Advantage Slots

I didn’t include a number of must-hits yet, including games such as River Dragons and Brian Christopher’s Pop’N Pays More:

It’s so rare they’re anywhere close to being profitable that I figured it didn’t make all that much sense to try to include every possible must-hit, including many old-school ones such as Mystical Unicorn:

Often, you want to be at least 90% of the way the way home, but that’s crucially factoring in what the starting point is. Take Wizard Strike, where we can clearly see the range:

For the major, we see this range ($600-$1,400):

So here’s what we’d do and we can use this logic for many must-hits (“90% rule”): $1,400-$600 = $800. 90% of $800 = $720. $720+$600 = $1,320. You can see in this example we’re just short of that figure at $1,319.28, so it’d be a dice roll if you still wanted to play.

That tangent out of the way, this post is about Money Storm Deluxe, Lucky Larry’s Lobstermania Deluxe, and Coyote Moon Deluxe, which you find in many casinos. Notice at the top I said “95% of the way there” for the bottom numbers. But what the heck does that mean with these games?

Let’s check this photo of Money Storm Deluxe (and make sure you click on the “Deluxe” version of these games rather than the other option to the left of it):

The other version of the game doesn’t offer any must-hits and thus can’t ever be an advantage play. If you happen to click on the wrong version, don’t fret; just click “switch games” on the bottom left of the screen. You also don’t need to put your voucher in to search for plays, as you can simply click on “bet per line” on the bottom of the screen to go through all the different bets.

That out of the way, let’s zoom in on the important part for each bet:

It tells us exactly what the must-hit points are and in this case, we have nice even numbers. If we look at the bottom figure (whirlwind), often the only one that’s close, we see that we need it to be at least $95 for it to be profitable long term. The closer we find it to $100 (or 100%), the better, as we can still lose on finds of 95% if we get unlucky and the meter goes all the way to the top, which it often does.

In this example, we’re at just $87.60, so not close enough. What about if we’re interested in chasing the middle (tornado) or top (hurricane) numbers in this example?

Well, if we bust out the old abacus, we need to find out what 96% of $250 would be for the middle and 97% of $1,000 would be for the top one. For the “tornado” middle in this example, we play anything $240 or higher. For the “hurricane” top number, we need $970 or higher. 

This is why I classified these games as “rainbow” on the risk scale, as those top numbers can sometimes take hours and many hundreds of bets (sometimes thousands) to reach. And that’s assuming you get them at break-even-or-better numbers to start with.

Let’s take a look at another example, which happens to be from Coyote Moon Deluxe, and see where we stand:

And let’s once again zoom in on the important numbers:

The bottom number (half-moon) must hit by $60. The middle number (full moon) must hit by $150. The top number (lunar eclipse) must hit by $600.

We’d use the same math as before: 95% for the bottom, 96% for the middle, 97% for the top. We’d then get the following as break-even starting points: $57, $144, $582. If any number is at or past those three figures, go ahead and play. Unlike many games, this is not one where you’d want to mess around with combos most of the time.

As noted above, when you play any of the three versions of this game, you play for the bottom number almost every time. Because of that, here’s a handy table for the bottom numbers along with their must-hit points:

Take at $19 or higher; must hit by $20

Take at $38 or higher; must hit by $40

Take at $57 or higher; must hit by $60

Take at $95 or higher; must hit by $100

Take at $190 or higher; must hit by $200

As you spin, hopefully you have some nice line hits and trigger free games. You have no control over that, so that’s why it’s so important to get these numbers as close to their must-hit points as possible.

Here’s footage from the third version of this game, Lucky Larry’s Lobstermania Deluxe, courtesy of George, Slots and Fun:

Lucky Larry’s Lobstermania Deluxe non-tutorial video