Super Aces Video Poker

Super Aces video poker makes for a relatively simple twist on Bonus video poker. Like most bonus games, it offers a big bump in payouts for four of a kind hands. And, as you should be able to tell by the name of the game, you should really be homing in on aces when you try to make those four of a kind hands.

Many people only know video poker in its most basic form, which is also known as Jacks or Better. This is the game that most closely resembles basic Five-Card Draw video poker in the way that certain hands are rewarded. It offers steady play to those who enjoy it, but it also comes up short in terms of producing high-impact, high-paying hands.

As a result, video poker has spun off into a variety of different variations on the basic game. These games can be broken down to two main varieties. First, there are the versions that alter gameplay slightly, perhaps by adding a wild card, bonus spins, multipliers, or some other twist that changes the game somewhat.

Then there are the games that keep the gameplay the same but alter the way that winning hands are paid out. In Jacks or Better video poker, you’re awarded payouts based on the chances of you making a winning hand. The less chance you have of making a winning hand, the more you get paid for it.

But so-called bonus games change that formula up a bit. In particular, they usually reward four of a kind hands at a higher rate than the straight flush, even though the former is an easier hand to make during play. Super Aces video poker falls into the category of bonus games, in that it’s played the same as Jacks or Better, but it adds changes to the pay table to jack up the excitement.

In Super Aces video poker, the four of a kind hand that pays off the highest is four aces. Since even amateur card players know that aces are usually a good thing, it isn’t too hard to understand the goal in this variation of video poker. But four of a kind hands of any type actually pay in the same neighborhood as the straight flush, although all hands still trail the royal flush in terms of payouts.

Super Aces video poker really adds thrills with more chances for high payouts on a single hand. But it compensates for this by cutting down the payouts for some of the winning hands that are commonly made during the course of play. As a result, it’s a game that requires a big bankroll or some early good luck if you plan to play it for a long period of time.

In the following article, we will take a close look at Super Aces video poker. We’ll look at the pay tables and demonstrate how those tables correspond with payback percentage. Finally, we’ll look at strategy and also talk about the game’s benefits and drawbacks.

How to Play Basic Video Poker

As we mentioned above, Super Aces video poker is played in the same manner as basic video poker games like Jacks or Better. The differences between the two only come in terms of payouts for winning hands. But as for actually operating a machine or playing online, the basics are the same.

If you have ever played Five-Card Draw poker at home with friends, you will have a pretty good head start at learning video poker. Even if you’ve never played it but have a little bit of knowledge of how to make winning hands in poker, you’ll have a good idea of how to play video poker. And, even if you’re a complete newcomer, you’ll still likely get the hang of it by playing just a few hands over a couple of minutes.

Now that doesn’t mean that you’ll immediately know how to play the game at an expert level. That’s where strategy comes into play, and we’ll talk about that in a little bit. For now, let’s just talk about the mechanics of playing a video poker machine like Super Aces.

Step 1: Establish Your Bankroll

If you want to win money playing Super Aces video poker, you have to risk money. This money is known as your bankroll, the size of which is determined by the amount of money that you put into the machine. If you are playing the game online, you’ll have to fund an account before you can begin playing.

Some machines give you a choice of what denomination you want to use while playing. Others have the denomination set beforehand. The denomination will be the basis for the credits that you have to play.

You’ll want to determine your bankroll based on how long you wish to play and the style of play for each machine. As you’ll find out, Super Aces video poker is what’s known as a volatile form of video poker. Volatile machines tend to require a higher investment in terms of a bankroll if you intend on playing the game for a long period of time in a single session.

Step Two: Make Your Bet

When you play a hand of Super Aces, as is the case with most forms of video poker, you’ll have the opportunity to bet between one and five credits per hand. Credits are sometimes referred to as “coins,” even though, with modern machines, you won’t actually be dealing with physical coins while playing. It’s recommended that you play five coins, also known as the max bet, whenever you can.

Why? Because of the premium placed on the payout for the Royal Flush, which is the rarest and most lucrative hand in all of video poker, when played with five coins instead of with one through four coins. This will become clearer to you when we show you the pay table for Super Aces.

Keep in mind that you can play less than five coins if you want, but you run the risk of hurting your ultimate return from the game by doing this. Try to find a denomination that allows you to play a max bet every single hand.

Step Three: Playing Your Hand

The goal when playing Super Aces video poker is to make the most lucrative winning hand you can from two rounds of play. First, there is the deal, followed by the draw. Again, those who know Five-Card Draw will understand this process.

For those who don’t, let’s walk you through it. The moment that you’ve made your bet and hit the “deal” button on the machine, five cards will appear on your screen. Your odds of receiving particular cards are the same as if you were playing with a 52-card deck at home.

One thing that you need to understand is that the results of the deal are completely random. And the odds of receiving specific cards reset every deal because a Random Number Generator is inside the machine’s software constantly “shuffling” the digital cards. Don’t expect certain cards because you think they might be “due,” or else it could lead you to bad strategy.

Anyway, let’s look at a possible five-card deal that you might receive while playing Super Aces video poker:

Within this deal, there are some interesting possibilities. The hand isn’t a winning one as it is, but you can anticipate the possibility of winning hands within it. It’s a matter of choosing the one possibility that you think is most likely to occur, while also weighing in the amount that each winning hand pays.

In this hand, there are a pair of twos. There are also four hearts, which is just one shy of a flush. And the two, four, and six of hearts give you three cards to a straight flush, albeit with an “inside” draw, meaning that only the three and the five can possibly complete it.

It’s up to you now to decide how you want to play the hand going forward, knowing that you have the draw round to improve the hand. In the draw round, you get to replace the cards you don’t want to hold with others from the remainder of the deck. (Keep in mind that you don’t have to discard any cards if you like your original hand as it is, and you can also discard all five cards if you choose to do so.)

Let’s say that you decided that your best chance lies with going for the flush. In that case, you would discard the two of spades. You would do this by hitting the “hold” button under the other four cards in the hand.

Once you’ve done this and hit the “draw” button, the Random Number Generator will deal you out the card at the top of the deck. Keep in mind that this deck now only has 47 cards in it since the five cards you were dealt are now out of play.

Let’s see how the draw comes out:

As you can see, you didn’t make the flush. But you did pair up your king, and a pair of jacks is enough to win you your initial bet back on a Super Aces video poker pay table.

Step 4: Continuing or Quitting

If you choose to do so, you can keep playing Super Aces video poker as long as there are still credits left in the machine (or in your online account). You can also cash out, at which point the machine will print you out a redemption ticket. You can use this ticket for other games in the casino or redeem it for cash.

As you can tell, Super Aces video poker plays exactly the same as basic video poker. But the differences come into play with the pay tables, which we’ll talk about now.

Pay Tables for Super Aces Video Poker

Super Aces video poker, like all video poker machines, comes equipped with a pay table. This pay table basically shows you how much you will win for each winning hand you can make, depending on how much you bet. But the pay table goes beyond that.

The pay table will show you what kind of hands you should be trying to make which will ultimately affect your strategy. It will show you whether or not the game is volatile, which affects the kind of bankroll you carry. And it will also let you know what kind of payback you should expect from the specific machine you’re playing.

In the case of Super Aces video poker, you’re likely to encounter several different pay tables depending on where you play the game. Your goal should be to find a table that is as close as possible to the table that pays out the most. This is known as the “full-pay” version of the game.

The following is a look at the full-pay version of Super Aces video poker.

Coins/Hand	1 Coin	2 Coins	3 Coins	4 Coins	5 Coins
Royal Flush	250	500	750	1000	4000
Straight Flush	60	120	180	240	300
Four Aces	400	800	1200	1600	2000
Four 2s, 3s, 4s	80	160	240	320	400
Four of a Kind (Any Other)	50	100	150	200	250
Full House	8	16	24	32	40
Flush	5	10	15	20	25
Straight	4	8	12	16	20
Three of a Kind	3	6	9	12	15
Two Pairs	1	2	3	4	5
Jacks or Better	1	2	3	4	5

How do you read this pay table? All you have to do is look up the row for the winning hand that you make and then match it to the column for the number of coins, or credits, that you played. For example, a straight made with five coins played will get you 20 coins, which is a 15-coin profit once you subtract the original wager.

Earlier, we told you how you should make the max bet whenever possible. Now you can see why. Notice how the payout jumps for the royal flush from 250 to 1 at one through four coins played to 800 to 1 for five coins played.

What you also might notice is that this game really boosts the payment for the four of a kind hands compared to other video poker games. Obviously, since the game is known as Super Aces video poker, aces are going to be your goal. Four aces actually pay more than a royal flush at every level besides five coins, where the payout comes in as half as much as the Royal.

The royal flush is like a unicorn in video poker, something rarely seen. But a four of a kind is something that is likely to come up if you play the game with regularity. That’s the reason for the excitement of a game like Super Aces video poker, where you can really have a better chance of earning a significant payoff on a single hand than if you were playing basic Jacks or Better.

Of course, video poker machines can’t just go and award extra payouts all over the place without taking something away. Otherwise, the machines will lose serious money to the players, which would lead to casinos and online gambling sites going out of business. That can’t happen, so the machine takes something away elsewhere on the pay table to compensate.

Consider that Jacks or Better machines pay off two to one for two pair. As you can see above, Super Aces video poker gives you just even money for two pair. That’s the same payout as you would get for a simple pair of Jacks or Better.

What does that mean for gameplay? Well, it means that you’ll be prone to wider swings of wins and losses while playing Super Aces video poker compared to Jacks or Better or even other Bonus games. That’s why, as we mentioned above, it’s known as a volatile game.

To play this game for a long period of time, you’ll need to hit one of those high-paying hands early on in your session, or you’ll have to bring a substantial bankroll. Otherwise, you run a high risk of seeing your entire bankroll diminish and eventually evaporate.

Some people won’t mind this aspect of Super Aces video poker. Hardcore players will appreciate the fact that its payback percentages are pretty high (more on that in a moment) and will bring enough money to withstand the slumps. Those people who don’t mind blowing through some money in a hurry will be okay with it as well, especially since the game gives them a better chance of a significant quick strike.

But if you’re a casual player who wants to hold on to a modest bankroll for several hours of play online or at your local casino, you might not find Super Aces video poker to your liking. You might be better off playing Jacks or Better.

Payback Percentages for Super Aces Video Poker

The payback percentage for any video poker machine is a mathematical figure that shows how much the machine will return to a player on average. It doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ll see the same results when you play. This is especially true if you’re only playing the game for a short session since luck will have a greater impact on that small sample size.

But if you play Super Aces video poker long enough, your bankroll will reflect the payback percentage. And that percentage is simply the byproduct of the pay table and the probabilities of making winning hands. You can figure it out yourself, or you can simply look the game up online and see what the payback percentage is.

The higher the payback percentage, the more lucrative the game will be in the long haul. Any percentage higher than 99% is good. For the full-pay version of Super Aces video poker, the payback percentage is a robust 99.94%.

In terms of money, that means that a person who put $10,000 into a Super Aces video poker could reasonably expect to leave the game with $9,994 in their bankroll once all the initial money has been wagered. Those figures reflect a $6 loss.

What makes that a good machine if you’re actually predicted to lose money? Well, as you play video poker, you will earn rewards from a casino or an online site. These rewards will help you to what is essentially a positive outcome if you play the game long enough.

As we said before, however, the full-pay table is only one of many versions of Super Aces video poker that you might encounter in your gambling exploits. Since it’s the highest-paying version, it stands to reason that all other variations will return you slightly less.

What should you look for in a pay table to let you know if you’re dealing with a machine that might not pay you back as much as you’d like? Well, the best plan is to commit the table to memory and conduct a quick online search to see what the corresponding payback percentage for that table might be.

Barring that, look for the payouts of certain winning hands, as there are hands which tend to be discounted more than others. For example, you’re likely to find versions of Super Aces video poker where the full house pays off at seven to one or even six to one. Since the full house is a relatively common winning hand for those who play often, missing out on the maximum pay for it will eventually hurt your winnings.

Again, casual players might not care about the payback percentage since it might not matter much in a short session. If, however, you really want to play Super Aces video poker a lot and want to maximize your winnings, it’s a good idea to keep an eye on the pay tables and, in turn, the payback percentages.

Learning Strategy for Super Aces Video Poker

One other important thing that you need to know about the payback percentages of video poker machines is that they can only be achieved, over the long haul, by those players who don’t make any mistakes while playing. Remember that every video poker hand that you play requires you to make a decision about which cards to hold and which to discard. The wrong choices will eventually cost you money.

What do we mean by wrong choices? Well, to explain it better, let’s play another sample hand of Super Aces video poker. Here is the deal:

Which cards should you keep? Your knee-jerk reaction might be that this a pretty obvious call to make. You might jump to the conclusion that the play that offers you the most potential is to keep everything but the nine of diamonds, thereby going into the draw with two pair.

If you were playing Jacks or Better, that would certainly be the right play. But remember that you’re playing Super Aces video poker. Look up at that pay table again.

Remember how we talked about two pair paying only even money in this game? If you keep the two pair, the best you can do with the hand is a full house. That would pay eight to one on the full-pay table, which isn’t bad, but it comes with a less than 10% chance of actually happening on the draw.

You also need to remember the name of the game. Super Aces puts the huge premium on four aces. If you keep the two pair, you’re eliminating a chance of that happening.

In actuality, the best mathematical play, which is the one that brings the most expected value if you played it over and over again into infinity, is to keep the pair of aces and dump everything else. Just because you make that play, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you will improve that hand into something better than the pair of aces. And if you were to have made the “wrong” play and kept the two pair, you might have lucked into drawing the full house.

But the bottom line is that the right play will make you the most money over the long haul because the math makes it so. The key is learning all the right plays. Here are two surefire ways of doing that:

Video Poker Software

This software will help train you into making the right plays. How does it work? It simulates play of a game like Super Aces video poker and then lets you know what the right and wrong choices are.

For example, if you received that hand that we showed you above and tried to take the two pair forward into the draw, the software would alert you to your mistake. It would then show you the right play.

Make sure to purchase software that allows you to either play games like Super Aces video poker or at least customize the pay table to your liking. Otherwise, you could end up getting false information. The bottom line is that constant practice with training software will eventually lead to perfect video poker play.

Strategy Charts

Most popular video poker games, and Super Aces video poker is included in that group, have strategy charts made up just for them. As is the case with the video poker training software, you don’t have to do any of the hard work. All you have to do is study and not worry about the math.

Strategy charts are readily available online for the video poker variation of your choice. They work by ranking all of the possible combinations of cards that could potentially form winning hands. You just have to compare your own hand to what’s listed on the chart and then eliminate the cards that aren’t essential.

For example, let’s go back to that hand we played above. To refresh your memory, you were dealt:

You would look at the strategy chart, starting at the top and moving down, until you saw a combination that you had in your deal. Eventually, you would see the following two lines:

• Pair of Aces
• Two Pair

Since the pair of aces is the higher ranked of the two, you would know to dump the remaining three cards. There is really no way you can go wrong if you have an accurate strategy chart and use it correctly.

The problem is that most casinos frown upon people bringing the charts into the building. You could use it online, but it would slow down your play.

Your best strategy is to sit down and memorize the chart. It might take a while, but it will pay off with perfect play if you can manage it. Below we have included a sample video poker strategy chart to help you get started.

Pros and Cons of Super Aces Video Poker

Conclusion on Super Aces Poker

Super Aces video poker makes it simple even for beginners playing the game in casinos or online at top gambling websites. Hunt down those aces and get ready to reap the rewards if you can grab four of them in a single hand. Just be prepared for your bankroll to take a bit of a nosedive if you can’t achieve those quads.