[Jaquen H'gar]

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... I did not think it was possible for slots or video poker to be +EV but when the progressives reach a certain level is + EV to get a team and play every machine.

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Video poker is one of the weapons in the armament of an advantage player, along with card counting, 1 and 3 card poker, etc. Video poker (VP) is considered the "loss leader" of advantage play, except it isn't negative EV, only a small + EV. However, what is gained is often worth making only a small amount per hour.

Example - $5 game, play max 5 coins per spin. That's $25 per spin, 1000 spins per hour, $25,000 wagered per hour. With casino slot payback, the EV is around +0.1% or $25/hr. BUT, that's just where it starts. At most casinos, the red carpet gets rolled out when you hit $1 million coin in, i.e. you've wagered $1 MILLION dollars. At $25k per hour, it actually doesn't take that long to hit this level - 40 hours. Once this is achieved, your rooms are comped for the next several trips, your food is comped, your airline tickets are comped, you get cash coupons up to $600 per month, and you get invited to participate in high roller freeroll tournaments where you can get lucky and win $50k+ or Rollexes or some such prizes.

Progressives are +EV even if you don't play as a team and tie up all the machines. A progressive is +EV when the payout is higher than the expected loss to achieve the royal flush. For example, a VP game where payback is 99% and the jackpot is $10,000 and should pay off every 20,000 hands. At $25 wagered per hand, you should wager $500,000 over 20 hours on average before it pays off. You expect to lose 1% of this or $5000 in order to win a $10,000 jackpot. Of course, taxes must be taken into consideration when determining the EV of playing for a jackpot.

As another post said, playing for progressives is like small losses adding up while you wait for your ship to come in. What's frustrating is to rack these losses up only to see someone at another machine hit the progressive, or to rack up the losses so that they exceed the progressive payout before you even hit it. You have to keep playing to recover some of your money but you know you are going to leave a loser. On the other hand, it's nice to hit many small payouts and then hit the big progressive. Recently a casino had a deal where high rollers were invited to play VP and so many coin-in resulted in a "free" rolex. Many advantage players were there to play a basically break even game EV-wise just to win a diamond rolex or two. One of them "accidently" hit a longshot progressive to pull down $50k+ in addition to his receiving the rolex.

Bottom line, are you going to get rich playing VP? No. You can make the same money per hour (not counting the bonuses)with lower variance in the poker room. But it's a nice thing to add to your repertoire to provide free airfare, hotel rooms, and food on a vacation.