The Agony and the Ecstasy of being dealt a straight flush

There are two very frustrating situations playing Bonus Poker.

One is when you are dealt a full house with three aces. Proper strategy is to hold the full house with most of the Bonus Poker paytables such as 8/5 and 7/5 though in 6/5 Bonus holding only the three aces makes sense.

The frustrating thing about holding the full house with three aces is that we are so tempted to just hold the three aces and try for the quad-aces jackpot.

the other frustrating situation is being dealt a straight flush with four cards to a royal. Proper strategy is to hold the dealt straight flush -- with the exception of Deuces Wild games where a straight flush isn't a big pay and then you try for the royal.

I guess you might make the case to try for the royal when a big progressive jackpot is involved. But in situations like those in the photo below, when dealt a straight flush with four to the royal you hold the straight flush. The photo below is of a dealt straight flush with four to the royal in 8/5 Bonus.

But here's my question: dealt a straight flush with four to the royal in a non-progressive game, how tempted are you to just hold the royal cards? Are you slightly tempted, very tempted or not tempted at all?

I've thrown away the 9 several times .... playing deuces ;) Never hit the royal.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by arcimede$

I've thrown away the 9 several times .... playing deuces ;) Never hit the royal.

---

You are supposed to throw away the 9 playing deuces. Are you suggesting to hold the SF playing deuces??

I do know they're really welcome since I've changed to bp as my main play. I hit one yesterday and it felt just as good as hitting four of a kind on dbp. And it was a closed straight flush, which made it even better. I've gone for it several times, but only hit once, which was about 5 years ago.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Alan Mendelson

You are supposed to throw away the 9 playing deuces. Are you suggesting to hold the SF playing deuces??

---

Nope. Just making it clear there are times when the 9 should be discarded.

Yes, I would hold the straight flush in this situation if, how Rob would state, it would get me back to playing a lower denomination or to reach a win goal. Heck, in my current situation I would be overjoyed to win this type of money. :D

I told someone about this who reminded me that at Harrah's Rincon several years ago a player who was dealt a king high straight flush dropped the nine and drew the Ace to get the progressive $1 royal. So my friend says, of course I would drop the 9. But when I pointed out that it was a $10 game and not a $1 game his said -- no, I would hold the SF on a ten-dollar game.

Always hold the straight flush on Jacks or Better, and it's not even close.

Your chance of drawing the proper card for the Royal is 1-in-47, or slightly better than 2%.

A Royal pays 16 times better than a Straight Flush, ignoring progressives. You would need about 50x the straight flush payout to where it would be worth drawing to the Royal.

So holding the straight flush is better both for variance control and for overall expected value.

Easy decision, unless you're a sick gambler.

By the way, in the summer of 1971, I had to "draw to an open ended straight flush" -- except the stakes were much higher than any gambling game. The stakes were my life!

My mother lost a LOT of blood and I was almost a certain miscarriage. She also had a previous miscarriage in the pregnancy before me, which went almost the exact same way at the same exact same point.

According to the doctor, there was about a 5% chance that I would survive the massive blood loss and avoid the miscarriage. However, somehow the bleeding abruptly stopped, the pregnancy proceeded as normal, and I was born healthy in early 1972.

The chance of my survival there was about equivalent to hitting a open-ended-straight-flush draw in video poker, which is 4.2%.

I think of that whenever I am drawing to an open ended straight flush.

Interesting analogy Dan, but as you said -- the stakes were much higher.

Here's a hand I had yesterday. Slightly different facts but I wonder what everyone would do. Playing 25 cent ultimate x 5-way. Get a full house dealt (i forget if next hand was 10x or 12x on that game but let's assume 10x for sake of discussion). So next hand all 5 hands are 10x. I get dealt AKQJ 9 of spades. Flush pays 30 so 30x5x10=1500 units. Or--do you throw it away and go for the royal. Of course-i threw away the 1500. Got no flushes and one pair of jacks.
Correct play obviously but tuff to throw away 1500 units.

I asked my resident pro -- my son -- who pointed out that your 1500 units on quarters was worth $375 but if you got ONE royal it would have been worth $10,000. As my son said... "it's only $375 so you have to do it. People will pay $375 just for that kind of draw," my son, the expert, said.

I have never played the game, but to be honest, I would have also paid you $375 for that kind of a chance at big money.

You should stay away from Ultimate X. It's a big edge for the house.

However, if you find an Ultimate X where someone left a few multipliers up (especially a 12x), then definitely run it until you lose all/most multipliers.

Dan-I know what you are saying and that is the difference between playing for recreation for a couple hours and playing professionally or compulsively for endless hours. I like ultimate x because of the chance for the hand described above. I had the excitement--I blew the hand--but that's what I am looking for when killing an hour or 2. The extra % I'm theoretically giving up--don't care.

Just to say I've enjoyed this thread BECAUSE I hit the third straight flush in 3 weeks-but today it saved the day as it got me started back on the uphill return after 3 not so good short sessions on vp. But what's so weird, the last two have been EXACTLY 5-9 of clubs!

sorry, that post went on by mistake.

Moved to the OPEN forum. -- Alan