When you play some online casino games you always need to be aware of the way those games play and play, for it is often all too easy to accidentally play some games in an incorrect way and that could result in the house edge of that game or the payout percentage becoming much lower than you may have been expecting!
Take one of the world’s most popular casino games, that being the game of Video Poker. The basic idea behind this game is you choose a stake, hit the Deal button and you are then dealt out five initial playing cards. The aim is to select which of those five cards you wish to discard and which you wish to keep in play, and once those you have chosen to discard have been removed replacements are then dealt out from the deck.
This will seem a fairly straight forward game to play to the untrained eye, however due to the winning hand combinations listed on the pay table of all video poker games and their respective pay out amounts, you need to understand fully how to play this game strategically to get the best chance of winning on every hand you play.
So below we have compiled several playing errors you could quite easily make when playing any type of video poker games, so if you enjoy playing this game regularly or simply wish to start playing it for the very first time, have a good long look through this guide to ensure you are aware of any mistakes you may must make, that could end up costing you dearly!
Coin Staking Errors
Let us start by enlightening you on several different staking errors you could make when playing video poker games online. The first thing you should always do when playing a video poker game is to ensure the coin values you are going to play that game for can be sustained by your available account balance.
So firstly, select a coin value that equates very well to your gaming budget and ideally ensure you have enough funds to play between 50 and 100 hands. Also, and this is a very important aspect of playing video poker, take a look at the pay table to see if the Royal Flush or any of the higher valued hand combinations have been enhanced when you play that game with the maximum number of coins in play.
If there is an enhanced jackpot on offer for maximum bet wagers, then make sure you play maximum bet wagers on every game you play, for by doing so the expected long term payout percentage attached to that variant is the one you are most likely to achieve as you play that game more and more.
One other thing to be aware of is that many progressive video poker games require players to play maximum bet hands to activate the jackpot paying hand combination as listed on the pay table, failing to play max bet hands will result in the jackpot payout becoming deactivated and as such you will never have any chance of winning it unless you play maximum bet wagers!
Play Low Paying Video Poker Variants
Each video poker game is going to have its very own long term expected payout percentage. This is worked out based on the actual payouts listed on the pay table and all of those winning hand combinations associated payouts.
This does of course mean that every single video poker game variant you come across will have its own payout percentage on offer when players put into play perfect playing strategy. The art to finding a video poker game to play that will give you the best long term paybacks is to only play those with the very highest payout percentages.
Somewhere listed on the pay table of the video poker game or usually in the help files of the game when you are accessing an online video poker game, you will find listed and displayed the expected long term payout percentage of that game.
So hunt around and compare the payout percentages as there can often be very subtle differences you will not first notice in regards to some winning payouts on certain hand combinations, and when playing games with the same name but at different casinos the payout percentage can differ quite noticeably.
If you do wish to play video poker online and you have an account at any Microgaming software powered online casino sites then the game worthy of your attention and play time in the gaming suite offered at such sites is the All Aces video poker game as that game has a payout percentage of 99.92%.
Playing the Jacks or Better video poker game at most online casino sites will see you up against a payout percentage of a fairly reasonable 99.54%, but if you love playing this particular variant of the game it will pay dividends for you to opt to play it at a NetEnt software powered casino as their variant of the game has a higher payout percentage of 99.56%!
Conclusion
As you will never wish to make any type of game playing errors when playing video poker games then always make sure you understand every aspect of the variant you are playing as mentioned above.
But also be aware that there is an option offered at many online casinos in regards to how you can set the video poker games to play and operate, and this is via the Auto Hold option setting.
If you turn on and activate the Auto Hold setting you will notice the game automatically is going o hold the best cards dealt out in the initial five card deal, which is going to take a lot of the guesswork out of having to decide with of these cards you should hold and which ones you should discard.
