What is the difference between a class 2 and class 3 slot? The key difference between the two classes is that a class 2 slot machine is connected to a centralized computer system that determines the outcome of each wager. Class 3 slot machines are considered traditional slots, like those you’d see in Las Vegas. The key difference between the two classes is that a class 2 slot machine is connected to a centralized computer system that determines the outcome of each wager. Class 3 slot machines are considered traditional slots, like those you’d see in Las Vegas. You are not staking against the house as is the case with Vegas-style one-armed bandits or so-called Class III slots. You’re wagering for a share of the money funded by other gamblers. Since Class II machines are connected to a central server, only one winner is determined per outcome.
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Just a comment about the tipping signs. Tipping of gaming staff used to be prohibited in the UK. It has been allowed for approximately 2 years. The signs are there to educate customers of the fact tipping is now allowed. The vast majority of staff dont hustle for tips, but do accept them gratefully
and on a personal note I dont agree with the signs.
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In my blog entry on Gambling in the United Kingdom I tried to shed some light on the various classes of slots they have there and what they mean to the player. I admittedly did a lousy job of it, because I still don't understand it very well.
Any of this could be wrong, but my understanding is that slots in the UK at one time, sometimes referred to as fruit machines, were 'compensated,' meaning they were programmed to achieve certain return percentages in the short term. So, if a machine had been running cold then it would be designed to loosen up to achieve it's desired percentage.
On the contrary, 'random' machines have the same odds every spin, which is how they work in the US.
This page at the UK Gambling Commission explains that class B3, B4, C, and D machines can be compensated OR random, while B1 and B2 must be random. The machines there did identify what class they were.
When I was there I noticed a lot machines stated 'The outcome of any game or feature is not necessarily that shown by the odds displayed.' in the rule screens. I tend to think these are the class B3, B4, C, and D machines, but could use a confirmation on that.
I guess my other main question is if someone is playing a B3, B4, C, or D machine how can he tell whether is he playing a compensated or random machine? As noted above, it can be either.
I've read a lot of legal mumbo jumbo on this topic, but does anyone really understand what is going on, who can explain it in plain simple English? I'm really looking to explain to the world if these 'compensated' games still exist, and if so, how to identify them.
Thanks in advance for any help.
Hi Wizard - good site, so glad I've been pointed to it.
In terms of compensated fruit machines, most of the posts on here are way off the mark.. some are pretty close.
I'll answer each post in turn (where relevant) and then i'll post a 'layman's guide' to compensation at the end.
All games have to state whether they are compensated or random on the glass, or loading screen in the case of video terminals.
They certainly do exist, and make up the majority of category D and C games.
Category C games are £100 jackpots and £1 stake (maximum) and are found in pubs, service stations and bingo halls.
They range from simple three reel, 1 winline 'bingo' Cat C's (these are very simple games with a single feature) to the very complex ones you get in pubs.I've designed, programmed, and written the control logic for all types of Cat C machines.
Category D machines are the low stake and prize machines, which are normally found in seaside arcades - these are the only Category under 18's can play, and include low stake fruit machines (identical to Cat C other than the stakes and prizes) as well as Crane Grab machines, Pushers, etc..
Dave
To answer my own question, I think that the 'compensated' games are what we would call 'pull tab' games here. They are most likely to be found in bars, fish-n-chip shops, and other places that don't want to take the chance on a fully random game.
Source: http://www.casinolifemagazine.com/article/gambling-professor-explains-british-casino-culture. In particular
They most definitely aren't operated as a 'pull-tab' system. There were a few manufacturers who did do their B3 random machines like that, which is actually against the tech standards, as for a game stated as Random must have the same chance of every outcome on every spin (that doesn't mean every outcome has to have the same chance of course).
Someone later in the thread mentioned Category B3A machines, which are only found in working men's clubs really, and do operate as a 'lottery' or 'pull-tab' system with a pre-set seed
Dave
Can you elaborate on how they do that?
I spent six weeks in Spain working on some slot machines for a Spanish manufacturer. Although the machines I was working on were typical Class 3 slots they also manufactured AWP (Amusement With Prize) machines. I was told those machines had multiple payback percentages and that if the actual results were outside some parameter they would change to a tighter or looser schedule to get back within the desired payback percentage range.
This is kind of true, and those who don't fully understand the way we compensate games often think this is what we do (i.e have one set of maths at 86%, one at 94% and one at 106% for example) but i've never come across a UK company that does this. I'll explain more shortly..
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I haven't been involved in the UK machine market, but from what I've read in this thread the compensation is simply an evaluation that if the recent actual payback has been outside some target RTP range, the game swaps in a tighter or looser set of reels for a while until the actual RTP gets back within tolerances.
Also, finite pool games are operated in the UK under category B3A. I don't believe any of the rest of the categories are based on finite pools, and a finite pool game doesn't need to compensate anyway because the total pool payback is known in advance. That's one of the primary reasons to using a finite pool rather than an independent random game. The deal may be shuffled so winners come out early or late, but the total payback is constant so you wouldn't ever need to compensate for anything.
This is a lot closer to what actually happens, but get 'sets of reels' out of your head.. it's nothing to do with sets of reels, excel, standard deviation, etc.. most programmers who do UK fruit machines have never even heard of standard deviation! :)
I don't believe that you could meaningfully exploit it, other than having a general idea of when NOT to play..which is probably never.
The reason is that, I would assume, for a certain pay to be advertised, then that pay probably has to be possible, IOW, at least one occurrence in every set, if not more. Let's say you have pays on a machine of 500-FOR-1, 100-FOR-1, 50-FOR-1, 25-FOR-1, 10-FOR-1, 5-FOR-1, 2-FOR-1 and 1-FOR-1..Okay, now for every single one of those things to hit once (100% payout, which certainly isn't the case) it would be 693 plays. Furthermore, the lower pays are certainly going to occur more frequently, by design, than the higher pays, so you're obviously going to have far more than 693 plays.
If you look at Wizard's analysis of the fruit machine he designed:
Note: From this point forward and only for purposes of my example, I am treating Wizard's fruit machine as a single-line game.
You'll see a paytable similar to the theoretical one I posed above would complete a pre-set cycle at 8000 spins based on the way Wizard set that machine up, however, Wizard's machine also has an extremely low house edge of 3.5%. I have no way of knowing whether or not these British fruit machines are lower in the pubs, but if I had to guess..
As has already been mentioned, new seeds can probably be added while a current seed is in progress, furthermore, a machine may be able to start with multiple seeds programmed into it in the first place. In the unlikely event the house ever gets way behind on the machine, assuming no programming errors, they would simply be able to let the seeds already loaded finish playing out before adding new ones.
Therefore, unless you watch the machine from the installation of it, know how many seeds the machine started with having been loaded, know the fixed RTP of each individual seed, and track all of the spins, then you have no way of knowing when you are at an advantage.
For instance, let's go back to Wizard's fruit machine. If we assume that only one seed is loaded into the machine at a time and is allowed to play all the way out, (and this is really a best case scenario for someone hoping to track it) then you could watch 2,000 spins with returns as follows:
One Cherry 400/2000 = 800
Two Cherries 30/2000 = 150
Three Cherries 2/2000 = 20
Three Oranges 7/2000 = 105
Three Bells 10/2000 = 200
Three Plums 2/2000 = 100
Three Bars = 0
Three Globes = 0
Okay, so the overall RTP in this 2,000 spin sample was 1375/2000 = .6875 or 68.75%
A single starting seed would have 8000 * .965 = 7720 in pays and 8000 in bets
If we subtract the 2,000 spins from both sides, we are left with 6,000 in bets and 6345 in pays, based on what you have seen. The remaining RTP, based on what you have seen is 105.75%, which is clearly awesome. Everyone likes trading 6,000 for 6,345, and actually, since we have this information, we know to quit ANYTIME we are more than 345 units ahead!
Okay, so you decide to play out the remaining 6k in bets, however, the previous day two people came in and played 800 total spins with the following combined results:
One Cherry: 190/800 = 380
Two Cherries: 20/800 = 100
Three Cherries: 1/800 = 10
Three Oranges: 7/800 = 105
Three Bells: 4/800 = 80
Three Plums: 0/800 = 0
Three Bars: 1/800 = 100
Three Globes 1/800 = 500
That's 1275 in pays v. 800 in plays, which brings us to 5200 remaining in seed plays and 5070 in seed pays, and the RTP on the rest of the seed is back down to .975 or 97.5%, which is still better than it started, but the player is at a disadvantage, and unbeknownst to the player, the best pays remaining are 7/9 Three Plums.
CONCLUSION
These things could theoretically be exploited, but a ton of information is needed, the more information the better, but at a minimum:
1.) What is the fixed RTP, per seed?
2.) How many seeds did the game start with, or how many seeds are left?
3.) Since the beginning of the current seed(s), how much has been bet and how much has been returned?
The probability distribution of results would also be nice to know, but strictly speaking, isn't necessary as long as you know how much the pool started with in terms of RTP and how many total bets that reflects, (i.e. House Edge) as well as the results of every spin.
If there is a jurisdictional minimum RTP on these things, then you could always assume that, but you'll not know where you are in a seed on anything except for a brand new machine, and even then, you may not know how many seeds have been loaded at a time.
Simply put, if you watch someone play one of these machines at a lesser return than jurisdictional minimum, or a return less than the base House Edge, (if known), but all that will really tell you is if the House Edge is better or worse than when you walked in.
If you have a barkeeper friend, however, who is in charge of seeding the machines, collusion could be possible just based on knowledge they would have of the machine's take (during a seed, if loaded one at a time) vs. the machine's pays for that seed.
Sadly, Mission, this couldn't be more wrong as to how fruit machines work. To me, compensators are even simpler than that, but then i've been using them for 17 years :) I'll try and explain it in a seperate post shortly, but there are no seeds - although there ARE sharks who learn how the games play (their profiles).
I've been doing some more digging and found some patent numbers that address these 'compensated' slots. They are GB2185612 and GB2087618. Based on my layman's reading of the latter, it seems the way these fruit machines work is they keep a running record of the return over the past x spins. Then it adjusts the probability of certain bonus features of the game according to whether the game needs to pay out more or less to get closer to its desired return percentage. It seems to me that there isn't just three settings (tight/average/loose) but a sliding scale according to the probability of the bonus feature(s).
That is about as specific as I can get. GB2185612 was not very helpful and I think what I did get of GB2087618 was not the full thing. American patents tend to run hundreds of pages, by comparison. If anyone wants to try to dig deeper, I used this site.
There may be patents to do with compensators, but they were never enforced.. and they are so wooly as to be unenforcable anyway - plus patents in the UK have to be inventions to stand up - for example, you can't patent a game design, feature, reel spin, etc.. In the UK, 99% of all US slot patents would be completely unenforceable!Trancemonkey
Why Compensate?
So what do we mean by compensated and why do manufacturers use them? Well, put simply it refers to the ability of the machine to control the experience the player receives by keeping track of money in and money out. Where a random game has the same chance on every spin of showing the player the same outcome (be it a progressive jackpot, a losing spin, or 3 bonus symbols) a compensated game can look at how much money it has stored and make a decision as to whether to give the player a specific outcome or not.
The second, and possibly the most important reason for using compensators, is that the volatility is controlled. This means that for an operator, cash-in-box (the take at the end of the week) is much more stable than for a random slot, hence why pub machines (which the landlord takes a proportion of) are compensated.
In the UK most compensated games run somewhere between 72% and 90%, the lower percentages being in pubs and the higher ones in arcades.
How Do Compensators Control RTP?
Compensators almost always have a top and a bottom which is commonly what we refer to as the range; on current £100 jackpot Category C games this is normally around £300, but this varies greatly my manufacturer and on an even more granular level – by game. As a player plays a compensated game they are adding money from their stake to the compensator(s), and when they win money from the game, the money comes off the compensator(s). This addition and subtraction of money from the compensator(s) is what keeps the machine hovering on or around its RTP. If we assume that the game is going to start throwing money at you whether you like it or not when the compensator hits its highest threshold (the top we referred to earlier) and will not let you win anything if it drops below its lowest threshold (the bottom), then the worst case scenario for the game is that the game will owe £300 at any one time. This means that after 100,000 games at £1 per play, the RTP will be at worst 0.3% off 80%. This is perfectly acceptable under UK Law with regards to compensated games.
How Do the Developers Come Up With the Maths
In my experience, the control of compensated games is done purely and simple in the developers head. Excel simulations are in the most part irrelevant – I occasionally used it to work out the averages for features, but other than that it’s down to trial and error and getting the feel of the game right. This is because as the game moves through the levels of the compensator (see below) you want the feel of the game to change, and as the feel changes, the decisions that you want the game to make, and the factors you want it to take in to account in order to make those decisions, change. Standard Deviation is not required, and in fact I hadn’t even heard of it until I started to do slot machines.
Single Compensator Game – Simple Game Example
Let’s start with a simple compensated game – one with only one compensator, running at 80%, with a stake of £1. Assume the game has 3 reels, each of 16 symbols and in essence looks like a simple slot. At the start of a game, when the player presses the start button, the game would take the £1 from the credit meter and add 80p on to the compensator. Therefore after the first game, the compensator now has 80p available for the player to win. The game then chooses 3 reel positions at random. It checks the outcome of the reel spin, and if it has enough money stored up to pay the outcome to the player, it allows the spin. If it doesn’t, it throws the result away and repicks. It repeats this process until an outcome is picked that it can afford.
So, let’s assume that our compensator is not just used for a simple YES/NO style decision. Let’s assume that the compensator is used to alter the chance of making a decision based on the amount of money it has saved up so that the more money the game has on it, the more chance it has of awarding the higher prizes. Now, let’s assume that our simple game has a range of just £100. We now divide this up in to levels as follows:
Level 0 – Less than £0
Level 1 - £0 to £19.99
Level 2 - £20 to £39.99
Level 3 - £40 to £59.99
Level 4 - £60 to £79.99
Level 5 - £80 to £99.99
Level 6 - £100+
Where the compensator value starts from clear down/reset varied by game and programmer in my time of doing compensated games – but I tended to start the game with at least some money on it for the players to win - £20 in the lifetime of the game is nothing, so let’s assume we start with £20 on the compensator.
At the end of every spin, the compensator would look at the value on it and set the relative level. So with £20 on the game, the compensator would be said to be in Level 2.
Here’s the table we are going to use to make our decision as to whether to allow the outcome of the spin or not. Assume the game does this as a decision process:
START GAME -> PICK OUTCOME -> PASS CHANCE OF OUTCOME ->YES -> SHOW RESULT
-> NO -> PICK AGAIN
You may notice a few odd things as you look through the table, which I will explain below….
Fruit Win Chance
Prize Lvl 0 Lvl 1 Lvl 2 Lvl 3 Lvl 4 Lvl 5 Lvl 6
No Win - 100 100 99 98 96 93 90
Cherry £2 0 100 100 90 80 60 70
Grape £5 0 50 75 100 100 90 80
Melon £10 0 20 40 50 65 80 90
Plum £25 0 0 5 25 50 90 100
Red 7 £50 0 0 0 15 40 60 80
Bell £100 0 0 0 0 0 0 50
*all values are chances out of 100… i.e. to allow a Melon in Level 1 is a 20 out of 100 chance
One of the odd things you may have noticed is the in Level 2, I allow a £25 win on a 5% chance, even though the compensator could have between £20 and £39.99. Allowing compensators to go “negative” is, again, personal choice but as the bands don’t sit perfectly with the wins available and never will, it’s quite normal to allow the game to overpay – you’ll notice in Level 0, there is 0 chance for all wins, so it will quickly get back to Level 1 and in to a positive position.
The other thing you might notice is that the chance of the low wins goes down in the higher levels, as does the chance of allowing a losing spin. This means that the game is now positively curating your experience – the more money it has available, the more it is trying to give it to you. This is very common on compensated games. Some old fruit machines used to just spin in a Jackpot when the compensator got too full!
Let’s take the example in the simple game earlier. The player presses start, the machine picks a random set of reel positions which is going to award £10, which is 3 Melons.
It then uses the compensator level to reference the table above – so it will pass a 40 in 100 chance to determine if it can allow the spin. If it fails, it will pick another set of reel positions.
To the untrained eye, every slot machine looks the same. But did you know there’s a huge difference between class ii vs class iii slot machines?
Almost every country in the world regulates some form of slot machines. They are offered to the adult public within licensed land-based casinos, online casinos, taverns, clubs, airports and/or charitable gaming facilities. While they all tend to look the same, there may be some very distinct, almost imperceptible differences between them. It all depending on whether they are Class II orClass III slot machines.
The legal delineation between class ii vs class iii slot machines is a purposeful one. They gives regulators more control over what types of games – and exactly how much winnings – players have access to. The decision to place one type or another in various facilities is often determined by the type of license an operator possesses, and the laws of the jurisdiction.
In many cases, especially throughout Canada, only full-scale casinos are permitted to host class iii slot machines. These are the kind found in major gambling destinations like Las Vegas, Atlantic City and Macau. Charitable gaming facilities, like the 30+ provincially regulated bingo halls across Ontario, are restricted to class ii slot machines.
Class II vs Class III Slot Machines
The easiest way to describe the difference between class ii and class iii slot machines is to compare the traditional class iii variety – those found in Vegas – to a scratch off lottery ticket. When a lottery agency prints tickets, they know exactly which ones are winners, and exactly how much profit they’re going to make once they are all sold.
That’s how class ii slot machines work. They are programmed like instant win lottery tickets. Every spin is predetermined as a winner or loser, and every winning spin’s value is already programmed into the machine.
Class iii slot machines are built on the foundation of a Random Number Generator (RNG). Patented in 1984 by Norwegian mathematician Inge Telnaes, the RNG is capable of giving a slot machine complete and utter unpredictability, while giving manufacturers control over the probability of outcomes.
Before Telnaes invented the first virtual reels with RNG technology, a slots’ payout percentage was based entirely on the number of reels, and the number of symbols on each reel. If a 3 reel game had 8 symbols per reel, there would be exactly (8x8x8) 512 possible combinations, meaning it would pay its jackpot, on average, 1 in every 512 spins.
Slot Machine Classes By the Law Books
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Any educated gambler would prefer to play class iii slot machines. Their odds of hitting a large jackpot are always higher. The RNG ensures that a jackpot can pay out at any given moment, not when the machine decides it’s time. But in many jurisdictions, the availability of class ii and class iii slot machines is determined by local and/or federal law.
The classifications of slot machines was first introduced by the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act of 1988, which defines class ii vs class ii slot machines. Note that Class I gaming refers to traditional Indian gaming based on a tribe’s cultural ceremonies and/or celebrations, thus has no bearing on any type of slot machines.
IGRA Definition of Class II Slot Machines
The term ‘‘class II gaming’’ means—
(i) the game of chance commonly known as bingo…pull-tabs, lotto, punch boards, tip jars, instant bingo, and other games similar to bingo…
The definition explicitly excludes:
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“…electronic or electromechanical facsimiles of any game of chance or slot machines of any kind”.
IGRA Definition of Class III Slot Machines
The term ‘‘class III gaming’’ means all forms of gaming that are not class I gaming or class II gaming.
Knowing the Difference Between Classes
A I said before, class ii and class iii slot machines look exactly the same. They use the exact same style of reels and graphics, and present the same types of features. A mere glance at the game screen, and you’d never know one from the other.
The easiest way to tell the difference between class ii vs class iii slot machines is to look at the signage Panther moon slot game free download. in the gaming facility. By law, only class iii slot machines can actually be called “slot machines”. All class ii games will be referred to by another name.
Common names for class ii slot machines include Video Lottery Terminals (VLTs) and Bingo Liners (machines programmed to pay out like a bingo card game). In Ontario, they are called TapTix machines (because it’s like tapping a button to play a scratch off ticket).
Whatever name they may go by, if the casino or gaming facility doesn’t call them “slot machines”, they are not real class iii slot machines.
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