I won $10 yesterday playing Megabucks on my laptop. Who do I tip?

If I won a huge sum of money, and had a sudden urge to get out of Dodge, I would surely honor it. I wouldn't tell a soul, I'd just go lickety split

Does anyone here think that the casinos play fair?
https://www.vegasslotsonline.com/news/2020/02/24/oklahoma-gambler-claims-casino-is-refusing-to-pay-8-5m-slots-game-win/
https://abcnews.go.com/TheLaw/story?id=3772215&page=1
https://www.cnn.com/2016/11/01/us/slot-machine-winner-steak-dinner-trnd/index.html

https://www.foxnews.com/us/woman-loses-slot-machine-jackpot-win-after-casino-got-social-security-number-wrong-by-1-digit

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2088642/woman-takes-slot-machine-selfie-of-43-million-casino-win-and-has-big-buck-payout-denied/

https://gizmodo.com/casino-denies-57-million-jackpot-because-of-software-5867314

I could see celebrating the win by tipping the cocktail waitress who brought them drinks or the dealer who dealt the cards but who do you tip when you're playing a slot machine on a floor with a hundred other people all at their own machines? Them "suggesting" he tip is just a sleazy as the casinos themselves.

BTW - get with your high school math teacher and start learning the odds of winning for all the games on the floor. There is ONLY ONE TIME where your odds match the risk: hitting 7 or 11 on the first roll at the dice table. That's it. Everything else, the odds never pay out equal to the risk. The entire system is rigged and the house always wins.
The same holds true for pari mutuel betting at the horse track.

While we're at it, do some research as to what happens when someone is publicly announced a winner of the lottery. Everyone they ever knew, talked to, or walked past on the street, is hitting them up for money. When my mom passed away, I had relatives who hadn't talked to me in 45 years suddenly calling saying I was their favorite family member and wanted me to share my inheritance with them (even tho mom specifically excluded them from the will).

I don’t know about tipping when playing slots, but I will comment that having spent a lot of time in England for work eating at a variety of restaurants, their service universally sucked ass. Like not even close to what I would consider average in the USA including eating at some pretty nice English restaurants. So there’s something to be said for paying people for performance. Btw I tip really well for good service.

A good tip is usually 20% of the money spent, so he could tip 20% of the money he spent on lottery tickets. Fair?

If I put a dollar in a machine I feel like I am throwing it away..so I do not play.

I'm >50. I think I've probably spent <$20 over my life on "gambling" which would include lottery tickets.

I went to Jai Alai once when I was in college. It was very interesting. I spend $6 and won $21. I think I've maybe spent $8-12 on lottery tickets over the years (it's been a long time, that was always at someone else's urging).

I think that's about it.

I have spent just a bit more, not much.

There is a horse racing track and full casino about 8 miles from me. It opened 30+ years ago and I have been twice. As least in horse racing you get something for the entertainment value. We got there as the first race was about to start and it was weird to see people jumping up and down and cheering on "their" horse or the one they bet on. Then I put down a whole two bucks on the next race. And I was jumping up and down and urging my horse on. On one race I won a whole 3 dollars on my 2 buck bet.

I ended up spending $20 on bets, and had fun. I have been back just once. Same results, watch a race and loose. Still better than pulling the handle on a slot machine.

I have never spent a penny on the lottery. My chances are only minimally different than those that do buy tickets.

If you include poker nights with the boys, add lotto, still less than $100 total.

I am a numbers guy and the probabilities just don't satisfy me or make me want to chase whatever jones gambles get from watching their money disappear.

I knew guys in college that were into Bookies for over a grand - the late '70's.:eek:

Some of my family on my mom's side were nurses and did "private duty nursing." I think it was my aunt that once was a nurse for someone that owned racing greyhounds. The story that's gotten back to me is that it's not tough to do things to affect how a dog runs, even little things like nail trimming can have an impact. I never got a whole story, and that was 50+ years ago. I'm sure these days that some of the old methods probably still work and they probably have a slew of new methods.

The Jai Alai was very interesting to watch, and I came away with an extra $15 in my pocket which for a college kid was a very good day.

I'm far less likely to buy a lottery ticket or scratch off. I'd rather buy a candy bar.

I was laid off back in 2001 and for a period took a job in a "game room" that was connected to a bingo hall. The game room was full of slot machines. The slots paid tickets which could be exchanged for vouchers to play bingo or sometimes gift cards (usually gift cards to target). The gamblers would play the slots between day and night bingo or after the night time bingo. It was actually pretty disturbing to watch these folks sit and stare at the screens, often chain smoking. They'd hit the button and then hit the button beneath each "wheel" to "stop" the wheels (which to my eye did absolutely nothing). Most of the machines would pay out $150, at one point they put 2 in that paid out $300. I've watched folks spend up to double or triple to win back a jackpot. We had one younger (30s-40s) couple that would come in and seemed to have more money than most. I was once on shift in the evening as the woman spent what I believe was $1200-1500 to try to win $300. I'm pretty sure that the owner ended up refunding some of her money and even then, she wasn't around for several weeks after that.

Working in that environment was interesting and depressing. I'm not a gambler, so I really didn't and still don't understand exactly what drove them to do what they were doing. It was educational.

Yowza! Maybe that's my "problem" too, that I'm a numbers guy. I just don't have that personality, I don't drink coffee, minimal alcohol, don't gamble, etc.... I just don't have the biochem or wiring to give me a personality to become addicted to things.

Now that you mention it. I think a went to a poker night with a buddy once. I probably took $5 in change. I have no idea if I won or lost or what so I was probably very middle of the road, win a few, lose a few, mostly break even-ish.

You can play live cash game Poker for a profit. Essentially you are playing against the other players and not the house. The House charges you a seat rental payable through the Blinds and a percentage of the pots you win. It comes to about $30 an hour.

To be profitable you need to know the mathematical probabilty of hitting your hand, intuitively understanding your opponents, knowing playing protocols and a bit of luck.

For me it would come down to playing a hit and run game.. get ahead by roughly what your target amount is, pick up and leave no matter if it is 15 minutes or 5 hours. Consider it as a good days work. The longer you sit the more it costs you and tipping is a drain on the bankroll. Plus you are adding more risk the more hands you play.

Doing that you can win 7 times out of 10, break roughly even twice and lose once. .

Playing the Sports Book you have to win 55% of your bets and never bet more than 3% of you bankroll on anyone bet. The best guy in LV is at 57% or so of his bets.. You are mitigating risk.

I met a guy who is a professional Sports book gambler...he was at 56% of his bets..he bet on Women's Basketball. Before he made a live bet he did a flow chart of each teams stats, and then to test his model he made 100 fictitious bets. Before he became a pro he was a stock analyst for Investor Business Daily in NYC. He is a mathematical savant..

^^^ Tabs...is it true that a casino can ban a player for 'just being good/winning consistently'?

Back in the 90's I used to play Poker at San Manuel out n Highland, CA...while waiting for a seat to open up I was looking at the Board of big slot machine winners...One name appeared 3 times for about 1M in winnings..he hit 3 times in 6 months..

No telling how much he had to put in..

I have heard of people, or friends of others, that have been banned/locked out because of their winnings.
Is this legal for the casino to do? Or is it just an exaggeration?

I worked at a casino in college as it was the highest paying job in town though the hours were terrible.

Gamblers lose all sense of prbability and stats at some point and start talking about how a change in the dealer affected the cards and other such nonsense. I would see people tracking roulette spins as if each spin were not an independant event.

I only worked there for a year but saw problematic gambling take hold with several customers. Some coming with their friends for a few weekends then showing up on their own, then on to staying until closing time maxing out several credit cards. At the time there was a system that would create a check off of a credit with INSANE fees. People run those checks off their cards until there was nothi8ng left. There were people that would self ban, they ended up in a notebook that security maintained, I remember one couple that did that was in for over 20k just to us and had banned themselves from all of Native Casinos in the area.

They can decline your action for anything they like.

In Poker since you are not taking House money they are not going to six yo for being a pro player. Quite a few locals do alright fleecing the out of town chumps. Unfortunately for them they might have a perchance to play other things. Lots of people with gambling problems.

TRUE

The casino I worked at banned at least one customer that was regularly a big baccarat winner. Another guy won big and walked out the door with $15k in chips likely to avoid paying taxes. His photo was all over the place in the back rooms.

There was a whole notebook full of photos of people that were banned.

Ok..thanks. It's surprising to me that they can do that. Seems that it would lead to lawsuits.