As we've seen, the casino has a .5% advantage. But because it's readily available in Vegas arid a lot of other video poker variations are derived from it, I also consider it the standard. Often you get enough cash back from the slot club or a promotion to make jacks or better an over 100% game.

The first chart is what the pay table for a 9/6 jacks or better video poker machine looks like. The second is also a jacks or better pay table, but with a critical difference: it's an 8/5 machine. Note the difference in the payouts for full house and flush; this lowers the return to 97.3%. As I mentioned earlier, I'm not going to provide you with the strategies, which are readily available in any number of books and computer software programs.

DEUCES WILD Our favorite video poker game is full-pay deuces wild. Full-pay deuces is an over 100% game and, for our purposes, this is where the money is. Most people learn how to play video poker on 9/6 machines, and we were no exception. But once we tried deuces wild, we were hooked. In deuces wild, you have to pay close attention to the pay schedules, since a seen-tingly slight change can have a pronounced effect on the return percentage. Examine the two deuces wild pay schedules that follow. The first schedule is the full-pay version. it's sometimes referred to as a 25/15/9/5

schedule, reflecting the number of coins returned for a wild royal, 5-of-a-kind, straight flush, and 4-of-a-kind (with one coin played).

The most important entry corresponds to 4-of-a- kind.

Again, notice the difference in return when just this one payout is lowered by a single coin.

The importance of playing the good deuces wild pay schedules should be clear. But it's not only about the positive expectation. The wild-card factor produces a particular kind of thrill.

When that wild card comes up in the first five cards, there's no telling how good the hand that's in store for you will be. You certainly don't get bored as fast. I?d say deuces wild has more psychological attraction than any other video poker game. Another aspect of deuces wild we like is that you don't have to hit a royal flush to have a winning session. Deuces wild comes with a mini-jackpot. Roughly every 5,000 hands you'll hit four deuces, which pays $250 (on the quarter machines with max coins played). Getting a four-deuce hand can giveyou a winning session without hitting the great big royal flush. Another reason I like deuces wild is that the strategy is simple to learn and easy to remember.

Some people disagree and think that the strategy for jacks or better is easier, but Brad and I have always thought otherwise The strategy is easy because it's broken down by how many deuces you have.

Organizationally, instead of one long chart, you have several little charts. For me, that makes all the difference. There is one big disadvantage to deuces. it's a highly volatile game, which produces much bigger swings between winning and losing sessions than Jacks or better does. You can rack up many many losing sessions in a row. If you don't hit a mini-jackpot (four deuces) or a royal, you're almost guaranteed to be a loser that session.

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