Tommy, I appreciate your vehemence in championing the obvious fact that roulette operators don't have to cheat when they have a 37th of all the total bets placed, guaranteed.
However, I think even you might be a little naive to suggest that there is nothing in the algorithm of these machines which functions as "gameplay".
If you are so sure of yourself, please publish the algorithm here - and then the light of truth and simplicity will be apparent to all.
😉
I cant publish the algorithm here because:
a) I dont know it, and id need a degree in mathematics to publish even a decent guess and
b) This websites font wouldnt let me write out such a formula
However, if you want to know where i got this information from i will gladly tell you. My gamcare counsellor let me borrow a book of hers once that was written by authors who were experts in their fields. One of these fields was a guy who made the software for fruit machines and FOBTs. Once i read about random number generation everything made sense, why i couldnt win, and why every pattern i found seemed to have a contradiction.
For the life of me, i cant rememeber the name of this book but if you ask gamcare im sure they can dig it up for you.
As for my naiveity, well i was certainly naive when i was gambling. I used to believe a different theory every week and i had plenty of clever evidense to back it up. However i failed to produce a winning method just like every other poor sod who'd been suckered into the same lie. So perhaps the truth is just extremely straightforward: There is no gameplay, just a machine that takes and takes.
It might not be the most detailed or 100% accurate truth but at least by believing it you will have no false ideas about being able to win.
If the roulette machines are random then why has nobody won a large amount of money on a fobt, more money is staked on these machines than the lottery, so theres a high chance that someone has been very lucky and won a huge amount of money. Im starting to think rigged.
Its not the bookies who manipulate the software its the companies whom rent the machines to the bookies, the bookies don't actually own the fobts. All very sus
There are plenty of instances where people have turned £5-£10 into a couple of hundred on these things, and many more where people have come off with a 4-digit profit - if they are as rigged as much as suggested then that'd never happen, right? Those instances are just heavily outnumbered by the losing sessions, because the 2.7% house edge always wins in the end.
Maybe I am naive but likewise I've never seen a regular stream of people turn a small sum into a mega win on a real roulette table, a few sure, but even there it isn't a regular occurrence, and when it does happen it's been due to them betting with large sums (rather than the £1-£2 bet per number you see people doing on the FOBTs) which has exposed them to potentially far greater losses!
I think the gamblers fallacy that they are rigged comes about from a mixture of two things:
1. The speed of spins.
I'd suggest you'd get 3-4 times more spins/hour on a FOBT, in the same way you get more hands/hour in online poker to land based games. Therefore that 2.7% house take is going to hit you 3-4 times faster and intensify losses.
2. The fact cash is rebet.
This was something I heard from one of the software engineers behind these, and the £500jp video slots. By not allowing you to cash out or placing any wins into a win bank (that you have to collect before re-depositing) it never mentally allows you to crystalise any wins you do have, it's just a number on the screen and designed as such for you to have a greater propensity to re-bet.
In a casino where chips are pushed towards you see those as real money and become more risk adverse to re-betting, but FOBT/modern slots are cleverly designed to reduce this thinking in the player.
In short, they aren't rigged, they don't need to be, they are just really clever in their design to make sure they suck back as much of the wins as possible/have you chase the losses more than you may otherwise do.
It may even be libelous to print that they are and could potentially get Gamcare sued for hosting the suggestion? lol!
And FWIW I know plenty of friends that can play these in the manner to which they were intended - they'll have a tenner maybe once a month when in to put some cash on a sports bet, lose it and walk out, get ten, twenty quid profit and walk out - just so happens that I (and the majority on here) have something up with us that prevents/prevented us acting the same way.
Although may I end by saying, if convincing yourself they are fixed helps you put a stop to your problem gambling - then good, do what works for you.
They were always rigged in my head because even when i turned £20 into £1000, and i did on many occasions, i still ended up a loser whether the bookie had the edge or not was irrelevant.
I know people in some of my GA groups (which i cant name for obvious reasons) that have turned a tenner into thousands in the space of a few hours on the FOBT's.
This only happened to them on rare occasions and then they subsequently lost all the money again, plus more. In light of the horrible feeling of making all that money then blowing it you cant really call these guys lucky though.
If you flip a coin enough times you will eventually get 10 heads in a row at some point and this is a similair thing. But being a compulsive gambler i could never stop at this point so id keep going and lose it all if this ever happened to me. It did in fact, at Blackjack. I started to curse the deck of cards thinking the casino had done something to them once they saw i was winning. Only later did i come to my senses and realise my 'winning streak' had been down to a series of independant outcomes which had ceased to favour me at some point. It makes gambling seem so boring but thats really the essence of it!
They were always rigged in my head because even when i turned £20 into £1000, and i did on many occasions,
would the fobts still have been rigged if you walked everytime you were up a £1000
the answer no!!!!!
Tommy - great post and you are absolutely right.
I hope every gambler struggling out there reads it, and learns from it, and finally realizes that continued gambling can't be an option...recovery needs to be our only option...for a better life both personally and financially.
YFIR,
Steve
Tommy,
I really am glad that you've managed to find a workable solution to your personal battle with the FOBTs, which as I understand it, involves a die-hard resolution to simplify their inner workings with the eventual aim of eliminating them from consciousness. I understand you have been effected by the tendency towards pattern recognition (as are all humans not just gamblers)... and I can see that any form of pattern recognition functions as addiction in your outlook.
Notwithstanding your admirable approach, I personally, need to reach the truth of these matters, before I can reach an elimination point.
While your overall view on adverse odds involved in these machines are correct, as they are correct for all casino games, your outlook is incomplete. The machines, sadly are not as simple as you want to believe.
The most problematic aspect of these immoral machines is precisely this problem of the inclarity of the algorithm. We can all walk up to a real casino wheel, or watch a horse race and have a fair idea of how the results are being drawn, but with these algorithm based machines we can't be sure what is really happening.
Specifically, I think your guestimation of how the algorithm works could be flawed as follows: You, very simply, attributed a random number generated to a specific number between 0-36. I think it's more likely that the random number generator decides on an OUTCOME based on the odds of the bet it is presented with after the bet has been made - in this case it simply looks at which numbers are covered and which are not - it then picks a number you haven't got if a LOSE has been derived, or a WIN, if that's what the processor decides on.
Either way, you see that, there is no clarity on this, and this is unfair to the punter - this whole form of gambling is bordering on illegal. I want an immediate cessation of it and an apology from the government.
Why would all the FOBT manufacturers, and indeed, the bookies, risk everything for the sake of fixing their software? Roulette is a guaranteed money spinner for them, espeically considering the addictive nature of the game, and the addictive personalities of the people who play them . If they really were fixed, then it would only take one whistleblower to expose it all. Have we heard anything? No, of course not, because they're not fixed.
I haven't ever said the machines are 'fixed'. At least, I don't know what people mean when they say 'fixed' or 'rigged' in connection with FOBT. The whole nature of gambling is that it is 'fixed' in the favour of the operator.
I've never said this... All I say is that in the specific case of FOTB, the machine operators are pulling the wool over our eyes, and there must be immediate clarity on this issue.
The algorithm must be made available, so punters really know what they are betting on.
i would like to see every roulette machine in the uk melted down for scrap- there fixed and we are mugs or were mugs to go near them i hate them and hope never to go near one or a bookie shop as long as i live ! sam
Hi I have been looking up forums about these FOBTS us I have been screwed big time.
They are fixed to a degree. They cream off a percentage from what I have read online.
Apparently they know where all chips are placed BEFORE paying out... across all their machines in the country it is done over the internet/server. They then work out which number will give them their set % profit each time.
So they work out which is the most 'unpopular number' before the outcome is determined hence FIXED ODDS as they work out how to cream off their 10% or whatever each spin.
In my mind this is where they are misleading as they ARE NOT like a real roulette wheel they give themselves a better return than real roulette which ALREADY would give a house edge. 92.5% I believe
The machines are still up for scrutiny and could yet be banned in my opinion. Also interesting recently the bookies are paying more tax on profits VAT I think so I dont think they are going to try and make the payout any better are they?
They are controlling the percentage profit which is very worrying. Unlike a fruit machine which in not centralised but does have a set payout...
Goverment is reluctant to change policy on these FOBTs IMHO as they own *** which makes a lot of profit from these machines...
I read that the industry is reliant on these for profit now with the competition from internet casinos etc. One bookmaker recently made ONE THIRD of profits from these machines.
Also read one canny service provider applied to have a shop with just the FOBTs but fortunately this was rejected due to problem gambling etc....
Clearly these are profit making machines with roulette being the dominant game and not providing the customer with a 'virtual random roulette' they are choosing the number that providess them with x % profit on that spin.
Who would bet in a casino where the casino could choose the outcome after seeing where all the chips were placed????
Awayout
Edited by GamCare Advisor, mentioned industry by name.
Finally - someone who can tell it like it really is.
Awayout, you've hit the nail on the head in your explanation of the FOTBs workings. Is it not wrong that only a few people will have the truth revealed to them about how and why their hard earned cash is disappearing? Heck, it's taken me so long to get a straight answer.
It is time for a change of law, we must take action. The only down side of forums like this one is it acts as a pressure release valve, designed to absorb some of the outcry - rather than being a vehicle for positive change. (some would say gamcare is a tool of the industry).... Anyway. Thanks for that very lucid explanation.
Okay so is this then end of the discussion guys?
Cos I only need u to tell me one thing....what was the point of all this posting?
At the end of the day noone drags ANY of us to bookie,casinos or to on line sites.
As compulsive gamblers we should all have realised by now we will never win because we can never stop.
Sorry but a long winded story and who know who is right BUT what the heck does it matter when its stopping that will make is strong not analysis of the machines.
I wish all of you and me lol a gamble free and peaceful future.
Take care all
Please let it go!!!
If not you cannot heal.
W xx
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