Tweet about Bonus Slot Prospecting

Here is the tweet: https://mobile.twitter.com/PokerBrad...55052516802562

I like this guy: honest, transparent and not afraid to tell it like it is when he loses money. This tweet is about how he (and other smart) hustlers find new games: Prospecting.

I lose anywhere from $300 to $600 on the low end to as much as $2,000+ when prospecting. The bad news is a lot of the games are duds, which is money down the drain. And when I figure out a game, I try to play different versions of the game to help understand how the manufacturers tweaked the game in different markets.

Bradley (in his tweets) was down $500 before it turned around. But later in his thread / conversation, he stated:

“I'd say it's kind of like an upgraded Block Bonanza but actually worth your time checking for plays.

High variance and some evaluation skills needed, I'd love to see all AP games more in that direction.”

For those of us who researched Block Bonanza (BB), you would know why Bradley played the game in the photos (game is not named & I haven’t played it).

Here is info on BB:
https://www.casi-know.com/slots/1132 (but game comes with different themes or skins)

Key points in BB:
- prizes are color-coded; you want huge yellow (& green) prizes
- the big prizes are generally found on the fifth reel, e.g. right-most reel / column
- you have to win a combination of at least three CONNECTING “$” symbols (leftmost to right columns) to win corresponding symbols on top matrix, RESPECTIVELY!!
- prizes change after so many spins, e.g. not sticky as in stays until it gets hit per the version I researched
- in one version, the Wild SYMBOL acts as a “$”
- some “$” **may** double (?) prize amount in the above matrix for that specific corresponding cell.

I didn’t play Bradley’s game but it’s pretty obvious why he prospected the game:
- large prize $600 on first & fifth reels / columns
- the prizes are awarded based on five key symbols (“Prize Pool”) as opposed to a winning combination in BB
- the prizes in this game is WAY LARGER than on BB; notice the two $600 cells in the first photo (the $600 prize in column one was hit but the second $600 on column 5 remained unhit, and was hit on the second photo).

This is not a bonus slot for me due to high variance; however, it shows how smart hustlers are able to figure out what games to prospect.

I keep saying these two key comments:
1) you want to be the one-eye king in the land of blind hustlers
2) you have got to focus on the next game; the games you are playing today has competition and will get replaced at some point in the future

In summary: Prospecting is expensive but is a necessary cost as being a successful hustler for the long run. Also, you will be surprised how much free information is on the internet if you know where to look.

Good luck.

Clarification: Wins on a Payline vs Wins on Scatter Symbols

If you ever played Jungle Riches (or any “Tiles” game), the general rule for the game is cells on a winning payline breaks or “award” those cells. The problem is 5-line wins are very hard to get despite wild symbols. The designers of the game allowed wins on scatters to break or “award” cells (and game also randomly breaks a locked cell).

The point is a lot of the times, the LAST EFFEN locked cell is on the fifth reel / column and is usually broken by a scatter win. If the game did not allow for wins from scatters (or randomly cracks a cell), it would be very hard to break the last cell and piss off the player base and the game would be a flop.

If you understand the “cell” concept from Tiles games, you’ll understand why wins on scatters are better than wins on a payline.

In Bradley’s game, unlike Block Bonanza, it awards prizes on scatters, and that makes all the difference. In Block Bonanza, the highest prizes were usually on the fifth reel thus making an extreme long shot to win.

My point is when game manufacturers make tweaks to a game, it also opens up the possibility for bonus hustlers. If Tiles did not allow for wins on scatters or randomly breaks a locked cell, very few hustlers would play Tiles.

Another clarification: If you make two key assumptions for Bonanza Blocks (BB)

- the awarding of prizes on the top screen is RANDOM, r.g. there is a function Y = f(X) that generates the block of prizes
- the hit or win ratio is INDEPENDENT of the prizes on top screen

Then BB is a bonus slot due to taking the limit of N (N = opportunities) as it gets very large; however, deep pocket & high tolerance to extreme variance will limit who can play the game.

If you assume the average sum of the prizes is Z, then that Z value is used for the payback or RTP calculation. The hustler checks to see when an outsized prize is available, e.g. that outsized prize is a multiple larger than the average for that column or reel. The logic is addition by subtraction: By avoiding the bad plays (prizes BELOW the average prize structure), then by logic you must be playing at above average RTP’s so at some point it becomes +EV. But the warning about variance still stands.

Bradley realized that this game relaxed some of the restrictive elements of BB and made this game a better play than BB, but you had to know how BB works and when BB becomes a play.