Double Super Times Pay Video Poker

A lot of video poker variations nowadays just feature a single addition added
to a standard game. Double Super Times Pay video poker is an example of this.
It’s a multi-line video poker game where you have the option of wagering an
extra 2 coins per hand in exchange for a randomly-awarded multiplier.

Each coin gives you a chance at the random multiplier. You get a possible
multiplier on your initial hand. Then you get another possible multiplier on the
hand you wind up with after discarding.

This page offers what we hope will be the only guide to Double Super Times
Pay video poker you’ll ever need. We cover the basics of how to play, how the
multiplier affects the probability and payback percentage for the game, where to
find Double Super Times Pay video poker online or off, and what kinds of
strategies can maximize your odds of winning.

The Basics of Double Super Times Pay Video Poker

To play Double Super Times Pay video poker, you need to first understand the
basics of video poker in general. As luck would have it, video poker is one of
the easiest games in the casino to learn.

The first distinction to make is between video poker and slot machines. The
games have a lot of superficial similarities, but the subtle differences make
video poker games like Double Super Times Pay a much better deal for the
educated gambler than almost any slot machine game.

In both games, a random number generator provides you with symbols on a
payline. Certain combinations of symbols result in a payout for the player.

The difference is that the symbols and probabilities in a slot machine game
are arbitrarily chosen. They usually have a theme, but they often also use
standard symbols like fruit and bars. It’s impossible to know what the
probability of getting a specific symbol in a specific place would be.

Video poker games like Double Super Times Pay use playing cards as symbols.
The probabilities for each of these playing cards mirror those you’d find using
a standard deck of cards.

This is a huge difference.

Casinos (and smart players) use a metric called “payback percentage” to
measure the odds for gambling machines. This is a long-term expected return to
the player, and it represents the average amount of money a player will win back
over a huge number of trials.

Here’s an Example:

You’re playing a slot machine with a payback percentage of 93%.

Every time you run a dollar through that game, the casino expects to win 7
cents.

Of course, in the short run, you’ll either lose your entire bet or win some
multiple of that bet.

But when you average your net loss over all those bets, if you’ve played long
enough, your average will mirror the mathematically expected return.

The long run is longer than most people think, too. We’re not talking about
dozens or even hundreds of spins here. We’re talking about thousands or tens of
thousands of spins.

The math behind calculating a payback percentage isn’t that hard. It’s just
the product of the potential payouts multiplied by the probability of getting
each payback. We’ll go into more detail about that in the next section.

But for now, understand that a slot machine provides you with half the
information you need to make this calculation. You have the payout, but not the
probability of winning the payout.

Since a video poker machine like Double Super Times Pay uses the same
probability as you’d find in a deck of cards, you CAN calculate the payback
percentage for the game.

We’d like to point out that slot machines are the only games in the casino
where you can’t calculate the house edge or the payback percentage. All other
games provide both pieces of data – the payout for the bet, and the odds of
winning the bet.

The other important thing to understand about video poker games is that you
get to make decisions which affect your outcome. Like blackjack, video poker is
a game where your decisions matter. We’ll get more into than when we discuss the
basics of gameplay below.

And gameplay is simplicity itself. You start by choosing a machine and
inserting your money. That money is converted into credits by the machine, which
is programmed for a specific denomination. Common denominations for Double Super
Times Pay include quarters or dollars. High rollers also play games where you
wager $5 credits.

The video poker machine converts your money into credits. Here’s an example:

You’re playing a $5 video poker game. You insert $1000 into the machine. You
have 200 credits to play with.

After you’ve inserted your money, you get to decide how many credits you’re
going to bet per hand. You can bet between 1 and 5 coins on most games.

But you should always bet 5 coins.

Here’s Why:

The jackpot on almost all video poker games is the royal flush. This hand
pays off at 800 for 1, but it only pays off at that amount if you make the
5-coin bet. If you only bet 1 coin, 2 coins, 3 coins, or 4 coins, the payoff is
only 200 for 1 or 250 for 1.

This makes a huge difference to your bottom line over time. Always bet the
max on a video poker game.

In Double Super Times Pay, you also have the option to wager 2 extra coins
per hand. If you want to not bet those 2 extra coins, the game plays out
normally – as if it were just another version of the base game in question.

After you’ve decided on your bet size, the machine deals you a hand on the
screen. At that point, you get to decide which cards you want to keep. You do
this by pressing the corresponding hold button beneath each card. You can also
just touch the screen on most newer machines.

Hit the deal button again to draw replacement cards for the cards you decided
to discard. Then the game pays you off based on the hand value of your final
hand.

Many video poker games – especially Double Super Times Pay – offer “multi-line”
games. These are video poker games where you can play 3, 5, or 10 hands at a
time. You must make a separate wager on each hand.

The initial hand on each of those is the same. The cards you keep are also
consistent throughout all hands. But the hands that are dealt as replacements
are dealt from differently-shuffled decks. As a result, it’s possible to get 3,
5, or 10 different hands, even though you started all those hands with the same
5 cards.

The wrinkle in this game is that you get a random chance at a multiplier with
your initial hand. You get another random chance at a multiplier with your final
hand. This multiplier increases the amount of your win (if any).

You’ll win a multiplier with a probability of 1 in 15 on each opportunity.
The multiplier varies, because it’s random, but it averages 4X.

Since we know this information, we can analyze how the extra feature affects
the payback percentage for the game, too.

Also, if you win two multipliers, they grow arithmetically, not
exponentially. In other words, if you get a 4X multiplier and another 4X
multiplier, your total multiplier is 8X, not 16X.

Finally, there’s an exception if you get a royal flush on your initial hand.
The multiplier for that hand is always 20, and you have no chance of getting
another multiplier on your hand after the draw if you get the multiplier on the
initial deal. But if you don’t get the multiplier on the initial deal, you get
another shot at the multiplier after the drawing action – even though with a dealt
royal flush, you’d never draw any cards. You’d just hold all of them.

Probability, Odds, Pay Tables, and Payback Percentages for Double Super Times
Pay Poker

Let’s back up a little bit and talk about probabilities in video poker. We’ll
start by providing you with a common pay table for 9/6 Jacks or Better, which is
sometimes available in a Double Super Times Pay version:

Hand/Coins	1 Coin	2 Coins	3 Coins	4 Coins	5 Coins
Royal flush	200	400	600	800	4000
Straight flush	50	100	150	200	250
4 of a kind	25	50	75	100	125
Full house	9	19	27	36	45
Flush	6	12	18	24	30
Straight	4	8	12	16	20
3 of a kind	3	6	9	12	15
2 pair	2	4	6	8	10
Pair of jacks+	1	2	3	4	5

This is called a 9/6 Jacks or Better pay table because the payoff for a full
house and a flush are 9 for 1 and 6 for 1 respectively. On a Jacks or Better
game, these are the 2 hands that casinos and video poker manufacturers are
mostly likely to adjust to get a different payback percentage.

This is the best version of a Jacks or Better video poker pay table you can
usually find. The payback percentage for this game is 99.54%.

To calculate that payback percentage, you just take the likelihood of getting
each payout and multiplying it by how much you’ll win if you get there.

You have a 54.5% chance of winding up with nothing at all. That’s an expected
value of 0.

You have a 21.5% chance of getting a pair of jacks or higher. That pays off
at even money, so that adds 21.5% to the payback percentage for the game.

You have a 12.9% chance of getting 2 pair. That pays off at 2 for 1, so that
adds 25.8% to the payback percentage. (Remember, you multiply the amount you’ll
win by the probability of winning to get the expected value for the hand.)

You have a 7.4% chance of getting 3 of a kind. That pays off at 3 for 1, so
that adds another 22.2% to the payback percentage.

You continue this process for every possible win to get the overall payback
percentage for the game. In this case, the overall payback percentage is 99.54%.
The house edge is 0.46%–add the 2 together and you get 100%.

You (and the casino) can use this information to project how much money
you’ll lose over time on a game like this. You multiply the number of hours
you’re going to play by how much you’re wagering on each hand. Then you multiply
that by the number of hands you’re playing per hour.

Let’s suppose you’re going to play for 20 hours on your next visit to Las
Vegas. You’re playing 9/6 Jacks or Better on a $1 machine, so you’re wagering $5
per hand. That’s $100. (20 hours X $5).

You average 600 hands per hour, so you multiply that by $100, and you get
$60,000.

The casino expects you to lose 0.46% of that, or $276.

That sounds like a lot of money, but let’s compare that with how much you’d
expect to lose playing an average slot machine with a payback percentage of 96%.

You’re still wagering $5 per spin, and you’re still making 600 spins per
hour, and you’re still going to play for 20 hours. The only change is the amount
you expect to lose – 4% of your total action instead of 0.46%.

4% of $60,000 is $2400.

That’s almost 10 times the losses.

Remember how we explained that video poker is almost always a better deal
than slot machines?

Here’s Why.

We do have a caveat, though – the theoretical payback percentage for each game
assumes that you’re making the mathematically optimal decisions on every hand.
If you make mistakes, you’ll lose a percentage point or 2.

But how does the bonus feature in Double Super Times Pay affect that payback
percentage?

You must factor in the cost of the extra 2 coins. You also must factor in the
occasional multiplier and how much that changes your expected outcome.

With some video poker games, the multiplier costs so much that it lowers the
overall payback percentage for the game.

But as it turns out, Double Super Times Pay increases the payback percentage
for the base game.

For the most part, Double Super Times Pay adds 0.5% to the payback percentage
of any game it’s added to.

To the best of our knowledge, Double Super Times Pay is available on top of
the following base games:

• Bonus Poker
• Bonus Deuces
• Bonus Poker Deluxe
• Deuces Wild
• Double Bonus
• Double Double Bonus
• Jacks or Better
•  Joker Poker
• Triple Double Bonus

We have individual pages devoted to each of these games. You should refer to
them for information about the various pay tables available and how they affect
the payback percentage.

Strategy Advice Specific to Double Super Times Pay Poker

The first strategic decision you must make when playing Double Super Times
Pay Poker is which game to play. This is where your knowledge of pay tables and
payback percentages comes into play. Compare the pay tables with the information
on the pages for each base game, and choose the one with the highest theoretical
return.

Second, keep in mind that strategy matters. It might be worth playing a game
with a lower expected return if you’re more familiar with the strategy for that
game.

Third, you need to decide if you want to play the extra 2 coins per hand. You
should always opt to do this with everything else being equal. If you can find a
game that has a better payback percentage, you should play it.

But if it’s a choice between a pay table that’s the same except for the
Double Super Times Pay bonus, you should always go with the Double Super Times
Pay option.

Finally, you should know the strategy for each variation. We cover specific
strategies for the games on each of their pages.

You do not need to make any modifications to the strategy for an individual
game because of the Double Super Times Pay.

These strategy tables, by the way, are easy to use – if you understand how they
work.

Video poker strategy tables are organized into a hierarchy of most desirable
hands to least desirable hands. You go down the chart until you find a hand that
matches your hand. Those are the cards you keep.

It couldn’t be much easier, but you do need to be card-smart enough to
recognize the hands when you’re doing the comparisons.

Where to Find Double Super Times Pay Video Poker, Online or Off, for Free or
for Real Money

You’ll have no trouble finding Double Super Times Pay video poker in
land-based casinos throughout the United States. Over 120 casinos throughout the
country offer the game, and most casinos offer multiple machines.

Finding Double Super Times video poker online is a little harder. You can
play for free at VideoPoker.com, but you can’t win (or lose) any money playing
there. All the games on that site use the internet equivalent of Monopoly money.
It’s fun, and you get a good feel for the game.

But you can’t win any money there.

Online casinos which take real money play tend to focus on the more
traditional video poker games. Double Super Times Pay is a newer variation that
is more popular at land-based casinos. We offer recommendations for several
online casinos, but most of them don’t offer Double Super Times Pay.

Conclusion

Double Super Times Pay video poker is a rare example of a fancy video poker
variation that improves your odds of winning. Most multiplier additions to video
poker games result in slightly lower payback percentages. We’re happy to report
that this is not the case with Double Super Times Pay.

If you can find Double Super Times Pay in combination with a good pay table
to a game you understand how to play, you’re all set. Finding a game with a 99%
or higher payback percentage is easier with this variation, as it adds 0.5% to
the overall payback percentage for the game.