becoming a best video poker player

Once again, this piece of advice applies to all gamblers, as impatience can lead a player down the road to ruin.

These are negative expectation games, after all, so losing more than you win during a short-term stretch is to be expected. If those losses cause you to play irrationally – by moving up to higher stakes, playing games you haven’t perfected, or even heading to the table game pits to blow off some steam – you’ll sacrifice all of the hard work and training you’ve put in.

And with online casino machine-based games like video poker and slots, the specter of impatient play becomes even more ominous. These games don’t have dealers or fellow players to slow things down, so a video poker player who is “steaming” can start clicking buttons maniacally, parting ways with massive portions of their bankroll in a matter of minutes.

Rather than fall into that trap, I advise taking the opposite approach.

Slowing the game down by taking your time with each decision serves two main purposes.

First, you’ll have a few extra seconds to run through your memory banks and find the correct play for that scenario. Playing with optimal strategy can be tough, even for experts, so it’s always best to think things through and be sure before making a draw/hold decision.

Second, and most importantly, thinking for a spell stretches the session out, thereby reducing your hands per hour rate. Video poker may be one of the most player-friendly games on the floor, but it’s still spread on the casino floor, which means it’s almost always a negative expectation wager.

Speeding things up when gambling on negative expectation only serves one purpose: compounding the small losses you’ll inevitably incur.

By slowing the pace and stretching a session out to last longer, you’ll absorb less of those inevitable losses – which pads your expected return over the long run.