Extra Action Poker

Introduction

 

Extra Action Poker is a video poker variant I noticed at the Green Valley Ranch on February 23, 2014. The game plays like conventional video poker, except with an additional bet, the player earns bonus hands if he gets at least one ace (or a deuce in deuces wild games). Following are the complete rules.

Rules

 

1. The game is based on conventional three- and five-play video poker.
2. If the player makes a max coin bet in the base game, then for an additional bet of 5, 10, or 15 credits the player will enable the Extra Action feature.
3. If the player gets at least one ace (or deuce in deuces wild games), with the Extra Action feature enabled, then the player will get extra hands. To be specific, with an extra bet of 5 credits the player will get 4 extra hands, 10 credits will get 8 extra hands, and 15 credits will get 12 extra hands.
4. All extra hands will have the aces, and only the aces, automatically held (deuces in deuces wild games). The player may not choose to hold different cards.
5. Each Extra Draw hand comes from a separate 52-card deck with only the aces held on the deal removed.
6. Extra Draw hands are paid based on a different pay table as follows.

 

The following is the pay table for Extra Draw hands in all games except when deuces are wild. Pays are based per coin bet.

The following is the pay table for Extra Draw hands in deuces wild based games. Pays are based per coin bet.

Image of the main rule screen.

Example

 

In this example, I made a 30-credit bet. 15 credits were for three hands of ordinary Triple Play video poker at 5 credits each. The other 15 credits enabled the Extra Draw feature for 12 extra hands.

In this first picture I was dealt a pair of queens, a single ace, and two junk cards. You can see the ace of spades was automatically propagated in the 12 Extra Draw hands. As usual, click on any image for a larger version.

In the next picture you can see I held the pair of queens and discarded the ace in the base game hands. Note how discarding the ace did not cause it to be removed from the Extra Draw hands.

In the base game I got one three of a kind and two high pairs for a total win of 15+2×5=25. In the Extra Draw hands I got one two pair and three high pairs for a win of 10+3×5=25 as well. So, my total win was 25+25=50 credits.

Strategy

 

The strategy is the same as conventional video poker for any given game and pay table.

Held Aces Analysis

The following table shows the expected value of an Extra Draw hand with one ace held. The lower right cell shows an expected win of 0.486531 per hand.

The following table shows the expected value of an Extra Draw hand with two aces held. The lower right cell shows an expected win of 1.972245 per hand.

The following table shows the expected value of an Extra Draw hand with three aces held. The lower right cell shows an expected win of 11.591837 per hand.

The following table shows the expected value of an Extra Draw hand with four aces held. The lower right cell shows an expected win of 200.000000 per hand.

The next table shows the probability of getting 0 to 4 aces on the deal, the average win per Extra Draw hand, and the expected return by the number of aces. The lower right cell shows that each Extra Draw hand is worth 0.248273 units.

With an extra three units bet (where each unit is five credits), the player gets 12 Extra Draw hands. The expected win from these Extra Draw hands is 12 × 0.248273 = 2.979271. These feature costs three credits, so the expected return from the feature, assuming the player buys all 12 Extra Draw hands, is 2.979271/3 = 0.993090.

Held Deuces Analysis

The following table shows the expected value of an Extra Draw hand with one deuce held. The lower right cell shows an expected win of 0.454102 per hand.

The following table shows the expected value of an Extra Draw hand with two deuces held. The lower right cell shows an expected win of 2.145714 per hand.

The following table shows the expected value of an Extra Draw hand with three deuces held. The lower right cell shows an expected win of 13.156463 per hand.

The following table shows the expected value of an Extra Draw hand with four deuces held. The lower right cell shows an expected win of 180.000000 per hand.

The next table shows the probability of getting 0 to 4 deuces on the deal, the average win per Extra Draw hand, and the expected return by the number of deuces. The lower right cell shows that each Extra Draw hand is worth 0.247835 units.

With an extra three units bet (where each unit is five credits), the player gets 12 Extra Draw hands. The expected win from these Extra Draw hands is 12 × 0.247835 = 2.974014. These feature costs three credits, so the expected return from the feature, assuming the player buys all 12 Extra Draw hands, is 2.974014/3 = 0.991338.

Return Summary

The following table shows the return for all base games Extra Draw is available in. As usual, all returns assume optimal player strategy.

Acknowledgment

I would like to thank IGT for providing me with a table with the base games Extra Draw is available in and returns, which we agree on.

Written by: Michael Shackleford