A picture is worth a thousand words:
This will be my only ever screencap of my neteller transactions, but everyone should memorialize their first whore... ermmm, bonus whore that is.
Total Casino Winnings: $0
27 May 2006: I deposited into Starluck Casino the required $100 and immediately got the $100 bonus. Since it was my first time playing blackjack with real money, I kept my bets at the minimum $1. And my anal retentive analytical self tracked ALL 1600 hands required for the WG (wagering requirement)!
Lowest my balance got: $188.50, highest: $231.50. Cashed out at $218. At $1 per bet, the total variance was 43 bets in about 1450 hands. (I didn't keep an accurate count of the number of split and doubled hands)
If the house edge at Starluck is the standard 0.5%, my balance stayed within 1 standard deviation and my median was $20 above the expected $190. Guess I was really lucky!
Net profit: +$118
Total Casino Winnings: $118 (from Bonuses: $100, Blackjack: $18)
29 May 2006: Next up, Planetluck Casino. Since $1 bets were boring and along with my manual tracking I was only earning about $10/hr, I decided to try $2 per bet.
Deposited $100. Got the $100 bonus. Met the WR after 727 hands. Lowest balance: $118, highest: $$227. At $2 per bet, the total variance was 54.5 bets.
Using The Wizard of Odd's Risk of Ruin Table, the chance of losing everything starting with $200 (so 100 x $2 bets) over 800 hands is just around .28%.
It took less than 2 hours to reach the required WR. Final balance $200. Approximate earning rate $50/hr!
Net profit: +$100
Total Casino Winnings: $218 (from Bonuses: $200, Blackjack: $18)
31 May 2006: I then deposited $80 into William Hill. Bought $80 in chips at the casino and immediately got the $80 bonus. Since I am starting with a balance of only $160, the bet size is back down to $1.
WillHill is good since they keep track of your remaining wagering requirements to clear a bonus. So after the first 300 or so hands, I stopped manually tracking my WR and when I took a break or when I reached a final table in one of my freerolls (check my next post!), I would hop over to the cashier section to check up on how much I of the $2000 WR was left.
Variance was with me at this site. From $1400 WR remaining until the end, my average balance slowly crept UP! All luck but I'll take it.
Final take? $207.
Lowest balance: $148.50 highest: $217.50. At $1 per bet, total variance was 69 bets. Though I started with only $80, this casino has given me my biggest take of the three so far.
Net profit: +$127
Total Casino Winnings: $345 (from Bonuses: $280, Blackjack: $65)
2 June 2006: It's now June. A nice surprise was that I simply had to buy casino chips over at William Hill and they immediately deposited the $40 monthly matching bonus. WR is 20x the bonus so $800. With just $140 in chips, I simply made $1 bets.
Right off the bat luck was not with me for this bonus and I was down $20. Final stats were lowest balance: $95.50 highest: $144.50. At $1 per bet, total variance was 49 bets. Final balance $115.50. At my low point, it was my first time outside 1 sd ($31 in this case).
Normalcy prevails and I've lost at blackjack for the first time. At -0.5% over 800 hands, the expectation was to finish down $4 at $136.00. I was 'unluckily' $20.5 below that but I managed to finish inside 1 sd.
Net profit: +$15.50
Total Casino Winnings: $360.50 (from Bonuses: $320, Blackjack: $40.50)
4 June 2006: This is a lesson on what happens when you don't read all the terms and conditions. Next target was Intercasino. After I deposited the $100, there was no matching bonus! I waited a couple of hours, thought maybe I needed to play some hands.
Went to their single deck blackjack table. And made a lucky mistake of making one bet.... for $25. Lucky because I made 21 vs. a bust for the dealer.
I immediately left the table and then went and read their T&C. What do you know, I am in a territory (Hong Kong) where they don't give the matching bonus! I guess I'll have to wait until I move at the end of the year to benefit from this one.
So I cashed out. They charged me $1 transaction fee and I made a lucky $24 at a site I should not have even been in. From everything I've read, this site is fine and you should get what you can from them, WR is 25x the bonus so $2500 and your expected take should be around $87.5 +/- $55 at 1 sd.
Net profit: +$24
Total Casino Winnings: $384.50 (from Bonuses: $320, Blackjack: $64.50)
6 June 2006: Next up is bet365casino. They have a 100% matching bonus up to $200, and the WR is 20x the bonus amount so $4000. A hell of alot of blackjack, so took my time over 3 days making $1 bets.
The best game here is blackjack surrender with the house edge of 0.39%. I didn't figure that out until about 240 bets mark. The expected result after 4000 hands is a final balance of $384.5 +/- 69.5 at 1 standard deviation.
My stats were highest: 441, lowest: 348 for a total variance of 93 bets. For the second casino, I ended up EXACTLY at where I started $400. What were the odds of that?
One additional bonus at bet365, is that they have a comp system of 1 comp point for every $10 bet. And every 100 comp point is worth 1 real dollar. So after betting $4000, you'll earn an extra $4. So remember to go pick that up from the comp section.
Net profit: +$204
Total Casino Winnings: $588.50 (from Bonuses: $524, Blackjack: $64.50)
9 June 2006: The next casino, PlayVegasFromHome was torture for me. It was the first one where I experienced variance greater than 2 standard deviations... negative. I hated the software, and I made tons of mistakes just hitting the buttons. The java interface was not responsive and I even made errors like hitting on 20!
At wagering amount 1550 out of the required 4000, my balance was at $291.50 after depositing $200 and getting the cashable $200 bonus. With the house edge of this 4-deck blackjack table at just 0.4%, down 2 standard deviations at this point would be at $307, so I was in the midst of a 1 out of 20 times experience.
Over the next 2000 hands, the balance then randomly went the other way up to $393.5 and with a $30 drop over the last 400, I finished the WR at $349 and inside 1 sd.
So the stats were, highest: $414, lowest: $291.5 for a total variance of 122.5 bets. Highest so far.
I still came out positive here so I shouldn't complaint... but I really didn't enjoy myself here, unlike at the other casinos. I then made a random $1 baccarrat bet and won back 95 cents (they take a 5 cent commission), and for the road, I made a $5 last blackjack bet and won.
Including those bets into my lifetime blackjack total over all the casinos, I find that after wagering over $14,000, I'm still a net +EV blackjack player! +$19.45. Woot!
Net profit: +$154.95
Total Casino Winnings: $743.45 (from Bonuses: $724, Blackjack: $19.45)
12 June 2006: Golden Palace Casino and their 300% matching bonus up $300. WR was 20x the deposit and bonus so $8000. I took this really slow. I had a really good run up to the WR 3000 mark and nearly broke $600. Fell all the way back down to 400.50 at WR7490 and finished at $405.
Like bet365, they have a comp system so I earned an additional $8 in comp.
My stats were highest: 598.50, lowest: 398 for a total variance of 200.5 bets. 1 sd is 98.4 bets so the variance was normal and I was lucky with the median at 498 instead of the expected 369.
Net profit: +$313
Total Casino Winnings: $1056.45 (from Bonuses: $1032, Blackjack: $24.45)
19 June 2006: Nine's Casino has a 100% matching bonus up to $200. WR is 20x bonus plus deposit, so $8000. This is a no download site and the interface is in flash. I hate it and my play shows! At this site, the bonus only gets credited after you've completed the WR. So you need to play with just $200 to cover the WR.
With the house edge at around 0.5%, the expected median point is just $160. At $1 bets, 1 sd is 98.4 and $2 bets, 1 sd is $139 so cautious betting is the key at this site unless you get a good run early.
Right at the 1000 wagered mark I was at an early low of $134.90 making just $1 bets. I then stayed around the $140-$160 mark until 2000 when I went on a slow 2 sd roller coaster (note that this is over 3-4 days)... Over the next $2200 wagered, I moved all the way up to $296.9 then over the following $1700, the balance moved back down to $107.9.
It stablized around $140 and with $6800 wagered, it hit the low of $99.9. A massive heater moved it up to $237.9 over $500 wagered and I finished at $150.
Highest $296.9, lowest $99.9. Total variance of 197 bets! That's over 2 sd worth. And my final balance of $150 was just $10 less then the -0.5% expected $160.
I'm now at a lifetime wagered amount of $30000 and my blackjack play has finally gone into -EV territory!
Net profit: +$150
Total Casino Winnings: $1206.45 (from Bonuses: $1232, Blackjack: -$25.55)
Next is Be the Dealer. They have a 100% matching bonus up to $200. WR is 22x deposit plus bonus so $8800 in total and their minimum bet is $2.
3 comments:
Very nice!
You definitely got much luckier than me.
I just finished up my Starluck Casino bonus yesterday.
It took me 4 hours to complete and I finished up with $64.50 of my bonus still intact.
I guess I'm just unlucky when it comes to blackjack. Still, the $64.50 represents a rate of over $15/hr for my troubles - not too shabby.
Just thought I'd make one more comment...
I deposited my $100 into PlanetLuck last night and cleared the thing in just over two hours playing $1 bets for the first 1100 bets and $2 bets for the last $500. Finished up at $209.50!
I really can't complain about a win rate of $93/hr!
Good luck finishing it up at William Hill. And remember that a $40 reload bonus becomes avaialble tomorrow!
Oops - I said that my win rate was $93/hr for last night's casino bonus clearing.
It was only about $50/hr - I counted my $100 deposit...
Sorry for turning your blog into a house of lies...
Post a Comment