Super Double Bonus Video Poker Guide
Super Double Bonus video poker gives gamblers an excellent opportunity to score big payoffs for four of a kind hands. The pay tables for the game resemble those of Double Bonus video poker, which is one of the more familiar variations of basic video poker. It differs by adding a bonus for four of a kind achieved with jacks through kings.
In the world of video poker, there are many different ways you can choose to play. You can stick with a simpler game like Jacks or Better. But it doesn’t give players too many chances for significant winnings on a single hand. For jackpot seekers, this can be a little bit frustrating.
Bonus Poker pay tables help to rectify this situation. They do this by boosting payoffs for four of a kind hands, sometimes known as quads. Since quads are much more realistic than other high-paying hands like a royal flush, you can imagine scoring one of these top payouts during gameplay.
As players took to Bonus Poker pay tables, video poker manufacturers came up with more and more of them. One example is Double Bonus video poker, which is named so because it literally doubles up the payments on basic Bonus Poker. That puts more of a premium on players making quads if at all possible.
Super Double Bonus video poker might not be the most imaginative name for a game, but it definitely conveys the gist of the pay table. It’s very much like Double Bonus Poker. Both pay tables have a high quad payout of 160 to 1 for four aces, and they both lower the payback for two pair to even money.
In the case of Super Double Bonus video poker, the main difference comes from a special payout for four jacks through kings. In Double Bonus poker, such a hand would end up with a payout of 50 to 1. But that rises to 120 to 1 for the same hand in Super Double Bonus.
Knowing this, you have to pay close attention any time you get multiple face cards in a hand. It forces you to adjust your strategy somewhat. But it’s an exciting way to play, as long as you don’t mind the volatility that comes from lower payoffs for common hands.
In the following article, we’ll explain everything you need to know to play Super Double Bonus video poker and play it well. We’ll talk about how to play hands of video poker and we’ll get into the special nature of the pay table for this specific game. And we’ll also look at the strategy you need to use to play this game at its highest level.
Why People Love Video Poker
Video poker, in many ways, represents an ideal combination of simple gameplay and strategic maneuvering. It borrows the simple play aspect from slot machines. And it gets the strategy part from table games.
You might think combining these two extremely different gambling pastimes would make for an awkward mix. In actuality, video poker makes for one of the most beneficial games for gamblers. That goes for both casual players looking to kill time and serious gamblers hoping to make long-term profit.
Take a look at what you get from playing video poker variations like Super Double Bonus video poker.
- Simple Play: You really only need to play video poker for a few hands or so before you get the hang of it. If you have a bit of a background on making poker hands, it probably won’t even take you that long.
- No Hassles: There are certain table games which require you to know what you’re doing in terms of how to play and the etiquette you should use. That can be intimidating if you’re a newcomer. With video poker, it’s just you and the machine with none of that pressure.
- Strategy: Do you find that playing slot machines is a mind-numbing experience because it’s pretty much all based on luck? Video poker solves that problem by letting you use some strategy. This will come into play each hand when you decide which cards to hold and which to discard.
- Probabilities: You might find that some gambling games really don’t give you much clue of your chances. But video poker is based on probability math that comes from using a simulated deck of 52 cards. This allows you to know both how often you can expect winning hands and what your average payback will be.
- Solid Payback: On average, the payback for video poker sails right past what you could expect from slot machines. And it also performs on a par with many table games in that department. Some games, including the full-pay version of Super Double Bonus video poker, even come close to eliminating the so-called “house edge.”
- Smooth Online Play: Playing video poker online is hardly any different than doing so in a casino. You will find a similar variety of engaging video poker variations on top gambling websites. And you’ll do so in a comfortable environment away from the crowds at your local casino.
- Variety: Once you learn how to play video poker, you can pretty much take that knowledge to any one of the hundreds of variations on the main game. You can choose whichever game suits your style of play and your tolerance for risk.
These are just a few of the reasons why video poker is so beloved by its enthusiasts around the world. The good news is that Super Double Bonus video poker is a game that only separates itself by its pay table. Actual game play in no way deviates from the most basic form of video poker.
With that in mind, let’s learn the most basic format. Here’s how to play video poker, from inserting your money through making your bets, all the way to playing and winning your hands.
How to Play Video Poker
Step 1: Establish a Bankroll
You need a bankroll so you can put money at stake playing video poker. This gives you the chance to win money in return.
If you’re playing in a casino, you can insert money into a video poker machine to create your bankroll. You might also insert a redemption ticket that you earned from another game in the casino. Online players have to fund a gambling account at the website of their choice.
You’ll notice that once you have created a bankroll that it is rendered on the screen in coins or credits. These are the units of play for video poker, and they’re based on the denomination you’re playing.
Denominations can sometimes be chosen by the player. But they’re predetermined by the machine you’re playing.
To figure out how much will be in your bankroll, divide the money that you put in by the denomination. For example, $10 in a nickel machine will give you 200 credits (10 divided by .05).
Step 2: Make Your Bet
Betting is an important aspect of video poker that is often misunderstood. You can bet between one and five credits in a video poker game such as Super Double Bonus video poker. The first mistake people make is switching up the amount they bet for each hand.
The people who do this often fall for mistaken logic on video poker. For example, if they won a bunch of hands in a row, they might think they’re due for a loss and bet less. Or, if they lost 10 hands in a row, they might think they’re due for a win and bet more.
In actuality, your chances of winning at video poker are based on a combination of the probabilities and your decision-making. Changing your bet to predict the outcome is only going to end up with you getting shortchanged.
In actuality, the correct way to play Super Double Bonus video poker is to make the maximum wager, also known as the “Max Bet,” of five coins for every hand. By doing this, you ensure yourself the highest payout for the royal flush. At one through four coins, that hand pays off 250 to 1, but that payoff jumps to 800 to 1 when you make the max bet.
Step 3: Play Your Hand
When you play video poker, you are essentially playing a one-person computer simulation of the table game known as Five-Card Draw. In Five-Card Draw Poker, you get five cards on the deal. You then replace cards from your deal with others from the deck to make the highest-ranked poker hand.
You’ll be doing the same thing in video poker. But you don’t have to beat other players with your hand. You just have to form one of the winning hands on the pay table.
For Super Double Bonus video poker, here are the hands you’ll be trying to make:
- Pair of jacks or better
- Two pair
- Three of a kind
- Straight (five cards of consecutive rank, like 3-4-5-6-7)
- Flush (five cards of same suit)
- Full house (three of a kind and two pair in the same hand)
- Four of a kind
- Straight flush (straight with five cards of same suit)
- Royal flush (ten, jack, queen, king, and ace of the same suit)
Those hands are listed from easiest to achieve (at the top) to hardest to achieve (at the bottom). For the most part, the payout for each winning hand gets higher as you move down the list.
The lone exception in Super Double Bonus video poker comes in terms of four of a kind. Even though that’s easier to achieve than a straight flush (based on probability), some quad hands involving certain ranks pay more.
You will use this knowledge when you first assess the five cards from the deal, which will appear on the screen once you’ve made your bet. Perhaps you’ll end up with a winning five-card combination that is so great as is that you won’t want to try to improve it. If that’s so, you won’t need the draw.
But more often than not, you’ll be looking to the draw to either improve a winning hand or, if you don’t have one on the deal, attain one. On the draw, you have the opportunity to discard cards from your deal. For each card you discard, one will be drawn from the deck to complete your hand.
It’s at this point that you’ll start considering the probabilities of making certain winning hands out of what you have and what’s left in the deck. You should also be considering how much each potential winning hand might pay. Figuring out when to take a risk for a potential reward is a big part of video poker.
Let’s take a look at an example. Imagine that you receive the following five-card deal:
As it is, this hand is no winner. You’ll need the draw to improve it to come out a winner. But the good news is that there are many possibilities of turning this into a winning hand.
A pair of fours falls below the threshold of Jacks or Better to be a winning hand. But if you were to hold on to the fours, you would have three new cards on the draw. Those cards could possibly lead to two pair, three of a kind, a full house or four of a kind.
You might also notice that, with a four through seven run, you have four cards of consecutive rank. If you were to drop one of the fours, you could shoot for a straight. To get it, you’d need to end up with a three or an eight with your single new card, an 8 in 47 possibility (8 threes and eights in the deck within 47 cards total).
Finally, a straight flush looms as an outside possibility. You would need to get very lucky on the draw to connect same-suited cards to the five, six, and seven of clubs. Even if you come up short of that, you can still end up with a flush if you get two more clubs of any rank.
This hand provides some tough choices. When we get to the strategy section, we’ll take a closer look at how you can make these decisions to maximize your winnings. Luckily, many hands won’t be so difficult in terms of making your choice.
Once you do make your decision, you just have to press the buttons underneath the cards you want to hold. There might be certain hands where you won’t want to hold anything. In that case, don’t press any of the buttons and just hit the “draw” button.
After you hit the “draw” button, your work on the hand is complete. The machine (or online game) will do the rest by replacing the cards you’ve discarded. Your hand is over at that point, and any winnings will be added to your bankroll.
You can continue playing video poker in this manner by simply repeating steps two and three. Of course, you can only continue as long as you still have credits, or coins, to bet at least a single coin. If not, you’ll have to replenish your bankroll.
Video poker is as simple as that. Even a complete novice should be able to handle it with no problem after just a few minutes of play.
Now that you have the basics down, we can talk about Super Double Bonus video poker. In particular, we’ll look at how the pay tables for the game affect everything from the style of play to the payback.
Super Double Bonus Video Poker Pay Tables
As we said above, you will play Super Double Bonus video poker just as you would any basic variation of video poker. But the pay tables for the game set it apart. To understand whether it’s the game for you, it’s important to understand what this all means.
On the surface, the pay tables for video poker show how much each winning hand pays. But that information is crucial in a lot of ways.
You can probably understand how your strategy will be affected by what the pay table says. After all, you’ll want to take chances on hands that pay the most.
What you might not realize is that the pay tables should also dictate the size of your bankroll. And they also show how much you can expect from the game in terms of payback.
First of all, let’s take a look at these pay tables. As we said earlier, Super Double Bonus video poker spins off of the game known as Double Bonus. Let’s take a look at a Double Bonus pay table:
Coins/Hands | 1 coin | 2 coins | 3 coins | 4 coins | 5 coins |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Royal flush | 250 | 500 | 750 | 1000 | 4000 |
Straight flush | 50 | 100 | 150 | 200 | 250 |
Four of a kind (aces) | 160 | 320 | 480 | 640 | 800 |
Four of a kind (2s, 3s, or 4s) | 80 | 160 | 240 | 320 | 400 |
Four of a kind (any other) | 50 | 100 | 150 | 200 | 250 |
Full house | 10 | 20 | 30 | 40 | 50 |
Flush | 7 | 14 | 21 | 28 | 35 |
Straight | 5 | 10 | 15 | 20 | 25 |
Three of a kind | 3 | 6 | 9 | 12 | 15 |
Two pairs | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
Jacks or better | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
Compared to Jacks or Better, which is the most common video poker game, Double Bonus more aggressively rewards four of a kind hands. Jacks or Better can atone for this somewhat by the fact that it pays off 2 to 1 for two pair, compared to even money (1 to 1) on Double Bonus.
Now, let’s look at the full-pay table for Super Double Bonus video poker:
Coins/Hands | 1 coin | 2 coins | 3 coins | 4 coins | 5 coins |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Royal flush | 250 | 500 | 750 | 1000 | 4000 |
Straight flush | 80 | 160 | 240 | 320 | 400 |
Four of a kind (aces) | 160 | 320 | 480 | 640 | 800 |
Four of a kind (jack through kings) | 120 | 240 | 360 | 480 | 600 |
Four of a kind (two through four) | 80 | 160 | 240 | 320 | 400 |
Four of a kind (five through ten) | 50 | 100 | 150 | 200 | 250 |
Full house | 9 | 18 | 27 | 36 | 45 |
Flush | 5 | 10 | 15 | 20 | 25 |
Straight | 4 | 8 | 12 | 16 | 20 |
Three of a kind | 3 | 6 | 9 | 12 | 15 |
Two pair | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
Jacks or better | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
First of all, what does it mean to say that this pay table is full pay? It means this is the game that’s the version of Super Double Bonus video poker that, on average, pays the most back to gamblers. Other pay tables with the Super Double Bonus name will pay less.
Let’s compare it to the full-pay Double Bonus. The Double Bonus game holds the edge in both the full house and the flush. These are mid-priced hands that will come up with some regularity if you play a long session of video poker.
But Super Double Bonus video poker includes a specific payout for four jacks through kings. You can see that in Double Bonus, jacks through kings are lumped into the four of a kind “five through kings” categories at 50 to 1. On Super Double Bonus, the payoff for those hands comes in at 120 to 1, higher than any other quad besides four aces.
You might also notice that Super Double Bonus video poker holds the edge in the straight flush, at 80 to 1 to 50 to 1. In other words, both of the areas where Super Double Bonus comes out on top are relatively rare hands.
This plays into the notion of Super Double Bonus video poker as a volatile machine. Whenever an abnormally high percentage of overall payback is tied up in rare hands, volatility is a factor. Volatility measures the steadiness, or lack thereof, of an average video poker experience.
With Super Double Bonus video poker, those swings could be much more pronounced. Since you’ll need to hit rare hands to stay ahead, you might have to deal with long stretches of watching your bankroll dwindle. And, if your bankroll isn’t that high to start, you could see it completely dissipate.
The flipside is that you have a better chance at huge payoffs on single hands playing Super Double Bonus video poker than on low-volatility games. That’s a tradeoff you may or may not be willing to make. It all depends on your particular tolerance for risk.
We showed you the full-pay version of Super Double Bonus video poker. Here are some of the other pay tables you might encounter under the Super Double Bonus banner:
Coins/Hands | 1 coin | 2 coins | 3 coins | 4 coins | 5 coins |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Royal flush | 250 | 500 | 750 | 1000 | 4000 |
Straight flush | 80 | 160 | 240 | 320 | 400 |
Four of a kind (aces) | 160 | 320 | 480 | 640 | 800 |
Four of a kind (jack through kings) | 120 | 240 | 360 | 480 | 600 |
Four of a kind (two through four) | 80 | 160 | 240 | 320 | 400 |
Four of a kind (five through ten) | 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 pair | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
Jacks or better | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
Coins/Hands | 1 coin | 2 coins | 3 coins | 4 coins | 5 coins |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Royal flush | 250 | 500 | 750 | 1000 | 4000 |
Straight flush | 80 | 160 | 240 | 320 | 400 |
Four of a kind (aces) | 160 | 320 | 480 | 640 | 800 |
Four of a kind (jack through kings) | 120 | 240 | 360 | 480 | 600 |
Four of a kind (two through four) | 80 | 160 | 240 | 320 | 400 |
Four of a kind (five through ten) | 50 | 100 | 150 | 200 | 250 |
Full house | 7 | 14 | 21 | 28 | 35 |
Flush | 5 | 10 | 15 | 20 | 25 |
Straight | 4 | 8 | 12 | 16 | 20 |
Three of a kind | 3 | 6 | 9 | 12 | 15 |
Two pair | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
Jacks or better | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
Coins/Hands | 1 coin | 2 coins | 3 coins | 4 coins | 5 coins |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Royal flush | 250 | 500 | 750 | 1000 | 4000 |
Straight flush | 80 | 160 | 240 | 320 | 400 |
Four of a kind (aces) | 160 | 320 | 480 | 640 | 800 |
Four of a kind (jack through kings) | 120 | 240 | 360 | 480 | 600 |
Four of a kind (two through four) | 80 | 160 | 240 | 320 | 400 |
Four of a kind (five through ten) | 50 | 100 | 150 | 200 | 250 |
Full house | 7 | 14 | 21 | 28 | 35 |
Flush | 6 | 12 | 18 | 24 | 30 |
Straight | 4 | 8 | 12 | 16 | 20 |
Three of a kind | 3 | 6 | 9 | 12 | 15 |
Two pair | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
Jacks or better | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
It shouldn’t be too hard to spot that these pay tables all differ on just one hand. the full house. It can range from 9 to 1 in the full-pay version of Super Double Bonus video poker all the way down to 6 to 1.
As that full house payment drops, it will, in turn, lower the payback percentage that you can expect playing Super Double Bonus video poker. Payback percentage is a measurement of how much you can expect to receive from a game in return for your initial investment.
It’s important to realize that payback percentage is not something that should concern you too much if you’re only a casual video poker player. By casual, we mean that you don’t play the game that often. If that’s the case, your actual results will be affected by luck far more than what the pay tables might say.
But as you play the game over and over again, the luck will even out. That’s when the combination of the pay tables and the probabilities will take over. And that’s when your results will start to resemble what the payback percentage says.
In terms of payback percentage for video poker, we consider 99% or higher to be excellent. If your payback percentage is 99%, it means that, for every $1000 that you bet in the machine, you can expect $990 in return. Your average loss for that amount bet would be only $10.
You might think that it doesn’t sound too appetizing to be losing money on average. But you have to remember that the vast majority of casino games come with a built-in house edge.
At 99% payback, the house edge is minimal. And, if you play the game often, you can expect to make up for what you lose by earning rewards from casinos or gambling websites. You can even hope to make a profit in this way.
The full-pay version of Super Double Bonus video poker shown above comes in with a payback percentage of 99.7%. That puts it above the recommended threshold.
As you move down the list of the other pay tables, the payback percentage for Super Double Bonus video poker drops. It bottoms out at 96.9% once you get to the last pay table (the one playing just 6 to 1 for the full house).
The lesson to take from this is that you should keep an eye on that pay table before you commit to a specific version of Super Double Bonus video poker. This is especially true if you’re planning on playing the game long-term in search of consistent profits.
Video Poker Strategy for Super Double Bonus Video Poker
Another thing that serious video poker players need to do is learn how to play any pay table with perfect strategy. That might seem like an odd concept. You might think there are multiple strategies you can employ in video poker to get similar results.
In truth, every possible combination of cards that you can receive on the deal contains an expected value based on how much each winning hand pays. If you make the choice of which cards to hold and discard that unlocks the maximum expected value for the hand, you’ve made the right selection. Any other choice is wrong.
Again, this is a mathematical concept that’s based on time. Play a certain deal just once or a few times and you might get away with holding the wrong cards because of the luck of the draw. Play it a hundred or more times, and your incorrect choices will start to hurt your potential payback.
It’s also important to understand the specifics of a Super Double Bonus video poker pay table before learning strategy. Take a look at the following deal.
You might think that keeping the two pair and discarding only the eight is the right play. And, on many pay tables, it is. But not Super Double Bonus video poker.
After all, two pair on a Super Double Bonus video poker pay table only gets you even money. That’s the same as you get for just a single pair of jacks or better, which you have in this hand with the kings. There’s no advantage in keeping the two pair over the pair of kings only if you can’t improve it.
The only way you could improve the two pair would be to draw a full house with another five or king. But playing the hand that way would eliminate your chance for four of a kind with kings. And, as we showed you above, such a hand is very lucrative in Super Double Bonus video poker.
In actuality, the correct play there is to hold only the pair of kings. You might be hard-pressed to figure that out while playing a fast-paced session. That’s why you should get some help.
There are a pair of video poker resources we recommend which do all of the probability math for you and let you benefit from the results.
Video Poker Training Software
Training software is excellent for those who have the time to practice their video poker often. It can be tailored to specific pay tables such as Super Double Bonus video poker. And you can learn the right plays for each deal through trial and error.
Once you have the software installed, you can play sample hands of Super Double Bonus video poker. Whenever you’re faced with a tough decision about what to hold and discard, you can ask the software for help. After a while, you’ll know the right play for every possible deal.
Strategy Charts
Look for a strategy chart online that’s tailored specifically to Super Double Bonus video poker. Print it out and set about memorizing it. In that way, you can take all the information with you when you play the game for real money.
A strategy chart works by ranking the combinations you might get on the deal based on their expected value. You will look at your own hand for these combinations. Hold the one that’s ranked highest on the chart and discard the other cards from the deal.
Super Double Bonus Video Poker Pros and Cons
- Big payouts for four of a kind hands of many different ranks
- Excellent payback for full-pay version
- Simple gameplay without any confusing twists
- Volatile game which might require a substantial bankroll
- High percentage of payback tied up in rare hands
- Lesser pay tables struggle to give top payback
Conclusion on Super Double Bonus Video Poker
Super Double Bonus video poker can really thrill you if you’re on the lookout for four of a kind hands. It might be a bumpy ride and could require a big bankroll to get the results you want. But the payback for the best tables combined with the increased jackpot possibilities make this a very exciting game.