When to Quit in Casino Video Poker

However, video poker falls out of the range of normal win/loss limit conversations because it’s different. For one thing, many wins come in huge lump sums so it’s difficult to gage when you should quit. Another thing is that even if you’re winning, video poker requires a lot of mental concentration, so playing too long will cause you to make mistakes. Keeping all of this in mind, let’s look at when you should quit a video poker session.

Since video poker is one of the best casino games in terms of offering a small house edge (or even an edge for you in some cases), the goal is to achieve the highest payout percentage possible. This means minimizing the amount of mistakes that you make, and following video poker strategy to a T for the game you’re playing.

Unfortunately, many players fall into the trap of thinking that just because they’re winning, they should keep playing despite fatigue or small mental errors. But since video poker requires you to be near-perfect in both winning and losing situations, mistakes made even while you’re winning big still costs you down the road. All things aside, you really need to set up a limit based on how well you’re focusing.

Simply put, if you have no trouble concentrating and you’re winning lots of money, then by all means keep playing casino games. The ultimate goal in video poker is to play well and hit the highest paying hands, so you don’t really need a win limit as long as you are focused. On the other hand, you should seriously consider quitting no matter how much you’re ahead if you make 2-3 mental errors in a small time frame at casino gaming.

At this point, you aren’t going to hit anywhere near the top payout percentage for the video poker games you’re playing. So it’s better that you quit while you’re ahead rather than risk losing everything by making more foolish mistakes.

While your win limit should be governed by how well you are concentrating, casino video poker loss limits are tied to your bankroll. This is the case even if you are still clearheaded and making sound decisions because you don’t want to lose your entire casino bankroll in a single session.

To illustrate this point, let’s say that you have a $200 bankroll and you’re betting $1 per spin. If you get to the point where you only have $100 left, this is a good time to quit playing. In this instance, you’ve already lost half of your bankroll and if you keep playing, there’s a good chance you could lose the entire roll. Obviously it’s no fun to walk away when you still feel like you’re making good decisions, but it’s the best decision if the cards aren’t going your way.

Always set up a loss limit before you start playing to ensure that you have something left to play with for the next session. If you have a small bankroll like $200, setting up a 50% loss limit ($100) is a good idea. Assuming your bankroll is $500 or bigger, you shouldn’t risk any more than 30% of it in a single session.

When a session isn’t going well, sometimes there’s a tendency for casino players to sacrifice payout percentage for wins. For example, instead of keeping three cards to a royal flush, a player might keep a pair of jacks just to come out of the hand with some money.

But as mentioned before, the key reason for playing video poker is to hit the best hands so that you can reach the highest payout percentage possible. Now we all know that it’s impossible to actually hit the highest payout percentage over the long run just because people are human and they make mistakes. However, you need to do everything in your power to get close to the highest casino payout percentage, and that means going for royal flushes and straight flushes whenever the situation dictates doing so.

In short, stick to recommended video poker strategy and make the right plays rather than chasing wins. If your session isn’t going so well and you aren’t picking up small wins along the way, quit at your loss limit and hope for better luck next time.