Slots Hero

I think we might have some crossover players, players who once played blackjack, and maybe still do, but are now into playing slots games.

The reason I say this is because I have heard tell of a new slots strategy: count the symbols.

The way this works is that players will count the symbols on the reels. It is believed that the number of symbols on the reels will reveal the likelihood of landing a particular winning combination.

For example if you were playing a three reel slots game with twenty symbols per reel, you would multiply 20 x 20 x 20 to equal 8,000. Then you would divide 1 into 8,000 then multiply it by 100%.

True this will tell you the odds of landing that winning combination, but it does not in any way reveal when that combination will happen. Knowing the odds of landing a particular winning combination could either depress you or just add to the trivia knowledge you possess.

But it does not give you an edge, or increase your chances of landing that combination.

And when it comes to modern day slots games—both online slots games and slot machines—this so-called slots strategy is actually useless.

Both online slots games and slot machines are video slots. This means that they do not have actual reels. The symbols are programmed into the game’s software and the RNG pulls a result for a spin when Spin is clicked or hit.

Without actual physical reels it is impossible to count the number of symbols present as the positions and visible number of symbols could change from resulting spin to resulting spin.

And without the ability to accurately count the symbols this slots strategy gives even less than it originally did back when there were actual reels.

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It seems that slots players will never tire of trying to find ways to crack the Random Number Generator (RNG) of online slots games and slots machines. I think they feel that if they can crack the RNG that they will then be able to beat the slots game, and collect that jackpot.

But the truth is that the RNG is not something that can be cracked.

Today’s ‘concern’ pertains to the RNG and previous spins.

Some players seem to think that the RNG takes into account the previous spin when pulling a result for the current spin. The truth is that the RNG does indeed take anywhere from the last spin to any number of spins into account when pulling a result for the current spin on an online slots game or slot machine.

Now, do not jump the gun on this. This is not by any means the secret, long sought after key to cracking RNGs and slots games open. There is a logical explanation to this:

The RNG has to take previous spins into consideration when pulling a result for a current spin simply because it would not due to have the exact same results as the last spin.

Actually that would be a pretty cool random jackpot idea—award a jackpot for landing exactly the same symbols in the same places as the previous spin.

The point is that, yes, the RNG does take precious spins into consideration. And if you were to go back in time and hit Spin on an online slots game or slot machine, you would get the same results on the next spin as you did the first time.

But there are two sides to this. While the RNG considering previous spins keeps the same results from being landed, this also means that it keeps the online slots game or slot machine from paying out the same jackpot too frequently.

This is a part of balancing the payout percentage of an online slots game or slot machine: the previous spin consideration of RNGs keeps the spins varied and also keeps the payouts from going crazy, paying out too much or not enough.

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Within the last couple of years developers of online slots games have begun to work another feature of the Vegas style slot machines: the ability to wager multiple coins.

What exactly is multiple coin wagering?

When you wager multiple coins you are wagering more than one coin on a single payline. For example you could be wagering $0.01 on a payline. A penny is your coin. If you were to wager, say, three coins on a single payline you would be wagering $0.03 per payline at that point.

This does not sound like a big deal but multiple coin wagering does have an impact on your slots strategy.

Remember your wagering is the only aspect of slots that you can control, so it is what you build your strategy on.

First off you need to check what the coin setting is on when you first open up an online slots game. Many online casinos will have the coin denomination set at its highest setting. If you do not check you could wind up wagering a lot more. Say you are a nickel player and want to wager $0.05 per payline. If you do not check the coin setting and it is set at 5 coins, you will be wagering $0.25 per payline; and your spins will get expensive quick.

If you do intend to wager multiple coins per line, think first about how much you want to wager in total. If you only want to spend no more than $1 per spin and are playing a twenty five payline online slots game, you could wager at most 4 $0.01 coins per payline.

The thing to remember about multiple coin wagers is that you need to take into consideration what denomination you assign to a single coin, and then figure what you are wagering in total so that you are not surprised at the cost of a spin. This is a part of managing your betting in your slots strategy.

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This morning I discussed elements of slots strategy that can be controlled by a slots player, the first point being to not even bother doing battle with the RNG as there is no way to beat it.

The one aspect of gambling with a slots game that a player can control is their bankroll. And bankroll management is the key to having a slots strategy. Rate of play is a part of such a slots strategy, but betting strategy is the other aspect.

Whether you are playing slot machines in a brick and mortar casino, or play online slots games, you will at some point, either from other players in the casino or in forums online, hear of something called a betting system.

Do not confuse a betting strategy with a betting system.

A betting system is a plan for betting with steps that you follow and do not deviate from.

An example of a betting system would be the Martingale betting system.

The way that this betting system works is that you double your wager on the next round if you lost the previous, and you keep doubling until you win.

So let’s say that you wager $0.25 on your first spin and you lose. You would wager $0.50 on the next, and a $1 on the next, and then $2, then $4. Well you see how this is going. In five spins, which can take less than five minutes, you would have gone from a quarter a spin up to $4.

With a betting system the wagers ad up quickly when used with a slots game. You can see how easily and how quickly you could run through your bankroll.

Now a betting strategy would be, in its easiest format, wagering the same thing and only increasing or decreasing the amount of your wager if your bankroll could handle the change. The change in your wager is dictated by you, and not by the rules of some silly betting system.

Any slots player worth their chips is going to steer clear of a betting system and focus on sticking with a betting strategy.

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Yesterday I talked about slots strategy in regards to the RNG of a slots game—how both online slots games and slot machines alike have RNGs, and how RNGs pull outcomes for a spin of the reels.

I ended my explanation of RNGs and slots strategy by clarifying that there is no slots strategy out there that can do battle with the RNG of a slots game and outsmart the RNG.

However, not all hope is lost. There is a way to create a slots strategy that can be used when spinning the reels. And it can be used when playing online slots games or slot machines, which is nice should you play both.

So what is this slots strategy? It is bankroll management.

No, no, wait, hear me out!

Think of it like this: strategy is about taking advantage of opportunities to make money and about making action that minimize your losses. Think about that last part: minimize your losses. That is what slots strategy is for.

Slots games—both online slots and slot machines—are designed to take a player’s money. Sad, but true fact of life. Some slots games will take players’ money faster than others.

Since the RNG of a slots game cannot be impacted by the player, there is no strategy that can be applied to take advantage of opportunities to make money since all opportunities are the same. So that leaves the other side of strategy’s purpose in your hands: to minimize your losses.

The best way for a player to minimize their losses in terms of slots strategy is bankroll management.

There are two ways to go about bankroll management. You can control your rate of play. Or you can use a betting strategy to control your bankroll—do not confuse that with betting system.

Rate of play means that you do not use the Stop Spin feature because it speeds up your playing, and you play more games per hour. The more games you play per hour, the faster you lose your money.

Also to control rate of play you can set yourself a certain number of games per hour or give yourself a set time limit to play—like play for ten minutes and take a break.

Bankroll management is key to a player’s slots strategy as it is the only aspect of playing slots games that the player can control.

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Something that puzzles me about some slots players is that they swear that they can beat the RNG. They will build whole slots strategies for tricking a slots game out of its jackpot like the game is the troll on the bridge, and they have to trick it to cross the bridge.

But slots games—both online slots and slot machines—are not trolls that can be tricked.

In fact, the RNG is one of the things the two types of slots games have in common. An RNG is a Random Number Generator. It is the portion of the game that pulls the results of a spin of the reels.

When a slots game is created, the game developers program the RNG with every single possible outcome the reels could have. I imagine that this takes a lot of time to do. Anyway, when a player clicks or presses Spin, the RNG will randomly pull an outcome for that spin.

And the RNG pulls that outcome the second Spin is clicked or pressed. That is why the Stop Spin feature that some slots games have is pointless—the outcome has already been pulled.

But some players swear that this is how to outsmart the RNG. They are advocates of Stop Spin being a part of any slots strategy. These players believe that if they click or press Stop Spin at just the right moment, they will fool the RNG into giving up its jackpot.

This is untrue since the RNG pulls an outcome as soon as Spin is hit. All Stop Spin does is increase your rate of play, and that increases the amount of money you stand to lose in an hour.

Because slots games are games of chance there is no slots strategy available to beat or trick the game. The best that a player can do in terms of slots strategy is to manage their playing and their bankroll.

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Online slots and slot machines are a bit tricky when it comes to your slots betting to payout chances. Naturally, a slots player would have to be tricky in return in their slots strategy to help compensate for it.

Let’s say that you are a nickel player, meaning that you wager a nickel per payline. But you are a player who likes to play with multiple coins per payline. So in effect you are more of a quarter player because you are wagering closer to a quarter on a payline.

So you would think that the online slots game or slot machine that you are playing would recognize the increased wagering, and, recognizing the increased amount of wagering, payout accordingly like a quarter slots game would.

You would be wrong in thinking that. Remember that the house wants to hang on to every little bit of an edge that they can. It does not matter that online slots and slot machines are built to have an edge to take more money than they payout.

Even though the online slots game or slot machine is able to accept larger wagers because of multiple coins, it does not mean that it will payout on a larger scale.

So what should you do in terms of your slots strategy?

For starters look at your own slots betting. How are you betting? You say you are a nickel player, but you are wagering five nickels per payline, which is actually wagering a quarter per payline instead.

Look at your total bet per payline. If the number of coins you are betting has you betting a quarter per payline then you are not a nickel player. You are a quarter player.

And you want that quarter payout scale you will not find it betting multiple coins on a nickel slots game. But you will find that payout scale on a quarter machine while only wagering one quarter per payline.

The point is that you have to adjust your thinking about your own slots betting in order to proper work out your slots strategy. This means, in terms of slots strategy, looking at your slots betting and what you are betting in total per line rather than what coin you are betting.

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Progressive betting is big in online casino games and it is used by a great many players. For many, especially for those who are new to playing online casino games, a progressive betting system has the feeling of having a strategy, hence the draw they have.

For online slots players there really are not any strategies that can really be used for slots games. This is because online slots are games of chance, meaning that there is no way for the player to influence the outcome of a round.

Without a way to really influence the game players turn to betting strategies in an attempt to feel like they are influencing the game. Or they try decking the computers out with lucky things in hopes of winning a jackpot.

Unfortunately players mistake progressive betting systems as a slots strategy.

For one thing progressive betting systems are not limited to online slots—they are used across the board of casino games.

But the big things is that progressive betting systems are not strategy. And in a game like slots, players can lose a lot of money fast.

A typical progressive betting system will have players placing their original bet, and then doubling it every time they lose.

For online slots, in an example, we’ll say that you are playing a twenty five payline game at $0.01 per payline for $0.25 per spin. If you lose that fist spin, your next wager will be $0.50. Lose that second spin and you then wager $1. And then $2. And then $4.

You can see how this goes. Since players tend to lose more spins of the reels than they win, you can see how a player could lose money very quickly.

This is why you want to avoid using a progressive betting system when playing online slots. If you want to create a slots strategy for betting control stick with flat betting.

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I often come across some commonly asked questions in relation to slots and slots strategy. Probably two of the most common inquiries is whether there is a way to tell when an online slots game is going to give up its jackpot or which online slots game pays better than the rest.

In regards to the first question, imagine that you could log in to your player account at your favorite online casino. You then click over to the list of online slots games, and you start checking on this one and that one. Finally you find one, make a few wagers and you have enough to pay all your bills this month and some left over. Naturally the leftover bit goes back into the slots game.

Sound too good to be true? Well it is.

Unfortunately there is no indicator that lets players know when an online slots jackpot will drop. If there were people would be playing all the time, there would be no incentive to work, and online casinos would run out of money and then close. And then you would have to work.

The thing to remember is that while an indicator would be nice, these are games of chance, not ATMs. They are meant to be played. And maybe you will win and maybe you will not. That is the point of a game of chance. And slots are the king of games of chance.

As for the second question about knowing if one online slots game pays more than the rest, there is a bit of an answer for that one.

Online slots games have payout percentages. A game’s payout percentage tells the player how much of the total wagers made by all players is paid back to players in winnings and how much goes to the online casino.

For example, if an online slots game has a payout percentage of say 90%, it means that 90% of the total wagers is paid out in winnings and 10% is kept by the casino.

But here is the thing with payout percentages. They do NOT mean that 90% of your own wagers is paid back to you. It just means that 90% is paid out in total.

The percentage that is paid back to players could come in the form of lots of little payouts or several large payouts.

Generally the higher the payout percentage the more that online slots game pays back. As part of a slots strategy, players can do a bit of research and find an online slots game with a high payout percentage and play that game.

But keep in mind—and in your slots strategy—that it does not necessarily mean that you will be the recipient of the entire percentage. Above all online slots games are games of chance—all you can do is make your wager, set the reels to spinning and hope for the best.

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The more and more online slots games I see being released, the more I see with an increased number of paylines.

When I first started writing about slots many of the new online slots only had twenty paylines.

Then within the last year or so I have seen the number increase to twenty five. And really that is not too big of an increase. If you are wagering $0.01 per payline, it makes a spin cost $0.25 instead of $0.20. So you get four spins per dollar instead of five.

But with the release of some of the new online slots games in July I noticed that several had forty paylines and there have been a couple with one hundred paylines so far this year. Again, at $0.01 per payline, that makes a spin cost $0.40 and $1 respectively.

This is where you online slots strategy comes in to play.

The point of strategy in the case of online slots is to keep you from losing money too quickly. Key points in online strategy are to do a little research and find the online slots game with the highest payout percentage. Also, stop spinning the reels as fast as you—this is not a race! Unless you are racing to lose your money.

So, online slots strategy for paylines. Obviously the more paylines a game has the more it costs per spin. Oh sure, you could choose not to play all of the paylines but that defeats the purpose of having all those paylines.

The best that you can do in terms of slots strategy and paylines is stick to the online slots games with twenty or twenty five paylines.

Such games still offer the features players like to see in online slots games (bonus games, free spins, wilds and scatters), but the number of paylines will not eat into your bankroll too quickly. And that is the point of online slots strategy—to save your bankroll so that you can keep on enjoying the game and maybe hit it big.

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