Slots Hero

We have talked more than once about how there really is no viable online slots strategy. That it is because the slots game’s Random Number Generator (RNG) and the actual set up of the game makes it impossible for the player to have any impact on the outcome of a spin. So what is there that a player can control?

Money. An online slots player can control their money. To a certain degree, meaning they are in charge of how they wager and whether or not they use any progression betting systems.

First off, it is not a wise decision to use a progression betting systems. The doubling of a wager until a win is made more often than not results in an online slots player’s bankroll being whipped out in no time. The best way to wager on slots is to stick to flat betting, meaning choose the amount you wish to wager and stick with it until you feel the need to lower or raise your wager, and then stick with that.

Also of note when minding your money and wagering on slots is how you wager on paylines. There is no payline that is more likely to land a winning combination than another. It is therefore foolish to set some paylines with a higher wager than others. This is not optimal slots wagering. Optimal payline waging in slots is to bet evenly on all paylines. This will ensure that no matter where a winning combination lands, it has just as much of a chance of paying out as it would on any other payline.

With no viable strategy for impacting an outcome of a spin, it is very important for online slots players to mind their money. Bankroll management is a key ingredient in playing online slots.

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At their core, online slots games are the same. They all work off of a Random Number Generator (RNG) which will pull one of the thousands of potential outcomes possible for the result of a spin each time. So when it comes to choosing which online slots game to play, players need something to go off of.

Some will choose which online slots game based purely on the theme of the game. There is nothing wrong with this; it is an entertainment based choice. And every online slots player has the right to play based on the enjoyment they get out of a theme.

Others will choose which slots online game to play based on the bonus features offered. A recent trend has software developers including a bonus game less often than in previous years. Some players do prefer bonus games to free spins—finding them more entertaining than free spins—and will seek out online slots with bonus games.

But a good number of online slots players will choose which game to play online after comparing the payout percentages of several online slots. The payout percentage of an online slots game is the amount of total wagers that is paid back out in winnings across the board; the winnings do not go to a single player. It is simply a percentage of how much that is taken in is paid back out. Naturally the higher the payout percentage, the more of the online slots game’s total wager is paid back out.

As a result online slots players will look for the online slots game with the highest payout percentage. A high payout percentage does not guarantee a large payout for any particular slots player. However players feel that there is a better chance of getting a payout out of an online slots game that pays back more than another online slots game.

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Slots are a very exciting game. The spinning, the noises, the flashing images, the payouts. It is easy to see how many players get caught up in the action and the excitement. And what happens when you get excited? You speed up.

An increase in speed is not a good thing when it comes to playing slots. This is not a race. There are no other players to beat to the finish line.

Also? Spinning the reels as fast as you can is not going to trigger a jackpot. Again, you are not racing other players to the prize. Speed is not going to make the jackpot come.

However, speed will run through your bankroll faster.

That is the only thing that increasing or maintaining a high spin rate will do. Considering that slots games are designed to take your money over time, it only makes sense that the faster you spin the faster your bankroll will be gone.

Think about it for a moment. If you speed up the time it takes to play through your bankroll, you will be done playing in a shorter amount of time. A high spin rate is bad slots wagering.

A high spin rate does nothing good to your odds. It drives the house edge up because they are acquiring your money faster. That is what house edge is based on, the house’s ability to take your money. And any slots player worth their bankroll will not take actions to drive the house edge up for themselves.

Rather than playing the reels as fast as you can, slow down. Enjoy the show that slots games put on with their animations, movie clips and music. Treat it as the entertainment experience that it is rather than a raving race to the end.

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I have heard some disparaging things about slots games and slots players. Specifically the players. Popular belief is that slots players are too stupid to understand that there is no such thing as slots strategy.

I have to disagree. We know very well that short of actually breaking or hacking into an online slots game or a slot machine, there is nothing that we can do to impact the outcome of a spin of the reels or land the jackpot. Okay, true, there are those some players that really do believe that a particular shirt or statue will influence the reels. But is that really so different than believing that walking under a ladder is give you bad luck? No, I did not think so.

But back to slots strategy and the lack thereof.

What a good many ignorant folk are seeing and mistaking for misguided slots players trying to find a slots strategy are actually shrewd players who are looking for ways to make the most of their bankrolls to make the fun of playing the slots last.

Yes, we know that the likelihood of winning a life-changing jackpot is slim. We play the slots because we enjoy them. They are easy to play and can be a nice way to unwind after a crummy day at the office.

And because we enjoy slots as a form of entertainment, we will examine ways to make our bankrolls last. Some slots players will look at betting strategies. Others will examine methods of betting—the number of paylines versus the number of coins per payline.

And for the slots players that find a betting strategy that works we can sit for hours spinning the reels of our favorite slots games while the hot to trot poker player who wagered high too fast lost his bankroll. For those nay-sayers who denounce slots players as simpletons, we will be waving goodnight to you as you stroll out of the casino empty handed as we continue to play. Think of that the next time someone says your favorite slots game is dumb.

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Strategy is nonexistent when it comes to slots games. Does not matter if you are playing a slot machine or an online slots game, there is no strategy that will impact the outcome of a slots game spin.

But there is some strategy in regards to a slots player’s money. It is called bankroll management.

This morning I told the slots tale of a woman named Jackie who got on a winning streak and then lost her winnings and her allotted money for that night.

In the tale, Jackie practiced a step in bankroll management that is good to follow: set a limit for yourself in how much you are willing to lose in one night. Think of it in terms of lose and it will help you choose a realistic amount for your bankroll. If you are not comfortable with the idea of losing $1,000 do not allot yourself $1,000 to play with in a night.

So in that respect, Jackie did well.

However, she did make a terrible mistake when it came to her winnings.

The mistake that Jackie made was to incorporate her winnings into her bankroll. Big mistake.

Allowing any significant amount of winnings to be added into your bankroll is a recipe to lose them. If you want to keep winning, keep in mind how much of the bankroll shown on the screen or readout is winnings, and play until only your winnings are left.

For example, if you are playing quarter slots and won $150, that is a significant amount. Now let’s say that you hit that $150 when you had $200 left on your screen readout. The slots game will add the $150 to the $200 so that it will show your bankroll as $350.

This is where the bankroll management strategy comes in.

What you need to remember is that $150 of that $350 is winnings, not part of your allotted bankroll. So as long as you do not have any more significant wins, you can keep playing until the game says you have $150 left.

This way you can still play and you are still only playing with your allotted bankroll—your winnings will not be spent this way. The point of a slots bankroll management strategy is to hang on to your winnings and keep from losing more than you intended.

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Sometimes we are on a roll when we are play a slots game. It could be a slot machine or an online slots game. It does not matter. Winning streaks happen on both sides of gaming. Today I am going to tell you the tale of Jackie and what happened to her when she was on a winning streak on a slots game.

Jackie is your average slots player. She gets up in the morning, goes to work, has a ham sandwich for lunch, goes back to her desk and then leaves the office at 5 pm every week day. Jackie lives an ordinary life by day, but by night she is a slots player.

Sometimes she plays classic three reel slots games, and other times she plays the newer five reel slots games. Sometime she drives to the nearest casino and other times she plays online slots. But she will play a few times per week.

Normally Jackie will set herself a limit on how much money she will play with, and when she runs out she stops for the night. She watches TV after she runs out of money. This is good bankroll management—the limiting how much she will play with at any one time, the TV part has nothing to do with bankroll management.

One night Jackie came home from another day of ham sandwich lunches and work to play a slots game. This particular night she was playing slots online.

After about fifteen minutes of playing, Jackie hit one of the higher payouts. A couple spins later she hit another. A few spins more and she hit another. And then another. In the span of ten more minutes Jackie had won so much that she had more money than she started with.

This was new! Jackie was on a winning streak! A little voice in the back of her mind told her to quit now, when she was ahead. But the voice of Thrill and Excitement were shouting, ‘Spin, spin! Spin, Jackie, spin!’

And so she did.

Thirty minutes later Jackie had lost the profit she had made from her winning streak and her allotted bankroll for the night. After staring at the screen, not quite believing that she had lost the extra winnings, Jackie shuffled out to her living room to watch TV like she always did. The night had felt so shiny a half hour before, and now it was just ordinary.

And Jackie vowed to quit the next time she heard that little voice telling her to when she was on a winning streak.

The lesson that Jackie learned is one that every slots player should heed. While there is no real way to gauge a slots game as to when to stop, the best rule of thumb is to quit while you are ahead.

If you win a significant amount from a spin, either quit or adjust your bankroll allotment. Say you won $30 while playing a penny slots game. That is significant. Do not think of your bankroll as being $30 richer. At this point, keep playing until you are down to $30. That way you can still have made some money off of a slots game.

I will cover this bankroll management idea more this afternoon.

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It is always considered smart gambling when players give themselves a bankroll. A bankroll is not just the source of money to spin the reels of a slots game. It is also the limit to your playing. Smart slots players will stop playing the slots when their bankroll runs out.

But the problem then becomes how much money to bring in order to enjoy playing the slots. First you have to determine what will make you enjoy them. Usually after winning, which a bankroll cannot impact, is the amount of time played when determining whether or not slots are enjoyable.

So you need a bankroll to cover the amount of time you want to play.

Time is not as it appears to be when playing slots.

Time is not measured in minutes. It is measured in spins. You might spin the reels slower than the guy next you. In half an hour you might have played less and have retained more of your bankroll, leaving you more time to continue playing, than that guy next to you who spun the reels twice as fast and has less money left to keep playing.

Put another way, the faster you spin the reels of a slots game the faster you will play through your bankroll. And the actual time it takes you to play out your bankroll means nothing. It is the number of spins that measures the enjoyment and lifespan of your bankroll.

Spinning the reels less often in an hour will cause your bankroll to last longer.

Think of how much you want to spend on a spin. Say you are going for the longest possible life for your bankroll, and are only going to wager the minimum amount per payline, then a twenty payline slots game would cost you $0.25 per spin.

Now that you know that each spin is going to cost you a quarter you can begin to figure how many spins you can play, which will determine how long you can play. If you have a bankroll of $200, you can play for 800 spins.

Determining your bankroll is part of your slots strategy. It helps you to know how long you can play so that you do not spend more than you know you should.

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We have already established that slots games do not have any real strategy. By real slots  strategy I mean that slots do not have any form of strategy that will influence the outcome of a spin of the reels. That is just the way it is with slots. You play them for the fun of the game.

However, you can always apply a sort of money management to slots when playing.

If you look at modern day slot machines or check out online slots games you notice that the number of paylines and the amount of a coin are not your only wagering options anymore.

Rather than wagering just one coin per payline, you can now wager up to five or even ten in some online slots games.

It is a sneaky way for the cost of a single spin to be driven up. Check it out:

You are playing a twenty payline slots game and you are wagering $0.05 per coin. You think of yourself as a nickel player. But then you are wagering five coins per line. Five coins at a nickel per coin means that you are wagering $0.25 per payline.

So you are in fact a quarter player despite the fact that you are only wagering $0.05 per coin. Bit on the sneaky side is it not?

Now in order to be eligible for some jackpots that are out there you have to bet the maximum, and that means all paylines and the highest number of coins. This can get quite costly.

There is a middle ground.

Find a slots game with a smaller number of coins, like one with a maximum coin wager of five coins instead of ten. You can find one with fewer paylines. Or you can find one with both. Which would be better.

You can then bet the maximum but still not be blowing through all of your bankroll. This is you managing your money in a slots game.

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As many players hear, there is no slots strategy for online slots games. None. But that does not mean that players do not have something about slots games that they can control.

Many online slots games today come with a number of paylines. It used to be that the standard was nine. Then it creeped up to fifteen. Then it was normal to release an online slots game with twenty paylines. Last year the number inched up to twenty five paylines being normal.

Then this summer came and a slew of new online slots games were released. And many of them featured forty paylines and some even boasted one hundred paylines.

Yes, it is true that you must have all of the paylines active in order to have the best opportunity to land a winning combination. But that does not mean that you have to wager the maximum number of coins per payline.

You can wager a penny per payline on a twenty five line slots games and effectively be playing a quarter slot machine. That is when wagering one coin per line.

But if you were to wager, says, one penny and five coins per line you are effectively wagering the same a single nickel per payline. That wagering brings your $0.25 spin up to $10 per spin. Suddenly your online slots game got a lot more costly.

Wagering the maximum amount of coins can quickly wipe out your bankroll. The best thing a player can do in terms of slots strategy if he or she wants to wager the maximum coin amount is to play a slots game with fewer coins per payline.

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Of all of the casino games that can be found in brick and mortar casinos, slot machines are the ones players have the least control over in terms of slots strategy.

What lures players to slot machines? And, yes, they do indeed lure them. It comes from knowing that this is an easy casino game to play. There is also all of the bright flashing lights and the sounds and then the sounds of payouts. And do not forget the carrot held above your head that you could win a massive jackpot and change your life.

Those qualities are what make slot machines the sirens of the casinos—they will lure you in and take your money.

Which is the purpose of slot machines. The built in house edge is stacked against the players, and as a game of chance, there really is not a strategy available that will allow players to have a direct impact on the outcome of a spin.

But there is one aspect that players can control. No, I am not saying tie yourself to something to keep you away from slots like how Odysseus did to not be caught by the sirens. Think of this as a way of controlling yourself around the sirens.

You can control your speed, or rate of play, on a slot machine. Slowing down how fast you are pounding Spin. The more you spin the reels, the more opportunities the house has to take your money from you.

Following that line of logic, the less times you hit Spin and the fewer rounds you play in an hour the less opportunities the house has to take your money.

I know how it is, the lights and the sounds—it is exciting and easy to get carried away. But for the sake of what you can call a slots strategy, slow down and limit how many times you spin the reels in an hour.

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