Double Bonus Strategy

1. 9 7 Double Bonus Strategy
2. Video Poker Double Bonus Strategy
3. Ultimate X Double Double Bonus Strategy

Learn the correct way to play some tricky hands

By Henry Tamburin

Double Double Bonus Strategy HELP!!! Discussion in 'Video Poker' started by Stardust1958, Mar 20, 2017. Page 1 of 3 1 2 3 Next Stardust1958 Platinum. Messages: 1,018. Double Bonus Strategy Card Strategy Card. Free shipping on this item! SKU: 1401 Categories: Slots/Video Poker, Strategy Cards, View All. Double Double Bonus Strategy Card Strategy Card. Free shipping on this item! SKU: 1402 Categories: Slots/Video Poker, Strategy Cards. Double Double Bonus Poker Strategy While the game is based on Jacks or Better, the higher payout for special quads changes some of the decisions. The difference is that players will break apart three aces from a full house and two aces from two pair. Players dealt a special four of a kind will need to make sure the kicker is an ace, 2, 3, or 4. My Double Double Bonus strategy was devised for machines using the pay table below. If you're playing a different Double Double Bonus pay table the strategy won't be perfect, but it will still be good. Please note that to achieve the 100%+ payout percentage, you need to be betting five coins per hand.

In my previous columns, I reviewed the common blunders made by video poker players when playing Jacks or Better and Double Bonus. This month I’ll review the common blunders in Double Double Bonus (DDB).

DDB is the most popular video poker game in the country. That’s because of the extra bonus payouts that you could get when you are dealt four-of-a-kind in Aces, 2s, 3s, and 4s accompanied with a “kicker.” (The latter is the fifth card in your hand; if it’s an Ace, 2, 3, or 4, that’s when the bonus payoff kicks in.)

Here’s an example of a bonus payout. If you were to end up with four Aces accompanied with either a 2, 3, or 4 kicker, the payoff with max coins wagered is a whopping 2000 coins, or one-half the payoff for the royal flush. (That’s a nice $500 payout on a quarter denomination machine, half of the $1,000 you could win for a royal flush.)

There are a variety of pay schedules for DDB that will find in casinos; the most common ones are summarized below. Notice that the best pay schedule is 10/6 DDB (meaning the full house and flush pay 10 and 6 coins times the amount of coins wagered respectively). The Expected Return (or EV) for 106 DDB is 100.07%, which means a player would have a slight edge if every hand were played perfectly. Unfortunately, the 10/6 pay schedule for DDB is rarely offered outside of Las Vegas (and a few Reno) casinos. The second best pay schedule is 9/6 DDB (98.98% ER), which is available in many casinos around the country. I would strongly recommend that you avoid playing a 9/5 or 8/5 DDB game because of the lower ERs (97.87 % and 96.79% respectively).

The playing strategy for 10/6 and 9/6 DDB is virtual identical; however, most players blunder when they play DDB because the playing strategy is more difficult to master than either the strategy for Jacks or Better, Bonus Poker, or Double Bonus. Here are some common blunders. (I’ve assumed playing 9/6 DDB.)

How would you play the above hand? The vast majority of players would hold the three Aces and the 3 kicker in the hopes of drawing the fourth Ace for a 2000-coin payoff. But that’s a common blunder. The hold that has the most value is the three Aces. (For the math inclined, the ER for holding the three Aces plus the 3 is 59.15 while it’s 62.45 for holding only the three Aces.)

You have a paying full house; would you hold it? If you do, you would be making a blunder. In DDB, you should always break up a full house if your three-of-a-kind is A-A-A. (That’s because of the high value of the Ace in DDB.)

This is a hand that most players blunder, especially if they are accustomed to playing Jacks or Better (JOB). In JOB, the correct hold is the two pair; however, because of the higher value of the Ace in DDB, the correct hold for the above hand is the pair of Aces.

And

How would you play these two hands? Most players blunder on one or both hands. In 9/6 DDB, you should hold a three-card royal flush over a four-card flush with one exception. If your three-card royal is composed of an Ace plus 10 plus either J, Q or K, the better hold is the four-card flush.

The reason the three-card royal flush containing an Ace plus 10 is less valuable than four-card flush is because it contains only two high cards and two gaps. This results in less potential straight flushes, flushes, straights, or even a high pair. The general rule for 9/6 DDB is this: hold any three-card RF (except one containing A plus 10) over four-card flush and the latter over a three-card RF containing an Ace plus 10.)

Many players opt for holding the inside straight (8-9-10-J) but this would be a mistake. When you play DDB, you should never hold an inside straight if it contains a single high card because the latter has more value. (The correct hold for this hand is the Q).

Tip of the Month

If you are going to play DDB, be sure you know the playing strategy for this game and you’ve practiced it at home. You can get a strategy table for DDB on the video poker page at www.wizardofodds.com. You should practice the strategy at home on your computer and take along a strategy card when you play in a casino. (I recommend the Video Poker for Winners and Optimum Video Poker software training products and the Dancer/Daily strategy cards. They are available on my web store at www.smartgaming.com). The other important point to keep in mind about DDB is it is a very volatile game compared to Jacks or Better, Bonus Poker, and Double Bonus. You’ll need more bankroll playing DDB because of the game’s higher volatility.

Henry Tamburin, Ph.D. is a blackjack and video poker expert. He is the author of the Ultimate Blackjack Strategy Guide (http://www.888casino.com/blog/casino-guides/blackjack/, editor of the Blackjack Insider e-Newsletter (www.bjinsider.com), lead instructor for the Golden Touch Blackjack course, and host of smartgaming.com. For a free three-month subscription to his blackjack newsletter, go to www.bjinsider.com/freetrial. To receive his free Casino Gambling Catalog, call 1-888-353-3234 or visit www.smartgaming.com.

How to score big payouts while avoiding the pitfalls

9 7 Double Bonus Strategy

By Henry Tamburin

The larger payoffs come at a price; namely, the payoff for two pair is only even money (or 1 to 1). By transferring some of the game’s payouts from the more frequent two pair to the less frequent four-of-a-kind, it becomes a much more volatile game.

Double Double Bonus Poker (DDB) is the most popular video poker game in the country. That’s because it’s possible to hit several big payouts besides the royal flush, and this draws players to the game. Unfortunately, there are also some pitfalls to playing DDB, which most players are not aware of.

Table 1 summarizes the different pay schedules for DDB that you are likely to encounter. The first thing that should jump out at you is the amount of the payoffs for four-of-a-kind hands. They are rather large payoffs, especially if the fifth card in the hand (the “kicker”) is a specific card.

For example, the payoff for four Aces is 160 times your bet but if the kicker is a 2, 3, or 4, the payoff jumps to 400 coins. (That’s a 2000-coin payoff, or one-half the payoff for a royal flush, betting the maximum of five coins.) Likewise, the payoffs for four 2s, 3s, and 4s increases from 80 to 160 coins times your bet with an Ace, 2, 3, or 4 kicker. These mini-jackpots are the magnet that attracts players to this game.

What most players don’t understand is the larger payoffs come at a price; namely, the payoff for two pair is only even money (or 1 to 1). By transferring some of the game’s payouts from the more frequent two pair to the less frequent four-of-a-kind, it becomes a much more volatile game (more about this shortly).

Tabl1 also summarizes the ER for the different DDB pay schedules (bottom of each column). The best DDB game pays 10 coins for a full house and 6 coins for a flush per coin played (see Table 1). The Expected Return (ER) for 10/6 DDB is 100.07%, meaning the player would have a tiny advantage over the house if he played every hand perfectly.

There are many casinos in the Las Vegas area that offer 10/6 DDB. (Just go to either www.vpfree2.com or the video poker page on www.lasvegasadvisor.com to obtain a list of casinos that offer 10/6 DDB at different denominations.) Unfortunately, 10/6 DDB is not readily available in other areas of the country. (Partly the reason for this in that in some gaming jurisdictions, casinos can’t offer a game where the ER is over 100%). Nevertheless, it behooves you to find a casino that has at least the 9/6 DDB pay schedule, which has a 98.98% ER. (I wouldn’t recommend playing the 9/5 or 8/5 DDB games because the ERs are woeful. Again, check www.vpfree2.com for a list of casinos outside Las Vegas that offer 9/6 DDB.)

The high volatility of DDB results in most players going broke rather quickly if they are not lucky enough to hit one of the high payoff hands. In other words, most players play DDB undercapitalized. For example, supposed you were to play 9/6 Double Double Bonus instead of the much less volatile 8/5 Bonus Poker (BP). Both games have roughly a 99% expected return (ER) but the variance for 9/6 DDB is much higher (41.99) compared to 8/5 BP (20.90) Let’s assume you have a $200 bankroll and you want to play for two hours (1000 hands). By using the bankroll function in the Video Poker for Winners software program, you can determine what your chances are of going broke for each game. The results are:

Playing the low-volatile 8/5 Bonus Poker, you will lose your $200 stake only 2.55% of the time on average (that’s roughly 1 out of every 40 sessions).

Playing the more volatile 9/6 Double Double Bonus Poker, you will lose your $200 stake 28.66% of the time (that’s roughly 11 out of every 40 sessions you’ll tap out).

This means you are 11-times more likely to tap out with your $200 bankroll if you play 9/6 DDB instead of 8/5 BP. The point is this: Video poker games that are highly volatile (such as Double Double Bonus) require more bankroll to prevent going broke. (Also, your “emotional” bankroll will be tested in games that are highly volatile because you can experience some long “dry spells”.) Let me repeat this so it sinks in: DDB is very volatile.

Assuming you have the bankroll and the stomach to play DDB, you should master the playing strategy before you risk any money. The playing strategy for DDB is tricky because of the importance of the ace (see my Tip of the Month). You’ll find a playing strategy for DDB on the video poker page at www.wizardofodds.com. You should also consider practicing the strategy at home with video poker training software until your playing accuracy is at least 99% before risking money in a casino. (I recommend Video Poker For Winners or Optimum Video Poker training software, both available on my web site.) I also recommend that you purchase the DDB strategy card by Dancer and Daily and take it with you when you play so that if you are not sure how to play a hand, you can refer to the strategy card.

TABLE 1

Double Double Bonus Poker Pay Schedule

Payout Per Coin Played

* 4000 coins for a five-coin royal flush

Tamburin Tip of the Month

Video Poker Double Bonus Strategy

You are playing Double Double Bonus and are dealt the following two hands. How would you play them?

You should break up the full house in the first hand, hold only the three aces, and draw two more cards. In the second hand, you break up the two pair, hold the pair of aces, and draw three cards.

Ultimate X Double Double Bonus Strategy

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Henry Tamburin is a blackjack and video poker expert. He is the host of the smartgaming.com website and the editor of the Blackjack Insider newsletter (for a free three-month subscription, visit www.bjinsider.com/free). For a free copy of his Casino Gambling Catalog, which contains books, strategy cards, and software for video poker players, call toll free 1-888-353-3234, or visit the web store at smartgaming.com.