lowkeyflyer

Want Wynn Black/Grazie Paiza Gold/Genting Ace. Would love Noir but that seems out of reach. Don't really care for Seven Stars.

Is 9/6 VP the "safest" and "cheapest" way to grind out the status? If so, roughly how long does it take and what is the optimal bet size?

lindaiah

VP is never the cheapest, in my opinion. The casino gives you more points per $ in regular slots than they do for VP. VP is a skill game; some places it takes 2x as much coin-in in a VP machine to make a Tier Credit than it does in a regular slot machine. Read the fine print on the rewards program for each casino. Should tell you how much you earn for each category of game (VP, slots, tables).

AFAM-DFW

If you mean 9/6 Jacks or better, those machines are rare to non existent on the strip.

lowkeyflyer

What do you find to be the cheapest?

lindaiah

All I can tell you is my personal experience -- I've made Diamond Plus at Caesars by playing regular slots and VP. I make Tier Credits twice as fast by playing regular slots (that's how they do it), but I love VP so I still play it (Dollars - $5.00 max bet on VP), for several hours per day. Same at Venetian -- made Grazie Elite status playing slots and VP.
If you're staying at Venetian/Palazzo, charge everything you can to your room. You'll earn tier credits for the cost of your room, everything charged to your room, and your play. I think you get 3 tier points per $1 paid for your room cost and 1 tier point for each $1 charged to your room for dining, purchases, entertainment, etc.

corky

I am not familiar with the Grazie program but I am pretty sure with both Caesars and MGM, getting one of their credit cards and then using the heck out of it is a pretty quick boost in status. Does Grazie offer a branded credit card with maybe no annual fee for the first year?

lindaiah

I don't know of a credit card associated with Grazie (pretty sure there isn't one). I know with Caesars if you get the credit card you are automatically bumped to Platinum status as long as you use the card at least once in the first 90 days outside of the casino properties, but Plat is just the second level of 5 or 6 levels. Gets you free parking, though, if that's a concern.

Visconti

Ah, it probably was once upon a time? Way back before the perfect plays were plastered all over the net, the casinos mostly treated VP similar to slot machines assuming on average a 5% house advantage. Back then, there were no easy VP table to be found and one had to either 1) find it some obscure paper publication, or 2) actually "pencil & paper" the best plays (just get some geeky math/stat Prof to calculate it). Assuming one had the inclination, there was an arbitrage opportunity between the casino treating VP (JOB) comps in a similar classification to slots.

Assuming one played perfectly, in JOB VP the house advantage is only 50bps, but, as another poster has observed, these days all the casinos have eliminated the arbitrage opportunity by greatly reducing the amounts of points earned per $$ in & out of the machine. These days, it's no better or worse than slots, unless you play during some kind of promo tournament.

Even when the going was good, to make this arbitrage work meant one would have to hit a RF to bring those odds to the 50bps category, otherwise it would be at or around 3%. And, since a RF only hits in about 1 in 40,000 hands, one would still require a significant payroll to weather the storm until hitting one, which could take considerably longer than 40K hands. So, assuming one had the bankroll, patience, played perfectly about 20 years ago, it was the gift that kept on giving. Sadly, those days are gone and will never return, and one can thank the internet.

Moreover, there used to be VP machines where the payout was over 100% (Full Pay Deuces Wild - my personal favorite) and earned rewards at the same time! You'll still find some VPs that pay over 100%, but they're all off strip and limit the play to 25 cents and will not earn rewards. On the strip, the only 9-6 JOB would have a $1 minimum, if I recall, at the Luxor? Otherwise, it would be a $5 minimum for 9-6.

PS - Back then, even table games earned full rewards! Just grind away on 2-6 deck BJ with good rules where the house advantage was only around 30bps.

csufabel

You just joined Vegas Message Board yesterday asking the same type of questions, right? The location is the same and the question is similar. I'm there as well, but rarely post however I visit daily for news and opportunities.

Those replys are better for you, but if you want to chase casino status, you do you.

lowkeyflyer

Correcto! Figured I'd ask on both.

lindaiah

In my experience, no matter what the VP pay table looks like, trying to earn Tier Credits/some kind of elevated status at VP is worse/harder than regular slots. Many casinos award 50% fewer TCs for VP than they do for regular slots. I know at Caesars it's 1 TC for every $5 in a regular slot and 1 TC for every $10 in a VP machine. Point is, if you're trying to get status quickly you shouldn't play VP exclusively.

lowkeyflyer

But does VP work better than Blackjack and Craps?

lindaiah

Depends on how much you're betting. If you're playing $200/hand at a table (no idea about minimum for Craps) for several hours per day that would probably do it. I really have no idea. Try going to the casino you are interested in and talking to a host. Generally speaking, though, I'd say VP would be better than Blackjack and Craps, and regular slots would be better than VP.

SPN Lifer

Is video poker (VP) an actual table, or series of machines?

Visconti

Their all a series of machines which come in all sorts of different variations. Some are stand up, table top ones in a bar, and some are designed to mimic slot action. VP really has little to do with actual Poker, other than the name.