schedules. Because these games are still so new, there isn't a whole lot on the market right now to help you along. That situation will be remedied shortly with the publication of my book, Video Poker for Winners. Until then, I can suggest two avenues of study that will pay dividends. The first is any good video poker computer program. Boot up the bonus schedule you want to practice and play away. The program will tutor you as you go. Stanford Wong Video Poker ($29.95) is excellent. The second is a brand new book called The Las Vegas Advisor Guide to Slot Clubs ($9.95) by Jeffrey Compton. The full value of any video poker schedule can only be realized when slot club benefits are accrued. Compton's book is the last word on the Las Vegas slot club scene, and goes so far as to identify the Las Vegas casinos that have the desirable 10/7 Double Bonus schedules. Both products are available from Huntington Press at (800) 244-2224.

Sidebar

Using Jacks or Better Strategy for Deuces Wild While Jacks or Better strategy translates very well to Bonus Poker, using it in a Deuces Wild game is a huge mistake. Take this example: AH QH 7S 6C 3D. The proper Deuces play is to pitch them alland take five new cards. Or this one: 5D 5C KS KH 7D. The proper play here is to keep only one pair (and it doesn't matter which). In short, playing Deuces Wild with Jacks or Better strategy would be analogous to trying to play successful tennis using a ping-pong paddle. In both cases, you will be disappointed with the results.

Bob Dancer's book, Video Poker for Winners, will be published by Huntington Press and is due out this summer.