Tips For Video Poker

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Video poker has many variations. Deuces wild, Jokers wild, Jacks or Better, All American, and Double Bonus can all be found in the world's casinos. However, by far the most popular form of video poker is Jacks or Better: all other forms of video poker are much harder to find (though the "wild" games are popular in some casinos). If you are a novice or beginner player you should stick with Jacks or Better -- the rules are the easiest to memorize.

Jacks or Better

1.Never break any made pay of Two Pair or better, except break anything other than a pat Straight Flush for any 4-card Royal.
2.Break a High Pair only for a 4-card Royal or any 4-card Straight Flush.
3.Break a low pair or a 4-card Flush or Straight draw only for a 3-card Royal, or any 4-card Flush or Straight Flush.
4.If you have both a 4-Flush and a 4-Straight, go for the Flush.
5.Break A-K-Q-J only for a pair or three suited high cards.
6.Break any three of A, K, Q and J for any two suited high cards.
7.Hold all high cards (jacks through aces), except discard the Ace from A-K-Q, A-K-J or A-Q-J.

If you follow these instructions, the casino will only have a .0146 advantage over you (meaning that for every $100 you play, you should expect to lose around $1.50. However, beware of casinos that lower the payouts for a full house and a flush. The casino should be giving you 9-1 odds on a full house, and 6-1 on a flush. Many casinos reduce these payouts to 8-1 for a full house and 5-1 for a full house. When this happens, the maximum payback falls to 97.29% -- meaning that you will have a smaller chance of winning big before you run out of money. My advice to you is to avoid the casinos that lower their odds on these "mid-range" hands -- they're simply not playing fair.

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